Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a neurobiological disorder characterized by recurrent, unwanted and unpleasant thoughts (obsessions) and/or repetitive, ritualistic behaviors (compulsions).
Current research indicates that OCD is caused by a biochemical imbalance in the brain involving serotonin, a chemical that affects sleep, appetite, anxiety and repetitive behaviors. Genetics may also play a role in this imbalance.
An estimated 5 million people of all ages in the U. S. alone (approximately 2% of the population) suffer from OCD. It is the fourth most common mental disorder. More children are affected by this disorder (one in 100) than by juvenile diabetes or asthma.
Many people with OCD suffer secretly. While acutely aware of the irrationality or excessiveness of their fears or behaviors, they are tortured by and ashamed of their inability to control them. This can make normal social situations very difficult, can lead to severe problems at work and school environments, and can inhibit the search for help.
While no cure exists for OCD yet, effective treatment is available. Several medications and exposure and response prevention therapy help many people control their OCD symptoms very successfully.
Participation in support groups also helps many people with OCD (as well as family members and friends) share common concerns, exchange information, and receive encouragement in their efforts to manage the impact of OCD upon their lives.
What Is OCD?
Depression
Depression is one of the most common psychological problems, affecting nearly everyone through either personal experience or through depression in a family member. Each year over 17 million American adults experience a period of clinical depression.
The cost in human suffering cannot be estimated. Depression can interfere with normal functioning, and frequently causes problems with work, social and family adjustment. It causes pain and suffering not only to those who have a disorder, but also to those who care about them. Serious depression can destroy family life as well as the life of the depressed person.
Depression can affect anyone. Once identified, most people diagnosed with depression are successfully treated. Unfortunately, depression is not always diagnosed, because many of the symptoms mimic physical illness, such as sleep and appetite disturbances. Recognizing depression is the first step in treating it.
Nearly two-thirds of depressed people do not get proper treatment:
The symptoms are not recognized as depression.
Depressed people are seen as weak or lazy.
Social stigma causes people to avoid needed treatment.
The symptoms are so disabling that the people affected cannot reach out for help.
Many symptoms are misdiagnosed as physical problems.
Individual symptoms are treated, rather than the underlying cause.
Clinical depression is a very common psychological problem, and most people never seek proper treatment, or seek treatment but they are misdiagnosed with physical illness. This is extremely unfortunate because, with proper treatment, nearly 80% of those with depression can make significant improvement in their mood and life adjustment.
Undestanding Suicide
Understanding Suicide / Common Elements
No single explanation can account for all self-destructive behavior. Edwin Shneidman, a clinical psychologist who is a leading authority on suicide, described ten characteristics that are commonly associated with completed suicide. Schneidman's list includes features that occur most frequently and may help us understand many cases of suicide.
1. The common purpose of suicide is to seek a solution. Suicide is not a pointless or random act. To people who think about ending their own lives, suicide represents an answer to an otherwise insoluble problem or a way out of some unbearable dilemma. It is a choice that is somehow preferable to another set of dreaded circumstances, emotional distress, or disability, which the person fears more than death. Attraction to suicide as a potential solution may be increased by a family history of similar behavior. If someone else whom the person admired or cared for has committed suicide, then the person is more likely to do so.
2. The common goal of suicide is cessation of consciousness. People who commit suicide seek the end of the conscious experience, which to them has become an endless stream of distressing thoughts with which they are preoccupied. Suicide offers oblivion.
3. The common stimulus (or information input) in suicide is intolerable psychological pain. Excruciating negative emotions - including shame, guilt, anger, fear, and sadness - frequently serve as the foundation for self-destructive behavior. These emotions may arise from any number of sources.
4. The common stressor in suicide is frustrated psychological needs. People with high standards and expectations are especially vulnerable to ideas of suicide when progress toward these goals is suddenly frustrated. People who attribute failure or disappointment to their own shortcomings may come to view themselves as worthless, incompetent or unlovable. Family turmoil is an especially important source of frustration to adolescents. Occupational and interpersonal difficulties frequently precipitate suicide among adults. For example, rates of suicide increase during periods of high unemployment (Yang et al.,1992).
5. The common emotion in suicide is hopelessness-helplessness. A pervasive sense of hopelessness, defined in terms of pessimistic expectations about the future, is even more important than other forms of negative emotion, such as anger and depression, in predicting suicidal behavior (Weishaar & Beck, 1992). The suicidal person is convinced that absolutely nothing can be done to improve his or her situation; no one else can help.
6. The common internal attitude in suicide is ambivalence. Most people who contemplate suicide, including those who eventually kill themselves, have ambivalent feelings about this decision. They are sincere in their desire to die, but they simultaneously wish that they could find another way out of their dilemma.
7. The common cognitive state in suicide is constriction. Suicidal thoughts and plans are frequently associated with a rigid and narrow pattern of cognitive activity that is comparable to tunnel vision. The suicidal person is temporarily unable or unwilling to engage in effective problem-solving behaviors and may see his or her options in extreme, all or nothing terms. As Shneidman points out, slogans such as "death before dishonor" may have a certain emotional appeal, but they do not provide a sensible basis for making decisions about how to lead your life.
8. The common action in suicide is escape. Suicide provides a definitive way to escape from intolerable circumstances, which include painful self-awareness (Baumeister, 1990).
9. The common interpersonal act in suicide is communication of intention. One of the most harmful myths about suicide is the notion that people who really want to kill themselves don't talk about it. Most people who commit suicide have told other people about their plans. Many have made previous suicidal gestures. Schneidman estimates that in at least 80 percent of completed suicides, the people provide verbal or behavioral clues that indicate clearly their lethal intentions.
10. The common consistency in suicide is with life-long coping patterns. During crisis that precipitate suicidal thoughts, people generally employ the same response patterns that they have used throughout their lives. For example, people who have refused to ask for help in the past are likely to persist in that pattern, increasing their sense of isolation.
SOURCE: Thomas F. Oltmanns, Robert E. Emery
University of Virginia
Suicide Statistics
Over 30,000 people in the United States die by suicide every year.
In 2005, more than 32,000 suicides occurred in the U.S. This is the equivalent of 89 suicides per day; one suicide every 16 minutes or 11.01 suicides per 100,000 population.
A person dies by suicide about every 18 minutes in the U.S. An attempt is estimated to be made once every minute.
Ninety percent of all people who die by suicide have a diagnosable psychiatric disorder at the time of their death.
Every day, approximately 80 Americans take their own life, and 1,500 more attempt to do so.
The World Health Organization reports that:
In the last 45 years suicide rates have increased by 60% worldwide. Suicide is now among the three leading causes of death among those aged 15-44 (both sexes). Suicide attempts are up to 20 times more frequent than completed suicides.
Although suicide rates have traditionally been highest among elderly males, rates among young people have been increasing to such an extent that they are now the group at highest risk in a third of all countries.
Mental disorders (particularly depression and substance abuse) are associated with more than 90% of all cases of suicide. However, suicide results from many complex sociocultural factors and is more likely to occur during periods of socioeconomic, family and individual crisis (e.g. loss of a loved one, employment, honour).
In the US, the Centers for Disease Control reports that:
More people die from suicide than from homicide. In 2000, there were 1.7 times as many suicides as homicides.
Overall, suicide is the 11th leading cause of death for all Americans, and is the third leading cause of death for young people aged 15-24.
Males are four times more likely to die from suicide than are females. However, females are more likely to attempt suicide than are males.
Firearms are the most commonly used method of suicide among males (57.6%).
