OCD Therapy for Adults in California

Specialized assessment and treatment of OCD, including intrusive thoughts, rumination, chronic guilt, mental compulsions, emotional responsibility for others’ distress, and the feeling that you need to be certain you have done the right thing.

In-person in Monrovia • Telehealth throughout California

Currently accepting new clients

Schedule an OCD Consultation

Could This Be OCD?

You may not think of yourself as having OCD. You may think you simply worry too much, overthink everything, feel guilty easily, or have a hard time letting things go.

OCD does not always look like excessive handwashing, checking locks, or visible rituals. Some of the most exhausting compulsions happen entirely inside the mind.

Do you …

• Feel responsible for making sure nothing goes wrong?
• Have intrusive thoughts that seem completely inconsistent with what you value?
• Keep thinking about a problem to be certain you haven’t done something hurtful?
• Feel compelled to make sure you have done the right thing?

Sometimes the question is not simply “Why do I worry so much?” but more “What am I trying to become certain about?”

OCD Can Take Many Forms

I work with adults experiencing many forms of OCD, with particular clinical interests in OCD involving responsibility, harm, morality, scrupulosity, rumination, and mental compulsions.

• Relationship OCD: Persistent doubts about a relationship, attraction, feelings, compatibility, or whether the relationship is “right enough.”
• Sexual OCD: Unwanted sexual thoughts, images, or doubts that feel disturbing or inconsistent with the person’s values and may lead to repeated checking or attempts to determine what the thoughts mean.
• Just-Right / Symmetry / Perfectionism OCD: A need for things to feel complete, exact, symmetrical, or “just right,” sometimes leading to repeating actions until they feel correct.
• Rumination & Mental Compulsions: Repeatedly reviewing, analyzing, figuring out, testing, replaying, neutralizing, or trying to reach certainty. These compulsions can be difficult to recognize because no one else can see them.

• Responsibility OCD: Persistent doubt about whether you have done enough, made the right decision, overlooked something important, fulfilled your obligations, or should be doing more to prevent an unwanted outcome.
• Harm OCD: Unwanted intrusive thoughts, images, impulses, or doubts about intentionally or accidentally harming yourself or someone else, often accompanied by fear about what having these thoughts might mean.
• Moral OCD: Persistent doubts about whether your actions, intentions, thoughts, or past behavior were morally acceptable, sometimes accompanied by excessive guilt, apologizing, researching, reviewing, or questioning whether you are a good person.
• Religious/Scrupulosity OCD: Fear of offending God, sinning, or not doing enough, which may include excessive or ritualized praying, confessing, reviewing, or reassurance seeking.
• Contamination and Illness OCD: Fears involving germs, contamination, becoming ill, or causing someone else to become ill.
• Relationship OCD: Persistent doubts about a relationship, attraction, feelings, compatibility, or whether the relationship is “right enough.”
• Sexual OCD: Unwanted sexual thoughts, images, or doubts that feel disturbing or inconsistent with the person’s values and may lead to repeated checking or attempts to determine what the thoughts mean.
• Just-Right / Symmetry / Perfectionism OCD: A need for things to feel complete, exact, symmetrical, or “just right,” sometimes leading to repeating actions until they feel correct.
• Rumination & Mental Compulsions: Repeatedly reviewing, analyzing, figuring out, testing, replaying, neutralizing, or trying to reach certainty. These compulsions can be difficult to recognize because no one else can see them.

Inflated responsibility can be especially important in some OCD presentations, particularly when a person feels compelled to prevent unwanted outcomes, make certain they have done enough, eliminate the possibility of being responsible, prevent another’s disappointment in their expectations of you, or fix another’s distress.

OCD therapists like to say that it is really tough to shock us. We’ve heard quite a lot!

Schedule an OCD Consultation

What Is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is characterized by unwanted, intrusive thoughts, images, urges, sensations, or doubts (obsessions) and repetitive behaviors or mental acts (compulsions). These patterns can cause significant distress and interfere with daily life.

One way I sometimes help clients conceptualize OCD is as a system that has developed rules for keeping them emotionally safe. The rules promise certainty or protection, but following them rarely produces lasting relief from fear, guilt, or shame.

Common Symptoms: Obsessions and Compulsions

Obsessions

An obsession can be an intrusive thought, image, sensation, urge, or doubt. Think of obsessions as experiences that hook into our fears and create an urgent need to know, fix, prevent, or resolve something.

Compulsions

What do we do when we are afraid? We try to feel safer. Compulsions are the physical or mental things we do to reduce distress, prevent a feared outcome, or obtain certainty.

Most people recognize checking, cleaning, arranging, or repeating. But compulsions can also be much less visible: seeking reassurance, avoiding, praying in a rigid or ritualized way, replacing “bad” thoughts with “good” thoughts, confessing, oversharing, mentally reviewing, overthinking, researching, or repeatedly trying to figure something out.

Rumination can be one of the sneakiest mental compulsions because it can feel like productive thinking when it is actually an attempt to reach certainty.

The very acts and rituals that have helped you feel safe may now be part of what is keeping you stuck.

Learn More about OCD

• International OCD Foundation (IOCDF): The IOCDF is a major hub for OCD information, treatment guidelines, self-help resources, support groups, and downloadable brochures/fact sheets.
  Link: International OCD Foundation | Educational Resources
• Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA): The ADAA is broader to include anxiety and depression, but there is dedicated content on OCD for treatment explanations, therapist directories, webinars, etc.
  Link: Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Diagnosis and Assessment

OCD is typically diagnosed by a qualified mental health professional through an assessment of symptoms, their impact, and the patterns of obsessions and compulsions involved.

Many people are surprised by how extensively OCD has entered their lives. Someone may seek help because of contamination fears, for example, and then recognize patterns involving mistakes, guilt, reassurance, perfectionism, or mental reviewing that they had never connected with OCD.

You do not need to diagnose yourself before contacting me. An assessment can help us understand whether your experiences are consistent with OCD and what type of treatment may be appropriate.

How I Treat OCD

Treatment is individualized to the person and to the particular way OCD operates in their life.

• Cognitive & Behavioral Work: When appropriate, we examine thinking and behavior patterns that reinforce OCD and practice responding with greater flexibility rather than pursuing certainty.
• Addressing Responsibility & Guilt When Relevant: For clients whose OCD involves inflated responsibility, treatment may also address beliefs about responsibility, guilt, self-trust, boundaries, and the perceived consequences of not preventing an unwanted outcome.

Schedule an OCD Consultation

Meet Edie Garnder, LCSW

I am a California Licensed Clinical Social Worker specializing in working with adults with OCD. My work includes Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), cognitive and behavioral approaches, and particular attention to less-visible OCD patterns such as rumination, mental compulsions, chronic guilt, scrupulosity, and inflated responsibility.

I also have lived experience with OCD. That experience does not replace clinical training, but it has given me an appreciation for how subtle and covert OCD can be and how easily compulsions can become mistaken for personality, conscientiousness, or simply “the way I am.”

Treatment is available in person in Monrovia and by telehealth throughout California.

Learn More About Edie

What Working Together Looks Like

• In-person sessions in Monrovia, California
• Telehealth throughout California
• Currently accepting new clients

The next step is to contact the practice through SimplePractice so we can determine whether my services are an appropriate fit for what you are experiencing.

Ready to Get Started?

If OCD is consuming your time, creating persistent guilt or doubt, or keeping you trapped in cycles of checking, reassurance, avoidance, mental reviewing, or rumination, specialized treatment can help you begin responding differently.

Schedule an OCD Consultation

Adults 18+   •   Private pay   •   Monrovia + California telehealth