There is a particular kind of struggle that can be incredibly difficult to explain.
You love Allah. You want to worship Him correctly. You want your salah to be accepted. You want your wudhu to be perfect. You want to make sure that you have done everything exactly as you should.
So you check.
And then you check again.
You make wudhu, but a thought enters your mind: Did I wash properly? Did I miss something?
You repeat it.
You begin your salah, but suddenly you wonder whether you made the takbeer correctly. Perhaps you didn’t pronounce something properly. Perhaps your salah isn’t valid.
So you start again.
And again.
From the outside, this may look like someone being excessively particular or overly cautious. But what is happening internally can be far more distressing.
This was at the heart of my recent conversation with Ml. Muhammad Coovadia, counselling psychologist, on Sabeelul Hayaat’s Where Islam Meets Mental Health series, where we explored OCD, waswasa, and faith.
🎧 Listen to the full interview.
In this conversation, we explore OCD, religious OCD, waswasa, and the intersection between Islam and mental health.
And perhaps one of the most important things to understand is that OCD is not simply about liking things neat or wanting everything to be perfect.
“It’s not just a belief.”
As Ml. Coovadia explained, OCD stands for obsessive-compulsive disorder and involves two key components: obsessions and compulsions.
“It’s not just a belief, but what the belief or rule or assumption is made that I have to do this. And if I don’t do it, then there are going to be serious, significant consequences.”
The obsession is the thought, fear, or rigid belief.
The compulsion is what follows.
A person may believe that their hands are not clean enough and therefore repeatedly wash them. They may constantly check something because they fear they have made a mistake. They may repeatedly seek reassurance because they cannot tolerate the uncertainty.
But there is another crucial component: the disorder begins to interfere with life.
As Ml. Coovadia explained, it can disrupt “a person’s spirituality, a person’s relationships with other people, or the ability to do general day-to-day tasks.”
That distinction is important.
Because being particular is not automatically OCD.
Wanting your house tidy is not automatically OCD.
Checking something once is not automatically OCD.
The question is whether the thoughts and behaviours become persistent, distressing, and disruptive.
When OCD enters the masjid
For Muslims, OCD can sometimes attach itself to something deeply meaningful: our relationship with Allah.
This is where religious OCD, also known as scrupulosity, enters the conversation.
And this can be particularly painful because the person isn’t necessarily trying to move away from Allah.
Quite often, they are trying desperately to get closer.
They want their salah to be perfect.
They want their wudhu to be valid.
They want to make sure their Qur’an recitation is correct.
They want to know that Allah is pleased with them.
But the desire for certainty can become an endless cycle of doubt.
Ml. Coovadia explained that religious OCD involves “rigid thoughts associated with religious actions or spiritual actions that a person feels they are compelled to do those actions in a particular way.”
A person may wash repeatedly because they feel that unless they have washed a particular area sufficiently, their wudhu is invalid.
They may repeat the takbeer because they are unsure whether they said it correctly.
They may repeat Qur’anic verses because they believe their first recitation wasn’t good enough.
They may even repeatedly say the shahadah, not out of the joy of remembering Allah, but because they fear that something they thought, said, or did may have taken them outside the fold of Islam.
And this is where the line between sincere religious consciousness and debilitating anxiety can become blurred.
“It actually becomes a barrier between them and Allah.”
Perhaps one of the most striking observations Ml. Coovadia made was that religious OCD can ultimately produce the very opposite of what the person desires.
“The key part is, what makes it dysfunctional is the fact that it does not take a person closer to Allah. It actually ends up becoming a barrier between them and Allah and their ability to connect with the religion of Islam.”
That statement deserves to be sat with.
Because if a person spends so long making wudhu that they miss salah, something has gone wrong.
If they spend so long repeating their salah that worship becomes unbearable, something has gone wrong.
If every act of ibadah becomes an exercise in fear, doubt and punishment, something has gone wrong.
The person may still have the most sincere intentions.
But the illness has begun interfering with the very relationship they are trying so hard to protect.
When fear becomes louder than hope
Islam teaches us about both fear and hope.
We need khawf—fear of Allah, because it keeps us conscious of our actions.
But we also need Raja—hope in Allah’s mercy.
For someone experiencing religious OCD, however, fear can become overwhelmingly dominant.
Every mistake feels catastrophic.
Every doubt feels dangerous.
Every thought becomes something that needs to be investigated.
Every uncertainty demands an answer.
Ml. Coovadia explained that sometimes the intervention is not giving the person more information about punishment but helping them rediscover hope.
“A person is currently bordering more on Khawf, on fear than Raja. So now a person doesn’t need more ayat or more ahadith about fear. Now they need to hear the ahadith about Raja and hope, and how Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala forgives.”
This is an important reminder for all of us.
Sometimes more information is not the answer.
Sometimes the person needs to be reminded of the mercy of Allah.
Waswasa is not a diagnosis.
Our conversation also explored the relationship between OCD and waswasa.
Islam teaches us about the whispers of Shaytan, and Allah tells us about al-waswas al-khannas — the whisperer who withdraws.
But we need to be careful not to reduce every intrusive thought to Shaytan, nor should we assume that someone experiencing OCD simply needs to become more religious.
Mental illness is not evidence of weak iman.
And an intrusive thought is not the same as an intention.
As Muslims, we can acknowledge the spiritual dimension of our experience while also recognising that psychological conditions require psychological understanding and, where necessary, professional treatment.
This is why the conversation between Islam and mental health is so important.
We do not have to choose between the two.
Islam has always recognised the importance of the mind.
One of the most fascinating points raised during our interview was the contribution of Muslim scholars to the understanding of psychological well-being.
Ml. Coovadia highlighted the work of Abu Zayd al-Balkhi, a ninth-century Muslim scholar, who wrote about conditions affecting the body and soul centuries before many modern psychological classifications existed.
This is an important part of our intellectual heritage.
Mental health is not a foreign conversation that has suddenly arrived at the doors of Muslim communities.
Our tradition has long recognised that human beings experience emotional and psychological distress — and that caring for the whole person matters.
Today, we have the opportunity to build upon that legacy by bringing together sound Islamic knowledge and evidence-based mental healthcare.
Treatment is not a failure of faith.
Perhaps one of the most hopeful messages from our conversation was that OCD can be treated.
Ml. Coovadia was clear about the importance of seeking help.
Treatment may involve psychological therapy, and in some cases medication may form part of a person’s treatment plan under the care of an appropriate medical professional.
One of the therapeutic approaches discussed was Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP), which is commonly used in OCD treatment.
The basic idea is that, with professional guidance, a person gradually learns to face the anxiety-provoking thought or situation without carrying out the usual compulsion.
It sounds simple.
It isn’t.
For someone whose mind is screaming, “You have to check one more time,” resisting that compulsion can be incredibly difficult.
But it is precisely through learning not to obey every demand of the OCD cycle that a person can begin to break free from it.
And for someone experiencing religious OCD, treatment can be particularly valuable when the mental health professional understands the person’s Islamic framework.
At times, there may also be a need to consult a qualified Islamic scholar who understands both the relevant ruling and the nature of OCD.
As Ml. Coovadia explained, sometimes “they just need that basic education.”
Not because their iman is weak.
But because they may have become trapped by an overly rigid understanding of a particular ruling.
Certainty does not disappear because of doubt.
There is a beautiful Islamic principle that can offer profound reassurance:
Al-yaqeen la yazulu bish-shakk — certainty is not removed by doubt.
For someone caught in a cycle of obsessive doubt, this principle can be transformative.
If you know you have made wudhu and then begin to doubt whether it was valid, the existence of doubt does not automatically erase certainty.
The answer is not always to investigate.
Sometimes it is to accept the uncertainty and move forward.
That can be incredibly difficult for someone with OCD, which is precisely why professional support can be so important.
The goal is not to make every doubt disappear.
Sometimes the goal is to learn that you can live without answering every doubt.
“It is something that is treatable.”
As we brought the interview to a close, Ml. Coovadia returned to perhaps the most important message of all:
“When it comes to OCD, there’s much more that can be said, but it is something that is treatable.”
Those words matter.
Because when you are living inside the cycle, it can feel endless.
You may begin to believe that this is simply who you are.
That you’ll always have to check.
Always repeat.
Always question.
Always seek reassurance.
But there is hope.
There is treatment.
There is support.
And there is no shame in asking for help.
Ml. Coovadia also reminded listeners that we should look at care holistically — seeking appropriate psychological support, religious guidance where necessary, and turning to Allah throughout the process.
“A mental health practitioner or anyone else is just a vehicle of change, but we are not the cause of it. The cause ultimately is Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala.”
That balance is beautiful.
We seek the means.
We make the appointment.
We speak to the psychologist.
We consult the scholar.
We learn.
We challenge the compulsions.
We make dua.
And we place our trust in Allah.
You are not your intrusive thoughts.
Perhaps this is the message I would most want someone struggling with religious OCD to take away from this conversation:
You are not a bad Muslim because your mind produces frightening, unwanted, or repetitive thoughts.
You are not failing Allah because you are struggling with a mental health condition.
And seeking treatment does not mean you have less faith.
Sometimes, the most courageous thing you can do is acknowledge that you need help.
Sometimes your worship is not in repeating the action for the tenth time.
Sometimes your worship is in trusting Allah and walking away from the doubt.
Sometimes your tawakkul is making the appointment.
Sometimes your ibadah is learning to live with uncertainty.
And sometimes the journey back to peace begins with admitting:
“I don’t have to fight this alone.”
As Muslims, we believe that ultimately, shifa comes from Allah.
But Allah has also placed means in this world.
And perhaps seeking those means is itself an act of faith.
