Melissa Jacobs: OCD is no joke

There's only one dedicated centre offering intensive treatment for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and it's based in London. I am biased because my life was deeply affected by this crippling disorder but I find this state of affairs completely unacceptable.

I am referring to genuine OCD, not the sort that afflicts David Beckham, Billy Bob Thornton and various other celebrities who are obsessively tidy and have their own rituals; the real OCD is rather more debilitating than that. The confusion may seem harmless enough — after all, both conditions are rooted in ritual and orderliness — but every time someone misdiagnoses themselves as an OCD sufferer it dilutes the real story.

OCD is, in fact, a serious anxiety disorder characterised by frequent intrusive thoughts or fears. The World Health Organisation has listed it as one of the top 10 most debilitating illnesses.

I should know. My OCD got so bad that I had to move flat because, in my mind, it had become contaminated. Every time I walked through the door, I felt a wave of insufferable anxiety wash over me. And once inside I couldn't touch anything without having to scrub my hands clean, or take a shower.

It is hard to understand and it sounds completely crazy but to those of us with proper OCD, it is all too real. Of course we know that our fears are irrational. But sufferers find it impossible to reason themselves out of it because OCD is due to over-activity in a specific part of the brain. This means the fears don't pass as they do with "normal" people. Instead they persist, become more frequent and cause ever-increasing levels of anxiety. The rituals are our way of reducing that anxiety; then we become locked into a cycle of intrusive thought and ritual.

It takes a long time for OCD to become this life-altering. I had managed to live a pretty normal life since OCD first struck in 1996, when I was 24, during a biology summer studentship at Yale University.

I spent the subsequent 13 years suffering from relatively mild OCD. Every sufferer has intrusive thoughts which are unique to them. Mine involved fear of contamination but it was only my own possessions which troubled me and so did not affect my relationships or life too much. In fact, I felt much happier when out of my flat or visiting someone else, because his or her home was contamination-free. That meant most people never saw my overzealous hand-washing as I ensured that I was always the guest rather than the host.

It was only last year that my condition reached life-halting proportions. I was forced to move out of my flat because the anxiety became unbearable, and I was also unable to work. Then I knew I had to act. I could no longer put off seeking intensive help.

Failure to find a programme in the UK meant that I returned to the US, where there are countless dedicated OCD treatment centres. I chose the one aligned to Harvard Medical School.