Aly Raisman was team captain of the gold medal winning U.S. Women’s Gymnastics teams in 2012 and 2016, with three gold medals to her name. A leader on and off the floor, Raisman uses her platform to help normalize the conversation around mental health, abuse awareness, body image, and self-care.
Raisman is also living proof that having obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) does not define your worth or limit what you can accomplish. Raisman is not just a gold medalist who happens to have OCD. She’s a role model and an inspiration, encouraging us all to better understand our mental health.
“I have a platform, and it’s important for me to use it to talk about things that are hard to discuss and that a lot of people are going through,” Raisman shares in a conversation with NOCD Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Patrick McGrath.
With all the success Raisman has earned over the years, she could have kept that part of her life private, but she made the choice to share her experiences with OCD in hopes of helping others. “We all know what it feels like to go through ups and downs, and go through hard times. I have found there are a lot of people who are suffering in silence and don’t have a support system; they may not even have one person they can go to ask for help.” says Raisman. “I just realized the more that I started to share, the more people could relate to my experience, and it helped me feel less alone.”
We all know what it feels like to go through ups and downs, and go through hard times. I have found there are a lot of people who are suffering in silence and don’t have a support system; they may not even have one person they can go to ask for help.
Aly Raisman’s journey with OCD
While Raisman is known for her athletic achievements, she’s also been open about her obsessive-compulsive disorder. Raisman believes that managing OCD is still something she’s working on. “I recently just turned 30, and I’m still learning so much about myself,” she says. “I’ve done a lot of therapy over the years, and I still am a work in progress. I think we all are.”
Though she didn’t recognize it as a disorder at the time, Raisman’s OCD first showed up during her childhood as a competitive gymnast. “I definitely was superstitious, where I did things that would make me feel more comfortable, or I felt like I had to do something—otherwise I wouldn’t compete well,” she explained. Raisman didn’t realize that the rituals she was performing were deeper than just a superstition.
A big part of this was perfectionism. Since gymnastics is a subjective sport, Raisman felt herself becoming very focused on what others thought about her performance. This attributed to challenges with people pleasing and chasing the reassurance from others that she was always doing the best job she could.
Though Raisman is now retired from gymnastics, she still finds that OCD manifests itself in her daily life, just in different ways. “I’m not superstitious anymore, but I do have things where if I plug in a curling iron, I’m worried, did I turn it off? If I cooked something, did I turn the oven off?” she explains. Her OCD intensified even more after she got her dog, Myo. “I was so worried, what if I left a candle on? Or what if I left the stove on and he’s home alone, and something happens?” she says.
Raisman also shared that her OCD flares up when she is talking to others about important topics, such as mental health and abuse awareness. “When I talk about really serious things, I tend to overthink what I said,” she shares. “I want to make sure I didn’t offend somebody, or maybe say something that’s going to trigger someone else.” This kind of catastrophic thinking, Raisman explains, often makes her second-guess her interactions and worry about them way after they’re over, leading to rumination and self doubt.
Raisman shares that while learning about her mental health is a never-ending journey, therapy has helped her tremendously. One of the main things she has learned is to recognize her compulsions and understand what they mean. This allows her to better trust herself and her feelings, whereas before, she would more often have fallen into a pattern of overthinking.
“I know I’m a good person, I know I’m well-intentioned,” she says. “It’s something I work on in therapy—trusting that if my feelings were hurt, I would be able to say something, and if I did hurt someone else’s feelings, I would hope they’d feel comfortable telling me.” Having this trust in herself and others helps limit patterns of overthinking and “what ifs.”
Navigating “what ifs” and people pleasing
Raisman is currently a commentator for college gymnastics. She’s learning how to balance her perfectionist tendencies and desire to please others with staying true to herself. “When you’re commentating, everyone has a different opinion,” she shares. “There’s going to be people who don’t like my voice, who don’t like the tone of what I said, or think I wasn’t critical enough.”
Despite other people’s opinions, Raisman tries to do the best she can while recognizing that it’s impossible to please everyone. The process has been challenging but also rewarding. It has given her valuable exposure to the idea that someone may not agree with what she says, and there isn’t always a way to avoid or solve that problem. Accepting uncertainty is a crucial part of living with OCD—instead of giving into compulsions that temporarily ease the anxiety of wondering what others think, learning to sit with the discomfort and move forward is very powerful.
Growing up in a sport like gymnastics, where feedback from judges and coaches was subjective, Raisman felt almost conditioned to seek approval from others. “I was taught from a young age that if I did a routine, I would immediately look to my coaches for approval,” she reflects. This need for validation contributed to her OCD and the people-pleasing tendencies that came with it. “I internalized that maybe it isn’t important how I feel. It’s more important to please the judges and the coaches because it’s a subjective sport.” This people-pleasing mentality only intensified her anxiety and OCD tendencies, particularly when it came to the constant stream of “what ifs.”
I internalized that maybe it isn’t important how I feel. It’s more important to please the judges and the coaches because it’s a subjective sport.
This need for validation didn’t stop when Raisman left the gymnastics floor. In her personal life, she struggles with similar thought patterns. Whether it’s making sure she doesn’t leave the stove on while her dog is home alone or worrying about how others perceive her actions, the “what ifs” persist.
Raisman is open about the fact that dealing with ”‘what ifs” isn’t something she’s fully overcome—it’s an ongoing process. However, she’s working on giving herself grace and learning to recognize that while the “what ifs” are still there, they don’t have to dictate her life. Instead of being consumed by others’ opinions, she’s focusing on trusting herself and acknowledging that her feelings do matter, despite what her OCD might be telling her.
The importance of a therapist who specializes in OCD
Raisman stresses the importance of finding a therapist who truly understands the intricacies of OCD. While there are many great clinicians out there, Raisman realized that not every professional is trained to deal with OCD in the way that’s most beneficial. “It took me a really long time to realize that I needed a therapist that specializes in what I was experiencing,” she shared.
It took me a really long time to realize that I needed a therapist that specializes in what I was experiencing.
For Raisman, this realization came after working with well-meaning therapists who, while supportive, didn’t provide the right kind of treatment. She recalled, “I’ve had therapists who didn’t specialize in OCD, and if I said I’m having anxiety, did I shut the stove off, did I turn off the curling iron, did I lock the front door, they would say, well, you should take a photo of it so that when you get nervous later you can go back and check that it’s off, or write on a sticky note, ‘I turned it off.’” At first glance, this might seem like helpful advice, but it’s the exact opposite of what someone with OCD needs because it encourages them to perform actions that reassure their minds temporarily. “When I saw an OCD specialist, she was absolutely horrified that they told me to do that,” Raisman recalled.
By working with a specialized therapist, Raisman learned that certain behaviors like seeking reassurance can make OCD symptoms worse. Dr. McGrath explains that reassurance becomes addictive over time, “The more you get, the more you want,” he says. Reassurance might feel like a quick fix, but it can lead to an endless cycle of needing more and more reassurance to feel okay, leaving people with OCD trapped in their compulsions, rather than working to overcome them.
A specialized therapist who truly understands OCD has gone through specific training to help guide individuals through exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy, rather than unintentionally reinforcing the disorder through harmful advice. ERP is a type of therapy created specially for OCD that involves slowly exposing you to your obsessions or triggers in a controlled environment. During ERP, you’re taught how to sit with the discomfort of your obsessions without acting out on them and performing compulsions. Finding the right therapist who is specifically trained in ERP treatment can make all the difference in your OCD journey.
OCD in athletes
OCD is not uncommon in the world of athletics, where perfection and precision are often emphasized to an extreme degree, allowing obsessions and compulsions to take hold in athletes who are under immense pressure. Reflecting upon her career today, Raisman recognizes how her intolerance for making mistakes, coupled with the pressure she felt to please others, impacted her mental health.
Raisman explains that during her training, she would often fixate on mistakes: “If I had done 10 routines on beam and I fell on one of them, that’s the one that I fixated on.” This relentless pursuit of perfection, paired with the desire to please those around her created a challenging dynamic. “I focused less on how I felt and wanted to please them more, which is obviously unhealthy,” she admitted, expressing that she doesn’t want other athletes to experience the same pressures.
Raisman also notes that OCD may be prevalent in other sports besides gymnastics, especially precision-based sports like ballet or figure skating. The pressure to be perfect, particularly in subjective sports, adds another layer to this already challenging mental health issue.
Dr. McGrath confirms that research has shown higher levels of OCD in athletes, making this an important area for further study. As Raisman’s journey demonstrates, the line between striving for success and falling into unhealthy obsessive patterns can be thin, but recognizing where the problems may lie is a crucial step in creating a healthier mindset for athletes.
Creating safe spaces for mental health conversations
Raisman discussed how important it is for people to have a safe space to talk openly, whether that’s with a therapist, a doctor, or another trusted adult. “I think that there’s a lot of people out there that don’t have a safe place to go to,” she explains.
Raisman advocates for professionals in all fields to be educated on how to offer the right resources to individuals who need support. While she knows it’s impossible for someone to be an expert in every area of mental health, she stresses the importance of knowing how to direct people to the right resources. “I think it should be more normalized to… provide people resources or even say, ‘Hey, I don’t know much about… OCD or addiction. However, I know this adult knows about this or I know this resource,'” she explains.
Raisman recalls an interaction with a doctor who, with her back turned, asked Raisman if she felt safe at home. Raisman gave feedback to the provider, explaining that for someone in a dangerous situation, it might be hard to open up to a doctor who isn’t fully engaged. “If your back is facing them, kind of acting like it’s another thing off the checklist, you know, going through ‘What’s your date of birth, how much do you weigh, your medication list, do you feel safe at home without even looking at me?’ I don’t think people are going to feel comfortable sharing that.”
Raisman also acknowledges that everyone feels comfortable communicating in different ways. She mentioned seeing a comment that suggested some people might actually feel safer talking about sensitive issues if the doctor isn’t looking at them. “It’s not one-size-fits-all of how you can communicate what you’re experiencing,” she stresses.
While professional care is very important, Raisman is also a big advocate for doing our parts as individuals. “We don’t live in a society where people go out of their way to help victims, survivors of abuse, people with OCD, or people with addiction. And so we have to do better and make sure that we’re all there for each other,” she explains.
Raisman pointed out that while many parents want to do everything they can to help their children, they may not always know what steps to take or how to guide them to treatment because of the stigma surrounding mental illness. “It has to be more normalized, where we can help people and guide people so that they know that there’s help out there,” she explains. Raisman wants people who aren’t mental health professionals to have access to resources and knowledge on how to help others that may be struggling, because the first person someone talks to about their struggles is often the trusted friend, guardian, parent, or adult closest to them, not a mental health professional.
“Some kid might tell their parent, and their parent might want to do everything they can to help them; they just might not know what to do, or how to help their kid that they love so much,” she shares. By creating an open conversation about OCD and other mental illnesses, we can help educate more people on the steps to take for proper help so no one ever feels like they cannot guide someone that is struggling.
In Raisman’s view, the more we normalize these conversations and offer varied approaches to communication, the more likely it is that people will feel safe enough to reach out for help.
You‘re not alone
If you’re reading this and live with OCD, Dr.McGrath and Aly Raisman want you to know there is help out there. They recognize how hard it can be to ask for support, especially when confiding in someone doesn’t always lead to the validation you deserve. “I think that how someone heals is really linked to how their experience of confiding in someone is handled,” Raisman explains, emphasizing how important it is for people to feel understood and cared for when they reach out for help.
Raisman also encourages individuals to be a safe, supportive person for others. “Be that person for someone who can go to you and be validating,” she says. Even if you don’t have all the answers, showing empathy and listening can make a huge difference.
Be that person for someone who can go to you and be validating.
For those dealing with OCD or any mental health challenges, Raisman urges you not to give up. “Just know that you deserve to feel safe. You deserve to live the life that you want to live,” she says. There are people out there who will support you, and you are not alone in your journey. “Sometimes I think when I’ve started any type of therapy or any type of treatment, I can feel like it’s getting worse before it gets better, and just know that unfortunately that’s sometimes part of the process, but just don’t give up,” she reminds us.
Above all, she leaves us with this powerful message: “If someone doesn’t help you, that’s their issue; it’s not a reflection of your experience or who you are, but there are good people out there.” Keep speaking up, and keep reaching out for the support you deserve.