Oh, you think you’re OCD because you have a tidy sock drawer do you?

I’ve written this post, or at least very similar ones a number of times so why do I feel compelled to write it again? Well, the problem just doesn’t go away, and so I’ll keep speaking out about it because my blog is my platform to talk about things that are important to me and this is very important to me. 

My problem is with the way in which people use particular words, now, I understand that language is constantly evolving but I don’t believe that’s a good enough excuse for the way people throw around terms that are actually terms for describing mental health conditions. 

Yesterday for example I was watching Elementary which is my current favourite show, one of the characters had organised Sherlocks books, and their explanation for this was that she has a touch of OCD. As though OCD is a cute quirk that makes people organise things, I see a lot of this on twitter. Statements such as I’ve colour coordinated my sock drawer, I’m SO OCD. 

Elementary isn’t the first time I’ve seen this on a tv show, I watch a lot of crime shows and so often when they visit the home of the bad guy they’ll conclude that as the home is exceptionally tidy the bad guy must have OCD. 

Which as well as reinforcing the stereotype that people with OCD are just meticulously tidy, paints them as dangerous people. 

And of course it’s not just OCD. People use terms such as psycho, schizophrenic and mental to describe dangerous, weird or violent behaviour. 

While I’m on the subject of OCD the quizzes that you see on facebook that ask how OCD are you? Are extremely offensive. My way of dealing with these quizzes is to unfriend/unfollow/block the people who post them because they are reinforcing unhelpful and incorrect stereotypes. 

I have three children with tourettes and I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard people excuse their own swearing by joking that they had a bit of tourettes, and there’s a meme that does the rounds saying that talking on the phone to someone with small children is like talking to someone with tourettes. 

Tourettes is not funny. It’s also not just about swearing. None of my children have swearing tics. They do however have many involuntary tics ranging from small to large motor tics, which can be uncomfortable as well as painful and exhausting, they also have vocal tics which can be a source of much embarrassment. 

Their tics can also make every day life difficult for them. 

Psychosis, OCD, schizophrenia, tourettes etc are serious conditions which can have terrible impacts on the lives of people with such conditions. They are not now, never have been and never will be funny. 

My kids may sometimes joke about their own tics, this is a coping mechanism for living with the condition, but this doesn’t make it acceptable for other people to joke about it. 

People use terms such as special or window licker which are completely unacceptable and I’ve heard people refer to mentally ill people as needing to go on the special bus. 

Again this is hugely offensive. 

There’s a certain man who has recently been given a very high powered position (I’m sure you know who I mean) I’ve seen people, after he’s tweeted or said something dangerous/stupid/offensive saying that he’s obviously mentally ill but the thing is the implication that his behaviour is due to him being mentally ill also implies that people with mental illness are dangerous/offensive/stupid. None of us KNOW his mental state and speculation on it is not helpful. I mean, you can be an offensive, dangerous person without being mentally ill. 

People often bandy around terms that should only be used to describe mental illness without even giving their words any thought, but in my opinion ignorance is no excuse. 

Using terms such as OCD, psycho, schizo, tourettes etc in the wrong way serves only to undermine the seriousness of these conditions, and using words such as retard, special, nutjob etc is nothing short of incredibly offensive. 

I think it’s high time that people give some thought to their words before they use them because as I said ignorance is no excuse.