The Language of Crisis

Despite quantitative research showing differences between obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) across genders, little research has qualitatively explored women’s experiences of the disorder. This chapter combines image schemas with illness narrative analysis to explore how women with OCD link the onset of the disorder to traumatic changes in their bodies that are experienced as a crisis. It is argued that the bodily changes disrupt the image schemas that provide stable conceptualisations of the b