Jake Shane Shares How His 'Hyperfixation' on Pop Stars Helped Him Find 'Comfort' amid His OCD Diagnosis

• Jake Shane appeared on Grip podcast on October 16 and opened up about his love for pop stars like Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga
• Shane revealed that he was officially diagnosed with OCD when he was 21 years old
• He shared that his hyper-fixation on pop stars helped him find “comfort”

Jake Shane opens up about his OCD diagnosis and how his “hyperfixation” on pop stars helped him find solace.

During the interview at Grip podcast on Oct. 16, the 24-year-old TikTok creator shared that he was officially diagnosed with OCD at age 21, but has struggled with it his entire life.

“When you have OCD, you hyper-fixate on things,” he explained. “For example, when I was in 6th grade, I hyper-obsessed over shampoos. I was clinically addicted to shampoo and would try all different shampoos and line them up as if they were one.”

During the podcast, Shane also addressed an article he wrote for Highsnobiety back in May, where he talked about hyper-fixing pop stars like Lady Gaga, Lorde, Beyoncé and Taylor Swift and “getting into their world.”

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“Something about female pop stars made the world go silent. (Hyperfixation, a symptom of OCD, was actually my only solace),” he wrote at the time. “My OCD didn’t improve and the intrusive thoughts remained the same, but entering the world of pop stars gave me the confidence to tackle those issues head-on.”

Jake Shane.

The Squeeze/YouTube

During the podcast, Shane explained that when he hyper-fixates on a pop star, he becomes “their advocate.” His love for pop stars came full circle in 2023 when he famously collaborated with Olivia Rodrigo to promote her single “Vampire” from her album INTESTINES.

“Honestly, I was in a tough spot at the time, where I was like, ‘I feel like I can’t think of anything funny,'” Shane told PEOPLE at the time. “I said, Olivia Rodrigo’s ‘Vampire’ is out, just reacting to that.’ Female singer-songwriters are my favorite to listen to.

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Later in the podcast, Shane talked about the struggles he faced growing up with untreated OCD, noting how people around him simply said he would “grow out of it.”

“My parents were very against medication, so I said, ‘Okay, there’s nothing I can do,'” he recalled. “[It] started when I was seven or eight years old [years old]and I started touching things evenly. Then it was [tied to] Good luck [and] bad luck. Like, ‘If I don’t, I’ll get bad luck.’ ”

He said those tendencies disappeared for about two years, but returned when he first discovered social media, noting, “Once it gets into your head, it just smolders.”

Jake Shane.

The Squeeze/YouTube

“I used to not be able to get out of bed unless I could do this one thing [and] I would hardly shower,” he recalled. “I was lazy, but I was lazy because everything took so much work in my head to make it happen. Everything took 10 times longer.”

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After taking medication and trying exposure therapy, he said he felt his symptoms were “more manageable” and he could “shut them down a lot more easily” and “skip the compulsion.”

“I can just do something and forget about it,” he added. “Since [in the past]I would do it and, like, I wouldn’t stop thinking about it.”

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Source: HIS Education