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Saving Rick

Saving Rick: Documenting a family's experience with OCD

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About

This film began six years ago. The story began much earlier.

My brother Rick grew up suffering from O.C.D. at a time when this illness was not so widely well known or diagnosed. Unfortunately, and at a great, personal cost to himself, he concealed the seriousness of his disability for many years. But once diagnosed in his late teens, his adult life was completely marred by his struggles to battle this illness. As the battles became more fierce and frequent, and his life began to crumble around him, I decided that I wanted to find some way to help him and maybe gain insight into his debilitating disease. At the time we began, he lived in Florida where there was little in the way of meaningful or accessible treatment. I, along with my other six siblings lived in Pennsylvania. This added another layer of complication to our efforts. It became imperative for Rick to travel to Pennsylvania more regularly in order for me to assist him. He lived on and off with me. And as we began to seriously pursue the treatment that we hoped would enable him to reclaim his life, Rick and I decided to chronicle the journey. We wanted to provide a personal, accurate profile to possibly help others in a similar position. Along the way this film became about even more than Rick and his pain. It also became about how one family, my family, dealt with an adult sibling with mental illness.

It is my hope that this film puts a very real, relatable face to the mental illness that impacts 1 in 5 American families every day. Because it was filmed over a five-year period, it provides an in-depth examination of the challenges, frustrations, fears and heartache of families trying to make sense of mental illness. More often than not the solutions do not come easily—if at all. Saving Rick lifts the veil of guilt and blame and reminds families that they are not alone.

Learn More: http://www.savingrick.com