Specialized training.

Expertly led.

Lasting Results.

You might’ve tried traditional talk therapy before, and felt okay while you were there, only to have your symptoms resurge the moment the session ended. This is because our OCD brains work differently. It’s essential for individuals with "sticky brains" to work with a therapist who truly understands how the OCD brain works - even if the presenting concern does not seem directly related to OCD.

Without specialized training, traditional talk therapy can unintentionally reinforce compulsions, strengthen the obsessive-compulsive cycle, and worsen symptoms. OCD specialists are trained to recognize these patterns and provide treatment that supports recovery rather than inadvertently maintaining the disorder. Whether you’re new to therapy or searching for a better match, there is hope.

At Oceanside Psychotherapy, treatment is tailored to meet your unique needs and symptoms, using evidence-based therapies such as Exposure & Response Prevention (ERP), Comprehensive Behavioral (ComB) Treatment for Skin Picking & Hair Pulling Disorders, Habit Reversal Training (HRT), Prolonged Exposure Therapy, Comprehensive Behavioral Intervention for Tics (CBIT), Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions (SPACE), Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT), and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).

Below you can learn more about each condition and specialized treatment.

  • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a mental health condition characterized by obsessions and/or compulsions.

    Obsessions are unwanted, intrusive, and repetitive thoughts, images, urges, or doubts that cause distress, anxiety, discomfort, or uncertainty. OCD can attach to virtually anything, with common themes including contamination, harm, mistakes, “just right” feelings, relationships, religion, morality, and sexual orientation. Having an intrusive thought does not mean a person wants it, believes it, or will act on it.

    Compulsions are repetitive mental or physical behaviors performed to reduce distress, prevent a feared outcome, or gain certainty. They may include washing, checking, avoidance, reassurance-seeking, counting, reviewing memories or conversations, analyzing or “figuring out” thoughts, and repeating words or phrases. Mental compulsions can be especially difficult to recognize because they may appear to be ordinary thinking or problem-solving.

    OCD is ego-dystonic, meaning that the thoughts and urges conflict with a person's values, wants, or sense of identity. Obsessions and compulsions are difficult to control and cause significant distress and/or interfere with daily functioning.

    OCD often follows a cycle:

    Intrusive thought or doubt → distress → compulsion or avoidance → temporary relief → increased importance of the obsession → cycle repeats.

    Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps break this cycle by gradually helping individuals face feared thoughts, feelings, situations, or uncertainty while reducing reliance on compulsions and avoidance.

  • ERP is a form of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) commonly used to treat Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), panic, and anxiety. ERP consists of two parts: (1) Exposure: gradually and intentionally facing situations, thoughts, images, and feelings that hijack and trigger your anxiety/OCD; and (2) Response Prevention: resisting mental and physical safety behaviors that you normally rely on to reduce or manage your anxiety.

    The goal of ERP isn’t to make anxiety go away, it’s to help you live with and around your anxiety. With repeated practice, ERP can help you learn that:

    • Anxiety and uncertainty can be tolerated

    • You don't have to perform a compulsion to cope with uncomfortable feelings

    • Obsessive thoughts don't require action or certainty

    • Anxiety often decreases on its own when compulsions aren't performed

    ERP is a gradual and individualized treatment. Rather than throwing you headfirst into the most frightening situation, Dr. Raciti will collaborate with you to create an “exposure hierarchy” and work alongside you as you navigate each step. Because OCD often carries significant shame, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) can be a helpful add on to foster self-compassion, reduce the struggle with unwanted thoughts, and support values-based action.

  • SPACE (Supportive Parenting for Anxious Childhood Emotions) is a parent-based treatment for children and adolescents with anxiety disorders and related difficulties, including OCD. Rather than focusing primarily on the child, SPACE helps parents change how they respond to their child's anxiety.

    SPACE teaches parents to balance acceptance (i.e., acknowledging the child's distress) with confidence (i.e., communicating that the child is capable of managing difficult emotions and situations).

    A central focus is reducing family accommodation, such as providing repeated reassurance, participating in rituals, avoiding anxiety-provoking situations, or completing tasks for the child. While accommodation may reduce anxiety temporarily, it reinforces the belief that the child cannot cope independently.

    Parents learn to gradually reduce accommodations while remaining warm, validating, and supportive. For example, rather than repeatedly reassuring a child, a parent might say, "I can see that you're worried. I know this is difficult, and I believe you can handle it."

    For children with OCD, SPACE can help reduce parental involvement in reassurance, checking, avoidance, and compulsions. It can also complement ERP, which directly helps children face feared situations without engaging in compulsions.

    Ultimately, SPACE helps parents shift from trying to eliminate their child's anxiety to supporting their child, while building confidence in their ability to cope.

  • Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors (BFRBs) are repetitive behaviors that involve the body and can cause physical damage, distress, or difficulty functioning. Common BFRBs include hair pulling (trichotillomania), skin picking (excoriation disorder), and nail biting.

    Common Features:

    • Urges or tension: An increasing urge, tension, or uncomfortable sensation before the behavior.

    • Repetitive behavior: The person pulls, picks, bites, or otherwise focuses on a specific part of the body.

    • Relief or gratification: The behavior may provide temporary relief, satisfaction, or sensory stimulation.

    • Difficulty stopping: People may repeatedly try to reduce or stop the behavior but find it challenging.

    BFRBs are not simply bad habits or a lack of willpower. They can be difficult to control and may occur automatically, intentionally, or both. Behavioral treatment can help reduce the behavior and its physical and emotional impact.

  • ComB (Comprehensive Behavioral Treatment for Skin Picking and Hair Pulling Disorders) is a behavioral approach commonly used to treat body-focused repetitive behaviors (BFRBs), such as hair-pulling and skin-picking. HRT (Habit Reversal Training) is often incorporated into ComB as part of an individualized treatment plan.

    HRT focuses on increasing awareness of triggers and urges, using competing responses that make the BFRB more difficult to perform, and modifying the environment through stimulus control.

    ComB expands on these strategies by identifying the individual factors that contribute to or maintain the BFRB across five areas:

    • Sensory: Physical sensations that trigger or reinforce the behavior.

    • Cognitive: Thoughts, beliefs, or attention patterns.

    • Affective: Emotions such as anxiety, boredom, or frustration.

    • Motor: Movements or physical patterns associated with the behavior.

    • Environmental: Situations or settings that increase the likelihood of pulling or picking.

    Treatment is tailored to the factors most relevant to each person. In this way, HRT provides key behavioral strategies within the broader ComB framework, helping individuals develop greater awareness, reduce BFRB behaviors, and build alternative ways of responding to urges.

  • Tics are sudden, rapid, repetitive movements or sounds that a person feels driven to perform. They are common in childhood and can range from mild to severe. 

    Common motor tics include blinking, facial movements, shrugging, head jerking, or touching. Vocal tics, on the other hand, are sounds or words, like throat clearing, sniffing, grunting, coughing, or repeating sounds.

    Tics typically begin with a premonitory urge (an uncomfortable sensation or urge before a tic is expressed). Tics can often be held back briefly, but this may increase discomfort or the urge to tic. Stress, fatigue, excitement, and anxiety can increase tic frequency or intensity. The types and severity of tics may vary over time. Importantly, tics are involuntary or difficult-to-control behaviors, not simply habits or intentional behaviors.

  • Comprehensive Behavioral Intervention for Tics (CBIT) is a structured, non-medication therapy for tic disorders, including Tourette syndrome. Based largely on HRT, it teaches people to recognize tics and premonitory urges and use alternative behaviors and competing responses to reduce their frequency, intensity, and impact.

    CBIT is not about constantly suppressing tics. Instead, it aims to help people manage tics more effectively and reduce their impact on daily functioning.

  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) can develop after experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event and can affect thoughts, emotions, physical responses, and daily functioning. After trauma, the brain and body may remain on high alert even after the danger has passed. 

    Common Symptoms include intrusive and unwanted memories, nightmares, or flashbacks; avoidance of trauma reminders; changes in mood and thinking (fear, guilt, shame, emotional numbness, or negative beliefs); and hyperarousal (being easily startled, tense, irritable, watchful, and having difficulty sleeping and concentrating).

    PTSD is more than simply having difficulty coping after a traumatic event. Symptoms persist and cause meaningful distress and impairment.

  • Prolonged Exposure (PE) is a structured, trauma-focused therapy primarily used to treat PTSD. It helps people gradually face trauma-related memories, feelings, and safe situations they have been avoiding.

    Main Components:

    • Psychoeducation: Learn about PTSD, avoidance, and trauma responses.

    • In vivo exposure: Gradually approach safe situations or activities that have been avoided because they trigger distress.

    • Imaginal exposure: Repeatedly recount the traumatic memory in detail in a safe therapeutic setting.

    • Processing: Discuss thoughts, emotions, and reactions following exposure.

    • Breathing skills: Learn techniques to manage distress during treatment.

    PE is not about forgetting or minimizing the trauma; rather, it aims to reduce avoidance and increase a person's sense of control and ability to function.