Breaking Free from the OCD Cycle: The Mosquito Bite Metaphor

The OCD and Anxiety Podcast by Robert James Coaching. Music.

Hello and welcome to the OCD and Anxiety Podcast where we explore how to have a more positive relationship with anxiety disorders taking back control so that you can start living the life you choose and not the one chosen by your fears. Music. Hello and welcome to episode 434 and I have a question for you. Ever had a mosquito bite you couldn't stop scratching? Feels great at first, right? But then it gets worse.

Itchier more frustrating and impossible to ignore and that's really what living with OCD can feel like which I'm sure you have experienced far too much as you're listening to this podcast.

The more that you try to fix that mosquito bite the more that you scratch it the worse it gets and today's episode I'll show you how the simple mosquito bite metaphor helps to explain the OCD cycle and what happens with that and more importantly how you can break free from it so make sure you stick around and let's let's get into that but before we do if you uh find the podcast helpful and you would like to support the podcast it would be amazing if you could subscribe to

do that you can you can just hit the subscribe button and you will be subscribed and that would be amazing also if you would like to get a free session with me you can by heading over to my website robertjamescoaching.com there you can book in for that free session or you can send me a message and let me know about what you're struggling with.

Many thanks and off we go. Today's quote is by Anita Roddick. If you think you're too small to have an impact try going to bed with a mosquito. And this is a perfect analogy for OCD, just like a tiny mosquito can ruin your night by buzzing around your ear or leaving a horrible, nasty red bite. Even the smallest intrusive thought in OCD can spiral into something completely overwhelming.

The thought might seem insignificant at first, but it quickly grows into an all-consuming obsession, leading to compulsive behaviours. And I think that the lesson here is that no matter how small a thought or action seems, it can actually have a major impact on us. But just as we can learn to resist scratching a mosquito bite, we can learn to manage OCD thoughts without letting them take over.

And just like a mosquito buzzing around your ear, these thoughts might be persistent, but they don't have to control your life.

With OCD you might feel like you need to do something to make that discomfort go away you might be checking a lock one more time or washing your hands again or going over a scenario about the past trying to have more certainty about it but just like with scratching the relief that you get from those compulsions it doesn't last for very long this is the frustrating thing about it very quickly you know it turns around again and the more you give in to them the stronger the urge becomes the

next time and you really get stuck in that OCD cycle often it's quite helpful to think of that OCD cycle as being like a clock if we think about 12 o'clock of the clock is the obsession three o'clock well we feel a lot of anxiety about the obsession six o'clock we want to do something to deal with that discomfort to get rid of it somehow so at nine o'clock we perform a compulsion but unfortunately because we had to perform a compulsion in order to.

Feel better well that sends a message to your kind of subconscious mind the next time in your you're in this situation you feel like the only thing that you can do to reduce your anxiety or to feel a bit better is to perform a compulsion so you've just reinforced that that habit loop and you know This kind of scenario here with the metaphor of the mosquito bite is really helpful in understanding how that kind of OCD cycle works.

Because when we do scratch that itch, we are just doing a compulsion that generally will just make things worse over time. One of the best ways to actually get ourselves out of this trap, to get out of the cycle of OCD, is through exposure. Yeah. ERP, for example, teaches you to sit with the discomfort of an intrusive thought without performing the compulsion that usually follows. It's like sitting with a mosquito bite and resisting the urge to scratch.

Yes, the itch is horrible at first. It can be extremely uncomfortable. But with time, it does start to fade. And I'm sure you've experienced this yourself when dealing with OCD.

And i think most importantly by by not scratching the itch you prevent prevent it from actually getting worse also just like a mosquito bike eventually heals on its own ocd thoughts lose their power if you don't feed them with compulsions it's not easy at first the anxiety might feel even stronger but the more you practice the less power the thoughts have over you exposure isn't about eliminating the thoughts altogether though just like you can't stop mosquitoes from from ever biting

you again as much as you would like that to be true but it it teaches you how to respond differently in these situations and to actually interrupt that OCD cycle that I was just talking about if we can learn to stay in the discomfort at three o'clock for a little bit well oftentimes times, you know, that anxiety starts to come down and we begin to feel a bit better.

If we were to take the metaphor and look at an acceptance commitment therapy approach to it, well, we would likely think of diffusion. And this is where you learn to step back from the thought or feeling and notice it for what it is, a temporary sensation that doesn't have to control you in the way that it so often does with OCD.

In practice, you might notice the itch or the mosquito bite, But rather than scratching it, you shift your focus to something else, something much more important, hopefully, related to your values, like enjoying time with friends or staying committed to a project that you've been working on. You know, with OCD, instead of engaging in compulsions.

I think ACT really encourages us to accept the presence of those intrusive thoughts without trying to eliminate them, whilst actually trying to stay committed to what is most important to us, our values and our kind of medium and long-term goals. OCD wants us to play a short-term game. It wants us to focus on feeling good immediately, feeling better straight away.

And actually what we need to focus on is more those medium and long-term goals and trying to, you know, trying to focus on doing healthy, positive things that bring around a sense of contentment and happiness in your life, you know, whilst also being more accepting of the difficult emotions that will inevitably come up.

For instance if OCD tells you if you don't wash your hands right now something awful will happen which it often does do that or depending on what your particular theme might be instead of responding with the compulsion to wash your hands in this situation or perhaps to check something or to think about something again ACT really teaches us to acknowledge that thought to try to bring a sense of acceptance and compassion to it and then to focus our attention

onto something more meaningful and important that could be spending time with your family it could be working on a creative project of some sort it could be pursuing something a passion that you really really enjoy by committing to what matters most you actually reduce the power of those intrusive thoughts you know and much much like how resisting the urge to scratch a mosquito bite allows allows it to heal over time.

So, if you've ever been in the tropics, you know there's nothing quite as satisfying as lying in bed at night under a mosquito net. I remember when I was in Thailand, I was doing this quite a lot. And you can hear the mosquitoes buzzing around, trying to get at you. But they can't reach you and you're kind of safe inside the net, completely protected from it. However, the mosquitoes are still there. You haven't got rid of them. They're still buzzing around, but they can't get you.

And this is a great way to think about dealing with OCD. These intrusive thoughts, like the mosquitoes, are always going to be there buzzing around and trying to get your attention. But you don't have to engage with them.

Instead of constantly trying to swat at every thought or compulsion, like scratching a mosquito bite, bite imagine building your own mosquito net a barrier of acceptance mindfulness and healthy responses exercise perhaps that keeps those thoughts at bay without having to actually engage with them the thoughts and anxiety don't disappear completely just like the mosquitoes don't magically go away but they lose some of their power because you've created space between you and then you're aware that

they're there but they're no longer controlling everything that you do and this mental net is really built through practices like acceptance commitment therapy and exposure learning to acknowledge the presence of those ocd thoughts without reacting to them compulsively you gain freedom by understanding that the thoughts don't have to dictate your behavior.

Just like the mosquito net lets you sleep peacefully while the mosquitoes are buzzing outside, act and exposure can help you live your life fully even when OCD thoughts are buzzing in the background. As with all things OCD, we often have more control over our situation than we might think.

In my experience, learning to manage OCD is finding a way to bring the right mindset to what is an ongoing difficult challenge. We don't have to have it all figured out. We don't need to know exactly what we're going to do in a given situation. Looking for certainties about these things can just be another way for the OCD to express itself.

Instead adopting a mindset of acceptance compassion and determination can help you to achieve things that you may have previously not thought possible it isn't that the pesky mosquito has stopped biting but it's more that you've learned to interpret those bites in a different way so there we go guys i really hope that you enjoyed that one if you have any questions at all do please let me know and also you can now follow the podcast on youtube you can head over there and

do that if you like many thanks and i will see you next time just a quick reminder that if you want to get a free session all you need to do to get that is to head over to my website www.robertjamescoaching.com and there you can leave me a message and we can arrange the free session and now just a quick reminder of my disclaimer any information that you view on my website, Instagram page Facebook group or anywhere else online or any information that

you listen to on the podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for actual medical or mental health advice from a doctor. Psychologist or any other medical or mental health professional. Music.