OCD and the brain

It’s been a total honour working with young people living with OCD, alongside their parents, researchers and OCD charities to co-develop toolkits for young people and future research ideas for the project at the Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging at University College London (UCL).

Dr Tobias Hauser and his team at UCL are interested in why OCD mostly emerges during adolescence and how brain development contributes to OCD.

I worked with the team, including researchers, public engagement, lived experts and two brilliant charities (OCD Action and The International OCD Foundation) to design a series of creative workshops and social sessions which would explore young peoples’ experiences of living with OCD, as well as their parents experiences, thoughts and feelings.

The workshops were incredibly powerful, and participants shared their experiences through a range of creative activities including poems, storyboards, letters, spirals and drawings.

It was brilliant to hear that this project was recently awarded the Outanding Public Engagement Project Award 2023 – I hope this will bring more attention to the complexities and difficulties of living with OCD.

The next phase of the project is now underway. Using insights from the creative workshops, the team is now working closely with lived experts from the OCD community to co-develop toolkits that explore the current scientific understanding of the relationship between OCD and the brain. The toolkits will be launched in Autumn 2023.

If you would like any further information about living with OCD, the two charities I worked with on this project (OCD Action and The International OCD Foundation) have a range of excellent information and support on their websites.