How do you know if a treatment is working? When it comes to mental health, we often have to change our definition of what "it worked" means. Each person is on their own journey and timeline with recovery. When I have a headache, I take some ibuprofen, wait a little bit in the headache tends to go away. I would say that it worked. If the headache doesn't go away, it didn't work in my brain goes into problem-solving mode on what else can I do.

We've carried over this mindset when it comes to treating OCD or anxiety. I often hear individuals say that treatment does not work for them. But when I dive in to their experience I've realized that changing the way we think are recovery is skewed.

But Nate! I did exposure and response prevention and I still have intrusive thoughts. I still have anxiety. I still have fears. Looking at this with an outside perspective we might say that treatment did not work for you.

Here is another perspective, what are you currently doing in your life that you were not able to do earlier? Well I'm playing with my kids now. I'm driving a car. You can watch a full movie without having to stand up and go check the door to see if it's locked. I'm not washing my hands is often.

Wait a second, is it possible for someone to continue to have intrusive thoughts and anxiety and still be in recovery. Yes, totally. This is not an all or nothing process if we spend our time with black-and-white we are often going to be discouraged.

If somebody is doing treatment to solely remove anxiety and intrusive thoughts then it sometimes can become obsessive and individuals become more hyperaware of how they're not getting better.

OCD evidence-based treatments

This is the way that I like to think about it. Somebody chooses to do an evidence-based treatment for OCD with the mindset that they are retraining their brain to not see threat as a threat. Do not react to this. They get back to living life exactly how they want to live it. The choose to not do any compulsions. During this time they may have a lot of intrusive thoughts, anxiety and fear. But we know that the intensity of this does not last forever.

We see reducing anxiety and intrusive thoughts as a positive side effect of doing treatment but it's not something we focusing our time with. This does not mean that you're going to always have scary intrusive.

What it really means is that our perspective can change our recovery goals. If I choose to face the fear and do exposures, I'm doing so to reclaim lost time and move toward my values and goals. If anxiety drops with it. great. If not, that's okay to for now.

I moved this idea to something physical, I am accepting that the ibuprofen I took may or may not get rid of my headache. If it does great. If it doesn't, bummer. There is a lot of acceptance in this. But the most important thing is that I am not going to stop my life even though I still have a headache.

Here is what I really want you to get out of this video. You can absolutely recover from OCD and anxiety, but you may need to come up with a realistic expectation and goals for yourself. If your goal is no anxiety and no intrusive thoughts, may be simply unattainable. however, maybe it's focusing your time on all the things you now can do in reducing frequency of anxiety and intrusive thoughts.

So when you catch yourself saying nothing is going to work for me or that treatment doesn't work. Really think about this and what it means? What is my definition for "work?"

A lot of times the individual will gather this realistic mindset through a trusted therapist. If this is not an option for you, I have worksheets to help you with this as well as 42 videos that take you through how to do treatment for your OCD. I'll link that down in the description.

What does your definition of recovery look like? Let me know down in the comments.