PART 01 | Have a shoot at the questions below

1. In the past year, are these thoughts or scenes appear in your mind repetitively and uncontrollably? (Multiple Choice)

a. Being afraid of dusts or bacteria

b. Eager to make things symmetric, in order, or do something in a certain way

c. Have the impulse to count or touch something

d. Worry about being responsible for acting immorally or harming others

e. Worries concerning sex or morality

f. No

2. Do you often try to repress, escape, or offset the thoughts or scenes above? (For example: Check the door for many times because of your worry about forgetting to lock the door when you leave; keep praying, counting, or muttering when horrible or unpleasant thoughts appear.)

a. Yes

b. No

3. Do you often repeat the behaviors below? (Multiple Choice)

a. Wash your hands, do cleanings, or sanitize

b. Touch or lay something with a certain sequence

c. Check: Whether the door has been locked or not, if the fire has been turned off, or if the motor has been stopped

d. Count repetitively

e. Store things (even you don’t need them)

f. No

4. Do you think those uncontrollable thoughts or behaviors unreasonable?

a. Yes

b. No

5. Do the conditions above bother you apparently?

a. Yes

b. No

6. Do the conditions above cause some negative effects on your life (like studying, working, and socializing)

a. Yes

b. No

*This test comes from Hong Kong Mood Disorder Centre and is only a preliminary self-test. This test cannot replace a professional clinical diagnosis*

Through the questions above, you may notice that there are some common characteristics among the symptoms of OCD. The most obvious one is their uncontrollable thoughts or behaviours. OCD is an Obsessive-compulsive disorder, and “obsession” represents those repetitive intuitive thoughts that may always cause negative moods. For instance: when a neat freak with OCD regards his sheet as dirty while being aware that this thought is abnormal since he washed it two days ago, he may produce a negative feeling like anxiety.

“Compulsion”, literally, are some compulsive actions, directed by thoughts, that people take to stop such feelings. For example: what causes them to keep checking the doors is their worry about safety, and they will check if the door is locked over and over again, trying to make sure it cannot be opened, or something unpleasant would happen.

PART 02 | A Restless World

These behaviours cost patients at least one hour every day and also interrupt studying, working, socializing, or other parts of patients’ lives. Patients might wash their sheets to stop the thought that “this sheet is dirty”, and they can probably get obsessed, going far beyond the normal time of doing the washing. This may lead the patients to even further confusion about whether to go on washing or not because they might have a meeting to attend. For OCD, compulsive thoughts and actions appear simultaneously for most of the time, though they may also appear respectively. Anyway, their appearance will undoubtedly take up a large proportion of patients’ time, and the experience is unpleasant.

It is worth mentioning that OCD is irrelevant to barely negative thoughts. For example: biting nails and being irritable cannot be attributed to OCD. OCD must involve repetitive and uncontrollable thoughts and behaviours. Such thoughts might be the “good or bad” of certain numbers or colours, and compulsive behaviours can be the principle to wash hand six or seven times after touching something dirty. Even if thinking or doing this way makes them unpleasant and want to stop, patients always feel unstoppable.