This week Jess and Laura tackle one of the most stigmatised “taboo” OCD subtypes around — POCD, - and because we don’t want to get shadow banned, we will refer to it as “PDF File” – but we are not using this term as avoidance, or to avoid triggering anyone - just so you know! It shows up most as intrusive, unwanted sexual thoughts, images, doubts, words about children.

This is the one that sends people spiralling in shame and silence instead of reaching out for help. They break down what it actually is (and crucially, what it isn't), why groinal responses happen, what recovery looks like, and why the fact that these thoughts horrify you matters more than you think. This is an episode that will not only help you to feel less alone, but it will highlight exactly how to ask for help, and where to get it. Plus, Jess finally gets Laura crying on the podcast.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Edited by Christian Nickson

Time stamps

01:39 Hellos and introductions

02:59 Brain Spam

07:00 Peadophilia vs POCD

10:45 A message for people supporting those with POCD

17:58 How can pOCD look? And a little note on incest thoughts

28:37 What is a groinal response and why does it happen?

35:10 Shame in POCD

41:54 Recommended help and resources

46:20 When POCD pairs up with other themes

49:10 What does recovery look like?

51:10 Statistics about types of thoughts

53:23 Final tips

55:40 Weekly Win

58:52 Exposure Lab

1:02:00 Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram and Tiktok: @justcheckingpod

For our individual OCD pages, you can find Laura on Tiktok and Instagram as @ocdtherapylaura and Jess as @jess_helps_your_ocd

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Description:

⚠️ Content warning: this episode contains discussion of suicidal ideation and themes that some listeners might find distressing.

pOCD — pedophilia-themed OCD — is one of the most misunderstood and stigmatised subtypes out there, and Molly Lambert has lived it. In this episode, Molly shares what her intrusive thoughts actually looked and felt like: from existential anxiety to fears about being a paedophile, magical thinking, emotional checking, and the spiral that nearly broke her. She talks honestly about suicidal ideation, how TikTok helped her find her way, what it took to finally share her thoughts with others — and what acceptance can actually look like on the other side.

Laura, Jess and Molly also dig into how common pOCD really is, why it tends to hit the people it does, how therapy helped, and why Molly now advocates publicly for OCD awareness (including how she handles the inevitable backlash). Plus: postpartum mums and pOCD, the role of drinking and distraction, and Molly gets involved in the Brain Spam feature 🧠

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Featuring Molly Lambert, OCD and mental illness advocate

Edited by Christian Nickson

Timestamps:

01:00 Hellos

01:30 Introducing Molly Lambert

02:57 What were Molly's thoughts like? From existential anxiety to paedophile fears

05:20 Magical thinking and checking emotions

09:20 When the pOCD started to spiral

14:40 How common is pOCD and why does it happen?

16:45 Thinking about suicide

17:30 What helped Molly realise it was OCD?

19:30 How drinking and distractions fit in

20:50 How TikTok helped

23:45 Other themes sneaking in

25:30 Starting to share the thoughts with others

28:30 Sharing with family

30:10 Advice for sharing — and Molly's experience of others' reactions

31:20 Therapy for Molly's OCD

35:47 Pursuing an OCD diagnosis

41:15 What acceptance can look like

45:00 Laura's OCD Doris

46:00 OCD help needs to be personalised

47:15 Molly's advocacy work for OCD

53:12 How Molly deals with negative feedback online

58:00 Postpartum mums and pOCD

1:04:50 How do Molly's friends and family help?

1:07:00 Where to find information and support

1:12:12 What did 15-year-old Molly need to hear?

1:14:33 Brain Spam

1:18:50 Wins of the Week

1:20:00 Avoidance in pOCD

1:20:25 Exposure Lab

1:22:30 Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram and TikTok: @justcheckingpod

For our individual OCD Instagram and Tiktok pages: @jess_helps_your_ocd and @ocdtherapylaura

Please check out our privacy policy: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Are you a terrible person, or does your brain just really, really want you to think so? This week Jess and Laura get into moral scrupulosity OCD — the subtype where intrusive thoughts aren't about harm or contamination, but about your fundamental character, your values, and whether you've done something unforgivable.

Laura gets personal about her own moral OCD compulsions (yes, really), and they unpack why this subtype hits so differently — the shame, the thought-action fusion, and why reassurance-seeking feels almost morally necessary in itself. Plus: a detour into horse willies, a neurodivergent shout-out, and an unexpectedly deep dive into manifesting.

🧠 Brain Spam, an Exposure Lab, and a listener question about supporting a loved one with moral OCD round things out nicely.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Edited by Laura Mole

Time stamps

00:43 Stuff you might Google with Moral scrupulosity OCD

02:50 Introduction and catch up

09:00 Brain 🧠 Spam

14:30 Horse willies

15:30 What moral OCD is

18:00 Laura's moral OCD compulsions

26:30 Why does it feel so bad?

28:11 What if i have actually done something bad?

31:35 Differences in therapy to help moral OCD; tolerating uncertainty, compassion, and thought-action-fusion.

40:46 Autistic shout-out

42:00 OCD irony

44:25 Manifesting and OCD

50:22 Question from a listener: Supporting a loved one

59:02 Exposure Lab

1:02:45 Upcoming episode themes

1:03:23 Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram and TikTok: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Ever wondered what goes on behind the therapy room door? This week Jess and Laura answer your questions about therapist life — from why therapy costs what it does to whether we actually have our own therapy (spoiler: yes). It's honest, a little unfiltered, and probably not what you'd expect. Dive in and get to know us better, and listen to what we worry about in OCD therapy too.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Edited by Christian Nickson

Time stamps:

00:00 Introductions and hellos

04:30 Today's themes

05:14 Brain Spam

13:00 Question for a therapist: what are you writing?

18:18 Therapy costs and the ick

27:26 People selling OCD dreams

32:20 What if you don't like your therapist?

39:55 Do therapists have therapy?

43:50 How we juggle work and look after ourselves

48:00 EMDR therapy for OCD

50:57 How does your therapist feel?

57:00 What your therapist finds hard when working with OCD

1:00:40 Therapist Weekly Wins

1:03:15 Exposure Lab

1:08:40 Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Do you love your partner? Are you sure? What about now? Still sure? If your brain won't stop cross-examining your own feelings, this one's for you.

In this episode, Jess and Laura dig into relationship OCD (rOCD) — the subtype that turns love into a courtroom and your own mind into the world's most annoying prosecutor. We cover what rOCD actually looks like, why it's so easy to mistake for genuine doubt, and how it gets you stuck in a loop of checking, reassurance-seeking, and mental reviewing that makes everything worse (classic OCD, honestly).

We also get into retroactive jealousy, false memories (yes, including the "did I actually kiss someone at that party in 2009?" variety), where our weirdly perfectionist ideas about relationships come from, and how different treatment approaches can help you stop taking your brain spam quite so literally.

Plus: The rOCD trap, some extra considerations for this subtype, and a surprise cameo in the Exposure Lab.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Edited by Christian Nickson

Time stamps:

00:00 Relationship OCD Google searches

02:47 Intro and hello

04:40 Brain Spam

07:20 Why relationship OCD?

07:42 What is rOCD and what does it look like?

12:45 What might someone with rOCD do?

15:00 Where we get perfectionist views of relationships

19:49 The relationship OCD trap

23:20 Retroactive jealousy

24:00 Did I just kiss that person? And other false memories

27:20 Is this OCD or normal doubt?

36:19 How do we work with rOCD?

40:00 How different approaches can work for OCD

47:30 Extra considerations for this subtype of OCD

1:02:34 Exposure Lab and Peter's cameo

1:05:55 Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Ever watched someone you love spiral and had no idea what to do — so you just… answered the question? Yeah. This week we're talking directly to the OCD support squad: partners, parents, siblings, and anyone else who's been accidentally colluding with OCD while trying to be a good human.

We cover why OCD feels the way it does (brain spam, basically), the sneaky reassurance traps even the most well-meaning loved ones fall into, what to actually say instead, and how to look after yourself in all of this. Warm, honest, occasionally chaotic, and featuring Laura's chunky rims and some words that made Jess blush.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

Edited by Christian Nickson

Time stamps:

00:40 Introductions and chunky rims

02:30 What we are covering and upcoming episodes

03:50 Brain spam

07:20 Recap of the OCD cycle

10:15 How OCD feels to someone with it

13:46 An example of what OCD is like for the person

18:00 Example of the impact of OCD on their loved one

20:02 Family accommodation and reinforcing the OCD

22:15 Reducing reassurance in a gradual and supportive way

26:42 Expectations and time frames for dropping reassurance

27:45 The reassurance trap and sneaky reassurance

30:30 Phrases to use instead of reassurance

31:15 The reassurance book

33:42 Validating the emotion, not the thoughts

34:30 Reassuring the person, not the OCD phrases

35:45 Managing the shame of a 'failed' exposure

36:40 Balancing care vs colliding with OCD when you need to manage your own emotions

39:07 Attending a therapy session

41:19 How to support exposures or behavioural experiments

47:18 Helping to advocate for a loved one with OCD

49:50 Neurodivergent considerations

52:10 Support for the supporter

54:00 What if the loved one doesn't want help?

57:18 What people with OCD want you to know

1:00:15 Do's and dont's

1:02:48 OCD Wins of the Week

1:04:13 Exposure Lab

1:06:15 Goodbye!

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Convinced you'll be the one person who does Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) wrong? This one's for you. Jess Hayes and Laura Mole walk through how ERP actually works — who picks the exposures, how scary they need to be, and why you genuinely cannot fail — plus what happens when therapy ends.

Exposure and Response Prevention is all about exposing yourself to your OCD fears (exposure) and then making active choices in not engaging in compulsions and avoidance (response prevention) to challenge the OCD, and it is often referred to as the 'gold standard' of OCD treatment. This episode explores why it can be a helpful approach, and future episodes will discuss some alternatives.

Podcast by

Laura Mole, Adv. Dip, MBACP OCD specialist therapist

and

Jessica Hayes, Msc PGDip, BABCP Accred OCD and perinatal specialist therapist

and

Christian Nickson, editor

Time stamps:

02:00 Brain spam

05:20 OCD brains need to obsess

07:20 Compassionate other voices

09:20 Erp as the gold standard, what is it?

10:45 Amygdala, the brain, and the threat response

15:44 How erp fits into cognitive behavioural therapy

18:40 Which cbt treatments are unhelpful for OCD

21:45 Brody and their contamination OCD

24:20 How might erp look like for Brody?

26:30 What we don't do with erp

27:10 Do you have to immediately do exposures?

27:30 Who picks the exposures?

28:30 You are in control and what to do if you aren't ready?

29:28 You can't fail your erp

31:15 How scary should exposures be? How Brody tackles erp

34:29 What to do to make erp work?

36:00 How family and other support can help

41:10 What comes after therapy?

43:00 When does erp not work?

46:34 Erp is imperfect

49:05 Questions from the listeners: Erp and medication

51:20 Key takeaways for erp for OCD

51:55 OCD Weekly Wins

52:56 Exposure Lab feedback

55:20 Exposure Lab for contamination OCD

56:20 Thank you and goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.

Come with us, Laura Mole and Jess Hayes, as we explore the 'checking' in 'Just Checking'. You get to hear about a day in the life of Shenrique, as we talk all about how they check to make sure that they aren't a bad person, then take a lesson from vampire superstitions to break the OCD loop. As always, you also get a look into our brain spam, and get to shout out your weekly OCD wins too.

Time Stamps:

01:30: Dramas through our week

07:00: What OCD Doris has been up to

10:30: Interoceptive differences in neurodivergence and health anxiety

13:15: Brain spam

18:48: Our story telling about checking clients

23:00: Epstein files, me too and OCD

23:20: Shenrique's checking compulsions in case they are a bad person

27:50: What checking actually does

28:40: Shout out to Elyse Myers

30:00: The OCD cycle and what keeps it going

31:25: Vampires and OCD to show what to aim for

37:49: Hierarchies and values-based erp lists

40:40: Do we have to do an exposure to everything on the list?

43:55: How do we help Shenrique?

45:40: More tolerance, not more certainty

46:40: OCD wins of the week

51:00: Questions from the listeners: OCD diagnosis

53:00: Exposure lab feedback from imaginal exposure

54:50: Exposure lab for checking

56:40: OCD being a big anxiety diverter

58:00: Goodbyes

Get in Touch:

Got intrusive thoughts to share or questions for us:

Email us at ocdcollectiveuk@gmail.com

Follow us on Instagram: @justcheckingpod

Please check out our privacy policy https://docs.google.com/document/d/1YJZ4Sdh4OpxjRR9twGY6dOMH9n55Mq6qTqLBxOtN3Fw/edit?usp=sharing

Content Warnings:

We do reference some thoughts that people may find distressing so please listen with caution if this is you, and take a break if you need to.

Disclaimer

This podcast provides educational content only and is not a substitute for professional mental health support, please contact a mental health professional for advice and support.