Hey guys. I just to share the intrusive thoughts in my mind with you guys to see if someone out there could relate to it and help me out a little bit. I am having some very disturbing, eerie & almost unexplainable thoughts since my early childhood. And they've always got me into enormous amount of anxiety which I can't explain. I'll just write down these thoughts. 1. Thoughts that tell me you're a bad person who wants to hurt someone. 2. Thoughts that tell me that deep down you don't love your life & you want to get rid of it. (Of course I don't want to.) 3. Some thoughts tell me that don't get near some objects otherwise you'll unconsciously harm someone. 4. There is also a strange thought that you'll get up from your bed at night and unconsciously hurt yourself and your family. (LOL) 5. I also have some thoughts in mind about being pedophile and harming children. 6. Sometimes I get worried while being next to a sick person, I feel I'll get contaminated by his germs. 7. Existential Thoughts like, "you know one day you'll die, so why would you enjoy your life and make it better". 8. When I read about some kind of disease or I see a post about self-harm or anything else, I think I might have this disease or I might be the same person. I even start to have symptoms of that disease for a moment. 9. & Yesterday a thought popped into my mind that this world is not real & you're living in an alternate reality of the world. (or like the dream world shown in some movies) There are many more thoughts like this in my mind & when I didn't know about their nature or why they happen, I really thought they mean something about me. I am a very nice & caring person & thoughts like this always got me into depression. I would always try to push them away or try to argue with the thoughts. I would seek reassurance from my family that I'm a nice man who won't hurt anyone. But this all couldn't help until I came across some books about intrusive thoughts & OCD. These books changed my views about these thoughts and I really started to get my life back on track. But then I got uncertain about the tips written in book. Because in those books it was mentioned that the first thing you need to do to break free from these kind of thoughts is "accepting" them & then "letting it go". When I tried to accept these thoughts, they bounced back with, "yes you are this kind of person, you yourself accepted it, now do it". I don't know why the acceptance couldn't help. I'm confused what to do when they reply like this. My anxiety goes even higher and I'm completely frustrated on how to accept these thoughts and let them go. Now I just want you guys to help me, read the whole passage, and tell me whether your intrusive thoughts also bounce back like this, or am I the only one? And also tell me the best way tp get rid of these thoughts or accept them without any other types of thoughts caused by this acceptance. Thanks a Lot.

Hello does anyone get such severe panic and anxiety that comes along with bad intrusive thoughts. Then the thoughts give you more panic because you feel you may act on them? Then I worry I’m going crazy, can anyone relate? Thank for reading

Hello, I’m new to this app. I’ve always had an anxious brain, and I’ve had coping mechanisms for as long as I can remember. When I was a kid, from as early as I could spell, until I was probably early teens, I would constantly write words in my head along to the beat of music. It’s such a vivid memory because I never stopped doing it. The word had to perfectly match up to the lyric and I loved that it kept my brain busy. I grew out of that, but felt like good context. My anxiety increased drastically around ages 17-19, and I began therapy. I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety and panic disorder, due to having a panic attack nearly every day at that time. I overcame that as well, and now the panic attacks are every now and then, but the anxiety is constant, and some recent symptoms have led me to believe I might have some form of OCD. Maybe not. I’m trying to understand myself and get better so I joined this app to make sense of things. Lately I’ve been having really intense intrusive thoughts. I’m really embarassed and they make me feel like a bad person. Thoughts pop in my head seemingly out of nowhere. It will be an image of me harming myself or someone else in a really bad way. (Trigger warning) for example the other day I couldn’t shake the image of me putting a knife through my own forehead, although it’s not something I want to do. Or I’ll imagine someone killing me. I imagine my loved ones dying often. The thoughts feel so out of my control it’s insane. I hate them. Another persistent issue that isn’t as new is replaying social scenarios. I’m a hairstylist so this one is difficult since I meet a bunch of new people every day. I obsess over how I act and if people like me. I will impulsively say things all the time and they will haunt me for weeks. I question even my closest friends and family who show their love. I find myself so angry and numb and like I have so much built up emotion and a busy mind always. While doing my job I spiral really badly if any little thing goes wrong and it’s embarassing. I know there’s more but I can’t think of it now. I just want to feel better and like I’m not constantly battling my mind.

The subject of OCD matters to the sufferer because it feels like confirmation that they are fundamentally unlovable and unwanted—as if even existence itself doesn’t want them. They feel like an error, carrying a deep sense of guilt and shame, as if they were inherently wrong. They suffer from low self-esteem and a deep internalized shame, because long ago, they were fragmented and learned a pattern of fundamental distrust—especially self-distrust. But the real trouble doesn’t come from the content of the most vile or taboo thoughts. It comes from the fact that the sufferer lacks self-love. That’s why, when you begin to walk the road to recovery, you’re taught unconditional self-acceptance—because that’s what all sufferers of OCD have in common: if you aren’t 100% sure, if there isn’t absolute certainty, the doubt will continue to attack you and your core values. It will make you doubt everything—even your own aversion to the thoughts. You have to relearn how to trust yourself—not because you accept that you might become a murderer someday—but because you enter a deep state of acceptance about who you truly are. It’s not about becoming a monster at all. It’s about making peace with what lies at the root of the fear. Making peace with the guilt. With the shame. Making peace with yourself and the person you fear you might be. Because that fear is not rooted in reality. It’s not rooted in any true desire to act. It’s rooted in your identity—specifically, in what might threaten it. That’s what confirms the belief that you are fundamentally wrong. And OCD fuels that belief by using intrusive taboo thoughts to attack your very sense of self. But then I wonder: let’s say, for example, someone fears being or becoming a sexually dangerous person—how could that person practice unconditional self-acceptance? I would never accept myself if I were to harm anyone—the thought alone makes me want to cry. I know it’s not about whether or not someone acts on the thought. It’s about the core fear underneath it. So how do you accept yourself when the thoughts—and the feelings around them—feel so completely unacceptable ?