A young woman who was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder at the age of 12 says that if she didn't do what the voice in her head was telling her, she genuinely believed she or someone she loved would die.

"It landed me in the psychiatric ward on two occasions, stopped me from being able to enter my house without severe anxiety and contributed to me dropping out of school," Ms Mora told Newshub.

Genevieve Mora is speaking out about the debilitating mental illness, now determined to remove the stigma which surrounds OCD and the common misunderstandings about its tendencies.