In Portland, Oregon, where I live, potential therapy clients have access to wide range of therapists who use evidence-based practices. However, this is not true for people who live in many other areas…
People with OCD are often plagued with a wide variety of painful thoughts. These include horrible images, worries they might harm themselves or others, or beliefs that they are condemned altogether. It’s natural…
Mad in America published a summary of a recent study that surveyed people with OCD about treatment preferences. I spent the last hour trying to track down a copy of the actual research…
In people who develop obsessive-compulsive disorder, there are often signs in childhood. However, OCD in children can be hard to distinguish from childhood fears and age-appropriate magical thinking. For OCD Awareness Week, The…
Since I saw him present on some preliminary results at a conference 6 years ago, I’ve been following with interest University of Albany – SUNY professor John Forsyth’s, PhD, research on his self-help…
One of the problems I specialize in working with is repetitive skin picking (also known as excoriation or dermatillomania). People struggling with this problem experience intense urges to pick at blemishes or perceived…
There’s no shortage of self-help books on the market. There is, however, a paucity of research on whether those self-help books are actually helpful to the people who use them. In an ideal…
I resonated with a recent article in Psychology Today about the difficulties people have in finding therapists who offer effective treatment. The authors Dean McKay and Scott Lilienfeld—especially Dr. Lilienfeld—have been extremely active…
I ran across this excellent 5 minute video on obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) by Helen Blair Simpson, MD, PhD through the Mental Health Channel. Dr. Simpson is a professor at Columbia University and director…
One of my specialties is working with people who struggle with repetitive hair pulling (called trichotillomania) and/or skin picking (called dermatillomania or excoriation). Individuals with these conditions often do damage to their appearance….
Trichotillomania (or trich for short) is a condition in which people repeatedly pull out their body hair, often leading to bald patches and thinning. The scalp is a common site—as are eyebrows and…
CNN featured a nice article on a lesser known subtype of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)–Scrupulosity. This involves religious-themed obsessions, such as fear of blaspheming, fear of going to hell, or a sense that you…
At Portland Psychotherapy, we are passionate about offering evidence-based treatment and promoting training in effective treatments to other professionals. I recently came across this opinion piece by a Yale graduate student recounting her…
In previous posts, I’ve written about how cognitive behavioral treatment (specifically, CBT with exposure and response prevention) has been shown to be much more effective in treating obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) than medication….
It has become fashionable nowadays in psychotherapy circles to talk about neuroscience and interventions that target the brain. Some writers refer to this bias as “neurocentrism,” the notion that our behavior is best…
You’ve probably noticed this already, but our minds have something to say on most topics. Some of this is pretty minor: “That iced tea looks refreshing!” In other cases our minds dole out…
Among people with whom I work, a practice that’s grown more common in the last few years but with iffy research support is the addition of an antipsychotic medication when an antidepressant medication…
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a serious and disabling problem for many people. Understandably, many people seek out medication to help with this problem, and research is shown that medication can be helpful some…
