Running, for most people, is a pleasure or a pain. That is, running is viewed either as an enjoyable exercise that brings about health and vitality, or it is a burden necessitated by one’s desire to shed excess poundage or avoid a heart attack. For Tina, running is a necessity. It is her means of relieving tension and neutralizing, or righting, wrong thoughts. Tina’s track is not found at the local high school. It is an imagined track that stretches from her bedroom, down the hallway of our house and into an adjoining bedroom. For hours, the stomping of Tina’s footsteps can be heard, as she runs in between her favorite activities of listening to music and reading.

By way of background, Tina is twelve years old. She is a bright child who gets straight A’s. Tina always has a book in her hand. She loves to read, and she is an excellent writer with a vivid imagination. Socially, Tina is somewhat awkward. Although she gets along well with other school mates, she has no close friends. I believe that her self-image has been impacted by the unwanted obsessive thoughts that come into her mind. It is common for those who have been diagnosed with OCD to have problems with self-image because they realize that their thought-life is not normal. As for treatment, Tina saw a few counselors on a 1imited basis, and took a Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitor. However, after doing my own research (lots of it), I choose to take her off the SSRI and stop the counseling. The counseling was of limited value, and I discovered that research is beginning to show patients can often achieve the same chemical reaction caused by an SSRI simply by changing his or her thinking pattern. Therefore, given Tina’s young age, and the mild nature of her OCD, I’ve decided to see if her behavior will improve without the psychiatric medication.

Tina’s metaprogram type involves direct mismatching, moving-away-from, and logical/objective in her rationality type. She is visual and auditory. Understanding how Tina processes information that influences her behavior has helped me to direct her toward behavior that helps her to control her obsessions and compulsions. One such example was when I attempted to encourage Tina to read some material that helped to familiarize her with OCD, its causes and cures. I felt that it was important for Tina’s self-image to understand that she was a not an oddity, and that others struggled with OCD yet led normal, successful lives. Due to her mismatch metaprogram, I knew that making such a recommendation could be difficult.

What I decided to do was to use language patterns and embedded commands to get Tina to make the decision that such reading would be helpful to her. A language pattern phrase that came in handy was along the lines of “You probably already know that most people who read books about a problem they are experiencing get a lot of help and insight from the books.” To deal with her tendency to mismatch, a phrase similar to “At first, I thought this book might help. But I’m not certain and kind of doubt it now. What do you think?”

In the end, Tina did read the material and found it helpful. Overcoming her OCD is not a high priority on Tina’s list since it doesn’t severely impact her life. Nonetheless, NLP is helping to guide Tina as she learns to deal with a physical disability in a successful and healthy way.