“I'm so OCD!”

Have you ever used this phrase, or heard someone you know say it? This common phrase is used today by many to describe everything from being neat freaks to being obsessed with details to being quirky.

But the truth is that obsessive-compulsive disorder is a real mental illness that intrudes on the lives of its sufferers. If you don’t obey its impulses, it feels like your world will literally end. Every time we use the term lightly, we make it harder for actual sufferers to seek help.

To help raise awareness and break stigma during International OCD Awareness Week, we had the International OCD Foundation partner with Amazon to give Alexa OCD traits—with the hopes that people will think twice the next time the phrase is about to slip out.