Fear of knives

[Guest guest]

Jo,

My now 13yo daughter, " Spunky " was diagnosed with OCD

at age 9. It came on suddenly, two weeks after her two

siblings started high school at the public school,

after having homeschooled for years, together. Spunky

started crying all day long (NOT normal for her, a

formerly joyous child). She had an extreme fear of

knives, not even wanting to go in the kitchen for fear

of seeing one, or having to touch one (such as to take

it out of the dishwasher and put it away, which she

had done with no problem, the day before). She

suddenly had a fear of snakes that made her scared to

even TALK about a snake, let alone look at a photo of

one. She feared poison in her food with every slight

discoloration of any part of any food. She was so

scared of death, as a topic of thought, she refused to

study history, because she knew that the people we

were reading about had died! She wouldn't study

science, as sometimes the topic of an animal's death

might come up. She couldn't concentrate on math. This

was all new for her. She had previously been a great

worker, and loved learning. Since her older sister had

been diagnosed with severe OCD the year before (which

had also come on suddenly, after she drank a lot of

coffee and lost some sleep), I took her directly to

the psychiatrist and he diagnosed depression and OCD.

She started on medication (Prozac). I already knew how

to do E/RP, so I had my daughter see a counselor a few

times, and then started my own E/RP with Spunky at

home. She sat on my lap as I pulled up photos of

snakes on the computer monitor. She would glance, then

look away. We progressed slowly to handling rubber

snakes, then looking at videos of snakes, then reading

about snakes ... and eventually, she became so

interested in snakes that when our neighbor had one in

his yard, Spunky was the one to suggest catching it

under a bucket, and she stood and watched while her

friend's dad did this. We worked on the fear of knives

the same way. First, she had to stand at the kitchen

doorway and watch me handle the knives. Later, she was

expected to put away the butter knives. Eventually,

she put away the sharper knives. Then, she later was

able to cut soft things with knives. She also

confessed to me that the fear of knives was related to

the scary thoughts she had, in which she pictured

herself grabbing a knife and attacking me, or her

brother, or someone else. She was terrified of these

thoughts. With the E/RP, she finally realized, once

and for all, that the thoughts were not " hers " and

they were not " willful " and she would never harm

anyone. She is completely fine with all her former

fears, now. They are all gone. Once in awhile, she

forgets to take her meds and washes her hands too

much. I remind her, and then she stops.

in VA

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