Getting Control: Overcoming Your Obsessions and Compulsions
Lee Baer
Language: English
Pages: 272
ISBN: 0452297850
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Thoroughly revised and updated—the go-to book for OCD sufferers who want to master their fears and take charge of their lives
The first comprehensive guide to treating obsessive compulsive disorder based on clinically proven behavioral therapy techniques, Dr. Lee Baer’s Getting Control has been providing OCD sufferers with information and relief for more than twenty years. In the same easy-to-understand format as the original, this updated edition includes:
• Cutting-edge behavioral therapy techniques
• Breakthrough advances in neuroscience
• Brand new material on hoarding
• Expanded sections on how families can help OCD sufferers
• The latest diagnostic standards as outlined by the American Psychiatric Association
• A completely revised list of resources
OCD sufferers and their loved ones will find everything they need to assess their symptoms, set realistic goals, and create specific therapeutic exercises for managing this disorder.
in fact you do not engage in homosexual activities. One of our patients was a contented husband and father who said he was sexually satisfied. However, he kept having the obsessive thought that he would “suddenly become gay” and make a pass at a man. He said he had never felt any sexual attraction toward men and had never acted on this urge. Instead of having sexual thoughts, you may worry that if you have a blasphemous or sacrilegious thought you will be punished. One woman had repetitive
very severe OCD who had had cingulotomy operations at the hospital since the 1960s. We concluded that the operations were effective for many patients with severe OCD who had not been helped by other methods.23 As a result we began working with the late Dr. Ballantine, with Dr. Martuza, and most recently with Dr. Rees Cosgrove to carefully assess all patients referred for cingulotomy for severe OCD which had not responded to any other treatment. We saw these patients before they underwent surgery:
in behavior therapy for OCD, as discussed in Chapter 2. To assess depression, you’ll answer two questions I’ve modified from a 10 item depression screening scale called the “Harvard Department of Psychiatry/National Depression Screening Day Scale”31 (HANDS, for short). For each question, carefully read each of the four choices. Check the number next to the statement that best describes the way you’ve been feeling over the past week. 1. How often have you been feeling blue over the past week?
practice goals by slowly decreasing the number of times you check a situation—say, starting from your current number and decreasing by one or two at a time. You can also slowly increase the amount of time you resist the rituals, starting at only a few minutes if you have to and building up to the full one to two hours, the time recommended in Chapter 2 for best results. When working on your practice goals, remember not to ask your helper for reassurance; this is a form of checking. But do accept
social or occupational performance, but still manageable _3 = Severe interference, causes substantial impairment in social or occupational performance _4 = Extreme, incapacitating interference 3. How much distress do your obsessive thoughts cause you? _0 = None _1 = Mild, infrequent, and not too disturbing distress _2 = Moderate, frequent, and disturbing distress, but still manageable _3 = Severe, very frequent, and very disturbing distress _4 = Extreme, near-constant, and disabling distress