Podcast Episode 395: Signs of OCD in Kids That Most Parents Miss Transcripts

Please note: Transcripts for the No Guilt Mom Podcast were created using AI. As a result, there may be some minor errors.

JoAnn Crohn (00:00)

Welcome to the No Guilt Mom podcast. I’m your host JoAnn Krone joined here by the brilliant Brie Tucker.

Brie Tucker (00:07)

Hello hello, how are you?

JoAnn Crohn (00:09)

We are talking about something that comes up a lot in our balance community, just questions around it. And we also see things, Brie, in the media around OCD. You and I both have very personal experiences with OCD. We both have loved ones who deal with it. And so I see a lot of these things in the media, or I see like people talking and they’re like, my gosh, I have such OCD because I want to be so organized. I’m like, that’s not it.

Brie Tucker (00:40)

Interesting until I ended up landing in this world of getting to understand OCD better. My only experience was the movie as good as it gets and like having that off-handed statement like, I’m so OCD. I like organized everything. And you’re like, no, not only is that not how it is, but that’s actually even hurtful.

Brie Tucker (01:05)

And the thing that gets me is like, it’s such a mindless thing. Like we’re not intending to be rude or dismissive, but the lack of knowledge and OCD is a tough one. Obsessive compulsive disorder. It’s a hard one.

JoAnn Crohn (01:20)

It is hard, in this podcast episode, we’re going to help you do just that. So if you’re new to the No Guilt Mom podcast, know that this podcast is for moms who feel overwhelmed, underappreciated, and stuck managing everything for their families. We want to tell you that you are not alone. And every podcast episode, we promise that you’ll walk away with doable strategies and reclaim your time, your energy, and your joy.

And today we’re gonna help you figure out how to navigate when your child has OCD, the signs of OCD. And we’re gonna do that with the help of Dr. Tamar Chansky. She’s the founder of the Children’s and Adult Center for OCD and Anxiety. She’s helped thousands of children overcome fears and gripping mental compulsions. She is also the author of Freeing Your Child from Negative Thinking, Freeing Your Child from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, and Freeing Yourself from anxiety. And with that, let’s get on with the show.

Welcome Tamar of the podcast. Brie and I are so excited about talking with you about this topic. I believe that you are actually the first expert we’ve had on the podcast about OCD. this is going to be a great, great episode. Wow.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (02:38)

Well, I’m so excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

JoAnn Crohn (02:43)

Yes. So you wrote a book 25 years ago that is all about free your child from obsessive compulsive disorder. And now you’ve completely rewritten the book. And so like my first question for you is, what did you feel needed to change about the stuff that you told parents about OCD?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (03:06)

Thank you. And I just, have the visual aid.

JoAnn Crohn (03:09)

wow, ⁓ wow, that’s a lot of-

Brie Tucker (03:12)

In the podcast world there’s got to be no less than like what

Dr. Tamar Chansky (03:16)

Different color post it now.

Brie Tucker (03:20)

2 packages of post it’s alone.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (03:21)

yeah, you know, so thinking about this question is it’s been a wonderful surprise reflecting on this process that I engaged in. don’t know, a year ago or something like that. thought, wow, 25th anniversary. This needs a refresh. And then what I thought was going to be about 20 hours. Ha ha ha.

JoAnn Crohn (03:46)

Hahaha

Dr. Tamar Chansky (03:47)

you know, months and months of just poring over every page because I will tell you, OCD is sort of my first love. I love that. Helping families when I first started my career after graduate school, I’ve been working with anxious kids and then I started to work with kids with OCD. And what happened just working with families who are completely lost feel, you know. Yeah.

Brie Tucker (04:16)

It is scary because 

Dr. Tamar Chansky (04:18)

Yeah, it’s continuous. You know, if you have OCD yourself, it’s scary because you see your child suffering with things that you would never want them to because you know what that’s like. If you don’t have OCD, it’s so scary because it’s so unrecognizable, kind of discontinuous with your own experience and you don’t know what to do. Yeah. And so I just yeah, working with families really intensely and seeing importantly.

the kids get better. really wanted to write the book, Freeing Your Child from OCD. So that was my first book. And gosh, time flies. 25 years later, when I realized I started to work on the changes and what I realized is how much I had changed in 25.

JoAnn Crohn (05:09)

Well, yes, of course.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (05:12)

Yeah,

we can talk about that. But yeah, in the sense of I learned so much from the children and families that I was working with over the years that my language changed the stories. You know, I had more stories that I wanted to put in that I think, you know, would be really inspiring for families in part to see the messiness that they are experiencing to know they’re not alone in that and also inspiring to see just how when parents know what’s going on with OCD, sort of I call it cracking the code, like what are these rules and rituals and everything about when parents understand that they can help their children navigate out. So it’s really all about, there’s so much communication, language, know, ideas in there.

JoAnn Crohn (06:06)

Let’s talk about that with the OCD because many people think that OCD is just being neat or liking things a certain way. I know that’s a pet peeve of mine when I hear somebody who’s incredibly organized say they’re a little bit OCD. I immediately want to correct them and say, no, that is not the proper use of the term OCD. True. Social context though, I don’t usually. But can you break down what OCD actually is and what it’s not?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (06:34)

And I have to say I was so happy to hear in the intro what you said about because there have been some celebrities even I have gone out on a limb, but you know some people will say It helps me my OCD helps me if something helps you it is not OCD It’s something else awesome that there’s something that helps you but that’s not what OCD is essentially what we’re talking about is we call it, it’s a no fault disorder that’s highly treatable, but what it’s marked by is intrusive thoughts. So thoughts that just barge in, you’re not trying to think, how can I make this better? How can I make it more perfect? Just intrusive thoughts that are sticky, we say for kids. Like they stick around, they’re really hard to get rid of. You don’t want to think them, but they’re there. And then there are rituals that kids figure out to do, or sometimes those are intrusive thoughts too, to undo the fearful thoughts that are associated with the intrusive thoughts. So for instance, you know, we hope that our kids learn to wash their hands. That’s a reasonable and good thing that we teach our kids, right? But when your child is stuck at the sink and thinking,

someone’s going to die because, ⁓ now I thought that thought I have to, you know, wash my hands all over again. It’s not done. Their hands are chapped. We know that this is a dysfunctional process. This is not something that is going to be helpful or real for them. But if my brain is telling me that I have to do something just right or else I better do it. When you can, even in a first session or conversation with a family, explain why this is happening that these are, you know, the filters not working right in your wonderful brain. This tiny part is hiccuping. It’s just sending the wrong message over and over. It’s stuck. You can retrain your brain to not send you those messages by breaking the rules and not doing the thing like it’s telling you to do.

JoAnn Crohn (08:49)

It’s so interesting you say about retraining your brain to not tell you the message because I hear that and I’m like, tomorrow I need to retrain my brain to not tell me some messages. I would like that so much. Right. Yeah.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (09:03)

I know. Yeah, that is the way that there is overlap with OCD. But where there is an overlap is just the content is off script. Yeah. You know, a lot of times people will say, well, isn’t it just anxiety? It’s actually its own category now because the content, the types of thoughts that kids have are not like, I hope I do well on that test or I’m stressed about getting into college. You know, it’s I’m going to hurt somebody or.

Brie Tucker (09:33)

Yeah it’s like such a bigger being. Like I always kind of saw like in terms of like OCD, at least the way that it resonates in my life with my loved ones that have it. It’s almost like Bigfoot. It’s this huge, massive thing that is always there, but nobody can see it. Right? But we can feel it. We know it’s there and it’s huge. And with my loved ones that have OCD, it causes fear in them. Fear and shame.

And that’s where like in our household, was hard to get help for so long with it because it was hard to figure out exactly without us knowing what was going on.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (10:12)

Yes.

JoAnn Crohn (10:13)

It’s hard. It’s hard to figure out what’s going on. And I want to get into a little bit about the differences between OCD and anxiety and also kind of the stories and the thoughts that may appear in kids so that you can recognize them as a parent that maybe, this thought may be OCD. And we’re going to do that right after this. So tomorrow before the break, we were talking about how OCD is more than just I need things a certain way.

I know in my experience, like it was hard for us to identify what was OCD. My loved one actually diagnosed themselves with OCD after seeing a lot of TikToks and Reels. They brought that to our attention and we were able to then go see a therapist about it. So it’s so hard to diagnose OCD because a lot of the things that happen with it are in the person’s head and like preset, they’re not visible. You don’t know they’re there, but they’re affecting.

behavior, something that I’ve seen is for instance, this fear of food poisoning, of getting contaminated by something. The thoughts weren’t always present, but the behaviors were refusing to eat anything that had so much of like a little speck on it that maybe that it’s going bad, but it’s definitely not going bad. But we’re just going to take that off the table and, just not eat the whole thing or like refusing to eat leftovers because

They’re not fresh and those kinds of things. What kind of like along those lines, I wanna make this really concrete for parents. What kind of behaviors might they be seeing in their children that may point to OCD?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (11:57)

Yeah, so those are great examples. I just I want to highlight the idea that parents were always trying to figure out what’s going on and juggle all the million other things that we’re doing at the same time. But so you see your child not eating immediately. The kind of strip that may come up is why are they refusing to eat, you know, or why are they wasting food? Yeah.

Brie Tucker (12:24)

I’m my inner dialogue right there.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (12:26)

or why are they taking forever?

Brie Tucker (12:29)

in the bathroom or yeah.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (12:30)

Yeah, in the bathroom forever, know, picking through things. It’s just so our curiosity and non-judgmental as much as humanly possible frame will help offset that shame, misunderstanding, all of that and help to get the answer sooner. So assuming that kids have sort of good intentions for the most part of what they’re trying to do.

JoAnn Crohn (12:56)

Yeah, always. Kids always trying the best they can. Yeah.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (13:00)

what’s your brain telling you? Like what are the thoughts that are coming up for you? So we might say like, what are you doing? We all say that, right? But yeah, take two, it’s going to be helpful to say like, hey, what’s going on? I see this happening. You know, what’s going through your mind or what’s your brain telling you? Then it may be a little more of a welcome mat and safety sign to your child to say, I don’t know.

you know, and that’s like, okay, that might be an opening to go further. But in terms of the things that parents will see, it’s these unusual behaviors, things being time consuming, a lot of repetition of things. And we were talking about washing your hands over and over, lots of soap being used, sort of time disappearing. Your child is upstairs doing something, you know, we don’t know what, maybe they are taking their clothes on and off.

when they’re getting dressed in the morning because their intrusive thought is saying, you you had a bad thought, you’re going to fail the test or your little brother’s going to get lost or something. Now you have to take the shirt off and put it on again when you don’t have a bad thoughts. Like this is the thing is when you hear the stories of what your loved ones are experiencing, your heart just breaks because you realize kids are really trying to figure out the right things.

We want to keep each other safe. They just don’t know that that message is not reality based, that that’s a brain hiccup. And the more, you know, you were saying, Bri, it’s like Bigfoot. Well, that might be a good name for it. ⁓ Part of the strategy that we talk about is relabeling what’s going on as I don’t use the term OCD unless parents come in or families come in with that. We don’t have to use that. We can. But we don’t have to. You just have to have

a way of referring to it. So some kids will call it meanie brain, sticky thoughts, that thing, that annoying thing.

Brie Tucker (15:05)

Actually, I want to throw that out there. Our experience with OCD in our household is with our oldest. He’s in his 20s, but our therapist told us that. He was having a lot of shame around the OCD thought process and the behaviors. The therapist was like, we should probably restructure it. I think that was one thing that he said was really helpful and I just heard you say, so I want to reiterate it as much as we can for the audience that-

We called it he who shall not be named or Baltimore, just depend if we said it or not. That was the name he chose. Like even in his twenties was like, yep. And because that’s exactly like, we’re like, we need you to understand that you know that those thoughts, and that’s the hardest part, I think with OCD, it’s anxiety in a different way. Anxiety, I feel like with my anxiety, I don’t always notice that I’m being anxious. I kind of do if somebody points it out.

I’ll be like, yeah, I guess that is an anxious thought, or I guess I am kind of spiraling or whatnot. But I find that like with the OCD type tendencies, my son was like, I know I shouldn’t be thinking this. I know that’s not logical, what keeps rolling around in my head, but I just can’t stop. And so he felt so ashamed. kept trying to hide the behaviors, right? Which ended up making them worse.

So that one piece of relabeling it to something that’s not a part of them really seemed like for my son, he said it really helped him let go of some of that guilt and shame he had about.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (16:36)

Absolutely. And then it becomes this thing that you can talk about together. You know, Baltimore is saying this, you know, what, how can we support you when that happens? Or is that the thing that shall not be named happening? Okay, that’s our game plan. It’s just the flow within a family, you know, before you’re tiptoeing, afraid of, you know, setting your child off more because they’re already so stressed. Now you have a way of saying like,

Is that that thing that shall not be named happening? What’s it saying to you? Okay. You know, can I help you boss it back? Break the rules? Do you want to take a pause? We can do something active and see because kids will want the thoughts to go away. want the thoughts to go away. But the way we work is we can’t go in there and turn off the switch.

Brie Tucker (17:30)

God, if there is a switch, you better tell me where.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (17:32)

no, is new flash to all. But the thing is that when we really downgrade the authority of those thoughts, it’s more like, I hear my air conditioner whirring. Now you might have background noises that you weren’t paying attention to before because they weren’t important. Now that we’re talking about it, you notice them. The more that kids understand that this can be kind of like that background noise, I always say,

It’s the best thing is if you hear your OCD as blah, blah, blah. It’s like junk mail. We don’t read it. We know it doesn’t hold any important information for us.

JoAnn Crohn (18:13)

So what I’m hearing first of all is that if your child might have those thoughts, the first thing you need to do is to rename it, to call it something else saying like, is he who should not be named happening or the other names that you said or just come up with a name as a family and then help with some strategies. And you said, change the rules, boss back, take a pause. Yes. So those are all things are helpful in it. I want to know the next steps in that. And we’re going to talk about that right after this.

So before the break tomorrow, we were talking about what to do when your child has an intrusive thought and how to kind of help them fight back against it. Now you mentioned three strategies, the boss back, change the rules and take a pause. What does it look like then when you use like those strategies? What does boss back look like to an OCD thought? And I’ll give you one actually. I have one thing that has been bothering me for a long time. It is my fear of flying.

I have always been afraid of flying. I have visions of the plane crashing. I don’t need to go into those for everyone out in podcast land, but I have developed this thing where every time before I get on a plane and Brie knows this, I have to take a picture of myself. I call it Joe on the jetway. And then I have to send it to all of my family members who are not on the plane with me before I get to the door of the plane, sometimes after the door of the plane. And then like that makes me safe. This is not great.

And yet this is just how I roll. So when we’re thinking about the thought, you know, the plane will crash. How do you use boss back on that?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (19:53)

And I would say that maybe how you’re handling that fear, which I bet you need to travel a lot and we all try to figure out the most.

JoAnn Crohn (20:04)

I’ll call on the plane after I do all that.

Brie Tucker (20:05)

I’m good.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (20:06)

The most adaptive ways to make our lives work, right? Yes, so maybe there are just some some small things to change there but one is that to start to think JoAnn that those strategies that you’re using are when you said I have to Take a picture. I have to send it up just start to edit in I feel like I have to

So that’s a small shift. You know, it’s not kind of earth shattering. But the thing is, when we say I have to do something, we’re going to do it. We feel like we really need to. But if you begin to introduce a little bit of a wedge there, drive a wedge between that, because it feels like those are the things you need to do to be safe. Also, you know that you don’t. A part of you knows that that plane, right? Yeah.

happens with intrusive thoughts, feels like that has to happen in order for you to be safe. So that would be one. One shift there. Another is, you know, when I said earlier about sort of break the rules. mean, bossing it back. If this bothers you, you might say like, what do you want to call this phenomenon? We’ll do a session right here. Yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (21:28)

I’ve labeled it as a cute quirky little thing I do so I could get away with it in public.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (21:34)

Well, you might say, thank you, cute, quirky, but you are taking up time and probably making me feel more anxious than I need to or want to. So thank you, but I will be changing the rules. And you might start in addition to editing the way you’re talking to yourself about this to do fewer of the steps. you said you feel like.

You feel like you have to take a picture and then you feel like you have to send it to my family.

JoAnn Crohn (22:08)

Yeah, my husband, if my husband’s traveling with us, it’s my parents.

Brie Tucker (22:15)

I have family members who are not on the plane.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (22:18)

This is the thing you can go as quickly or slowly as you need to change is always good Whatever it is. So whether this happens Tomorrow you’re like I had this conversation, you know what? I’m sick of this and I’m not doing it because I know it’s magical thinking Yes, it’s scary to picture a plane crash. That means my nervous system is working, right? No one feels good or should

Feel good thinking about that or looking at that but I also know my brains kind of playing tricks on me because no one else wants a plane crash But they don’t feel like their brain isn’t sending them the messages that they need to go through all these steps So, you know what? Respectfully, I’m not gonna do that. That would be Going quickly with it. That’s fine going slowly. Maybe there’s some part of it. You could skip or change or delay

Dr. Tamar Chansky (23:13)

Change that you make is breaking up a pattern that is reinforced every time that you do it.

JoAnn Crohn (23:21)

So tell me about delaying. What does delaying look like when you’re coaching kids, especially how to delay behavior?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (23:29)

Yeah, well, so let’s say it’s a child. So we’ve talked about contamination, hand washing, checking is another, know, going back, checking and rechecking, redoing things like the clothing on and off. So delaying just means that if, let’s say a child feels like they need to recheck their backpack look to make sure all the papers are in there and zip it 10 times, whatever, so they’ll do well in school.

And so we do the relabeling of that’s bossy brain saying that we know that’s not true, but there’s a strong feeling inside. Okay. How long do you feel like you can delay before you decide again, is this something you need to do? Because OCD absolutely benefits from our attention. If we’re standing in front of it, it’s hard to resist. If you’re holding your camera,

You know, that you just took a picture and you’re like, ⁓ okay, I shouldn’t send it. Put the phone away, do something else. Getting your brain busy with something else is not just a distraction strategy. We think of it more as engaging somewhere that is more productive and your choice. A different part of the brain gets engaged at that point. You’re not in fear mode. So I say to kids, you know, do you feel like you could delay for five minutes or 10 minutes and then reevaluate?

We set the timer, you know, we do things in session, set the timer, we start talking about what movies they’re going to see this summer, what their sports are doing. And then I’ll check in and what happens, the anxieties come down, not by doing a ritual, just by re-engaging a different part of the brain elsewhere. That’s a really helpful strategy.

Brie Tucker (25:19)

Okay. I have a question about that because you were talking about like engaging a different part of the brain. And I have read that again, one of the big things that for me has been difficult as trying to wrap my brain around the OCD and how to work with that diagnosis with my child is that I have read that the brain kind of acts more similar to an addict type brain. And like you said, the brain really wants to do that at the moment. They really want to do whatever.

that compulsion is. And again, I guess that’s what I’m talking about. When there’s a compulsion that you’re trying to break your child up because like, you know, that it’s not helpful for them. They have expressed that it’s not helpful for them. But I have found that it brings up different behaviors that I have not seen in any other aspect of my child, except for when we’re trying to break it. So like that was something that we had read in one of our books about like how it can make the brain react in similar ways to an addict.

They really, really want the comfort of doing that compulsion to bring down their anxiety. Just like if you were an alcoholic, you really, really, really want that drink to help you feel calm and relaxed. Is that a correct analogy? Kind of, kind of, yes, second, no.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (26:37)

We have so many different, in a way, we have so much we know about the brain and in a way we have so little, right? True. Okay. The way that I would talk about it with kids, and this is true, I try to tell the truth.

Brie Tucker (26:53)

Wait, kids will come back at you so fast. Won’t they, Joya? They would know it. They’re like,

Dr. Tamar Chansky (26:59)

So it’s a very good policy but the part of the brain that is deciding if something needs to be acted upon or not is malfunctioning So I’m in my office. I have a cat who loves to come into my office and destroy plants and furniture so I I listen for the click of the door because my cat

Dr. Tamar Chansky (27:26)

also listens for the click of the door. He must be brilliant. I don’t know. If the door doesn’t click, he comes upstairs and he’s in my office. So, okay, what is the point of this? I hear that click and I know then the door is shut with kids with OCD or adults that the threshold of is it finished? Is it not? Is there something I need to do? Is there not? That that

threshold is, we’ll say malfunctioning. It’s the threshold to detect whether something needs to be acted on is too low. So it just takes less, you know, bit of to register boom, like we need to do something here. And so that’s, I’ll say, yeah, your brain is, it’s telling you, it’s not sure, but it’s telling you that you need to do something.

What does another part of your brain think about this? And again, like we’ve talked about, people know most of the time. It’s not like, I didn’t know that I didn’t need to check. Of course they know, but the feeling is still there. But again, by resisting that part that’s saying it’s not finished or you you need to redo it. That’s how the brain thresholds kind of get retrained and back back in line.

JoAnn Crohn (28:51)

It’s hard when you’ve done it for so long that you don’t know what it’s like not to do it. It’s real hard. Because even when you talk about like my plane thing, I’m like, I’ve been doing it for so long. I don’t know if I can do it.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (29:00)

Yeah, that’s such a good point.

Brie Tucker (29:09)

Well wait, I would throw this in there too. Wouldn’t you also say JoAnn, like, and this is what you were talking about too, think Tamar, that your brain now has all of this evidence. See, you’ve never crashed because we’ve done this. 

JoAnn Crohn (29:20)

We’ve done this.

It’s hard when I see that in my loved ones when they see it even like I’m sitting here hearing the conversation. I’m like, ⁓ crap, this might not be anxiety I’ve had for like all my life. I am seriously like there’s another behavior compulsion series that I get into and as you talk tomorrow about this like constant need to do something to prove something else. I’m like, well, I can name another thing I do like that and I can name another thing I do like that stuff that causes me constant anxiety and fear and panic.

But like probably the outside world, don’t even think, well, Brie kind of knows about this one. She’s actually limited my access to checking our podcast advertising revenue because I have to check it all the time to make sure that we’re okay. ⁓

Dr. Tamar Chansky (30:10)

Remember the edit JoAnn, it feels like you need to. But this is a thing, thinking in parts in a sense is to say that that part keeps reminding me about that. Is there another part that has a different idea about it? Yeah, because you’ll never even though we know neuroplasticity, we can change these settings. And it’s incredible when you do, you know, the first few steps.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (30:40)

Were really, really hard. If this were easy, we wouldn’t be sitting here talking about this for sure. But also that we are capable of change and when we do make changes, momentum starts. But, you know, I use the analogy of getting in a swimming pool that that first step, I’m a person who crawls really, it could take me 10 minutes to get into a swimming pool. I do not jump in.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (31:10)

Why? You know, I say to kids, what does it feel like when you get in a pool? Not the heated pools. Yeah. know, cold. And I say, OK, and what happens a few minutes later? It warms up. ⁓ did somebody warm it up? No, I had.

Brie Tucker (31:24)

hope not, that would mean it’s probably yellow. Sorry. ⁓ Parenting humor there. ⁓

JoAnn Crohn (31:28)

It’s true.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (31:30)

The truth on the no-guilt moms. Yes, love it. No one’s ever made that comment, but I will now be using

Brie Tucker (31:40)

Please! Intrusive thoughts!

JoAnn Crohn (31:42)

That was actually my thought as well. So it’s okay. We go for the humor.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (31:47)

I’ve been saying that for 25 years and this is the first time someone said it. But yeah, you know, sometimes these pools are more manageable. Sometimes they’re freezing cold. But the point is we do adjust. But part of it is you’re deciding that these changes you want to make because it’s really interfering with your well-being. I mean, even

Dr. Tamar Chansky (32:12)

Absolutely kids will say this is just making me so mad or I’m so frustrated I’m late to school all the time or my friends I have to pretend like I dropped something When really I’m retying my shoes because my brain is telling me that you know Somebody’s gonna get hurt if I don’t so you get to a point where it’s gonna be worth it to go into the swimming pool Yeah with the thing the part that you’re ready to do It’s not a race and you see

Okay, you were able to because the thing is we reset. I should have said that. I gotta get my yeah, my invites in order here. Prognosis is good, you know, is great. And also we reset from anxiety when there is not an actual threat, which when we let ourselves try new things, we see that the anxiety does reset and we’re okay. So

Yes. Little by little, maybe you have somebody else take the picture or you delay sending it. I’m telling you, JoAnn. That parts. Yes.

JoAnn Crohn (33:16)

Little by little, I’ll, I’ll,

I will definitely be looking at other areas that I can work on as well. And also how we could help our loved ones too.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (33:27)

things that come up that will say, you know, even if you’re not ready to make a change on the outside, making that change on the inside to say, I feel like this, but I know I really don’t need to do that. Or, yep, I’m going to keep doing this now, but it’s not a forever thing. When I’m ready, I will be making changes. All of that changes from the program of I have to do this or else.

Brie Tucker (33:51)

Yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (33:52)

So you shared so much great information with us, Tamar. To the parent listening to this right now, what would you say to the parent who feels overwhelmed and unsure where to start?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (34:02)

I would say you’re like every parent at the beginning of this journey. That is, how could you feel any other way? Fortunately, we live in a time when OCD is really treatable. There are great ideas and resources. Check out.

JoAnn Crohn (34:18)

Including your book, your book, go get your book. Yes.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (34:21)

Yes,

bring your child from OCD, but there are lots of online resources as well and that just even taking one idea from today that maybe you ask your child, what do you want to call this stuff? Or is this bugging you or how can I help you and not the sticky thoughts? Just one movement starts more movement. That’s how it works.

Brie Tucker (34:47)

I love how you’re reiterating, like separating the sticky thoughts from the child’s identity.

JoAnn Crohn (34:53)

And the I have to to the I feel like I have to. You got it. Just you’re creating a little bit of distance in your child’s life and the between the thoughts and themselves.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (35:04)

Exactly. This would never be a choice that anyone would make. It’s what do we do with the thoughts that come.

JoAnn Crohn (35:10)

Absolutely. So we like to ask this of everybody who comes to the podcast, what is coming up for you that you’re excited about?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (35:17)

Well, I’m really excited for the launch of this book. Yeah, that’s August 5th, train 25. And that’s just a great milestone because as I said, I feel so connected with the families of kids with OCD. And I’m working on another book that’s due at the end of the summer. So I’m very excited to finish that and go on vacation with my family.

JoAnn Crohn (35:46)

Where are you guys going?

Dr. Tamar Chansky (35:48)

Yeah, I’m in Philly. Go to the Jersey Shore. That’s The beach around here we go. Yeah, yeah. ⁓

Brie Tucker (35:52)

I love it! the beach! That’s the best vacation everywhere.

JoAnn Crohn (35:58)

Well, thank you, Tamar, for joining us and sharing all of this great info for helping our kids with OCD and even telling it, figuring out if it’s OCD that we may be dealing with or we may be seeing in our child. So thank you for everything that you have shared.

Dr. Tamar Chansky (36:16)

Thank you so much.

JoAnn Crohn (36:18)

And remember, the best mom is a happy mom. Take care of you and we’ll talk to you later.

Brie Tucker (36:24)

Thanks for stopping by.