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Introduction
to OCD
Obsessive
compulsive disorder, or ocd, and autism are two
other disorders that begin in childhood.
Many children and adults with Tourette Syndrome
have other conditions like ADHD and OCD.
Obsessive compulsive behavior is normally
associated with frequent repeatitive practices
like washing of one's hands or taking frequent
baths for fear of germs, constantly checking
doors over and over again to ensure they are
locked, etc.
There
are basically two principal elements of OCD:
- thoughts or
obsessions
- behaviors or
compulsions
Obsessions
are experienced in the form of thoughts, images
and impulses that are persistent and recurrent
in nature. When the obsession is in the
form of images, the images visualized are
usually inappropriate, unwanted and intrusive.
Compulsions
are defined as repetitive behaviors and/or
mental acts that OCD individuals believe have to
be performed in response to their obsession(s),
and often according to one or more rigid rules
that they feel "must" be performed or
carried out. Typically, these acts or behaviors
are performed to prevent or reduce distress or
to prevent the occurence of a dreaded situation,
happening or event.
At a
Tourette Syndrome Support Group meeting a few
years ago I met two beautiful girls with both
Tourette Syndrome and OCD. One had an
obsession with anything that would spin.
When going to a department store one day with
other mother she never exited the door but went
around and around for 10 minutes or so until her
mother found her. She would wake up at 2
or 3 am in the morning and walk in a tight
circle (4 to 6 feet) in her bedroom for periods
that would often exceed one hour. Many
times her parents would wake up and have to come
in to make her go to bed again. She had
broken several fingers at different times when
she would become so obsessed with the spinning
blades ceiling fans and oscillating fans that
she would insert her hand into the path of the
rapidly moving blades without concern over the
pain she would encounter.
The
other girl had an obsession with heat and fire
and had horrible scars on her hands from laying
them down on hot stovetop burners.
She had been known to put her hands into open
flames coming from gas stovetops, or to remove a
pot of boiling water or cooked vegetables to
place her hand on sizzling hot electric
stovetops. These are the type of OCD
behaviors that can physically hurt a child and
put their lives in jeopardy. Obviously,
the parents of these two girls lived in fear
that something bad would happen every time they
left them alone for a minute. The second
girl's mother told me she never left the kitchen
when cooking and could never turn her back from
the stove for a minute.
But
obsessive behavior can be less obvious in some
Tourette's patients because they don't fall
under the categories of "fear" or
"phobias." Instead, obsessive
behavior can also relate to becoming obsessive
with an activity. My 17-year old son John,
for example, has been obsessed with pro
wrestling the past four years. Prior to
that he was obsessed with collecting sports
cards. He would sit for hours upon hours
reading the most recently monthly price values
of every baseball and basketball trading card
published over the previous 20 or so
years. Name a player, a year and sports
card publisher and he could tell you the value
of the card.
Now
John is totally obsessed with
wrestling. He watches every event on
TV, several nights per week on different
networks. He saves money and watches
every Pay-Per-View event. He's recorded
over 500 wrestling events, subscribes to 5 or 6
wrestling magazines, spends at least 10 to 12
hours of every day visiting wrestling sites on
the Internet and participating in simulated
wrestling matches, or "role playing"
as it is referred to whereby one challenges
another to a match and then manually types out a
storyline of events preceeding the match and
every move made in the match. It is not
uncommon for him to write 400 to 800 lines of
script for his biggest matches. He online
wrestling record is currently 84 and 0, never
being beaten. If you are one who hates pro
wrestling as much as I do and don't understand
why I would allow John to participate in these
activities, click here
for my response prior to sending me a critical
email.
Introduction
to Autism
Autism is a
complex developmental disability that normally
appears in the first three years of life. It is
a neurological disorder that affects normal
development of the brain in the areas of social
interaction and communication skills. Children
and adults with autism typically have
difficulties in verbal and non-verbal
communication, social interactions, and leisure
or play activities. The disorder makes it hard
for them to communicate with others and relate
to the outside world. In some cases, aggressive
and/or self-injurious behavior may be present.
Persons with
autism may exhibit repeated body movements (hand
flapping, rocking), unusual responses to people
or attachments to objects and resistance to
changes in routines. Individuals may also
experience sensitivities in the five senses of
sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste.
Over one half
million people in the U.S. today have autism or
some form of pervasive developmental disorder.
Autism and its associated behaviors have been
estimated to occur in as many as 1 in 500
individuals (Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention 1997). Autism is four times more
prevalent in boys than girls and knows no
racial, ethnic, or social boundaries.
Family income,
lifestyle, and educational levels do not affect
the chance or probability of autism
occurrence. Its prevalence rate makes
autism one of the most common developmental
disabilities. Yet, like with Tourette
Syndrome, many professionals in the
medical, educational, and vocational fields
along with most of the general public are still
unaware of how autism affects people and how to
treat and interface with individuals that have
autism.
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