Why is Uncertainty Acceptance Important with Harm OCD?
What makes OCD so difficult is accepting your thoughts to be just thoughts. If you have harm OCD the idea of this may be unsettling. The intrusive thoughts can make it extremely difficult at times to just to simply sit with the anxiety that comes with not knowing if you are capable of harm. What we want for our clients is to accept the uncertainty that comes with not knowing. We do this by building confidence and self-esteem. We want our clients to remain open to the idea that a thought may be more than a thought and to learn to make a choice not to do anything about it (Hershfield 2018). Assessing your willingness to accept to live with not knowing is of most importance. This means you would be giving up quite a bit. This would mean that you could potentially cause harm to someone. With that being said, maybe you can still live a very comfortable life even though you feel uncertain and carry these annoying thoughts. What is likely true is that you can live with uncertainty. We know this because there are so many other things you do that you don’t feel the need to check on or seek reassurance with. For instance, you don’t check to see if the light is secure on the ceiling that may be right over your head. You simply trust that it is. You also blindly trust strangers driving their cars and at any point they can turn their car towards you and kill you. The truth is, you can never be certain and certainty is ultimately unattainable (Grayson 2003). Accepting a world where bad things happen is ultimately the goal. Preparing you for this world requires us to help you build your confidence about being able to handle your worst fears. Remember, although I can’t promise you that your worst nightmare won’t come true, I can say that you are not at any greater risk than the rest of us (non OCD suffers) (Grayson 2003).
Taking the risk to accept uncertainty is hard and we hope that you choose to take that risk. Why, because you already do it in other areas of your life.
Important points from this article:
You will eventually have to choose to live with uncertainty.
If you have harm OCD, you are likely to have the same risk of harming someone as most non-OCD sufferers.
You already live with uncertainty and accept it.
OCD is treatable.