Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 1

Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder - Essay Example ated with the disorder are often fixated on such effects as inflicting harm upon another person or creature, dealing with failures in one’s personal life, or sexuality. Very often those who must deal with obsessions and compulsions over which they have no control begin to feel as they might be slipping into insanity. The compulsions can be wide-ranging, but almost all are typically situated within the psyche as a means to relieve anxiety. OCD is often described as an exaggeration of the quite common ability of the human mind to force one to obsess upon a single idea. For instance, who hasn’t found themselves absently humming the same tune over and again in an almost compulsive manner? The difference between the normality of obsessive and compulsive desires like these is that when the average person become aware of the act they are capable of stopping themselves. The sufferers of OCD, by contrast, cannot. Though designated as a mental disorder, current research indicates that the cause of OCD is neurobiological. Neurons in the brain of those who suffer from OCD have been discovered to have a high sensitivity to serotonin. Serotonin is a chemical that assists in the transmission of signals to the brain. Further research indicates that the trigger of OCD may be the onset of puberty, the effect of mental stress, and possibly even a genetic predisposition toward the development of the diseases (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Part I). Successful treatment of OCD in the past few years has been accomplished through the use of medication, specifically that family of antidepressant drugs known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). The most popular drugs for treating OCD have been clomipramine (Anafranil), fluoxetine (Prozac), fluvoxamine (Luvox), and sertraline (Zoloft) (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Part I). These medications treatment the symptoms of OCD through altering the level of serotonin utilized in the transmission of signals to