With worries and repetitive thoughts crowding their brain, students with OCD can struggle to keep up with their studies.
Students focused on OCD’s insistent mind chatter may not even realize how much they are missing in the classroom. Those realizing their schoolwork is suffering will likely experience increased anxiety.
OCD and School Performance
The learning problems students with OCD might demonstrate include:
Divided Attention. No one can listen intently or read carefully when tuned into their anxious thoughts. Students with OCD can easily miss key points in a lecture or fail to catch the details of assignments. They may even have difficulty focusing on visual materials. The consequence of poor concentration is naturally diminished performance on homework, quizzes, or tests.
(A student’s apparent inattentiveness or distractedness can be mistaken for signs of ADD, attention deficit disorder.)
Losing Time To Rituals. It is not only thoughts that distract students with OCD from their schoolwork. Needing to perform anxiety reducing rituals takes energy, focus, and time away from class assignments. Some students might leave the classroom to perform a ritual such as hand washing. Other compulsive behaviors, such as counting the letters on a page, directly interfere with schoolwork.
Distressing Emotions. Individuals with OCD generally have high anxiety that builds over time until a ritual is performed to relieve it. As the anxiety grows, the student will be focused on that uncomfortable feeling, not on the teacher’s voice, or their assignment.
Students with OCD are also susceptible to shame. They may be ashamed of their symptoms, or for failing to answer a question if called upon. They can also feel embarrassment if reprimanded for daydreaming or being inattentive in class.
Fatigue. Those with OCD may be fatigued from the strain of managing their symptoms, or from staying up late studying because symptoms distract them. Many young people with OCD also have sleep-related problems such as frequent nightmares.
Gaps In Learning. OCD compusions such as hand washing or dressing rituals may cause absenteeism or tardiness. These large or small gaps in attendance can create an academic chasm - students falling behind their classmates - since new learning generally builds on what was taught earlier.
Avoiding Triggers. Students with OCD may “workaround” their symptoms by avoiding people, places, and things that trigger anxiety and compulsive behavior. If their triggers are related to reading, writing, or math (e.g., touching every fifth word, avoiding sharp/pointed letters, fearing certain numbers) school performance will obviously be affected.
Ask For Help
If you are a student struggling with intrusive thoughts and repetitive behaviors, talk to your parents, a teacher, school counselors, or a doctor and get help. Whether your symptoms are from OCD or another issue, there are people who understand your struggle and will assist you.
Source: OCD Eduction Station
Photo credit: Friends’ Central School
