'I didn't sit on my sofa for a year': the hidden toll of OCD

For people with obsessive compulsive disorder, distress goes far beyond neatness. While pursuing her Master's in Bengaluru, 23-year-old Stuti avoided her apartment sofa for a whole year, convinced it was contaminated after flatmates sat on it. She traces her first such fear to age three. Shame, misdiagnosis and delayed care can trap patients in exhausting cycles of fear and compulsion.