Sharon Collon [00:00:01]:
Thank you, Natalia. I'm so excited for our chat today.
Natalia Aiza [00:00:05]:
Me too. Thank you so much for having me, Sharon.
Sharon Collon [00:00:08]:
Oh, look, I've got so many questions. I'm really excited to talk to you and also to share your amazingness with our community here at the ADHD Families Podcast. But can you start off by telling our beautiful listeners a little bit about you and the work that you do?
Natalia Aiza [00:00:25]:
Absolutely. So I started working as an ADHD therapist and coach here in the United States, and I eventually transitioned to being full time focused on OCD because so many people in our neurodiverse community also experience ocd. And I wanted to be a practitioner that's at the forefront of doing ethical work that is supportive both of neurodiversity and of healing ocd.
Sharon Collon [00:00:57]:
And I know from my beautiful community, this is an area that trips a lot of parents up. Right. Because, yeah, the, the. What you use for ADHD and OCD is like, what strategies you use get a little bit confusing. So I'm really going to delve into that today. But before we do, I'd love to hear a little bit about your journey.
Natalia Aiza [00:01:18]:
Yeah, absolutely. So I have both. I have ADHD and I have ocd, and I kind of knew that there was something that was taking away my ability to focus and that I was using anxiety to cope with that something for many, many years. I had absolutely no idea what it was. I had this, like, secret intrusive thought that I was actually not as smart as I was pretending to be, that I was not actually capable, that I was faking it. And the whole time I had very severe ADHD and went through you, you know, top tier schooling in the United States all the time, only coping with ocd. So in other words, I developed all of these compulsions and anxiety strategies which actually made the ADHD go underground almost because I was, in those moments, I was fully functional on the outside. On the inside, I was an anxious mess.
Natalia Aiza [00:02:25]:
And so I, for me, my adhd, my OCD go hand in hand and are kind of at war with each other.
Sharon Collon [00:02:34]:
I hear that a lot. And no, I would love to go into, you know, what OCD is, because I think for the listener, you know, our. What, what media focuses on is the clean, you know, the cleaning, right, the obsessive cleaning or the counting on the, you know, the door handles and all that sort of stuff like that. But can you tell us about the different types of ocd?
Natalia Aiza [00:02:56]:
Absolutely. There's so many. The one that gets seen the most is cleaning and contamination. Yes, they exist, but they are actually like a minority of our cases. So what we see a lot more of is a type of OCD called moral scrupulosity, where it's a fear of being a bad person. That one's very common. There's also fear of harm coming to you or your loved ones. There's fear of being the person that might harm others.
Natalia Aiza [00:03:30]:
And there's other types of OCD that are really focused on perfectionism. So you might imagine someone like symmetrically lining things up on a shelf. Where I see it actually show up. Are things like symmetry and perfection out in the real world. Like, for example, I'm going to write this email, but it has to be three lines. It can't be like a little bit on four. It has to all fit onto three lines. And actually meticulously making things in your life just right is what I'm calling it.
Natalia Aiza [00:04:02]:
So those are just a few of the many options. And for some of us, we have intrusive thoughts, which are unwanted thoughts that randomly pop in and like scare scare us. And for other people, we have a type of OCD that is purely obsessional and does not actually have this like extra component of these random scary thoughts. So, you know, it's. It's kind of all over the place. But the main thing that ties it all together is the cycle. So an OCD cycle is there is some fear and then we do something about that fear, something physical or something mental, and then we are temporarily soothed. After this temporary soothing.
Natalia Aiza [00:04:55]:
We actually eventually go back into the fear. And in some ways we've reinforced the original fear because we gave it attention, we engaged with it, and so that's why OCD sort of fuels itself and tends to snowball over time.
Sharon Collon [00:05:14]:
Oh, and you can see how that would escalate when you've got ADHD in the picture as well.
Natalia Aiza [00:05:19]:
Yes.
Sharon Collon [00:05:21]:
I've got to disclose that we come from a very OCD prone household here. We definitely have it here. And I think one of the most confusing things is, you know, people kind of label it as an anxiety. Can you tell me how it differs from anxiety or where the distinction is?
Natalia Aiza [00:05:40]:
Yeah, it's a great question. I sometimes use the two words interchangeably when I'm speaking, and I absolutely do not mean to because ocd, the clinical definition of anxiety, are distinct. So you can feel anxious, you can experience anxiety, you can experience worry and not have ocd. So in the case that you have anxiety, you're experiencing these troubling, ruminative thoughts, as long as you're not Doing anything to self soothe. And as long as the fears aren't highly specific, then it's probably generalized anxiety disorder. What distinguishes OCD is, like I said before, that cycle, we have this fear and we can't just sit in the distress. We have to do something about it. We have to fix it somehow.
Natalia Aiza [00:06:40]:
That's what makes something OCD is engaging in this repetitious relationship with your anxiety where you're constantly trying to create a solution for it.
Sharon Collon [00:06:53]:
Okay, you just said so much gold there. So can you tell us about some misconceptions about ocd? Because I know that we touched on the cleaning one where that's what people are looking for, but what are some others that people have?
Natalia Aiza [00:07:08]:
Oh, so many. So many. I feel like the ones that annoy me the most will be the ones I'll share with you. But one is the idea that OCD is a good thing. So it's like a brag, a humble brag online. Like, I'm so ocd. Look at how, you know, well organized. My closet is.
Natalia Aiza [00:07:29]:
OCD is maladaptive. Those of us who have it have it for the lifetime. And those of us who have it in its more severe form experience a lot of distress and difficulty. And truly it is. It can reduce the quality of our lives. So it's definitely not something to humble brag about. Another misconception about OCD is that it has to be physical. That's not actually true.
Natalia Aiza [00:07:57]:
So you can have an entire OCD cycle in your head and just look like you're dazed and looking off into the distance. Especially when you have adhd, it can get confused with someone just being distracted. But really inside our heads, there's an entire cycle happening.
Sharon Collon [00:08:20]:
That's. Yeah, it's so great to know as well. And I really think that that whole, you know, look at me, I've got ocd. That whole thing, oh, my gosh. It's just so. It's a lot, isn't it? It's a lot.
Natalia Aiza [00:08:32]:
Yeah. It's quite irritating. But, you know, it sort of is what it is. We all have to deal with, you know, people. People label themselves, like, I'm so ADD as well. They do that. So I always say, well, first of all, it's adhd and it's a clinical diagnosis, not something that you just, like, put a label you put on yourself.
Sharon Collon [00:08:58]:
So now, thinking about ADHD and OCD and the overlap, can you tell us a little bit about that, what that looks like?
Natalia Aiza [00:09:06]:
Yeah, I think the best way to explain that overlap is to just Speak from my personal experience. This might align with yours, it might not, but it's. It's really the. The clearest way I know how to explain it is to explain my brain. So I will use the example of this podcast. I am chronically late to events because of my ADHD. I have intense time blindness. Here it's 9pm My ADHD medicine has long worn off, and so my OCD wants me to set not one, but three alarms for this event.
Natalia Aiza [00:09:49]:
So when I am going to prepare for speaking with you, I know now that I cannot do that compulsion of three alarms. But that's what my OCD wants and that's how my OCD will be satisfied. So all day I did not put three alarms. I just had the one. And I had to sit in this ick. This distress of. I think I'm going to miss it. I think I'm not going to be on time.
Natalia Aiza [00:10:20]:
And I had to simply trust that I was going to be able to have enough executive function to show up and do a reasonable job. But my ocd, meanwhile, is badgering me to do it the OCD way, which is to follow this system that my OCD says is fail proof. Right? And the truth is that these threes is actually something that my OCD has wanted me to do forever. So I remember in high school, I couldn't remember the material, I couldn't retain it. So my OCD devised the rule of threes that I had to read every Shakespeare play three times, I had to rewrite every essay three times. And so in my head, there's something magical and essential about the number three that will help me execute, you know, these, these regular tasks that, like, I really want to be able to perform without problem.
Sharon Collon [00:11:23]:
Oh, that was such a great explanation. And tell me, why is it so common that OCD is getting missed or misdiagnosed?
Natalia Aiza [00:11:35]:
Well, I mean, I'll be, I'll be frank. Like, I, I was high functioning my entire life and, and I went to Harvard. I, like, got into Harvard Law. And from the outside you would be like, oh, she's just tightly wound, right? But on the inside, I had this ADHD OCD battle constantly going on, but really it was such an internally pained disorder. So, you know, other disorders, let's say bipolar, it can be more. More geared towards other people, it can involve more people, it can be a little bit more dramatic. Ocd, our drama tends to be that we retreat. So like a very severe person with OCD has agoraphobia usually, which means they barely leave their House OCD often makes us make ourselves smaller rather than kind of make ourselves into any sort of spectacle out there in the world.
Natalia Aiza [00:12:38]:
And so it gets missed. We simply look depressed or anxious or just uninterested. But really we're stuck in our houses doing compulsions, you know, loading the dishwasher in threes and not feeling comfortable with, like, being out in the world that has so many tricks goes.
Sharon Collon [00:13:01]:
And you did mention it before, you talked about intrusive thoughts. And I've noticed more and more social media popping up about that. Can you explain to people what that is?
Natalia Aiza [00:13:13]:
Oh, goodness. So before I do, I have to correct something on social media. Now, there's this trope of the intrusive thought one, like, I got bangs or something like that. Intrusive thoughts are not impulsive thoughts. Intrusive thoughts aren't like, oh, like, what if I do this fun thing? A true intrusive thought is a highly negative thought. It's usually ego dystonic, which means that it doesn't agree with our sense of self. So I will have and had. It's been a while, actually, but I used to have all the time, you're a murderer.
Natalia Aiza [00:13:51]:
You're a murderer going on in my head. So, like, I have not committed any murders. Just putting that out there. But my OCD was really trying hard to convince me of that, that I was capable of harming someone on that level. And so, for example, if I was walking near the knives, my OCD might say, you're going to stab someone. When I was close to a window, my OCD said, you're going to throw your child at the window. I would have all of these kind of out of nowhere, seemingly thoughts that involved me causing harm to others. And before I knew what my diagnosis was, I.
Natalia Aiza [00:14:33]:
I mean, I honestly thought I was a terrible person. Like, who thinks these things? Those are intrusive thoughts. So it's out of a fear that something bad is going to happen. And usually it's out of a fear that we are bad.
Sharon Collon [00:14:51]:
That was such a great explanation. So now thinking about what OCD looks like in children, because listeners of this parent listen to, listeners to this podcast are parents, and they, you know, possibly listening to this, thinking, oh, my gosh, you know, I can hear some things coming through. And we know that a lot of our kids with ADHD have looping thought patterns or, you know, they talk about their brain, you know, not being able to stop things. So what would be some things that we could look out for as parents when we're on the lookout for this for OCD and adhd?
Natalia Aiza [00:15:29]:
Yeah, absolutely. So I'll give a few examples again because that's how I learn and think. Something that to look out for is your child is highly dependent on you at nighttime because nighttime is often when a lot of the OCD fears strike. So if your child for example, needs you to do a certain routine, but like exactly that routine. So good night, I love you, I'll see you in the morning. But you can't leave off, they'll see you in the morning or else they're going to like, you know, experience panic. That type of rigidity is a really big clue that perhaps your child might be developing or has developed some OCD features.
Sharon Collon [00:16:19]:
That's a really good explanation. So thinking about now ocd, how it impacts school and friendships and family routines, can you let us know how it would impact those things?
Natalia Aiza [00:16:35]:
So many ways. So with friendships, OCD often makes us anxiously attached. So we have intrusive worries that people are hanging out without us or that that something that we're missing something about how our friend feels about us, for example. Another consistent difficulty with relationships and OCD is the fact that we tend to ask a lot of our loved ones. We, we tend to seek reassurance accommodations. And in the OCD world, accommodations are actually something that causes a lot of reliance on our family members. It's not like in ADHD where accommodations help you be more independent. In OCD, accommodations actually make you more dependent on other people, which is obviously not like that healthy for you.
Natalia Aiza [00:17:35]:
Another effect of having OCD for children will be difficulty with really expressing what their true worries are because often they're kind of nonsensical and we, as the kiddos say, I low key know it. I'm worried about this thing that I know is unreasonable but they can't seem to feel comfortable sharing it with others. So a lot of times kids who are teenagers and you know, really know that they shouldn't be worried about their parents going out at this point in their lives. They're terrified of their parents leaving the home, they're terrified of being alone and they're afraid of vomiting. These are things that teens and young people have difficulty like really being vulnerable with each other about. But they're very common in the OCD population. Population.
Sharon Collon [00:18:34]:
So now thinking about treatments and if you could explain what some evidence based treatments are for children with ADHD and ocd.
Natalia Aiza [00:18:44]:
Yeah. So with adhd I'm not, I'm not going to go over it because I know that that is something that your podcast is offering every day, but only to say that if your child has both. And I really want to make sure that the OCD specialist understands ADHD as well. We really do want that dual understanding because otherwise they're not really going to be able to meet you where you're at and be able to see how your child has to use some coping strategies in order to function with the adhd. And we can't take that all away and say it's all, you know, rigid and all ritualized and routine. So the treatment for OCD is something called exposure response prevention, erp. So this is the gold star standard. It's basically a behavioral system where you face your fears, but you do so gradually.
Natalia Aiza [00:19:47]:
So it doesn't sound like the most compassionate of therapeutic approaches, but long term, it actually is because it gets you out of the therapy room quite quickly. We can usually get it done in maybe six months, four to six months of actual focus on the ocd. And it's not like you have to have a lifetime of therapy. OCD is treatable in a very clinical way. You list out all of the things that you're afraid of, then you list all the things that you do because of the things you're afraid of. And you and your therapist together create a fear hierarchy where you basically decide how you're solely going to start dropping those compulsions and facing those fears.
Sharon Collon [00:20:39]:
Okay, so thinking about therapies or approaches that can make OCD worse.
Natalia Aiza [00:20:47]:
Oh, what?
Sharon Collon [00:20:50]:
Because I know this is. This is tricky. What have you come across that can make it worse?
Natalia Aiza [00:20:56]:
Well, number one is talk therapy. And I get it. I used to be a talk therapist. It's. It feels like you're doing the right thing. It feels like, well, why wouldn't I validate this person's feelings? Why wouldn't I explore their childhood, blah, blah, blah. And it actually makes the OCD so much worse because in that case, the therapist becomes the compulsion and therapy becomes this container for all the worry and to get reassurance from another person that you're okay, that nothing bad is happening. And so talk therapy, really, I cannot overstate it.
Natalia Aiza [00:21:38]:
You cannot talk your way out of ocd. And talk therapy, in its very premise that you can sort of discuss your OCD until it's better is false. It just doesn't work like that.
Sharon Collon [00:21:54]:
And it's. Yeah, it's really great to hear. And so thinking about now, advice that you would give to parents whose. Whose child is a bit resistant to going through the exposure therapy.
Natalia Aiza [00:22:10]:
Yeah, I mean, so first of all, just kind of, I speak as an OCD human with ocd, kiddos, there will be resistance. This is not the kind. The warm fuzzy therapy experience that everyone is looking for. So we often have to bribe and beg and push and require to get our kiddo into therapy, this type of therapy. That being said, I always tell parents, give me five sessions, by the fifth session, I've got their heart. I know, know that they know that this is working and they want to come back. But the first, you know, few sessions are going to be touch and go because it's super unpleasant and they don't understand why they have to do it. So if you can't even get your kiddo into the room, then that's when I recommend.
Natalia Aiza [00:23:04]:
Dr. Leibowitz's work is called the Space program Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions. And it's actually an OCD therapy that is 100% coaching parents. This is something that I also do in addition to doing therapy with children. I will work on the side coaching globally in order to help parents get their kids to the therapy room and notice what they are doing that is actually exacerbating the OCD cycle. Because we, we are. We often are. Even I go home and sometimes reassure my child when instead of making them face their fear.
Natalia Aiza [00:23:52]:
It's a completely natural thing for parents to do, to try to be the person in their child's life that soothes and not the person that challenges. But unfortunately, we do have to learn how to get our kids into that challenge zone so that they can grow and also defeat their. Their fears.
Sharon Collon [00:24:18]:
I think this is, this is the moment that trips parents up, right? So we get that when we have adhd, we kind of coach them through things and we like. It's almost like being their safe person is the most important part. Right? But then if we're where parents struggle is, when we're pushing them through that fear, that's. That's where we get tripped up. Can you tell us how you support parents through that? Because that's the bit that I'm just not sure about.
Natalia Aiza [00:24:48]:
It is tricky. And I always tell parents, like, I do my best parenting in this therapy room. When I go home, I will make the same errors because naturally, as parents, we want to be nurturing, we want to be compassionate. And in the moment, being strong with the OCD doesn't feel compassionate in the moment. It feels like, well, why wouldn't I rescue my. My little person from distress? Like, I get it. What I, as a therapist can see that parents often can't see is that there's a long game here, right? We need to prepare our children for success in the world. Success without us and resilience.
Natalia Aiza [00:25:38]:
And yes, if we refuse to engage with the OCD or accommodate the OCD that night when they're 11, yes, it'll be hard that night. It might be hard, you know, that week, but long term, it will make your child stronger because they do need to learn how to handle distress. And I think that's the big thing that modern parents are afraid to teach. And so, you know, helping your child go into a room that is dark rather than letting them, you know, turn on all the lights and sleep that way is, you know, it feels really harsh. It feels really hard. And also after a night or two, they're gonna be like, oh, I don't need to sleep with all of the lights, lights on. I'm actually okay. And those are the lessons that actually mean more to them than, you know, the soothing that you're offering that night.
Sharon Collon [00:26:40]:
So it's the long game.
Natalia Aiza [00:26:42]:
Okay?
Sharon Collon [00:26:44]:
So thinking about that distress and reinforcing compulsions and things like that, how can parents help manage that distress? So they're in there, they've got their, you know, trying to get their child into the dark room. How does. How does that play out for parents? What should they be doing?
Natalia Aiza [00:27:05]:
So I say, you know, do less. I think as parents, we're trying to do all the things now. And ironically, you know, sort of our generation when we were children had OCD symptoms. We didn't actually get accommodated or coached through it it that much. And it actually helped us rely on ourselves for soothing. That being said, you know, I would often start with something more gentle, like, I see that you're scared, or I'm here if you need me. Something generic and warm or just being present. So I.
Natalia Aiza [00:27:45]:
I do therapy where we are really, like, facing something dark for the client. We're doing something like writing their obituary, for example. And there might be moments where we have to pause and just, like, be human and acknowledge the fact that this is heavy stuff. And that's okay. You saying to your child, like, I see that you're trying really hard, and I know it's not easy. That's healthy. That's kind. Just not too much of that.
Natalia Aiza [00:28:21]:
Because if you're pushing to pushing your soothing too hard, then you're communicating to the child that you think that they can't handle it. We want to communicate to them that it's no big deal. And we really do believe that they can they can, they can deal with it, frankly.
Sharon Collon [00:28:42]:
So we're showing a quiet confidence in them.
Natalia Aiza [00:28:44]:
Yes, yes, yes.
Sharon Collon [00:28:49]:
So tell me what you wish more people understood about ocd.
Natalia Aiza [00:28:57]:
Oh, so many things. So many things. One of which is that OCD and, and I'll, I'll focus on kiddos. No, I really believe that we are missing diagnoses of OCD left and right. And most people get diagnosed with anxiety when for like 10 years before someone really recognizes that it's OCD. So my main issue is just, we need to, we need to learn. Can I restart that question? Okay, one more time. Can you ask it again? Yeah, sure.
Sharon Collon [00:29:42]:
So tell me, what do you wish more people understood about ocd?
Natalia Aiza [00:29:47]:
I really hope that people start to understand how it's different from anxiety. I get so many clients that come into my center having been misdiagnosed with anxiety for 10, 15 years. It's heartbreaking because when we have the anxiety diagnosis, we don't know that we need specialized treatment with erp. So I think that just understanding the cyclical nature of OCD and the types of phobias that are common with OCD would completely change people's experience. It would get everybody or most people diagnosed so much quicker. That's what I truly wish for. Now.
Sharon Collon [00:30:32]:
I couldn't do this podcast without asking about school can't, right? Because I think this is going to be something that people are screaming down the screaming as they're listening to this podcast. So, you know, we know that ADHD school can't. A lot of kids are having trouble accessing school, but what I'm wondering is whether when we have OCD in the picture, whether diagnosed or not, whether this is what, what is underneath it and what your experience has been with school count.
Natalia Aiza [00:31:08]:
So first of all, can you just define school count for me?
Sharon Collon [00:31:13]:
So a school can't is kids not being able to access, also not being able to get them to school.
Natalia Aiza [00:31:18]:
Got it. So in the United States, we call that school refusal, which is not a better term. I like school can't, but. But I've never heard it before. So I just did a presentation with the ADA here in the United States on school refusal. It is an incredibly pervasive issue and I think that in the communities of neurodiversity, we first have to acknowledge that school is not designed for us. It just isn't hard. Stop.
Natalia Aiza [00:31:50]:
So we have to have a far more compassionate and open minded view of school refusal or school can't when we are talking about our population. However, with ocd, what ends up happening is that being afraid of school starts to be the O. The obsession in ocd. Right? And so then the compulsion, the C in OCD is to stay home from school. School, it's to not go into a situation where you're going to be triggered. And so it's the kind of thing that ends up snowballing over time. So at first, it's one day, one mental health day here, one mental health day there, one like undefined tummy ache. And suddenly there's so much school getting missed, and there's such a reward for missing school school that we actually end up with children who prefer home to school, which is not natural for children.
Natalia Aiza [00:32:56]:
They are programmed to want to be around their peers, but so many of our kiddos now are wanting to be behind screens and in their homes and in relative anxiety safety. So the key is to believe that your child can. So every child, as a school, can, on some level, you want to exude that quiet confidence in the morning that they will make the choice to go to school and be incredibly supportive of the true difficulty that they're facing in school, while not supporting school avoidance, because that is going to make it worse.
Sharon Collon [00:33:42]:
And so now thinking about. Sorry, I'll be out. No, no, I'm recording a podcast. Shut the door.
Natalia Aiza [00:33:57]:
Shut the door. So funny.
Sharon Collon [00:34:03]:
I knew we were going too good without an interruption. It's just funny because I've got to share with you. I have a sign on my door that says, ADHD coaching is confidential. Do not come in unless someone is bleeding. Right. No one respects that sign in this house. Okay, so the next question I wanted to ask you is about time or stages of life. So I know that for me, my OCD came after each pregnancy.
Sharon Collon [00:34:36]:
So after I gave birth, essentially. And I. And I feel like for a lot of parents listening to this, they might not realize that OCD comes in like waves. Like, once you have it, you don't always have it. Like, you can have stages or where it flares up. Can you tell us a little bit about that so we can help, you know, let people know that it's not like a one and done kind of thing.
Natalia Aiza [00:34:59]:
Absolutely. So what's interesting is at my center, we see so many children, but we have most of our child clients are at seven that age for some reason, and then puberty. Those are the big onset times. Right. So OCD correlates with the hormones, the growth hormones, and for women, for born females, there is a strong correlation both with life cycles and also menstrual Cycles. So OCD very much ebbs and flows just like hormones do. And I think that one of the key issues that we don't quite understand is how it relates to the endocrine system. However, you will notice that your child will have seasons of ocd.
Natalia Aiza [00:35:57]:
Another, another way that it ebbs and flows is actually with infections and allergies. So with kiddos that have strong allergic reactions and their immune system is overreactive, they might have some inflammation and you might see some OCD symptoms come up. Same thing. There's a, there's an issue called pans pandas, which is basically an inflammatory response in the brain to an infection in the body. And that's another time when you see a rapid onset of OCD symptoms. So there's a tremendous mind body connection when it comes to ocd. And it's also genetics. So you have a genetic predisposition to it.
Natalia Aiza [00:36:43]:
And it's important to look in the family tree. Who maybe has hoarding disorder, which is genetically related, who might have tried Tourette's, all of these sort of sub genres, specific phobias, all these are connected in this OCD constellation.
Sharon Collon [00:37:01]:
Thank you, because that's so helpful. So thinking about, if you don't mind, if I'd love to ask you about your personal experience when you were talking about coming on this podcast today and you were with the three reminders. What I would love to know is how you coach yourself to only do the one because doing the compulsion feels like the right thing to do, right? So how did you do the one?
Natalia Aiza [00:37:29]:
So at this point it's a muscle, right? We have incredible neuroplasticity as humans and we can recondition ourselves. So three doesn't even feel like that great of a number to me anymore. Which is amazing because it went from being like this number that I had on a pedestal. Pedestal to feeling just like another number. I. My special relationship to three got interrupted by doing things in different, different numbers so many times that my, my brain's sort of connection to that, to that particular ritual got severed. Nonetheless, I'll still feel the temptation, I'll still feel that urge coming up, but it is just so much less strong than it used to be. Had this been 10 years ago, I would have spent the entire day in low grade panic if I hadn't done those three.
Natalia Aiza [00:38:28]:
And now I might have like an intrusive thought every once in a while. Did I put an alarm? It was just one. Maybe I should check it. Am I sure it's okay? But none of them actually Hook, Like, I'll have these intrusive thoughts. I'll have just these, these OCD thoughts, and I don't really pay them much mind. They come in, they flow out, and I just kind of carry on with my day. But that's, that's from years of practicing, of practicing turning away from the OCD and to do something that actually is a cognitive restructuring act, which is to do the opposite of what your OCD wants you to do.
Sharon Collon [00:39:12]:
So do you think that the adhd, you know, obviously the executive function, like the poor impulse control, that power of the pause, which is so much of what we do in ADHD coaching, like trying to teach people to do that and support people to have that pause before they action. Is that where it kind of can really come unstuck for people with ADHD as well? Like, before they know it, they're doing the compulsion without pausing.
Natalia Aiza [00:39:38]:
Oh, yeah. Yes, 1,000%. When we're going through this, this life without having strong impulse control, we are going to do our compulsions, we're going to do all sorts of behaviors, and we're not going to be able to regulate ourselves until we get that, we get that slowing down that happens, that we can coach in ourselves, that, that, that medicine can, can help some of us with that meditation, just being able to allow yourself some time for decision. Because adhd, oh my gosh, we, our brains just want to barrel forward into whatever will get us that, that dopamine hit. And in the case of ocd, it's often doing the compulsion that, that gets it done.
Sharon Collon [00:40:33]:
You could see how it would trip people up. Right? Like. But you know what, what I've found from this discussion today is just overwhelmingly how hopeful it is and positive it is. Like you've got a roadmap out of, you know, you know, you're saying OCD makes your life small. You've got a roadmap out of it. Yes. Make your life whatever size you want. It doesn't have to be dictated by ocd, which I think is fabulous.
Natalia Aiza [00:40:58]:
Absolutely. It's so treatable. That's. I couldn't, I couldn't do any other type of therapy, honestly. Like, I need to do something that's as treatable as ocd, because I love that satisfaction of getting someone unstuck. So just as long as people trust the process, they get an exposure response, prevention therapist. Someone that really gets is like 80 or 90% effective rate. It just has to be the right time.
Natalia Aiza [00:41:34]:
And a person that really understands ocd, those are the two critical components. And by right time, I mean you want to get better. Because Natalia 20 years ago was completely happy being stuck in her stuff. She was not in a place where like there was openness to change. So, you know, it just wasn't my right time. But when it was, it really, it came together quickly.
Sharon Collon [00:42:03]:
So tell me, how can people find you?
Natalia Aiza [00:42:06]:
Oh well, my Instagram handle is at LetsTalk OCD and honestly, drop me an email nataliaroswellnesscollective.com I still compile, possibly answer those. I am really into responding because if, if nothing else, there's just one person that hears you and guides you to somebody in your area, in your neck of the woods or if you're looking for OCD or parental coaching, I can do that from wherever. So feel free to drop me a line and, and tell me what you're looking for and what you're wondering about out.
Sharon Collon [00:42:47]:
And I'm going to put a link to all of Natalia's details in the show notes as well. But I want to say thank you so much for sharing so much wisdom with us today. Of I just love it, love it.
Natalia Aiza [00:43:01]:
Thank you. It was really nice being on and I appreciate so much when people are specializing in ADHD bring me to speak about ocd, nothing makes me happier because it's, it can really help our quality of life. And I wish that when I was learning about my ADHD I also knew more about this other side, the OCD control that I was actually finding to be a bigger stranglehold on my life than anything else.
Sharon Collon [00:43:37]:
I'm hyper aware that a lot of parents listening to this, this might just be the missing link that they, you know, that this could be lining things up for them. So thank you so much for being here and sharing your wisdom with us.
Natalia Aiza [00:43:51]:
Thank you.
Sharon Collon [00:43:53]:
Take care.
