Jul 13, 2026 · 44 min · 14 segments
OCD is one of the most misunderstood mental health conditions in the world—and it's far more than being organized or liking things a certain way. In this episode, OCD specialist Kristina Orlova…
Kristina OrlovaGuest
Keesha ScottHost
thought a lot about this because in specializing in this for about 10 years this is the most common thing i keep coming up against which is how do i how do we explain this in the simplest way right so best i can come up with is so every human has intrusive random thoughts stuff that just pops in suddenly you're like okay what is that Usually folks are able to recognize it fairly quickly that that was garbage.
A person with OCD, the parts of the brain that are kind of impacted, think of it this way.
And so you can't just dismiss it because suddenly you're kind of fighting flight responses on, everything's firing on all cylinders.
And so you're sitting there temporarily kind of frozen like, oh my gosh, something's happening.
Because typically if something like that happens for any of us as humans, we do do something to try to resolve it and feel better and move on.
But with the OCD brain, what's really interesting is that same response actually doesn't work.
And so you're doing what you think is helpful, but actually it's kind of linking these things together and creating this association in the mind that, oh, that is a threat.
So that fact that that thought kind of jumped in there or that image or a feeling, oh, that's the same as, let's say, somebody actually standing here with a knife ready to attack you.
thought a lot about this because in specializing in this for about 10 years this is the most common thing i keep coming up against which is how do i how do we explain this in the simplest way right so best i can come up with is so every human has intrusive random thoughts stuff that just pops in suddenly you're like okay what is that Usually folks are able to recognize it fairly quickly that that was garbage.
A person with OCD, the parts of the brain that are kind of impacted, think of it this way.
And so you can't just dismiss it because suddenly you're kind of fighting flight responses on, everything's firing on all cylinders.
And so you're sitting there temporarily kind of frozen like, oh my gosh, something's happening.
Because typically if something like that happens for any of us as humans, we do do something to try to resolve it and feel better and move on.
But with the OCD brain, what's really interesting is that same response actually doesn't work.
And so you're doing what you think is helpful, but actually it's kind of linking these things together and creating this association in the mind that, oh, that is a threat.
So that fact that that thought kind of jumped in there or that image or a feeling, oh, that's the same as, let's say, somebody actually standing here with a knife ready to attack you.
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