I want to find ways to support my granddaughter

You asking others how you can support her is already a great start to show you care! :) be there for her for sure, calm her down when shes having a hard time, create coping mechanisms together and positive activities to do when she’s feeling like shes in a spiral. I dont know what type she has but create something that helps support her when shes having a hard time. Over all love her! People with ocd need a lot of it😭 i hope she can overcome come it with a her good grandparent best of luck.

It’s paradoxical. Our gut instinct as humans, especially when we love someone, is to rush in with comfort, to soothe, to reassure, to make sense of the fear. But with OCD, that instinct backfires. The very thing that feels like love in the moment, offering reassurance, ends up feeding the disorder like gasoline on a fire. The way through OCD isn’t by answering its questions or solving its riddles, but by refusing to play the game at all. If she has OCD, her compulsions will almost always fall into two broad camps: physical actions or mental rituals. Both can be just as debilitating. Think of compulsions like a thirsty monster living in her mind. Every time she does one, even something as small as asking, “Grandma, what if I ate something poisonous?”, the monster opens its mouth. And when you feed it by giving reassurance, it quiets down for a moment, but it always comes back hungrier. The cycle never ends. That’s where you can help. Your role isn’t to starve her of love, it’s to starve the monster. That means when she seeks reassurance, you resist the urge to give the quick relief. Instead, you sit with her in the storm of uncertainty. That’s the hardest part: holding space without fixing. So when she says, “What if I ate something poisonous?” instead of rushing to comfort with “Oh honey, that’s nonsense” or logical detective work like “Well, what did you eat?”, the better response is, “Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t. I guess we’ll see.” It sounds cruel at first, but it’s actually the most loving thing you can do. Because uncertainty is the medicine. OCD hates uncertainty more than anything. It feels like standing on the edge of a cliff with no railing. But strangely, that same cliff edge is also the gateway to peace. When she learns to stand there without jumping into compulsions, the monster gets weaker. Over time, it starves. OCD is a fear-based disorder, and fear is like a bottomless pit. The more you try to “get to the bottom of it,” the deeper it pulls you, until you’re exhausted, hopeless, and lost. Trying to figure it out, to reassure, to make sense of it, all just strengthens the pit’s pull. The only way out isn’t down, it’s sideways. Step off the ride, don’t take the bait, stop digging. Loving someone with OCD isn’t easy. It will test your patience because healing isn’t linear. One week she’ll seem better, and the next week she’ll slide back. Some days you’ll think, “She’s healed!” only to see the disorder flare up again. That doesn’t mean she’s failing, it means she’s human. Recovery is more like climbing a mountain. Sometimes she’ll slip, sometimes she’ll stop to catch her breath, but the direction still matters more than the pace. So your compass in all this is uncertainty. Lean on it, anchor yourself in it, and use it as your go-to response: • “Maybe, maybe not.” • “I don’t know, and I don’t need to know.” • “It might be true, it might not.” That way, you’re not fighting her fears or fueling them. You’re teaching her to coexist with them until they lose their power.