I’m a high-school senior, and I recently found out that I’ve been suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder for years. In eighth grade, I should have sought help, but I didn’t want to tell anyone about my repressed thoughts or compulsions. It affected my quality of life by making me terrified to think for a few months for fear of what my mind would bring up. At the moment, I’m still living with it, but it isn’t as disruptive — most of my more upsetting symptoms are gone. While it’s at a low point, I’m afraid that when I go to college next year, with the added stress of living in a new place, away from home for the first time, with strangers, and so many pressures, that it’ll come back full force – or even worse than before. I don’t want this to make college unbearable. Thank you. It actually was a relief to write this down.

There are a lot of things in this world that scare me.