Susan’s mental obsessions and religious concerns.

Susan’s mental obsessions and religious concerns. We actually have a sizable number of Orthodox Jews in our practice with a variety of religious concerns. You describe a few different problems with your OCD: words and images you have in your head that you don’t like; concerns about your own level of observance and how G-d may judge this; and finally how you will be judged by your peers. Each of these is a different feared consequence for the general concern about your religious practices. With mental obsessions, it is not the content of the thought that makes something an OCD problem — all thoughts, no matter how bizarre they may seem to you are normal. They become an OCD problem when you want to know what they mean or want to stop them. With you the goals would be twofold – helping you live with the thoughts (once you are able to live with them, they become less frequent and when they occur you would care less) and helping you to accept what you can’t know. In this second category, your neighbors say nothing about your level of observance, but it is true that some may be fine with it and some not. We can never please everyone. With regard to G-d, all of us could attempt to become saints and few do. Even the more observant in your neighborhood could always do more. Treatment would help you to accept that you can’t know the mind of G-d and that your goal would to trust in His judgement even if it went against you, because you’d like your faith to be strong enough to accept whatever He decides. Obviously this isn’t easy, but that is why treatment is necessary. It is likely that their are experienced OCD therapists where you live, especially in the major metropolitan areas (NYC, Washington, Chicago, LA). You can check with the International OCD Foundation to see if there are experienced OCD therapists in your area.   Your other posts are thoughtful, but I wonder if they are a little bit compulsive in trying to assure/explain yourself to others.

#JonathanGrayson #MentalObsessions #OCDTreatment #Scrupulosity