Parenting a Child with OCD: Family Life, Siblings, and Turning Down the Volume 

Episode Overview 

To many people, the word “accommodation” can sound clinical, but it actually describes something deeply human—like a parent watching their child suffer and doing whatever it takes to make that pain stop. Rearranging the house, answering the same question for the fourteenth time, waiting at the door until the lock has been checked one more time:. That overarching instinct is love. But that sort of accommodation can sometimes make OCD symptoms stronger — and that’s not cause for guilt. It’s something crucial to your child’s health: it’s information. 

In this episode, Beth and Britt sit down with Katie Torres, LCSW, to explore what OCD looks like inside a family system — from the child experiencing it to the siblings who witness it and the parents trying to navigate it all. Katie brings sixteen years of clinical expertise and the grounded perspective of a mom of three to this essential conversation. 

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Meet the Guest 

Katie Torres, LCSW 

Katie is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with sixteen years of experience in the mental health field. She found her calling in OCD treatment during her graduate school internship and has never looked back. Katie works with individuals and families navigating OCD across the lifespan. She is also a parent of three young children and brings both her clinical expertise and her lived experience as a mom to everything she does. 

Episode Transcript 

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability. 

What Is OCD — and Where Does It Come From? 

Britt Teasdale 

There’s a phrase that’s often used in the OCD world: accommodation. It can sound clinical or even technical, but what it describes is something so deeply human. A parent watching their child suffer and doing whatever it takes to make that suffering stop. Rearranging the house. Answering the same question for the fourteenth time. Waiting at the door until the lock has been checked more than once. The instinct is love. The desire to protect is real. But that protection can sometimes make OCD symptoms stronger. It’s not a reason for guilt — it’s a reason for information. And that’s exactly what this episode is about. 

Beth Hope 

Our guest today has spent her career working with children, teens, and families navigating OCD, and she brings a depth of clinical expertise that we have been looking forward to sharing with you. She understands not just the child sitting in the therapy room, but everyone else in that household who is quietly holding their breath. Katie, we are so glad you’re here. Tell us a little bit about yourself and the work that you do. 

Katie Torres 

Thank you both for having me. I’m really excited to be doing this with you. My name is Katie Torres. I’m a licensed clinical social worker, and I’ve been in the mental health field for about sixteen years now. I kind of stumbled into working with individuals with OCD during my graduate school internship — it’s really not a focus that you learn a lot about specifically in a master’s of social work program. But I loved it so much from day one, just seeing people who were really struggling and how much better they actually got from treatment, that I never really wanted to do anything else. It’s been what I’ve continued to do for my entire career: work with individuals and families experiencing OCD and help them feel better. 

Britt Teasdale 

Katie, what’s something that people might not find in your professional bio that you’d want them to know before we start getting into the topic? 

Katie Torres 

Probably just that — especially when we think about families and accommodation — I’m also a parent. I have three little kids: eight-year-old twins and a five-year-old daughter. That’s definitely my favorite role. And a lot of what we talk about when it comes to OCD treatment, even in understanding anxiety and family accommodation, I really try to think about how I can bring that into my role as a mom too. 

Beth Hope 

Tell us — I think most people have some sense of what OCD is, but there are also a lot of misconceptions. Why don’t we level-set and start with: what is OCD? Where does it come from? Why do some people have it? 

Katie Torres 

OCD, or Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, is a mental health condition categorized by a person experiencing recurrent, distressing thoughts — thoughts they do not like, that feel misaligned with who they are. When they have those thoughts, they feel emotional distress. A lot of times that’s anxiety, although sometimes people describe it more as disgust or a sense that something just isn’t quite right. That emotional distress then leads to some type of attempt to relieve it — whether it’s a physical act or a mental process. And it repeats in a cycle: a thought I don’t like, distress from that thought, something I do to bring that distress down. It works in the short term. People feel relief for a few moments — until the next thought pops up. So it becomes this really problematic cycle that can start to interfere in pretty much every area of someone’s life. 

Britt Teasdale 

Do we know why some people develop OCD and others don’t? 

Katie Torres 

It’s a really good question, and there’s a lot that’s still unknown. We know there are some genetic components — studies looking at identical versus fraternal twins have found a higher rate of OCD among identical twins. There are also factors related to brain structure and chemistry, and neurotransmitters like serotonin. And then there are environmental factors: stressors, life events, things people are exposed to. I think that can be hard, because it means there’s not one clear understanding of why it happens. For people who suffer with OCD, or their families, there’s often this search for a definitive “why.” And I always try to help people untangle from that need, and find some level of acceptance that — even without a full explanation — they can move forward and engage in treatment. 

Beth Hope 

Is there a typical age or developmental stage when OCD tends to show up? 

Katie Torres 

A lot of individuals start to experience symptoms around ages eight to twelve, and then there’s another window in young adulthood around ages eighteen to twenty-two. But even that answer is complicated, because people are often struggling with symptoms for a long time before they get an accurate diagnosis or access evidence-based treatment. So that’s generally when things start to show up — but the gap between onset and treatment can be significant. 

Britt Teasdale 

OCD is really described as one of the most treatable mental health conditions — which is interesting given how widely it’s misunderstood. Can you dig into that a little bit? 

Katie Torres 

Absolutely. There are two really important things I’d want anyone who’s struggling with OCD — or whose child is struggling — to understand. First: OCD is not a personality quirk. It’s not “a little thing I do.” It can be really, really debilitating, and the people who experience it know that firsthand. Second: there is quality, evidence-based treatment that works. We have a substantial body of research — randomized controlled trials — showing that Exposure Response Prevention, with or without medication management, produces significant symptom reduction for a majority of people who engage with it. Both things are true: OCD can be debilitating, and there is really quality treatment available. 

What OCD Can Look Like at Home 

Britt Teasdale 

Can we dig into what OCD can actually look like within a family system, on a day-to-day basis? If a parent is unsure about some of the behaviors they’re seeing? 

Katie Torres 

There is not one specific way that OCD is going to show up — and that includes in children. The cycle we talked about is consistent: a thought, emotional distress, doing something to reduce that distress. But the content of the thought and what the person does to bring down their distress can vary so widely that it can look really different for every individual. We always say: if you’ve met one person with OCD, you’ve met one person with OCD. 

That said, what you might notice in a younger child is increased reassurance-seeking — more repetitive questions, or what feels like confessing thoughts or worries. They seem really tuned into hearing you say that everything is okay, that they’re safe, that they’re a good person. On the flip side, because the thoughts a child is having feel so misaligned with who they are, there’s often a lot of shame involved — and they may actually be scared to tell their parents what they’re thinking. So you might see a child who retreats more, isolates, spends more time alone in their room. Same mental health condition, two really different presentations. 

Beth Hope 

Let’s say I’m a parent and my kid is consistently seeking reassurance or asking the same questions over and over. What should I do? 

Katie Torres 

If I’m a parent and I’m not in this field, my instinct when my child asks me a question is to answer it. If they ask three or four times, I might feel frustrated — but I’m still probably going to answer. That’s a really normal response. The problem is that for a child struggling with OCD, that reassurance actually perpetuates the cycle. It becomes the ritual that brings temporary relief but reinforces the idea that they need to keep seeking it. That doesn’t mean you never answer your child’s question — but it does mean that if this feels different from your child’s baseline, if something has shifted, that’s worth paying attention to. That’s when you want to talk to a mental health professional or their doctor. 

Beth Hope 

And I think about not just the reassurance-seeking, but the rituals — behaviors kids feel they need to complete before they can move on. Sometimes they seem harmless in and of themselves. In the moment, accommodating them feels like it helps the child and helps the family keep moving. But what I’m hearing is that long-term, it’s exacerbating the situation — and it won’t end without some change in approach. Is that right? 

Katie Torres 

That’s exactly right. OCD can take up such a strong presence in a child’s life — the pull is so real, the distress so intense. Kids don’t believe they can step away from it until they’re actually doing it and seeing that it’s true. So of course loved ones are inclined to do what they feel they need to do to bring down their child’s distress. There are so many competing interests, especially at high-pressure moments like morning drop-off or bedtime, that it becomes natural to say: “We’re going to do what we need to do to get out the door.” But what the child can take away from that, unintentionally, is one of two things: either “Even mom and dad think this fear could be real” — because they’re engaging in the behavior to prevent it. Or even harder: “Mom and dad know the distress I’m feeling really is dangerous, and we need to do something to bring it down.” That’s the message that can get sent inadvertently when families accommodate OCD. And one of the most important focuses in treatment for kids is helping them understand that they can handle their own feelings of distress — without using those behaviors to artificially bring it down. 

How Is OCD Different From Other Anxiety? 

Britt Teasdale 

Does OCD often get misdiagnosed as generalized anxiety? And how do we know the difference — especially since we all have intrusive thoughts sometimes? I don’t want parents listening to hear “intrusive thoughts” and suddenly wonder if they have OCD. 

Katie Torres 

Really great point. We all have thoughts that feel intrusive or unwanted. If I don’t struggle with OCD, my brain is able to sort those thoughts pretty quickly without me even realizing it. It kinds of files them away as “garbage” — not worth paying attention to, doesn’t align with who I am. One of the ways we help kids and families understand OCD is this: the presence of an unwanted thought isn’t necessarily what’s different when you have OCD. It’s that your garbage sorter gets turned off. 

So when a child has a thought like “What if I raised my hand in class and said something really inappropriate?” — and they don’t struggle with OCD — that thought gets quickly and automatically sorted away. When OCD is present, instead of that happening, a whole secondary process kicks in: Why would I have that thought? What does it mean about me? I better put my hand down and make absolutely sure I don’t participate. And of course, the more we try not to think about something, the more we think about it. So the thought comes with increased frequency and intensity — because it now has so much power. That’s really what makes up OCD: everything that comes up after the thought, and the weight that gets placed on it. 

Britt Teasdale 

That process sounds exhausting — especially for a child. The constant battling with your own thoughts, and the shame on top of it. 

Katie Torres 

“Exhausting” is a word a lot of people really resonate with when they have OCD. Feeling like you’re in constant battle with your own mind, having to constantly filter and attend to your thoughts — that’s something people without OCD in the same way just don’t have that same process to navigate. And you’re right about what else it can look like. A child who’s really preoccupied with their thoughts might look like they have ADHD — seeming disengaged in class, distracted, not focused on the task at hand — when in reality, everything they’re focused on is their thought process and the rituals they feel compelled to perform to keep those thoughts at bay. 

Beth Hope 

I want to ask about comorbidities too. You mentioned ADHD — I know there’s also a lot of overlap with depression and with some people on the autism spectrum. How do we know what we’re treating, and does it change the treatment approach? 

Katie Torres 

There is a high rate of comorbidity with OCD — with mood disorders like depression, with ADHD, and with autism. And it makes sense: especially without an accurate diagnosis, there are these formative years where a person thinks, “I’m having these thoughts. What does that mean about me? I must be different. I must be bad in some way.” That naturally tracks alongside depressive symptoms. 

As for treatment — the reason accurate diagnosis matters so much is that evidence-based treatment for OCD is Exposure Response Prevention. While it falls under the umbrella of cognitive behavioral therapy, it’s a specialized treatment specifically indicated for OCD and anxiety disorders. It’s different from what we’d use for generalized anxiety, depression, or ADHD. So even when there’s significant comorbidity, we want to understand how to use ERP specifically to target OCD symptoms. 

The Sibling Experience 

Britt Teasdale 

Can we dig into the sibling experience a little? What is it like to grow up alongside a child with OCD? 

Katie Torres 

It can be really hard for siblings. The first impact is simply seeing someone they love struggle. When you’re young and you’re watching your brother or sister fight with OCD, that’s a really challenging emotional experience in and of itself. 

And then there’s the reality that OCD often seeps into family dynamics — norms, rules, routines. It’s common for siblings to get pulled into rituals or rules that the child with OCD has established. Maybe they’re asked not to speak while their sibling is doing a ritual. Maybe they participate in checking behaviors. They don’t want to cause distress. They want their sibling to feel okay. It feels like a way to help. So it’s pretty normal and understandable — but it’s something we have to address in treatment too. It’s not just about working with caregivers. We want to give siblings permission and encouragement to start challenging OCD rules and showing up in a supportive way rather than an accommodating one. 

Beth Hope 

How important is it for parents — including extended family, step-parents, multiple caregivers — to be aligned in how they’re responding to OCD behaviors? And how realistic is it to expect total alignment? 

Katie Torres 

I actually think it’s more important to be communicating than to be perfectly aligned. I don’t think perfect alignment is realistic. What I do think is realistic is: Can we have a shared understanding of each other’s perspectives? Can we agree that our child is experiencing OCD, that we want to get them support, and that accommodating or providing reassurance perpetuates the cycle — so we want to work together to show up differently? If we start there, then we can get into the practical details. But if we go straight to the logistics — “We’re never going to answer this question more than once” — without first having that foundational conversation, it’s really hard. Parents have different personal tolerances for watching their child in distress. Getting to shared perspective first makes everything else more possible. 

Reducing Accommodation — and Supporting the Whole Family 

Beth Hope 

How we respond is also going to depend on the age and developmental level of the child — whether it’s the child with OCD or a sibling. I assume the conversations and approaches look pretty different depending on what a child can actually understand? 

Katie Torres 

Absolutely. And that connects to something really important: if part of treatment involves decreasing family accommodations, that’s something we’re talking with the child about and providing age-appropriate education around. Because without that context, it can feel like the opposite of what it’s intended to be — it can feel punitive. “Where did the comfort I was getting go?” So we have to set the stage. And at the same time, as we’re decreasing accommodations, we need to make sure we’re at least maintaining — or increasing — the level of support. How do I show up for my child in a way that feels validating and supportive, without inadvertently making space for OCD to pull harder? 

Beth Hope 

And really, what we’re asking parents to do is watch their child sit in distress without immediately relieving it. That has to be incredibly hard. How do we support parents through that? 

Katie Torres 

That’s the hardest thing. Accommodation exists in the first place because the instinct to protect your child from distress is so deeply biological. So parent support is such an important piece of this. How can caregivers support one another? How can they seek support outside the home — a family member, a friend, a therapist — so there’s a neutral space to decompress? That matters a lot. 

And I also think the right clinical support will always come back to this reminder: what you’re doing is actually helping your child — not just in the moment, but in building life skills that most of us want our kids to have. Which is: I can sit with emotional distress. I can feel hard feelings and watch them rise and fall on their own, without needing to do something specific to make them stop. That’s a really hard thing. But it is something I want for my kids and for the kids I work with. So it’s about how parents take care of themselves in the moment, and how they remind themselves of the larger goal when it feels really, really hard. 

Exposure Response Prevention: What It Actually Is 

Beth Hope 

We keep talking about exposure therapy and ERP as the gold standard. But I don’t know that everyone knows what it actually is — beyond the stereotype of someone covering you in spiders because you’re afraid of spiders. 

Katie Torres 

I love that framing because it gets at something real: ERP is really about teaching an “approach” versus “avoid” mindset. Not just approaching spiders, but approaching our own internal experiences — the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings we’d rather avoid. That’s something most of us would want for our kids: the ability to approach rather than avoid. 

Exposure Response Prevention has two parts. Exposure: facing the things that bring up distress. Response Prevention: at the same time I’m facing those things, dropping the safety behaviors — the rituals, the mental processes that give me an illusion of control. Both parts matter. You can do exposure, but if you’re consistently doing safety behaviors in the moment — if you’re still seeking that sense of “okay, I’m safe” — you’re not actually getting to the learning that ERP is built around. 

With children especially, a lot of those safety behaviors are mental — internal processes we can’t see. “Every time I have a scary thought, I have to think about my favorite show until it goes away.” We can’t observe that from the outside. So a big part of treatment is building psychoeducation and insight: what are the processes you’re going to practice intentionally refraining from during exposures? 

ERP gets a bad reputation for being scary. And yes, it’s uncomfortable — of course it can feel daunting to think about facing the things you fear. But it’s also a really compassionate treatment. You have trained clinicians literally walking alongside you as you face those fears, helping you discover that you can actually handle your own experience of anxiety. That anxiety comes up, reaches a high point — and if you don’t do anything to try to get rid of it, it comes down on its own. That’s one of the biggest gifts ERP can give someone: knowing that anxiety, like any emotion, doesn’t stay at a ten forever. It naturally decreases over time, without having to be “fixed.” 

Levels of Care: When Is More Support Needed? 

Britt Teasdale 

How does a parent figure out what level of care is appropriate? When can OCD be managed with weekly outpatient therapy versus something more intensive like an IOP or PHP? 

Katie Torres 

First, I think it’s important to see a treatment provider who really specializes in OCD and who uses evidence-based treatment — ERP specifically. That will give you a solid foundation to work from. From there, I think about the frequency, intensity, and duration of symptoms. If you’re starting to see a shift — things that were manageable before are now interfering with school, with activities your child loves, with daily life — that’s a sign that more intensive support may be needed. One of the big benefits of IOP or PHP is that we can really increase the dose of ERP. And we know more treatment means people tend to get better faster. 

Beth Hope 

Can you talk about the role of medication? ERP is the gold standard, but sometimes medication is also part of the picture. 

Katie Torres 

It really depends on the family’s comfort level, and both approaches — ERP alone and ERP with medication — show really good results. Certain medications, specifically SSRIs, are evidence-based and indicated for OCD. The combination of medication management and ERP often produces an optimal outcome. For some children, especially when OCD symptoms are intense enough that engaging in ERP is really difficult, medication can help quiet the noise enough to create a little more room for the therapeutic work to take hold. 

When a Parent Also Has OCD 

Britt Teasdale 

If a parent is also struggling with OCD symptoms — maybe diagnosed, maybe not — how often do we see that? And how do we support both the parent and the child? 

Katie Torres 

It’s something I’ve seen quite a bit. When a child is in treatment, there are times where a caregiver will recognize — through what we’re discussing in family therapy — that a lot of it resonates with their own experience. And that cycle we’ve talked about: the compelling feeling that they have to respond to certain thoughts in a certain way. I want to say clearly: if a parent recognizes that, it doesn’t mean they caused their child’s OCD. That’s something that comes up with a lot of shame and worry, and the answer is a resounding no. 

But it can bring up something valuable too: a parent realizing that their child has access to support that maybe they never had. There’s been so much more awareness and treatment development in OCD over the last twenty years. And sometimes it actually leads to a really positive trickle-down effect — a parent seeing their child’s work in treatment and thinking, “How can I apply some of this increased flexibility to my own life?” There can be unexpected gifts in the process. 

Can OCD Go Away? 

Britt Teasdale 

With treatment, can OCD completely go away? Or is it something a person manages for life? 

Katie Torres 

If someone can shift their relationship with their thoughts, recovery can go far beyond symptom reduction. Less frequent thoughts, less intensity, less compulsion to engage in rituals — all of that is very possible with effective treatment. And what that opens up is a much fuller engagement with life — relationships, activities, school, work, the things OCD can pull you away from. 

What we’re honest with our patients about is this: there may be moments in the future when OCD surfaces again — possibly in a different way, around different content. Maybe someone who worked through contamination concerns later notices checking behaviors showing up, or worries about harm coming to a loved one. So a big part of treatment is learning to generalize those skills: How do I recognize what OCD is doing? How do I identify it for what it is? How do I practice sitting with it and choosing not to give it the response it’s asking for? 

What OCD Can Look Like in a Full Day 

Britt Teasdale 

Could you walk us through what a typical school day might look like for a teen struggling with OCD — and then what that same day could look like after learning effective ERP techniques? 

Katie Torres 

I want to speak to some of the OCD themes that can feel more taboo, because I think naming them openly helps normalize what families might be experiencing. One very common presentation is intrusive thoughts about harm coming to — or being caused by — oneself toward a loved one. These thoughts go sharply against someone’s values. They’re extremely distressing. And they’re very common in OCD. 

So imagine a child who wakes up, goes through their morning routine, and sees their mom walk by the staircase. Just seeing their mom triggers the thought: “What if I pushed mom down the stairs?” That thought causes immediate, intense distress. What happens next might look a few different ways. One: the child returns to their room and physically distances themselves from mom, believing they’re keeping mom safe by staying away. Two: the child feels compelled to confess the thought immediately — “I had this thought, are you okay? Are you sure this is okay?” — which can derail the whole process of getting to school. Three: the child doesn’t do anything outward, but instead mentally retreats, running through the thought again and again, trying to get certainty about whether they’re a danger, whether they wanted the thought, whether it means something terrible about them. That mental process has no end. 

And you can see how any one of those carries into the rest of the day. Getting on the school bus, sitting through a math test — these become almost impossible to engage with fully because that mental process is still running. Then at lunch, something else triggers a similar cycle. Did I bump into someone in the cafeteria line? Was I trying to hurt them? More replaying. More seeking certainty. And on it goes. OCD can be happening in every single moment of someone’s day, even when you can’t see it at all from the outside. 

Talking About Stigma: “I’m So OCD” 

Britt Teasdale 

There’s that phrase we’ve all heard: “I’m so OCD — I love to keep my house really neat and tidy.” As you learn more about OCD, that phrase can feel really frustrating, even painful. How do you respond when you hear it? 

Katie Torres 

There are really two problems with that kind of language. First, it’s deeply invalidating for someone who feels genuinely tortured by their OCD symptoms. Second — and just as important — it delays people seeking access to effective treatment. When we normalize OCD as a personality quirk, a little organizational habit, it paints a picture of something it really isn’t. And it can inadvertently send a message to families or kids that “this is just who I am,” rather than “this is something that can really impact my life and that I can get support for.” 

When I hear that language from people who aren’t in the field — friends, loved ones — the best response I’ve found is to offer compassion while also offering more information. This is what I work with. This is what it actually looks like. And most of the time, when people are saying that, there’s no ill intent. They only know what they know. 

Postpartum OCD 

Britt Teasdale 

I want to ask about postpartum OCD. Since we’re speaking to parents — is this something you can speak to? 

Katie Torres 

Absolutely. It’s a very real phenomenon. Part of it may be the hormonal and neurochemical shifts that come with having a child. But a big part is also just the environmental shift — the enormous new responsibility of another human life. It’s very common to see OCD develop or show up differently after having a child. A lot of it centers around themes of the safety of the baby, or doubts about whether the parent is doing a good enough job or whether they’re safe around the child. 

And I do think we need to do more to improve screening and support for new mothers around this. There’s also a societal piece worth naming: we almost produce OCD-like conditions in new parents with the sheer volume of conflicting information we bombard them with during pregnancy and early parenthood. You better do this. Don’t eat that. This is the only right way. Sometimes I genuinely wonder how it doesn’t happen to every new parent — the pressure and information overload are extraordinary. For someone already predisposed to anxiety, it can really be a perfect storm. 

Beth Hope 

100%. When it comes to that level of stakes — and especially for first-time parents — we’re constantly being told there is one right way and a hundred wrong ways, and the information is often conflicting. For someone predisposed to anxiety or OCD, that can be the moment it surfaces in a new way. And the big takeaway is: there is help. There are supports. People are not alone. The first step is recognizing that something feels off and reaching out — to a therapist, a primary care physician, someone who can help you start to untangle what’s happening. 

Key Takeaways for Parents 

Beth Hope 

If you had to leave a parent with a few key pieces of advice — whether they know their child is struggling with OCD or they’re just starting to notice something — what would you want them to walk away with? 

Katie Torres 

The biggest thing I’d say is: proceed with curiosity. Get curious about what you’re seeing in your child — and get curious about your own response, too. Am I responding primarily to reduce their distress in this moment? Does that feel helpful, or does it feel like it might be perpetuating things? But I’d couple that curiosity with a lot of compassion — for yourself and for your child. You are the best parent for your unique child. There is no one better for them. It won’t be perfect, and it doesn’t need to be. OCD brings up emotional responses in everyone around the person who’s struggling, so give yourself a lot of grace and room. We talk about progress over perfection a lot in OCD treatment — and that applies just as much to loved ones and caregivers as it does to the person in therapy. 

Beth Hope 

That connects to something you said earlier about approach versus avoid. That’s really the challenge for parents too: it’s hard, but we have to approach rather than avoid — and a big part of that is getting help. 

Britt Teasdale 

And “progress over perfection” as a parent — that’s something I’m taking with me. We can get so attached to this idea of being the perfect parent, and that can really get in the way of our own mental health. Thank you for that. 

Katie, what keeps you so passionate about this work? 

Katie Torres 

Just the knowledge that treatment really works. I always come back to a young girl I worked with early in my career who had really debilitating OCD — it came on pretty suddenly, strong contamination concerns that were affecting every area of her life. Getting to school was hard. Getting to soccer was hard. Getting to the play she was in was hard. It was taking a real toll on her and her family, who were in disarray because this had all happened so fast. 

Long story short, this girl — ten years old — showed up to treatment every single day with an energy and commitment I couldn’t believe. She was willing to do hard things. She was willing to be brave, again and again, and sit with all that distress and discomfort. And her mom said: I’m going to try to do this differently, because I really want this to last. It was such a formative experience for me. I’m still in communication with her and her family today — she’s an OB nurse now, which is remarkable given where her fears originated. She’s an amazing young adult who knows she has OCD and is able to hold space for that and live the full life she wants for herself. 

Stories like that bring me renewed commitment every single day. It’s a real privilege to walk alongside people in that journey. 

Britt Teasdale 

Thank you so much, Katie. This has been such a treat. “Being brave” is another takeaway I’m bringing with me from today. Thank you for being here. 

Katie Torres 

Thank you both so much. It was a real privilege to talk with you today. 

Final Thoughts from Your Hosts 

The instinct to protect your child from distress is one of the most human things about being a parent. As Katie said so clearly today, accommodation comes from love. It can also keep OCD in the driver’s seat. Knowing that isn’t a reason for guilt — it’s a reason for information and a path forward. 

The other message we’re taking away is how treatable OCD really is. So many families spend years thinking this is just who their child is. It isn’t. ERP works. Your child can get their life back. Families can and do get their lives back. 

If you’re noticing something in your child — repeated questions, rituals you’re working around, a kid who seems weighed down by their own thoughts — let curiosity be your first step. Not panic. Not guilt. Curiosity. And then you can bring that curiosity to a clinician who specializes in OCD. 

Remember: progress over perfection. For your kid, for yourself, for your whole family. 

If today’s conversation resonated with you, share it with someone who might need to hear it and subscribe to You Only Know What You Know wherever you listen to your podcasts. It helps more parents and caregivers find us. 

You can also follow us at @CompassHealthCenter on social. We would love to hear from you. Send us a message or drop a comment and let us know what topics you’re interested in. You’re not alone in this. Thank you for being here, and we’ll see you next time.