OCD, metaphor, and me: the horse that can’t eat apples

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Barnsley, Sarah. 2023. OCD, metaphor, and me: the horse that can’t eat apples. The Lancet Psychiatry, 10(3), pp. 170-171. ISSN 2215-0366 [Article]

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Official URL: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/...

Abstract or Description

I expect most people haven’t heard the one about the horse that can’t eat apples. It's not a joke; it's a poem, one I wrote in the spring of 2016, when my mental health was spinning out of control. The poem was the first of what became a poetry collection, The Thoughts, which explores intrusive thoughts as part of obsessive-compulsive disorder. I hadn’t planned to write so much. With the work recently published, I now find myself reflecting on how poetry provided such capaciousness and versatility.

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Article

Identification Number (DOI):

https://doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(23)00040-8