OCD Tricks: Blending / Inference-Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT)

This video presents the cutting-edge concept of Blending, which comes to us from Inference Based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (I-CBT).
I'm Michael Parker, LCSW, a therapist in private practice in Pittsburgh, PA. You can visit my practice website at: www.pittsburgh...
You can check out my self-help book, The OCD Travel Guide, which is available on Amazon: www.amazon.com.... This self-guided treatment manual is based on ACT and ERP approaches to OCD.
Intro Music Credits:
Big Bird's Date Night by Twin Musicom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. creativecommon...
Artist: www.twinmusicom...

[@aguywithocd]

Essentially blending is akin to black/white thinking where something is either contaminated or it's not, there's no grey area because one has blended into thinking in terms of yes or no.

[@OCDspace412]

You make a good point. OCD is all about generalizing and abstracting, and removing context and nuance. I'm probably more inclined to say that black and white / all or nothing thinking are consequences of blending. The blending occurs at the core conceptual level. So, once I've blended checking homework with being a good student or asking for forgiveness with being devout or picking up litter with being responsible, I'm now locked into doing those behaviors. And like you said, when I don't do the behavior, it now feels like the inverse is true. I'm a bad student, I'm heretical, I'm irresponsible. Thanks for pointing that out.

[@MegaSaanch]

Waiting for more of your videos… These days I have been going backward to the pre-OCD period of my life, where it was dormant. Then I had very low insight, life was filled with a stagnancy where everything seemed to be in a different isolated and separated reality with no happiness and constant rumination about basically everything. This is making me fall into a comfort zone because it was the period where I was all 20 years however, I am not at all happy and can’t do anything which I still was able to as I was making progress. I don’t know honestly where am I falling… 🤔 I have blended stuff for 20 years in my life- and this insight tool helped me come out of a major spike I was facing-

[@CQM-y6v]

I’m glad you added so many examples because as someone who has spent SO MUCH TIME compulsively researching lead paint I was really not on board at first. 😂 It seems like this de-blending needs to be done with a therapist or with a set of parameters that prevent the parsing of context from becoming a compulsion of its own. That’s where my brain spends the most time - trying to figure out what “clean enough” or “safe enough” or “responsible enough” actually is. I understood the intent of what you were saying but just want to point out that trying to add context can become its own compulsion if you aren’t careful. Thank you for these wonderful videos though; I am learning so much!

[@OCDspace412]

Thank you for bringing that all up! I would agree that it's helpful to go through this process with a therapist because we can't always see our own thought processes without that external help/guide. And such a good point how 'deblending" could totally devolve into more obsessional doubt. The key, I think, is get deeply acquainted with the difference between being in that state of trusting oneself and the information one has available vs. doubting oneself and the available information. It's probably really hard to de-blend things when you're not in that state of trust. I also like to point out that a 'lack of information' is actually really important information to be trusted. If there is no irrefutable, direct evidence identifying that there is toxic dust in the air, at some point, that has to be enough information to draw a conclusion and move on. Thanks for commenting. I hope that helps!

[@CQM-y6v]

@@OCDspace412 Yes, you distilled it perfectly to the state of trust. Thank you!

[@husainsattar4671]

So I check but internally what I know. It’s kind of a rumination, sometimes it used to be from what if thoughts , sometimes other thoughts . But now I know the what ifs are just obsessional doubt . The more I check or ruminate the more I will cause that pathological doubt to be in place. My question is if one stops answering or ruminating or checking what I know, how long will it be before this pathological doubt goes?

[@OCDspace412]

Such a good question. Ultimately, I think of doubt as a distrust of what one knows to be true. It's a repetitive pattern of ignoring and rejecting the information you have, and thinking you need to go beyond what you currently know. And I think trust is the answer. Trust is the opposite of doubt. It's a reconnecting with what one knows. And real, genuine knowledge isn't something one has to go searching or checking for. I tell my client "You know stuff. You just need to trust it." Just like one knows whether or not they need to sneeze right now. Real knowledge is effortless and simple. But it can only happen through trusting sensory information and believing that is enough. These can be big, complicated topics that require more in depth work, but I hope that helps!

[@kentmarcus1255]

Awesome video! Would you be able to do a video on Real Event OCD? That would be amazing.

[@OCDspace412]

Yes. I'll do one soon!

[@andreasjohansson2490]

Thank You for the video. I just realise I do alot of blending for my OCD

[@OCDspace412]

Glad this was helpful!

[@husainsattar4671]

So I really want to get back to being the way I used to be ie good self care exercise etc. but I became afraid that I may never be the same going forward so in a sense it will be hard to be myself or someone who acts on his values and looks after himself. But if I try to obsess about being this guy, then correct me if I’m wrong ocd will convince me that I’m not this guy, so I won’t feel like doing these things? They call it fear of fear. Any suggestions from icbt?

[@OCDspace412]

I think you would find that ICBT places less focus on a "you vs OCD" approach, and asks you to identify why you have come to believe these negative things about yourself (i.e. it's not just OCD telling you this, you are believing this about yourself for some reason). The core issue in OCD from an inference-based approach is a distrust you have in yourself and a focus on a feared possible self. You start to give this feared "you" that exists in your mind more weight than the real you that is out there functioning in the world on a day-to-day basis. ICBT helps people to trust the self that exists right now in this moment and give that more weight than the feared self. The treatment helps you to start making clear judgments about yourself again. I would definitely recommend looking into some of the resources available on the website: icbt.online/ Hope that helps!

[@lifematterspodcast]

This is very helpful. I am integrating these tools. Would you say overall medication is a net benefit or more case by case?

[@OCDspace412]

Many people benefit from medication, and it is definitely on a case-by-case basis.

[@jerboshow]

Thank you for the vid! This helps me with the concept a good deal.

[@OCDspace412]

Thank you for the feedback. So happy this helped!

[@purryellis]

I can now see how I 'blend' things that are my triggers!

[@OCDspace412]

Awesome. It really is such a helpful concept!

[@sw8281]

Great video. Thanks!

[@OCDspace412]

Thanks for watching. Happy it was helpful!

[@ArmandoDeLaGarza-t7r]

Great work/info Mike!!! Thank you!

[@OCDspace412]

Glad it was helpful!

[@UsernamehereCustoms]

Been having an unbelievably absurd blending problem recently that eventually led me to this video. For context, there are two nations that I have two different opinions and feelings about, but their flags are pretty similar. I've never had a problem with this, my brain was able to contextualize them and keep them separate as concepts, but one time back in August I looked at one of those flags and mistakenly felt the feelings associated with the other one because of how similar they look, and it was all wrong. Now as a result, both countries are blended in my head and the blend itself has almost become an obsession - I can't stop thinking about it because my brain desperately wants things to return to normal and wants those nations de-blended as soon as possible so I can get on with my life. So my question is, how could I use cognitive behavioral therapy to get these concepts de-blended in my head?

[@OCDspace412]

I can't provide specific therapeutic advice, but I'm happy to clarify the concept of Blending. In the situation you describe, I'm not so sure that blending is the main issue. It sounds like there are still 2 separate opinions that can be identified, but questions have emerged around whether these opinions/feelings can be trusted. In other words, you used to feel certain about your beliefs, but this event (feeling the wrong feeling when looking at one of the flags) has created self-doubt. The goal from an ICBT perspective would be to re-establish trust in yourself and your beliefs. When you trust your own beliefs, an event like you describe is irrelevant. It is simply a random mistake with no consequence for your beliefs. When there is a fear about oneself (what if I don't truly believe what I think I believe), random events can suddenly seem significant. If this sounds accurate, I would say that ICBT could be quite helpful for this issue. Thanks for finding my video. I hope this adds some clarity.

[@UsernamehereCustoms]

@@OCDspace412 Thank you so much for getting back to me so quickly, I appreciate it. I haven't really considered if beliefs had anything to do with it, I thought it was entirely down to some sort of a decontextualization problem because ever since then I've had moments where it genuinely feels like I get the same feelings for both flags even though I know I'm supposed to get two different ones. Maybe you're right about the belief part though - maybe I'm subconsciously having trouble "trusting" my belief system surrounding those flags, because the beliefs got mixed up one time due to an innocent mistake and so nothing feels right anymore and the belief has to be rebuilt from scratch. You've definitely given me something to think about, thank you again - and I'll definitely look more into ICBT.

[@OCDspace412]

@@UsernamehereCustoms Good luck on your journey. I definitely recommend checking out the ICBT website when looking for support from this perspective.