My wife was diagnosed with OCD. She has cleaning compulsions and needs for things to always have their own place. It's nice always having a clean house, but its such a helpless feeling. She was put on an antidepressant for postpartum depression and its helped mellow her out a whole bunch.
My only compulsion is really mild compared to a lot of people, so I got lucky that way. It sounds stupid, but I just count syllables when I hear people talking, until I start and end on every finger. But the gory images getting stuck in my head is *extremely* distressing to me, since I've seen a lot of horrific things in life, and seeing one image triggers a mental avalanche of other images that I can't stop.
I'm really glad your wife's meds are helping. I was on anxiety meds, but they also helped with my OCD. I stopped them a few weeks ago, though, because they made me feel like a zombie.