OCD & Anxiety Specialist
Expert Exposure and Response Prevention Therapy (ERP) for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Online Cognitive Behavioral Therapy For All OCD Themes and Subtypes
Experiencing the symptoms of OCD can feel relentless. Intrusive thoughts, images, or urges show up out of nowhere and instantly flood you with anxiety and doubt. You try to push them away or reason with them, but somehow that only makes them stronger. Before you know it, you’re stuck in a loop of fear and compulsions that feels impossible to break.
For over a decade, I’ve helped children, teens, and adults reclaim their freedom from the grips of OCD using the gold standard in OCD treatment, Exposure and Response Prevention Therapy (ERP). I’m fully licensed to practice in Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Washington, New Jersey, and Illinois.
I deeply respect my clients as some of the bravest people I’ve ever met, and my commitment is simple: to use proven therapies, applied with care and compassion, to help you find the lasting relief and freedom you deserve. - Josh Kaplan, LCSW
Meet Josh Kaplan, LCSW and OCD Specialist.
Hi, I’m Josh Kaplan, LCSW. I’ve dedicated my career to helping people recover from OCD using Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), the gold-standard, evidence-based treatment that truly works.
Over the years, I’ve helped clients facing every OCD theme and subtype imaginable: harm, contamination, relationships, taboo or violent thoughts, sexuality, morality, scrupulosity, health, and more. Whatever form your OCD takes, I want you to know that you’re not alone, and that effective, lasting help is possible.
I’m deeply passionate about this work because I’ve seen how life-changing ERP can be for people with OCD. You deserve proven treatment that helps you break free from intrusive thoughts and doubt, feel safe in your own mind again, and get back to living your life without OCD calling the shots.
Understanding Obsessions, Compulsions, and Intrusive Thoughts.
OCD is often misunderstood. It’s not about being “neat” or “organized,” it’s about intrusive, unwanted thoughts, images, or doubts that can attach to almost anything: harm, contamination, relationships, sexuality, religion, morality, or health.
These thoughts feel real and threatening, triggering intense anxiety, guilt, disgust, or fear. To find relief, people with OCD perform compulsions, behaviors, or mental rituals like checking, washing, or seeking reassurance. While these bring temporary comfort, they actually keep the cycle going, convincing the brain that the thoughts were dangerous.
Over time, OCD can start to take over more and more of your life, but it doesn’t have to stay that way. I use Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), the gold-standard treatment for OCD, to help you face your fears directly and retrain your brain’s response to them. Together, we’ll work on breaking the OCD cycle so you can regain control and start living your life with freedom and confidence again.
How Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) Works
Exposure and Response Prevention Therapy (ERP) is a practical, step-by-step therapy that teaches you to respond differently to intrusive thoughts and anxiety. We will gradually practice facing OCD triggers while reducing compulsions, reassurance seeking, and avoidance. Of course, this is done at a pace that feels manageable. I will guide you through each exercise, explain what to expect, and make sure you have clear tools to use between sessions so you can feel safer, more confident, and back in control.
With a focused course of treatment, typically 10–14 sessions, most people notice a real shift: intrusive thoughts lose their intensity and frequency, anxiety fades, and you begin to feel safe in your own mind and body again. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) is the recommended first-line treatment for OCD, an evidence-based approach proven to retrain your brain to respond differently to fear.
Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP) for OCD
OCD can range widely in severity, and for some people, traditional once-per-week sessions aren’t always enough to create the momentum needed for meaningful relief. In these situations, ERP is often most effective when delivered at a more intensive level.
For clients who need greater support, structure, and consistency, I offer an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP) for OCD. This program is flexible and can be customized to your needs, whether that means meeting 3–5 times per week or extending individual ERP sessions from one hour to two hours.
We’ll work together to determine the right level and frequency of treatment so you have the steady guidance and accountability required to make real, lasting progress.
Why Exposure and Response Prevention is the Gold Standard for OCD Treatment
Proven and Supported by Decades of Research
Decades of research show that most people who complete ERP experience significant improvement in their OCD symptoms, anxiety, and overall quality of life.
Endorsed by Experts
ERP is recognized as the most effective first-line treatment by leading organizations, including the International OCD Foundation (IOCDF), the American Psychological Association (APA), and NICE (UK).
Targets the Root Cause
Unlike traditional talk therapy, ERP targets the obsessions and compulsions that fuel OCD, stopping the cycle in its tracks and retraining the brain’s response to fear and uncertainty.
Leads to Lasting Freedom
ERP helps you face fears instead of avoiding them, retraining your brain to tolerate uncertainty and reducing the power of intrusive thoughts and anxiety.
How Does Cognitive Behavioral Therapy For OCD Fit Into Treatment?
ERP is a specialized form of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) that goes beyond talk therapy. It helps you gradually face the thoughts, sensations, and situations that trigger anxiety while learning to resist compulsions and avoidance.
More traditional CBT complements this by helping you recognize and shift unhelpful thinking patterns, like overestimating danger, needing certainty, or believing that thinking something makes it more likely to happen. These distorted beliefs can keep you stuck in the OCD cycle. Together, CBT and ERP retrain how your brain responds to fear and uncertainty, creating lasting relief and freedom from OCD’s grip.
What I Offer: ERP Treatment for All OCD Themes and Subtypes
I specialize in treating all subtypes and themes of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). While OCD can manifest in countless ways, the core mechanisms of the disorder are always the same, and every theme responds equally well to Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP). My practice offers online therapy for adults, teens, and children throughout Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Washington, New Jersey, and Illinois, making specialized OCD treatment accessible wherever you live.
Contamination OCD
Contamination OCD involves intense fears of becoming contaminated or spreading contamination—but feared “contaminants” can include germs, chemicals, emotions, or even other people. To feel safe, individuals may wash, clean, avoid contact, or seek reassurance.
Intrusive Violent, Sexual, and Taboo Thoughts
Intrusive violent, sexual, and taboo thoughts are unwanted, distressing mental images or urges that go against a person’s values and sense of self. These thoughts can feel alarming and lead to guilt, fear, or compulsive efforts to “prove” they’d never act on them.
Harm OCD
Harm OCD involves intrusive fears of accidentally or intentionally causing harm to oneself or others, often triggering guilt, panic, and compulsive checking or reassurance seeking. These thoughts are unwanted and distressing, not reflections of intent or desire. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals face these fears, reduce compulsions, and relearn that thoughts of harm don’t equal danger or action.
Relationship OCD
Relationship OCD (ROCD) involves intrusive doubts and fears about one’s partner, relationship, or feelings—such as “Do I really love them?” or “What if they’re not the right one?” These thoughts create anxiety and lead to compulsions like constant reassurance seeking, comparison, or overanalyzing feelings. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals learn to tolerate uncertainty about love and relationships, reducing obsessional doubt and allowing genuine connection to grow.
Pedophilia OCD (POCD)
Pedophilia OCD (POCD) involves intrusive, unwanted sexual thoughts or fears of being sexually attracted to or harming children. These thoughts are unwanted and distressing, not reflections of intent or desire. Common compulsive behaviors include mental checking, avoidance, or reassurance seeking. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals with POCD face these fears safely and learn that thoughts do not reflect intent, character, or risk of acting on them.
Existential OCD
Existential OCD centers on intrusive, unanswerable questions about life, reality, death, or the meaning of existence. People with this form of OCD often get stuck in endless rumination, trying to find certainty about questions that have none. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals learn to tolerate uncertainty and disengage from overanalyzing, allowing them to reconnect with the present moment and live more fully.
Moral or Religious Scrupulosity OCD
Moral or Religious Scrupulosity OCD involves obsessive fears of being immoral, sinful, or offending one’s faith or values. Individuals may engage in excessive praying, confessing, reassurance seeking, or mental reviewing to feel “pure” or “good enough.” Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals face these fears while learning that uncertainty, imperfection, and doubt are normal parts of faith and morality—not signs of wrongdoing.
Sexual Orientation and Gender Themed OCD
Sexual Orientation and Gender Themed OCD involves intrusive doubts or fears about one’s sexual orientation or gender identity—such as “What if I’m actually gay?” or “What if I’m not truly the gender I think I am?” These thoughts create distress and lead to compulsive behaviors like checking feelings, monitoring physical reactions, or seeking reassurance. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals reduce anxiety around these intrusive thoughts and accept uncertainty, allowing them to reconnect with their genuine sense of self.
"Just Right" and Perfectionism OCD
“Just Right” and Perfectionism OCD involve an overwhelming need for things to feel precise, even, or “perfect.” This can show up as arranging, repeating, or redoing tasks until they feel right, or excessive mental checking to avoid mistakes. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps individuals resist the urge to fix or perfect, teaching the brain to tolerate discomfort and uncertainty so that tasks can be completed without endless correction or doubt.
Responsibility OCD "checking"
Checking OCD involves repeated behaviors or mental reviews to prevent harm, mistakes, or accidents—like repeatedly verifying that doors are locked, appliances are off, or messages were written correctly. These checks provide temporary relief but reinforce doubt and anxiety over time. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps break this cycle by teaching you to face uncertainty and resist checking, allowing confidence and trust in your memory and actions to naturally return.
Hyperawareness or Somatic OCD
Hyperawareness or Somatic OCD centers on an obsessive focus on automatic bodily sensations or processes—such as blinking, swallowing, breathing, or heartbeat—or on being overly aware of one’s own thoughts. This heightened self-focus can make once-automatic sensations feel unbearable or constant. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps retrain attention and reduce anxiety by teaching you to allow these sensations or thoughts to exist without trying to control or escape them, so they fade naturally from awareness.
Magical Thinking OCD
Magical Thinking OCD involves the belief that certain thoughts, numbers, words, or actions can cause or prevent bad outcomes—even when there’s no logical connection. People with this form of OCD may feel intense responsibility to think or act “just right” to keep something terrible from happening. Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) helps break this false link between thoughts and outcomes, teaching the brain that thoughts are not dangerous and that safety doesn’t depend on mental rituals or superstitions.
Online OCD Therapy Available in: Colorado, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Washington, New Jersey, and Illinois
My practice is 100% online, allowing us to treat OCD where it actually shows up, in your real life. Through secure video sessions, we can design and complete Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) exercises right in the environments that trigger anxiety the most. This means we’re not limited to an office setting; instead, we can target OCD directly in the places it tends to take hold, your home, office, car, outside spaces, or even the grocery store.
Online therapy gives us the flexibility to make ERP more effective and practical, helping you learn to tolerate uncertainty and resist compulsions in real time. Whether you’re in Denver, Phoenix, Seattle, Las Vegas, Salt Lake City, Chicago, or anywhere in between, you’ll gain the tools and confidence to move beyond fear and start living more freely.
Take the First Step Toward Freedom from OCD
Recovery begins with a single step. If you’re ready to start ERP therapy for OCD, I invite you to schedule a free 20-minute online consultation. We’ll discuss your symptoms, goals, and what effective treatment can look like for you. Together, we’ll take that first step toward freedom from OCD. I'm fully licensed in Colorado, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Washington, New Jersey, and Illinois.
Accurate Assessment & Diagnosis
Many people with OCD spend years in the wrong treatment before getting the right help. In our first sessions, I’ll do a thorough assessment to understand your symptoms and how OCD shows up in your life. From there, we’ll create a clear diagnosis and a structured ERP plan tailored to you, so you can finally start moving toward real recovery.
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Psychoeducation
In our first few sessions, I’ll spend time providing psychoeducation, so you’ll not only understand your symptoms but also the “why” behind treatment. We’ll go over how OCD works, the cycle of obsessions, compulsions, and avoidance, and I’ll show you why ERP is so effective in breaking that cycle. Having this knowledge up front helps you feel more confident, reduces the fear of facing triggers, and gives you a clear roadmap for recovery.
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Exposure Hierarchy Creation
Once you have a solid understanding of OCD and ERP, we’ll build a structured list of triggers ranked from least to most anxiety-provoking. The goal is to help you gradually face your OCD in a way that feels manageable and effective. Together, we’ll design exposures based on real situations in your life, creating a treatment plan that’s practical, personalized, and built for lasting progress.
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Structured In-session Exposure Practice
We’ll choose specific exercises from your hierarchy to practice during sessions, so I can coach and support you in real time as you face anxiety-provoking thoughts and situations. With my guidance, you’ll learn how to resist compulsions and let anxiety fade naturally. Over time, these exercises help retrain your brain, reduce fear, and build lasting confidence in your ability to handle uncertainty.
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Homework Exposure Practice
Homework exposures are a key part of ERP, helping you apply what you’ve learned to real-life situations. I’ll assign variations of what we practice in session so you can face OCD fears and resist compulsions in daily life. These exercises are tailored to your triggers and designed to build confidence, strengthen progress, and help you take back control from OCD.
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Fine-Tuning, Relapse Prevention, and Long-Term Success
Throughout treatment, we’ll track your progress using standard OCD assessments and adjust your plan as you improve. As symptoms decrease, we’ll shift focus toward maintaining progress and preventing relapse, essentially helping you become your own OCD specialist. By the end of therapy, you’ll have the tools and confidence to manage OCD independently and keep your progress long-term.
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