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Book Buzz: Lena Dunham talks OCD in new memoir excerpt

It seems that Lena Dunham and her “Girls” alter ego Hannah Horvath have even more in common than we knew.

In a new excerpt from Dunham’s forthcoming memoir, Not that Kind of Girl, published in The New Yorker, the actress talks about struggling with aspects of obsessive-compulsive disorder, much like her character did.

The excerpt talks about Dunham being “afraid of everything” as an 8-year-old. It delves into this serious topic with touches of humor, such as when she remembers bringing an article about OCD to her therapist.

“Sitting with my mother in the beauty salon one afternoon, I come across an article about obsessive-compulsive disorder. A woman describes her life, so burdened with obsessions that she has to lick art in museums and crawl on the sidewalk. Her symptoms aren’t much worse than mine: the magazine’s description of her most horrible day parallels my average one. I tear the article out and bring it to (my therapist), whose face crumples sympathetically, as though the moment she’d been dreading had finally arrived. It makes me want to throw my needlepoint supplies in her face. Do I have to do everything myself?”

Not that Kind of Girl will hit bookshelves Sept. 30 from Random House. Dunham is promoting the book with an 11-stop book tour, kicking off in New York the day it publishes.

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