Lately I've been trying not to get hung up on my dreams. I've been trying to find every reason not to, but the dream I just woke up from turned so horrible so fast. It started with a girl rejecting me and my reaction was deplorable. I stood there shocked that she could say no to me, isn't that concerning? The situation escalated pretty quickly, and at the end a woman basically told me that I'm being spied on. It was all a mess that wasn't even the catalyst. I know it's just a dream, but the people in my dreams seem so real. I can't believe I behaved the way I did. I'll be ruminating on this forever now.

So, I know my capacity to get fixated on things. And it's normally something that's relatively remote but, my latest issue is really getting to me and I was wondering if people have any advice. I'm avoiding getting too into specifics, as I don't want this to get reassurance-y but, in essence.. I came to the realisation recently that people who I'd been "friends" (feels like the wrong term now) when I was younger were not very nice people, and normalized a lot of very unpleasant behaviour towards other members of the group. They really normalized it, sold themselves as figures of authority, as older and more responsible and grown-up than others, and looking back, they acted horribly. And coming to this realisation, that I'd been manipulated into just accepting their behaviour has just... broken me. My OCD has latched onto it and I can't stop feeling irreversibly tainted by it. I've talked to others about it, and they've reassured me, told me it's not a big deal and that I hold myself to too high a standard, but none of that sticks. I feel better for a bit, then think 'Maybe when you told them you were skewing it to make yourself look better' or 'Did you leave out a crucial detail'. I keep ruminating over and over, trying to remember exactly how everything played out, trying to figure out if I fed into the behaviour, if I did something bad myself (because y'know, I feel like I was accepting of it at the time, so what does it say about my own values?). I know I need to stop doing all this if I want to improve, but then some part of me keeps saying 'So, you're just going to let yourself off the hook then?' Normally, I can rationalize my own fears to some degree, assure myself something won't happen, but the realness of the situation, and the fact I only came to understand the reality of it because the thought had been bothering me means it feels so much more all-encompassing. I know confessing in itself is a compulsion, but I keep feeling that if I'm not I'm somehow concealing what I 'really am' from others around me, and any positive interactions are me deceiving them in some way. I feel like I can't enjoy anything in life right now, and a good part of me feels I should not enjoy it ever again. If anybody has any advice on it, I'm all ears. Or even hearing if you relate to these feelings, I might appreciate the solidarity at least.

Ii spoke w my bf this weekend and he mentioned that he has thoughts just like me, but his don't bother him like me. I then felt a lot better and he tried dissecting one of his thoughts like I usually do and realized it felt more real for him after. That made me realize that none of my thoughts were ever true and I blew them up. However, yesterday I had a thought ab “wait wut if you liked that one guy? How dare you bc youre supposed to love your bf and not secretly like someone else” and treated it as I usually did bc I accidentally wanted to see if it was true but didn't rlly but I would check to see if it was there and now that thought feels so so so real now and I feel really bad how do Ik it's not real? I feel so bad and guilty bc lividly this makes 0 sense but it feels so prominent. It felt pretty real when it happened yesterday too. And now I feel awful bc how is it possible after my clarity the other day? Why does it feel so prominent 😞😞😞

Why are things so real the first time they’re in my mind and then when I think about it later it’s easier for me to be like wtf?? I was watching a movie earlier and the young girl had developed more in the chest area than the last movie and I felt the desire to check her out so I did. Then later I let myself imagine her having sex and I liked it. But now looking back I’m like ew. The boys in the movie have also developed as the movie went on and I couldn’t help but think that in their real life they’ve probably woken up to boners and s*men and stuff. And looking back it’s just ugh. Idk if it’s sexual relevance but I genuinely let myself indulge in these thoughts and groinal responses and I remember thinking to myself I don’t want to be attracted to little kids and how do I stop myself (everyone has attractive qualities so in younger boys I see man like qualities). Idk I need help. I wouldn’t type this out if I truly believe I was messed up but I’m still scared