Tag Archives: OCD & Intrusive Thoughts

Darling Girls by Sally Hepworth

For as long as they can remember, Jessica, Norah, and Alicia have been told how lucky they are. As young girls they were rescued from family tragedies and raised by a loving foster mother, Miss Fairchild, on an idyllic farming estate and given an elusive second chance at a happy family life. But their childhood wasn’t the fairy tale everyone thinks it was. Miss Fairchild had rules. Miss Fairchild could be unpredictable. And Miss Fairchild was never, ever to be crossed. In a moment of desperation, the three broke away from Miss Fairchild and thought they were free. Even though they never saw her again, she was always somewhere… Read more,

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Child physical & sexual abuse
  • Domestic violence
  • Foster care system
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Childhood trauma

Everybody’s Favorite by Lillian Stone

Lilian Stone—childhood evangelical, AOL girlfriend, and professional nail biter is always living on the edge of anxiety. From the pitfalls of a girl plagued by religious trauma, the incomprehensible yet unforgiving need for perfection, and a twenty-pound beagle she never meant to keep, Everybody’s Favorite is a refreshing story of what it means to pick yourself when the world is telling you otherwise. Still navigating the ins and outs of adulthood, accompanied by an obsessive-compulsive disorder that’s become an exercise in self-acceptance and thus compassion… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Religious trauma
  • Eating disorder
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Bullying

Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult by Maria Bamford

From “weird, scary, ingenious” ( The New York Times ) stand-up comedian Maria Bamford, a brutally honest and hilariously frenetic memoir about show business, mental health, and the comfort of rigid belief systems—from Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People, to Suzuki violin training, to Richard Simmons, to 12-step programs.

Maria Bamford is a comedian’s comedian (an outsider among outsiders) and has forever fought to find a place to belong… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Suicidal ideation
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder & intrusive thoughts
  • Bipolar Disorder
  • Eating disorder (bulimia)
  • Death of a pet

Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert

Bradley Graeme is pretty much perfect. He’s a star football player, manages his OCD well (enough), and comes out on top in all his classes . . . except the ones he shares with his ex-best friend, Celine.

Celine Bangura is conspiracy-theory-obsessed. Social media followers eat up her takes on everything from UFOs to holiday overconsumption–yet, she’s still not cool enough for the popular kids’ table. Which is why Brad abandoned her for the in-crowd years ago. (At least, that’s how Celine sees it)… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism discussed
  • Parental abandonment
  • Panic attacks
  • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Hospitalisation for a broken arm

6 Times We Almost Kissed [and One Time We Did] by Tess Sharpe

Penny and Tate have always clashed. Unfortunately, their mothers are lifelong best friends, so the girls’ bickering has carried them through playdates, tragedy, and more than one rom-com marathon with the Moms. When Penny’s mother decides to become a living donor to Tate’s mom, ending her wait for a liver transplant, things go from clashing to cataclysmic. Because in order to help their families recover physically, emotionally, and financially, the Moms combine their households the summer before senior year. So Penny and Tate make a… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Anxiety
  • Emotional child abuse & neglect
  • Cheating recounted*
  • Sexual assault mentioned*
  • Suicidal ideation mentioned
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Physical illness & injury*
  • Ovarian cancer mentioned including discussions of the original diagnosis, remission, and death
  • Surgery recounted, including organ donation and an oophorectomy
  • Death of a father, on-page

*Context : The protagonist’s ex cheated on her in the past. Mentions of an interrupted assault that happened twenty-five years earlier. Mentions of dealing with Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency and surgery required for a tug o’ war injury that nearly severed fingers.

Business or Pleasure by Rachel Lynn Solomon

Chandler Cohen has never felt more like the ghost in “ghostwriter” until she attends a signing for a book she wrote—and the author doesn’t even recognize her. The evening turns more promising when she meets a charming man at the bar and immediately connects with him. But when all their sexual tension culminates in a spectacularly awkward hookup, she decides this is one night better off forgotten… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Antisemitism mentioned
  • Emotional child abuse recounted
  • Anxiety
  • Panic attack, on-page
  • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Abortion recounted
  • Bullying recounted

The Immeasurable Depth of You by Maria Ingrande Mora

The Immeasurable Depth of You by Maria Ingrande Mora

Fifteen-year-old Brynn can’t stop thinking about death. Her intrusive thoughts and severe anxiety leave her feeling helpless—and hopeless. So after her mom interprets one of Brynn’s blog posts as a suicide note, she takes extreme measures, confiscating Brynn’s phone, blocking her Internet access, and banishing her to stay with her father who lives “off the grid” on a houseboat in the Florida mangroves. Isolated from her online friends—her only friends—Brynn resigns herself to a summer of mind-numbing boredom and loneliness until Skylar appears. Skylar is everything… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Internalised ableism
  • Suicide & suicidal ideation
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • Seasonal Affective Disorder
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) & intrusive thoughts
  • Hospitalisation
  • Hurricane

Six Goodbyes We Never Said by Candace Ganger

Six Goodbyes We Never Said by Candace Ganger

Naima Rodriguez doesn’t want your patronizing sympathy as she grieves her father, her hero—a fallen Marine. She’ll hate you forever if you ask her to open up and remember him “as he was,” though that’s all her loving family wants her to do in order to manage her complex OCD and GAD. She’d rather everyone back the-eff off while she separates her Lucky Charms marshmallows into six, always six, Ziploc bags, while she avoids friends and people and living the life her father so desperately wanted for her. Dew respectfully requests a little more time to process the… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism
  • Racism
  • Fatmisia
  • Depression
  • Social anxiety
  • Panic attacks, on-page
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
  • Intrusive thoughts
  • Attempted suicide recounted
  • Suicidal ideation recounted
  • Death during childbirth mentioned
  • Anaphylaxis mentioned
  • Hospitalisation recounted
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a mother & father
  • Car accident recounted

The Valley and the Flood by Rebecca Mahoney

The Valley and the Flood by Rebecca Mahoney

Rose Colter is almost home, but she can’t go back there yet. When her car breaks down in the Nevada desert, the silence of the night is broken by a radio broadcast of a voicemail message from her best friend, Gaby. A message Rose has listened to countless times over the past year. The last one Gaby left before she died. So Rose follows the lights from the closest radio tower to Lotus Valley, a small town where prophets are a dime a dozen, secrets lurk in every shadow, and the diner pie is legendary. And according to Cassie Cyrene, the town’s third most accurate prophet, they’ve been… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Anxiety & anxiety attacks
  • Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Intrusive thoughts
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a father
  • Death of a friend
  • Car accident

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy

Jennette McCurdy was six years old when she had her first acting audition. Her mother’s dream was for her only daughter to become a star, and Jennette would do anything to make her mother happy. So she went along with what Mom called “calorie restriction,” eating little and weighing herself five times a day. She endured extensive at-home makeovers while Mom chided, “Your eyelashes are invisible, okay? You think Dakota Fanning doesn’t tint hers?” She was even showered by Mom until age sixteen while sharing her diaries… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism (r slur)
  • Fatmisia & body-shaming
  • Child physical, verbal and emotional abuse including gaslighting
  • Grooming and sexually predatory behaviour toward a minor discussed
  • Hoarding
  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
  • Eating disorder (bulimia)
  • Graphic disordered eating including food restriction, bingeing, purging and over-exercising (theme)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Emesis
  • Death of a mother from terminal breast cancer