Member Comments are provided by individuals and reflect their personal opinions only. Under NO circumstances should you act on any advice or opinion posted in this forum. ALWAYS check with your personal physician before taking any action regarding your health! MedHelp International and our partners, sponsors and affiliates have no obligation to monitor any comments posted on this site, or the content and/or accuracy of such exchanges. MedHelp International does not endorse the views of any user.
Mental Health (Expert Forum)
ocd or tourette disorder
Answered by
Roger Gould, M.D. - Mental Health, Wellness
Questions posted in the Mental Health forum are being answered by Dr. Roger L. Gould, author of the Mastering Stress and Depression program and affiliated with the UCLA. Department of Psychiatry. Topics covered include anger, attention deficit disorder (ADD), bipolar disorder, dementia, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), learning disabilities, memory, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), panic, personality disorders, phobias, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), schizophrenia, stress, transitions, and work problems.
 |
ocd or tourette disorder
by lin, Feb 16, 2001 12:00AM
hi iam a 24yr old female.i know i have a form of ocd where i have pure obcessions.It started about 5yrs ago-i would obcess about getting thyroid disease(my father has it)-then i obcessed i had a brain tumor-then m.s-when i had it all checked and they found nothing i feared i was going crazy-then i obcessed i would go crazy and hurt my family.After a long process of reassuring myselfnone of this would happen because these are involuntary thoughtsi stopped obcessing about that andstarted obcessing that what if i cant stop obcessing-what if these thoughts come into my headuncontrollably.So to reassure myself began saying the obcessions voluntarily.Then i i obcessed what if i have invouluntary thhoughts about everything-like if an involuntary thought came into my head after everything i would hear -say -or think.So again-i praciced it voluntarily so when it would happen involuntarily i could know what to do-just accept the thought and change the picture.i also obcessed that if i could have these thoughts internally-why not out loud-i put those thoughts to rest when reassuring myself obcessive thoughts are a form of ocd and noone w/it says their obcessions out loud.I have almost mastered putting my bad thoughts to rest-and i have never had a compulsion.My concern is is this normal of ocd-i had it under control until i saw a girl on t.v. w/tourette syndrome and i realized i have what she has except internally.Could this be beginning signs of tourette?Also-i had an mri done about 3yrs ago-i read that tourette is a neurological disorder-would it have shown up on the mri if i had it?
Doctor's Answer
by Roger Gould, M.D., Feb 19, 2001 12:00AM
, Feb 19, 2001 12:00AM
Nothing you described sounds like tourette syndrome. Are you being treated or are you treating yourself. If you are treating yourself you are doing a good job of controlling your symptoms, but you are not getting the relief you deserve. See a psychiatrist and get treatment.
Communities
Ask a Doctor Forums
Tools and Applications
Personal Information
Medical Information
Doctors and Partners
Like you I've obsessed about just obsessing, I've worried about saying things out loud, I've obsessed about going crazy. I've had horrible images. I've worried the images will be there forever. I've had "mental" compulsions, which means I have counted or prayed or chanted silently excessively to ward off whatever particular obsession was circling through my head at the time. I've never really had physical compulsions, although at one point as a child I went through a stage of having to touch everything evenly with each hand exactly the same so that I wouldn't be "uneven" forever.
Do you ever notice how when you get genuinley distracted by something all these obessions seem to disappear, if even just for a moment? That is the key to cognitive control of the symptoms. Like you said, accept the thought and let it go. If you have a bad image, lay another image over it then allow yourself to be distracted by something else. It really works!
I don't think you can be aware of having Tourette's syndrome, and I think it's something you are born with (but I'm not sure.) The way you present your concern, it seems like yet another one of your obsessions.