Marisa T. Mazza - The ACT Workbook for OCD: Mindfulness, Acceptance, and Exposure Skills to Live Well with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

The ACT Workbook for OCD by Marisa Mazza is a gift to anyone who struggles with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). It addresses OCD in its depth, covering all forms of the disorder and illustrating them with multiple examples of personal stories, including rare subtypes that are often missed. Its practical and easy to follow. Based on cutting-edge methods and steeped in ancient wisdom, this book will empower you to live your life fully, and show you step by step how to reclaim your life from OCD. Whether you work with a therapist or by yourself, this book is well worth reading.

Marina Bystritsky, PhD , adjunct faculty in the department of psychiatry at UCSF, and psychologist at the San Francisco Anxiety Treatment Center

The ACT Workbook for OCD is a valuable self-help book for those wishing to commit to life change while moving forward in meaningful ways. OCDs debilitating grip is truly loosened through reading the information, completing the exercises, and practicing the evidence-based interventions presented within. Marisa Mazza has hit the target in combining acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), exposure and response prevention (ERP), and compassion-based work in assisting those who suffer from OCD and who wish to break free. I will heartily recommend to clients and clinicians alike!

Robyn D. Walser, PhD , codirector of Bay Area Trauma Recovery Clinic; assistant professor at the University of California, Berkeley; author of The Heart of ACT and Learning ACT II ; and coauthor of The Mindful Couple

In The ACT Workbook for OCD , Marisa Mazza does a superb job simplifying a complex treatment into an approachable and helpful guide to the treatment of OCD. The workbook is written in a way that provides the reader with the experience of being in front of an understanding and wise clinician; gently guiding you through clearly stated clinical instruction. The workbook addresses a wide range of OCD manifestations which are at times overlooked in self-help literature. I look forward to using this workbook within my clinical practice treating OCD.

Elliot Kaminetzky, PhD , licensed clinical psychologist, founder and clinical director of My OCD Care, and adjunct clinical supervisor at Pace University

The real strength of this book is that it goes further than just teaching you what OCD is or how to combat itit also helps you to use your values and other meaningful aspects of your life as the anchors and motivation for treating your OCD. Exposure therapy can be really tough, and this book helps you to teach yourself to be more willing to tolerate the challenges, and more compassionate around your missteps, so that you can live the kind of life you want regardless of what thoughts pop into your head.

Ryan Vidrine, MD , director of the OCD program at TMS Health Solutions, and assistant professor at UCSF School of Medicine

Considerable effort has been devoted in recent years to improve the efficacy and accessibility of the gold standard of OCD treatment: an intervention called ERP. One promising source has been ACT. ACT does not represent an entirely new approach to OCD, per se, but it does contain components that may complement and facilitate ERP. For example, procedures like clarifying values and enhancing commitment are not traditional components of ERP. Mazza has produced a practical and useful workbook that infuses ERP with the complementary components of ACT. It is a valuable resource for those who suffer from OCD and the clinicians who treat them.

C. Alec Pollard, PhD , director of the Center for OCD and Anxiety-Related Disorders at Saint Louis Behavioral Medicine Institute; professor emeritus of family and community medicine at Saint Louis University School of Medicine

Publishers Note

This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering psychological, financial, legal, or other professional services. If expert assistance or counseling is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought.

Distributed in Canada by Raincoast Books

Copyright 2020 by Marisa T. Mazza

New Harbinger Publications, Inc.

5674 Shattuck Avenue

Oakland, CA 94609

www.newharbinger.com

The exercises Soothing Touch, Learning to Treat Yourself as a Friend, Self-Compassion Break, Exploring Self-Compassion through Writing, and the stages of acceptance in chapter X are from THE MINDFUL SELF-COMPASSION WORKBOOK by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer. Copyright 2018 Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer. Reprinted with permission of Guilford Press.

Cover design by Amy Shoup

Acquired by Tesilya Hanauer

Edited by Brady Kahn

All Rights Reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Mazza, Marisa T., author.

Title: The ACT workbook for OCD : mindfulness, acceptance, and exposure skills to live well with obsessive-compulsive disorder / Marisa T. Mazza, PsyD, Clinical Psychologist.

Description: Oakland, CA : New Harbinger Publications, [2020] | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019056575 (print) | LCCN 2019056576 (ebook) | ISBN 9781684032891 (paperback) | ISBN 9781684032907 (pdf) | ISBN 9781684032914 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH: Obsessive-compulsive disorder--Treatment. | Acceptance and commitment therapy.

Classification: LCC RC533 .M397 2020 (print) | LCC RC533 (ebook) | DDC 616.85/227--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019056575

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019056576

To my husband: you are the most important person to me.

Contents

Foreword

Rainier Maria Rilke, in Letters to a Young Poet, s aid, Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart andtry to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) does not love questions. In fact, it despises uncertainty; it mistakes control for certainty; it eschews freedom for attempts to avoid fear, discomfort, disgust, and distress. And it ensnares its sufferers in rituals that bring only fleeting relief, if they bring any at all. OCD affects 1 in 100 adults, and most frequently begins in adolescence. Despite its prevalence, it can take more than 10 years for individuals suffering from this disorder to find providers skilled in its gold-standard behavioral treatment, exposure and response prevention (ERP). Adults who struggle with this disorder may lose their childhood; they may struggle for years, and that struggle may have substantial costsin meaningful relationships, academic or professional success, and even experiencing freedom of movement and joy in living.

Perhaps you have been lucky enough to find a provider skilled in exposure-based treatment. Maybe your provider has even handed you this book! But if you havent found your way to a good therapist, perhaps you were looking for other resources, and you came across this one. There are many self-help books focused on exposure and response prevention available to OCD sufferers. Many are excellent. However, what if youve had trouble engaging in ERP? What if you feel so trapped by your fears that the thought of approaching them seems an impossible, unreachable goal? What if you already feel ready to give up? And what ifa different life could be waiting for you, just beyond the horizon? What if that life you could build would make the suffering, and all that you have learned from it, worthwhile? What ifdespite your mind saying it isntits possible for you to fall back in love with your life? What if each sentence you read, each word in each sentence, could be a step toward the possible?