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- [00:00]
A
I see people in my practice and I also have some online programs, but I didn't exactly choose to specialize in anxiety and ocd. Those conditions really chose me. One day I had a very intense panic attack and it landed me in the er. I thought I was dying. A little bit later in graduate school, a professor said, you know, you might have ocd. And that was the beginning of when I started connecting these dots of OCD and anxiety in my own life. What I have struggled with a somatic awareness, OCD that attaches to my breathing. This urge to monitor your breathing and begin to breathe manually. You begin to mentally monitor as if you have to control your breathing. And it's maddening. I really couldn't even sleep. I want you to know that asking for help is actually courageous. It's a strength. And there is such wonderful help out there.
- [01:15]
B
Are you tired of the endless cycle of your obsessions and compulsions? And do you feel like OCD is ruling your life? Well, listen, you don't have to go on like this forever. As a licensed clinical psychologist with 25 years of OCD treatment experience, I know firsthand how debilitating the condition can be. But I also know that it can be managed with the right treatment. This is why I lead a team of top tier clinical experts at nocd. NOCD is an online platform offering specialized, accessible and convenient OCD treatment. To get started with effective treatment for obsessive compulsive disorder, head to nocd.com and book a free call with our team to start your treatment journey today. It's time to live the life you deserve and not the life that OCD wants you to live. And don't forget, subscribe to our NOCD YouTube channel so you can stay up to date with our latest podcasts and webinars. Now, onto today's episode. Happy to have everyone here at the get to Know OCD podcast and welcome my guest today, Paige Pratko. Paige, you are a therapist and a YouTube content creator. Tell everyone a little bit about yourself.
- [02:25]
A
Hi, Patrick. First, I want to thank you so much for inviting me here. I feel so honored to be here talking about ocd. My name is Paige Pradko, as you've said, and I'm a licensed therapist in Rochester, Michigan, and. And I specialize in helping people with OCD and anxiety disorders. I do a few different things. I see people in my practice and I also have some online programs, some online recovery programs, and a community support group that's called the Warm Heart Hub. If anybody is interested in seeing Those. You can find them@pagepradco.com but I didn't exactly choose to specialize in anxiety and ocd. Those conditions really chose me to give you a little bit of background. In my early 20s, I was living and working in downtown Chicago in the corporate world and hiding pretty severe anxiety. One day I had a very intense panic attack, and. And it landed me in the er. I thought I was dying. Well, they didn't really explain that it was a panic disorder or, you know, a panic attack. What they did was say, well, your heart is fine. And they sent me home.
- [03:49]
B
There you go.
- [03:49]
A
And a little bit later in graduate school, a professor said, you know, you might have ocd. And that was the beginning of when I started connecting these dots of OCD and anxiety and my own life. And that really changed the course of my studies, and it ultimately changed my life's work. And I do think that having lived, experienced with anxiety and OCD really helps me to understand my clients better.
- [04:26]
B
There's so much to unpack there. Yeah. So let's start with. All right, so you're at a job, you have a panic attack. They don't really tell you what leads you to go to graduate school, to get out of the corporate world, to even get into graduate school to become a therapist.
- [04:41]
A
I think that interest in learning more. Not only did I always have an interest in psychology and in helping people, but I think there's always a little bit of trying to understand what is it that's going on inside of me and. And what, you know, I want to understand a little bit more about myself. And I wonder. I want to understand a little bit more about others.
- [05:12]
B
And then. And as much as you're willing to discuss, obviously on this, but for someone to come up to you and say, I think it's ocd. Were there some obvious signs that people were seeing or.
- [05:26]
A
No. This particular professor was pulling out my work and was looking at my work and could tell there was definitely signs of perfectionism there. But I had many other themes that, of course, they didn't know about. One of them being somatic awareness, ocd, where it was attached to my breathing.
- [05:50]
B
Okay, that can be a tough one, too, because, boy, once you take something that's automatic and think you suddenly have to control it, boy, it is hard to let that go, isn't it?
- [06:02]
A
It sure is. It sure is.
- [06:05]
B
So let's. We'll get into that in a little bit because I think it would be interesting to talk about some various subtypes and the way people Experience them. And we haven't talked about that one too much on the podcast yet. Podcast yet. But I want to stick with some of the history first. So. Okay, so now you're a therapist, and many people are very content there. That's their life. That's what they do. You taken it a step further. You're online content creating what leads to that jump?
- [06:37]
A
Yeah. So I. I have a YouTube channel where I share mental health videos, and it's interesting how that began. I'd like to tell you a little bit about somebody, and I'm going to change their name to Al to protect their privacy.
- [06:56]
B
Very good.
- [06:57]
A
So Al popped his head into my office. And Al was in his 70s, and he was trembling. He was very frail. He had very little eye contact. And Al handed me a piece of paper, folded up, and I unfolded the paper, and there he had a list of all of his symptoms that he had been experiencing. Al had been living alone and struggling with these conditions alone. Pretty severe ocd, panic disorder, and agoraphobia. And this was the first time in his 70s that he reached out for help. So he was incredibly courageous. And Al asked, could I help him? And I told Al that I thought I could. And so Al and I worked together for several years, and Al was making incredible progress. Really was just reclaiming his life, and it was just really beautiful to witness. Well, as Al was getting better, he was urging me to share the mental health tools that we were using in session. He wanted me to share them online because he knew that there were people like him that were alone, that were struggling, that didn't know what to do. And Al even wanted to put his whole life story out there. He wanted to share. He really had this hope of helping people. And I said, al, you know, I struggle with anxiety. I don't want to put myself out there socially. Putting myself on YouTube is about the last thing I want to do.
- [08:42]
B
Yeah, true. I can understand that.
- [08:45]
A
And Al kept urging. Shortly after, Al became very ill, and he called me one evening, and he said, paige, I can't get up. And I asked his permission to call the ambulance. And very sadly, Al passed away the next day. I really was grieving after Al passed away, and I was haunted by his request that I put some videos out there. So I decided, okay, Al, you win. I'm going to put some videos out. I made a few very basic videos, just shot it with my iPhone, put them up on YouTube, and was quite surprised that anybody actually watched the videos, to tell you the truth.
- [09:43]
B
And they did, right?
- [09:45]
A
They Did I? I had quite a positive response to the videos.
- [09:51]
B
Yeah, I love that. I, I had a similar thing that I had. I always do an intro, talk to people that I'm working with. And I had an elderly gentleman who said, you need to write that down as a book. And he was the inspiration for the first book I wrote. Don't try harder, Try different. And it was of his continuing encouragement of if you don't get this out there, people won't know it. Right. So sometimes there's great inspiration from the people we work with, aren't there?
- [10:21]
A
Great, great inspiration. And I look at everything that I do on, on YouTube and for a bigger audience. That all came from Al's hope, that all came from him. That's not something I would have done on my own.
- [10:39]
B
Right. Well, cheers to Al. To all the Al's out there who've inspired all of us to do more.
- [10:46]
A
To all the owls out there, you know what he led to. The videos now have had over 3 million views. And you know, obviously I kept at it after a positive response.
- [11:00]
B
Yeah. Well, what continues to motivate you to keep doing it?
- [11:06]
A
I receive communications from people that a video had changed their life. It might be a different video for each person, but I will receive correspondence from people about how much it's helped them, how much it encouraged them to get help. Just different stories from people that it's very encouraging for me and I realize that helping and I'm so grateful to have any small part of helping people around the world, especially in areas that really do not have any kind of mental health help. And there's a lot of areas in the world where there, there is just very little access and so I'm just grateful to just be a part of that.
- [11:58]
B
What's been the most popular one you've done so far?
- [12:02]
A
My most watched videos. Pretty straightforward, pretty basic ERP for ocd. And I have another one called Pure O ocd, Intrusive Thoughts. And I think those videos have been widely viewed because they share very basic information. I think people are hungry for very basic information about what's going on with them and what are some straightforward evidence based tools that they can use to help them.
- [12:40]
B
Yeah. And I think it's nice too when people who have the condition, who've gone through the treatment themselves, who come out on the other side and who could talk about what it's like to live the life you want to live and not the life that OCD wants you to live is very inspiring for people.
- [12:57]
A
Absolutely, absolutely. A little in the last year or two, there have been two videos. One called My Heart is Scaring Me and that's for people with cardiac related health anxiety. And another video is called relationship ocd. And those two videos, I share stories about what it's like to have those particular conditions. And people really resonate with the story. They say, oh my gosh, that's exactly what I'm going through. That's exactly how I feel. I didn't even know there was a name for it or I didn't know anybody else felt like that. And they really resonate with it. And I think when people feel they connect with it and they feel understood, it really opens them up to then consider, okay, what are the tools that we can use to help them improve and feel better?
- [14:00]
B
It's been fun to do discussions on relationship OCD and really bring that to the forefront, especially it being one of the newer subtypes. But what we haven't done a lot of and I still think is kind of a mysterious one. I want to go back to what you brought up is the health related ones, the, the cardiac issues, the breathing, and again, as much as you're willing to discuss. But could you describe to people what it's like to have the somatic concerns, the breathing, the fear that you're maybe not getting enough air or you're, you're not exhaling enough carbon dioxide. You know, OCD will grab onto anything, right? And I think it'd be great for.
- [14:38]
A
People to hear OCD can grab onto anything. So those are two health anxiety, ocd, somatic awareness, ocd. They're in this realm of people that are dealing with physical sensations. And so, for example, what I have struggled with, a somatic awareness OCD that attaches to my breathing. It's the obsession is this urge to monitor your breathing and begin to breathe manually. And so a very automatic process. You begin to mentally monitor as if you have to control your breathing. And it's maddening. I really couldn't even sleep when I was in bouts of this. And somebody might think, my gosh, that's just an automatic process. But it's amazing how OCD can latch onto it. A lot of people experience that with blinking or swallowing or monitoring their heart rate. There's all different types of somatic awareness ocd. And in the recovery process, we're learning how to allow the urge to be there without responding to the urge. And it takes time, but it's a very successful treatment. Now, health anxiety OCD is a little bit different that can attach onto Any kind of physical sensation or even worries about different health anxiety issues. Different health issues. And so in that realm, usually what we see happen is that someone is Googling obsessively over a health concern. If it's their heart, they might be Googling excessively, which really exacerbates the condition. And they might be possibly going to the doctor or monitoring their heart rate or their blood pressure or something like that continuously. And so again, in that condition, of course, if there is a medical condition, we want to rule that out first. That's always important. And you can have health anxiety with a medical condition, for sure. And so we do take care of that part of it. But then it is learning to, again, not respond in the way that they used to respond to that kind of anxiety.
- [17:33]
B
Yeah. And again, it is very debilitating. I've watched people spend hours just trying to take a deep enough breath. Right. In our intensive program that we used to run and make some of the strangest noises that you might have ever heard as a way to exhale enough of that air out or try to breathe in enough. And of course, the issue with OCD is you'll. You'll never do it. Exactly. Right.
- [18:00]
A
Oh, that's.
- [18:01]
B
You just. You're never going to scratch that itch, shall we say? So. Right, right. It's. It's this chase that you never win and you never catch. Yeah.
- [18:10]
A
And in that. And that what you were describing, it almost sounds like there's a little bit of that just rightness in there.
- [18:16]
B
Yes, totally. Yeah. Yeah. Not uncommon to see that combination of things come in there, that if I could just do the just right breath and I would reset my body, everything would be okay and I'd have that right mix of oxygen or something.
- [18:31]
A
Absolutely, absolutely.
- [18:34]
B
And I appreciate that you said that it really interfered even with sleeping, because it. It is all encompassing, isn't it? And then the worry will be, well, what if I fall asleep and I don't breathe right? Or something could. Could even happen.
- [18:46]
A
That's correct. That's correct. Yeah.
- [18:50]
B
Yeah, it is. It is a jerk of a disorder. It's the nicest way to say it. I'll just. I'll say it like that. It is.
- [19:00]
A
And I especially found, you know, with health anxiety during the pandemic. Boy, we. People with OCD that were really triggered in that environment too. And I just. People were reaching out to me. And I'm sure you as well, during the pandemic with increased amounts of health anxiety.
- [19:26]
B
Yeah, definitely. For people who had it. But, you know, it was always interesting too, because people like, oh, everyone with OCD must be really, you know, going overboard. And I said, not if they didn't have health anxiety. You know, I had people who said, I'm still afraid. I ran someone over last week with the car. I don't really care about COVID Right?
- [19:44]
A
Oh, yeah, exactly.
- [19:45]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was really interesting that, yes, it's a stressor, but sometimes OCD will be like, yeah, I can handle Covid. That's fine. I'm still afraid I did this other thing and that would be terrible. Yeah, yeah. You. You talked about the feedback. What, what do you think people really resonate with when they watch your videos and hear some of the advice that you. That you give?
- [20:09]
A
Yeah, I think that people resonate with. First of all, the, the information I share, my videos are not. They don't have really great slick production at all. Not. Not at all. In fact, people will. They really get annoyed. Even if there was a little music in the background, they get annoyed. They just want to hear what it is that I'm sharing and. Oh, they, they connect with. I think that they feel like I care and I really, truly do care. And I'm saying that because I get a lot of messages that people do feel like my sense of caring comes through. And I'm glad that that comes through because I do really want to help and I think that they connect with the stories that I share on the videos and the information that I share. I try to stay with more evidence based treatment recommendations because there's a lot.
- [21:12]
B
Of non evidence based treatments out there, unfortunately, that can really grab onto people with OCD and, and take them down a path that you really don't want to go.
- [21:24]
A
That. That's true. And I just. So the listener understands really what, what we mean when we say evidence based is. Evidence based means there's hundreds of hundreds of studies and we've had meta analysis and we know really what is helpful and that's what we're sharing. And sometimes I'm also sharing emerging evidence and I'll try to state that clearly.
- [21:50]
B
Yeah. And that meta analysis is just. How do you analyze all of those hundreds of studies and really pack them down into this one thing to show that, yes, we see an effect, that this treatment really works. That's what I love about ERP is it consistently comes through in these meta analyses to show the impact that it has on the lives of people, which is wonderful. Yeah. Yeah. It is hard sometimes to convince people to start erp. Obviously you're you're asking people to do something they're afraid of. I always talk about that's why we do hierarchies. And, and we, we don't throw you in the deep end of the pool to sink or swim. We stick a toe in the water. How do you motivate people to start facing their fears?
- [22:31]
A
Yeah, I. Motivation is, is so important. I really spend a lot of time with people in my practice up front before we ever even begin to talk about exposures. I really work a lot in that area of motivation. And what is it that OCD is taking away from them right now? What would their life look like if they were in recovery from ocd? Who would notice in their life? What would they notice? What would they be doing different? I want people to have a sense of what they are going to be working for. What are their values? What do they want to follow in their life? What kind of life do they want? How much time are they spending right now compulsing or ruminating or so forth? What are they avoiding in their life? And so I spend a lot of time on that work up front before we ever begin to talk about exposures. And we're going to, when we begin exposures, we're going to do everything we can in session first, you know, before that, I'm just sending them out on their own.
- [23:51]
B
Yeah. It is Mental Health Awareness Month. While we're filming this, it may not be when we air it, but it is at least when we're filming it. But I don't care if it's not when we're airing it. I want to talk about that a little bit and just maybe take a little broader view on your take on mental health in general, the state of mental health in general, the stigma of mental health and what you're hearing and what people are responding to from the work that you're doing.
- [24:21]
A
Yeah. And mental, you know, the climate that we're in, we have this. We've made so much progress in mental health awareness. There's a lot. It's more normalized to talk about today. People are willing to talk about anxiety and OCD and trauma, whatever they're going through. I also, I love that we have so much access today, like multiple, multiple layers of access of help. So we, we have therapists that are specialized in treating ocd, but we also have recovery programs online recovery programs. We've never had anything like that before. We have, we have support groups that are online, that are international. They're. They're really wonderful. We have peer Led groups, we have forums, we have so, so many layers of access that we've never had before. But in our mental health climate, I do have a lot of concerns. I have worries about budget cuts. For example, in my state in Michigan, we've had $300 million cut from our schools in the mental health programs. And I really worry about what are the consequences going to be. What I'm noticing is everyone is more stressed right now. No matter what side you're on, everyone is more stressed. There's so much more uncertainty out there. And humans really manage stress well. When it's this short, short stress, you know, we're able to manage that pretty well. But when we have this long term stress and what we call an allostatic load, allostatic means that we have these multiple layers of stress and it's chronic and it's lasting for a long time and that can lead to, you know, exhaustion, anxiety, fatigue, and that's not good for us. So that's one area that I try to talk a lot about in my videos is how to manage that, that allostatic stress load, that long term stress. And hopefully my videos help to lighten that load a little bit.
- [27:01]
B
Yeah, I worry too about some of this, maybe the flywheel effect of some of these things because we know that there's issues potentially with violence in schools and we say, well then we need to do more mental health awareness so that we don't have violence in schools. But then money is often taken away from mental health before anything else. And then how do we fulfill that? How do you help the mental health issues when you take the funding away from the mental health issue? So it's always the concern and I think that it's important and why we push say at OCD to make sure that insurance covers OCD treatment. Right. Because we want to be sure that there's accessibility if there's anything that we've talked about, and I'm sure you've seen this page too, at conferences. Up until the teletherapy revolution, it was how do we disseminate evidence based treatments to people?
- [28:00]
A
Yes.
- [28:01]
B
And now what you've done, what we're doing is really working on making that happen. How do we actually get evidence based treatments out to the people who need them? And I, I hope that we continue to push that forward and make sure that people get the help that they need and don't have to sit and suffer.
- [28:21]
A
Yes, Patrick, that is just brings up such a great point, how far we've come in OCD treatment when I first began as a therapist and I'm going a couple decades back, we had almost nothing to offer people with ocd. And isn't it amazing that we now have a couple of decades of all of this research and we know what really helps people with OCD and we know what doesn't help people with ocd and we're getting better and better at that. So that is so exciting in our field, like just how far we've come and like you said, the way that we're offering all of that information now in so many different avenues, and that's really encouraging. Yeah.
- [29:16]
B
Yes, yes. And that does mean to everyone, just public service announcement. Stop being cruel to rubber bands and snapping them on your wrist. Everyone, if that's been suggested to you, please just take the rubber band. That is not a way to punish yourself. Yeah, yeah, it's. There are still. Our CEO, Stephen Smith, had a therapist tell him to do that. Right.
- [29:41]
A
I can remember, like when you. I haven't thought about that in years, but I can remember that.
- [29:46]
B
Yeah, yeah.
- [29:47]
A
Oh, my gosh.
- [29:49]
B
Yeah. So I've started an anti cruelty to rubber band campaign so that we, we, we stopped doing those types of things. But, you know, it is, it is good to see where we are. But you are correct too, that the field is so young. You know, it's, it's only. We're only a few hundred years from when we thought all mental health issues were demonic possession and we were cutting holes in people's skulls to let the demons out. Right. That was just a few hundred years ago. So we, we have definitely in the last 50 or so years seen just exponential improvements.
- [30:27]
A
Yes.
- [30:28]
B
In the work that we've done for mental health in general and in the last 30 years for OCD specifically, the, the incredible amount of work that's been done. Yeah, it's. Yeah, it's really, really great. You know, if, if you had the magic wand ability to get a message out to everyone about mental health in general, what would you want to say to people?
- [30:54]
A
What a thought provoking question.
- [30:58]
B
Well, that's what I do as the host of the get to Know OCD podcast. Yeah, there you go.
- [31:03]
A
It's so. I mean, gosh, wouldn't you love to have a magic wand? I would just daily go nuts with it. I used to have an office next to a therapist and she had a magic wand on her desk that she would, she would wave over her clients sometimes. So it's pretty funny. If I had a magic wand, I would want us all to have the power to see and respond compassionately to the invisible pain that people hold. And the reason why is because so many people are wearing a mask and they're going through life and they're showing up for work and they're smiling and they might be showing up for their family and friends and nobody sees, nobody knows that they're holding internal pain in internal, invisible struggle. And wouldn't it be like magical if we could see that? And I just imagine if we could see internal pain, internal struggle, invisible pain, if we could see it just like we could a physical injury that people would be so compassionate and understanding to others and that would allow people to drop their mask and to be real and to open up and just make that space for healing.
- [32:56]
B
I'd love to do that too. On the therapy side of it, where people would accept the recommendations for mental health treatment in the same way they would for physical therapy. You know, if you had broken something and were told you need physical therapy twice a week, most people will figure out a way to make that happen. But if you're told that you need mental health treatment twice a week, I don't know, you know, and, and that's a hard push. So. But we know this and we do this for ourselves at no City. We know that front loading, that therapy at two sessions a week or even more potentially can really have a massive impact on the lives of people.
- [33:34]
A
Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
- [33:36]
B
And how important that is. Yeah, you know, you, online gets, gets a bad rap obviously at times, you know, with all sorts of various information out there. How do you, in the work you do, really make sure that you're. And, and I don't want this phrase in any way that I would think you would do anything else. But, you know, you, you are out there making sure that you're showing evidence base, you're doing it ethically, you're, you're giving out the truth about what's going on. There's obviously people out there who might just hear something and then want to make a video about it, say, oh, I heard this. And then, you know, they, they throw these out there. And sadly, some of those things could get a lot more views than, than what we might do where we're showing some of the evidence, the sensationalizing things. How do you though, just stick with making sure that the message is clear that here's the ethical way, here's the truth way, here's the right way to show people what's going on in the world and how to get help.
- [34:43]
A
It is important. That's really an Important topic. I do think as therapists we have a responsibility, if we have a therapist and a content creator, we have a responsibility to very thoughtfully consider what it is we want to put out. And hopefully we're doing so ethically. For me, that means staying with evidence based tools, evidence based therapies, or at least emerging evidence. But we're not going to be perfect because as you know, as we just talked about a few moments ago, our field is evolving. We're always evolving. And even as therapists, as people, we're evolving. And I look back at some of my older videos and I think, you know, I wouldn't say that in the same way today. Maybe that was five years ago and I would, I've evolved since then. I've learned something new since then. And so I do see that we're were evolving and so, but still we need to do the best that we can at being transparent. If I were to share something that was, had emerging evidence, but it wasn't considered evidence based yet, I like to be transparent about it. I like to say that in my video, this is not considered evidence based yet, but I think there is, this is interesting, it's interesting to talk about. And so I, I will bring, I will say something like that. So I think let's do our best as if we are therapists and we're content creators. Let's do our best to be ethical to, to talk about evidence based strategies. But if we're going, if we're pushing that envelope a little bit and talking about something else, let's be transparent about it. I think that's the best that we can do. And also to always keep in mind of how we are trying to help those people that have OCD and anxiety conditions.
- [37:06]
B
I love that. Thank you. And thank you for doing the work that you do with that on. Just a more personal question. I love the art behind you. I'm wondering if you could tell us a little bit about it. I think it's really beautiful.
- [37:18]
A
Well, my, my mother is a wonderful artist and, and so she, she has made some wonderful compositions and very colorful and I tend to fill my house with a lot of things my mother has done. And my son is an artist as well. My son's also a therapist.
- [37:39]
B
Oh, cool. Yeah, yeah, no, I, I, those are beautiful works there.
- [37:47]
A
Thank you so much.
- [37:48]
B
Tell your mom highly appreciate her work. Yeah, absolutely. There are people out there right now listening to this who feel as if they're alone. No one will understand them. This thing that I've got in my Head is so different than anything anybody's ever had before. I'm the only person who's ever had this thought, image, or urge. So common in ocd. Right. How do you. How do you motivate people to take that first step to. To recognize that that's probably not the case?
- [38:22]
A
Yeah, I. If someone is listening to us right now and is struggling in some way with. With mental health, I just want to give you the message that you are not broken, but you're having a very human response to whether it's uncertainty or stress, you know, anxiety, what pain, whatever you are dealing with, you're having a human response and there's help for that. Good mental health starts always with a proper diagnosis, a proper assessment. You have to really know what you're dealing with. And so we want to figure that out first, and then we want to look at what is it that really can help that condition. And that is really what I would call good mental health help. And some people have this feeling like they have to figure it all out on their own. You know, they feel some kind of shame if they have to ask for help. And I want you to know that asking for help is actually courageous. It's a strength. And there is such wonderful help out there. Now. Recovery is not a straight line. You know, there's good days and bad days, but it doesn't take away from the progress that you're making. And it is just. It's okay to reach out for help. You don't have to do this alone. And there is excellent help out there.
- [40:13]
B
I had an old CEO who had a term that he called terminal uniqueness. This. This notion that I'm the only person in the world who struggles with this. And so I, I like how you just said that, because that belief, I think, is one of the things that really stops people from getting help. They're. They're afraid if I say this out loud, it might come true. Like a magical thinking type of concern, or if I tell this to someone, they're going to call the police on me because no one should have this thought or image or urge. And I'm. I'm always kind of internally smiling when they finally take the risk, they say it and I just go. And anything else, and they look at me with like this confusion of. Wait, you're. You're not shocked by that? And no, I've heard that 14 times in the last two weeks that there's just. There's nothing really special about that one whatsoever. But, but people really do hold on to Those notions that, that what if this is, this is just something that's so different than anything else this person's ever heard before. Yeah.
- [41:19]
A
Yeah, absolutely.
- [41:21]
B
Paige, I would give you your, a last minute or two here just to send a message out to everyone because you know, your work is very influential and I appreciate your videos and even just. Yeah, and like you said, I do like your production. Even, even the Face with the F A, C E on it. I just, I love that graphic. I thought it was great, you know, so, you know. But what can people expect that they're going to hear from you? And what do you want them to take away?
- [41:51]
A
Yeah, I, I want people to feel just like you explained. I want few people to understand that they're not alone and I want them to, to feel understood if they're watching what anything that I put out there. I'm hoping that they understand that they are not the only one and that there is such wonderful help available and recovery is possible. Recovery doesn't mean that we're never going to have a scary thought or that we're never going to have that sensation again. That's not what recovery means. Recovery means that you will know what to do and you'll know what not to do. You'll know how to respond in those moments. You won't get sucked in anymore and you will change the way that you are relating to those experiences.
- [42:56]
B
That's awesome. Beautiful message. I really like that. And if people again want to find you and watch your info, where can they go?
- [43:04]
A
Yeah, they can find me at pagepradco.com and at page pradcotherapy on YouTube.
- [43:14]
B
Awesome. Paige, thank you so much for the work you do for being here with us today. This is a great conversation. I really appreciate it.
- [43:21]
A
Thank you, Patrick. I really appreciate that you gave me that opportunity. Thank you.
- [43:26]
B
Awesome. And thank all of you for watching us on the get to Know OCD podcast. If you like it, you can subscribe to the NOCD YouTube channel where you can watch other episodes and, and recordings of webinars that I do every Wednesday night. And if you're looking for help for OCD or related conditions, check us out@nocd.com that's nocd.com we work with OCD, body focused, repetitive behaviors, tics, anxiety disorders, hoarding, mood issues, trauma. And we also do our fun NOCD411 sessions. If you want an hour with an expert just to ask questions, we can do that too. So nocd.com we'll see you again in the future. Be good to yourselves. Thanks.