Find your tribe in a Sea of Creativity
Wait wait so this doesn’t seem to be an UNcommon headcanon exactly, but I still want to really get into it for anyone who might be curious. And so! This is just gonna be a rundown of why I think Ritsu has OCD, and more specifically what it is about him that makes him my favorite depiction of OCD- whether intentional or not- that I’ve seen in media.
cw for in-depth talk of obsessive and compulsive behaviors, as well as frank talk of OCD as a whole and the different ways it might present. Please keep in mind that a lot of this is based off of personal experience, so while I’m very open to discussion, please keep it respectful! I am more than willing to meet anyone who’s curious or who relates halfway, but I will not hesitate to block anyone who purposefully crosses lines.
So, OCD. Obsessive-Compulsive disorder is a distressing, relatively common mental health disorder that is based in a cycle of obsessive, anxiety-inducing thoughts as well as the compulsive behaviors used to temporarily alleviate them. These obsessions and compulsions can be anything and everything- the hallmark of OCD is simply the obsessive-compulsive pattern- though there are a number of common “themes” so to speak, such as contamination, harm, etc.
Now, the thing about media depictions of OCD- especially in media made by non-OCD people- is that most of them are going to fall into common public perceptions of the disease. This in turn means that these characters are likely going to express cleaning or checking behaviors- as in, they’re going to have clear, easily identifiable, and outward-focused compulsive behaviors. These combine to make a character who is OCD in a way that the majority non-OCD audience can understand; and while it is very important to note that OCD CAN and DOES manifest in these ways, these depictions leave a whole host of other obsessive themes and compulsive behaviors that most media, especially most media written by non-OCD people, have simply left unaddressed.
This is where Ritsu comes in. Right off the bat Ritsu is established as having a number of characteristics that people with OCD might as well (though there is, of course, no hard and fast rules): he expresses tendencies towards fixation and obsessive behaviors, he’s a perfectionist, he’s got unresolved childhood trauma, he feels perpetually responsible for anyone and everything around him, and he’s under quite a bit of stress quite a lot of the time. He’s also 13. OCD often manifests in the teenage or young adult years, though it may also manifest in childhood or, on occasion, in adulthood. My symptoms kicked up in earnest at around 15, and honestly I would say that Ritsu displayed symptoms even before the big cleanup arc.
Now, Ritsu’s first major arc is the aforementioned Big Cleanup arc, in which of course we have the recorder-licking scheme. Immediately after this event, Ritsu begins to express continuous worry, immense guilt, fixation turned to its natural extreme, and of course intense, repeated distress strong enough to spontaneously induce psychic powers. He also started confessing to other things that were dishonest/ may have been dishonest near immediately (ie telling everyone that he doesn’t have psychic powers).
So then! What does this mean! Well, the fact of the matter is is that OCD can very much manifest as a fixation on past events and what a person thinks they mean in terms of their relative morality. This can happen fast, and it can get ugly very quickly due to the OCD brain’s tendency to latch, latch, latch. In these cases it might be more difficult to discern the compulsive behaviors a person - thus this and similar sorts of OCD have earned (in some places) the designation of pure-O or pure-obsessive OCD, which is a bit of a misnomer as we’ll see in a second- but they are still very much there. In cases such as these, the compulsive behaviors tend to be mental- reviewing, ruminating, checking, confessing, etc, and chances are that a person will feel monstrous, constant amounts of guilt.
And Ritsu’s distress was familiar, as was his vulnerability. His compounded upset, his confusion, his flailing attempts at safety and certainty that inevitably only ended up perpetrating the same frightening cycle that he was trying to escape- this was familiar. Fifteen, sixteen year old me recognized myself in the sort of hazy, fog-addled way of someone who wasn’t sure what they were about quite yet, and now nineteen year old me has several more years under my belt and is able to say: I recognized myself in Ritsu, because Ritsu expresses a symptom set that could be attributed to several things but that I, though admittedly somewhat biased, attributed to OCD. The immediate confession, the impulsivity, the rationalization and the willingness to give a part of himself up just for an ounce of control- his distress and fixation versus his perceived sense of self, his lashing out. He’s upset, he’s frightened, he’s young, he’s mentally ill. We’ve all been there.
So then we get into the second half. Why is it that Ritsu, who is not confirmed as having OCD and likely was not intended to have it, my favorite depiction of OCD in media?
The simple fact of it is that in stories where characters have OCD, their OCD is often centered in their stories, and while OCD very much (and very quickly) works it’s way into every corner of a person’s life, it still gets… tiring, to see people whose narratives center their illness to the exclusion of all else. But Ritsu is a full-fledged character outside of his mental health issues. There’s also of course the fact that he wasn’t intended to have OCD in the first place, which (ironically) is what allows him to be more relatable. This gets a little messy in that OCD is still so misunderstood and stigmatized that if you’re writing a character and you say “this character has OCD,” then chances are you have to make them immediately sympathetic to avoid reinforcing negative public perception. Now see this causes an issue in that it has people avoiding the whole taboo-thoughts/ideas side of OCD entirely, which reinforces negative stereotypes and emotions and is also a different conversation.
In the case of Ritsu however, who is unconfirmed etc, it means he can be messy. He panics, he spirals, he’s disgusted with himself and reaching out for anything and anyone that gives him a sense of control even if that sense never lasts. He’s afraid in a very real way, even if that fear is presented through a lens that isn’t applicable to everyday life. His guilt is real, visceral. And he’s still sympathetic regardless! He’s an effective character! He’s memorable, he’s complex, and yeah. He’s my personal favorite depiction of OCD.
Anyways, there’s more I’m sure, but this is all I’ve got at the moment. Here’s to hoping that it actually makes sense.