New Wisconsin summer camp offers camaraderie for middle schoolers with OCD

At a new Wisconsin summer camp this June, usual camp activities like petting farm animals, going for a swim or sitting around a campfire will have an added significance for campers who are overcoming related fears associated with their anxiety or obsessive compulsive disorders.

At the camp organized by OCD Wisconsin, those campers won't be alone, but will be with other campers who have similar diagnoses. All of the campers, from grades five through eight, will have a diagnosis of either OCD, specific phobias or social anxiety.

OCD Wisconsin landed a grant from the Plant a Camp Program , funded by JACK Mental Health Advocacy, to pilot the camp, which the organization hopes to continue offering in future years. Scheduled for June 27-30 at a retreat center in West Bend, it's accepting applications now. Parents and guardians are also invited.

Opportunities for students with OCD to come together, or just to access basic treatment, aren't easy to find.

“There is no doubt there is a vast wasteland of people to help children, let alone adults, with OCD, to the point where one provider can have upwards to 1,000 clients," said Cindy Tiffany-Frey, president of OCD Wisconsin .

Keri Brown, an OCD therapist in Black Earth who will lead the summer camp, said demand for care has grown exponentially since the pandemic.

“I certainly can’t accommodate all the people that reach out to me, but I do my best, and I do my best to refer them to other folks who are just as busy and full as I am," Brown said.

Amanda Heins, a psychologist for the adolescent residential OCD program at Rogers Behavioral Health, said the pandemic created a "natural bubble of avoidance" that gave students serious reasons to avoid situations that could be socially challenging. Students missed out on opportunities to build social skills and confidence.

Heins said the camp community could help students expand their comfort zone and realize how much they have in common with others.

“OCD and anxiety can make you feel, at times, like 'no one else is feeling this the way that I’m feeling this; something must be wrong with me specifically,'" Heins said.

At the camp, students will be able to practice “exposure and response prevention,” a common treatment model for OCD, under the care of a professional, that involves confronting situations that cause anxiety. Brown said the idea with the camp is to "make exposures fun" and have support from peers while doing it.

“I think kids will benefit from being able to meet other people who struggle with similar things, to be able to talk openly about their symptoms without that fear of being judged," Brown said.

Jason Niosi, vice president of OCD Wisconsin, has seen his own son benefit from therapeutic group settings as his son learned how to manage his OCD.

“Talking about stuff helps, but talking about it to someone who knows what you're going through can be better, because, well, they know," said Niosi's son, 13-year-old Dexter.

Dexter will volunteer at the camp, hoping to pass along some of what he's learned.

“I remember how difficult OCD was for me, and I didn't really have control over my own life. And that was an awful feeling to have to deal with all the time, and take away focus from everything that I actually wanted to do," Dexter said.

Dexter has already raised awareness about OCD in his own school. He produced a short film, " The Mind ," describing the experience. In the video, he shows ways that he uses "competing responses" to resist a compulsion associated with OCD — for example, putting his hands in his pockets to overcome a feeling of needing to turn a light on and off when entering a room.

After a couple years of hard work in therapy, Dexter said he has overcome many of the anxieties that used to hold him back. For example, he used to worry about being poisoned by small critters. Recently, in pursuit of his interest in wilderness survival, he learned that earthworms are nutritious. He found one and ate it.

"I did some research on what bugs are edible and what benefits they have, so I wanted to try it," Dexter said. "They mostly taste like chicken. They’ve got protein, and they’re pretty good for you.”

Dexter said he hopes by sharing his own experiences coping with fears, he'll encourage others on the journey.

"Knowing that other kids have to struggle like I did, but might not have the proper help that I got, is hard for me," Dexter said. "So I want to be able to help them in any way possible and get to basically the point I am now, where I can freely do whatever without worrying about OCD.”

Learn more about the camp at OCDWisconsin.org/camp .

Contact Rory Linnane at rory.linnane@jrn.com . Follow her on X (Twitter) at @RoryLinnane .

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: New Wisconsin summer camp offers camaraderie for middle schoolers with OCD