So my friend and your friend Lily Bailey – author of the 2016 OCD memoir Because We Are Bad: OCD and a Girl Lost in Thought and host of Wednesday night community resource, #OCDtalkhour - has got a new book out this week! It’s called When I See Blue, it’s in shops this Thursday on June 9th, and it’s a story aimed at children about a 12-year-old boy with OCD called Ben. I’m sure many of you listening to this podcast will think back to your childhood and remember how lost and confused you felt not understanding what was happening to you and why you were having such difficulty with thought. And s ..read more

On this episode of The OCD Chronicles, I’m talking to Dr. Katie Gordon. Katie is a licensed clinical psychologist who specializes in cognitive-behavioural therapy, and she’s done research work in the field of eating disorders. So far, so relevant to both this podcast and my own personal journey... Katie is also the co-host of the Psychodrama podcast. And yet the main reason why I wanted to talk to Katie for this episode was to learn more about her new book,The Suicidal Thoughts Workbook: CBT Skills to Reduce Emotional Pain, Increase Hope, and Prevent Suicide. There’s much real talk contained ..read more

According to the International OCD Foundation, studies show that almost all (in 2011 the percentage cited was 92%) of OCD patients also suffer from at least one other disorder. Among the most common are Autism Spectrum Disorders, which is just one reason why I'm delighted to be talking to Dr. Joanne Limburg on this episode, an acclaimed Cambridge based poet, novelist and lecturer at De Montfort University in Leicester. Joanne's OCD and her autism, both of which were diagnosed someway into adulthood, greatly influence her work, and the relationship between the two conditions is something we ta ..read more

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I’m over the moon to get my friend and British comics hero Jamie McKelvie on this episode of The OCD Chronicles. It certainly took some tooing and froing - but I do think it was more than worth the wait. As well as being the man responsible for Captain Marvel's current cool as anything suit, and, with his key writing partner Kieron Gillen, a string of brilliant comics series, Jamie was recently diagnosed with ADHD. I’ve long thought that OCD and ADHD were shitty bedfellows. Very different conditions, very similar consequences for a person's life – especially when diagnosed in adulthood. Here ..read more

This week on The OCD Chronicles I’m talking to writer and OCD sufferer Yan Baskets. Yan has some story to tell - you can read his excellent blog at https://ocdetour.wordpress.com - about how, terrified that OCD was going to deny him all of the opportunity, hope and wonder that life can offer, quit his job, sold his stuff, and bought a ticket to travel to the other side of the world. Until COVID hit, he just kept on travelling, seeing, exploring... I’ve done my fair share of travelling myself. I’ve forced myself to for the same reasons that Yan has – and I hope – will do again. Because hey, if ..read more

Jack Pridmore wears a lot of hats. Footballer, author, man on the telly, and an incredible advocate for the societal understanding of OCD. And that's not even the half of it! In this deep dive of an episode, I primarily talk to Jack about how OCD led to him stepping away from football - then a conversation about how I have come to accept the end of my career as a magazine editor ensues. I'd be amazed if Jack didn't end up on a future episode of The OCD Chronicles down the line. I feel our chat barely scratched the surface of all he has to say! In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this episode as ..read more

Here's a fact about me. When I was a kid, all I wanted to do was draw cartoons. That's all I wanted to do when I grew up, and then somewhere along the line, I discovered journalism. I still doodle now and then, and so it's been exciting getting to know Jason Adam Katzenstein - an actual professional cartoonist! He draws for The New Yorker! And he's really nice! On this episode of The OCD Chronicles we get deep into the weeds on many matters neurological, and discuss how Jason's not-too-long-released memoir Everything Is Emergency came to be. As ever, if you enjoy this episode, please do Rate ..read more

TV and films ongoing struggle to depict and represent OCD authentically is a subject that matters to me greatly. I've written about it extensively in the past, most recently for The Guardian. It's a subject I'm sure The OCD Chronicles will return to down the line. But I'm always keen to get creative voices from The OCD Chronicles on this podcast. If we can see ourselves authentically in the media we consume, then we're one step closer to OCD not being so misunderstood. Filmmaker and sufferer Nick Thomson is the latest creative to attempt to capture the condition - his short film For Want of a ..read more

I've got loads in common with Chris Westoby. We're both from Yorkshire. We're both musicians. Writers. We've both written books about OCD - though in Chris' case, his has already been published! And, sadly, we both have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.  On this far reaching episode, Chris tells me his OCD story and we discuss how OCD has changed us, and how we fight against it taking anything more from us.  As ever, if you enjoy this episode, please do Rate, Review and Subscribe. It's a huge help ..read more