Manhattan Center for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

Schedule an appointment
  • Home
  • Teletherapy
  • Affiliated Therapists
  • Problems Treated
    • Anxiety
    • Panic Attacks
    • Insomnia
    • Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
    • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
      • POCD: Pedophilic OCD
      • HOCD – “Gay OCD”
      • Harm OCD
      • Hit and Run OCD
      • Existential OCD
    • Depression
    • Social Anxiety
    • Trichotillomania
    • Dermatillomania (Skin Picking)
  • Resources
    • What is CBT?
    • How to Get Started with CBT
    • What Is Mindfulness?
    • Free PTSD evaluations for frontline medical workers
    • Worksheets
    • Out-of-state Resources
  • Training
    • The MCCBT externship
    • The MCCBT Postdoctoral Fellowship
  • Mental Health Blog
  • Contact us
Home » Mental Health Blog » Anxiety » OCD » OCD Counseling: 3 Reasons Why It Might Not Be Helping

OCD Counseling: 3 Reasons Why It Might Not Be Helping

August 29, 2009 by Dr. Paul Greene

For people suffering from OCD, it can be hard to find helpful counseling. Being an informed consumer can make all the difference.

It is common for people who think they might have OCD to say, “I’d better see someone,” and go to see a psychotherapist. So far, so good. However, there are different types of therapy for OCD, and evidence suggests that some work better than others. Many people who seek help for obsessions or compulsions with a psychotherapist find that sometimes, after months or years of therapy, their symptoms are still a problem. There can be many possible reasons for this.

OCD counseling

Reasons Counseling Sometimes Doesn’t Work

Other issues

One possibility is that OCD is not the only problem that needs attention in counseling. Other co-occurring conditions (e.g., depression, eating disorders) can worsen prognosis. For example, if someone has OCD as well as depression and a history of trauma, some of those other issues might need to be addressed first.

There is no perfect treatment

Another possibility involves the fact that even the most effective treatments for OCD don’t work for everyone. Exposure and Ritual Prevention (ERP), a kind of psychotherapy for OCD, is often found to produce significant improvement in two thirds to three quarters of patients in clinical research studies (e.g, as described in a previous post). This means that a significant proportion of people trying this type of therapy will not see significant improvement.

Importance of getting right kind of counseling for OCD

The most alarming possibility, perhaps, is that the patient sees no improvement, and is not receiving the appropriate type of OCD counseling. Many people have called me over the years saying that they are contemplating switching therapists. When asked why, they often say something like, “Well, I really like my therapist and all, but we’ve been talking about my childhood and my parents for 2-3 years now, and I’m still checking my kitchen stove 30 times a day. I’m getting tired of it!” 

If you think you may have OCD and decide to see a therapist to work on it, ask whether he or she thinks ERP is appropriate for you. He or she may have a good reason for not recommending it; however if your therapist IS not familiar with it, you might consider getting a second opinion.


Subscribe to the Manhattan Center for Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy blog!

Related posts from manhattanCBT.com:

Filed Under: Evidence-based treatment, OCD Tagged With: compulsions, exposure, finding a therapist, psychotherapy

Manhattan Center for CBT

Stay up to date with the Manhattan Center for CBT!

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 337 other subscribers

Categories

  • Addiction
  • American mental healthcare
  • Anxiety
  • Cancer
  • Career
  • Cognitive-behavioral therapy
  • Coronavirus
  • DBT
  • Depression
  • Eating disorders
  • Evidence-based treatment
  • Featured
  • Insomnia
  • Kids and teens
  • Mindfulness and meditation
  • OCD
  • Panic attacks
  • PTSD
  • Social Anxiety

Contact Information

Manhattan Center for
Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy
315 Madison Avenue, Suite #806
New York, NY 10017 (map)
1-646-863-4225
https://www.manhattancbt.com

Copyright © 2022 Manhattan Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy/Psychology, PLLC, d.b.a. the Manhattan Center for Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy & Paul B. Greene, Ph.D. except where otherwise noted.

Recent Tweets

Tweets by @anxietyocd

Recent Posts

  • How to Be Kind to Yourself During Mindfulness Meditation
  • Anxiety and Difficulty Swallowing
  • All-or-Nothing Thinking: Examples and How It Causes Depression and Anxiety
  • What Are Intrusive Thoughts?
  • CBT for Anger Management Problems
  • 7 Easy Things You Can Do To Boost Your Mental Health
  • OCD
  • Anxiety
  • Depression
  • Social Anxiety
  • Insomnia
  • Trichotillomania
  • Mindfulness
  • Panic Attacks