- Date posted
- 3y
- Date posted
- 1y
Comment deleted by user
- Date posted
- 1y
@Macyyy729 Hey! I’m still here. I’m happy to hear you’ve been doing well! I’ve struggled with relapse before, and I have some pretty good advice for you. About two years ago I was doing very well with my mental health (at least I thought I was) my anxiety level was what I would call “normal” and I was functioning throughout the day. But, what I didn’t notice was; I was still doing certain things in my life that involved checking, controlling and coping with different aspects in my life. So for example: I had major anxiety and intrusive thoughts around my breathing. I went to workout and ended up swimming at the gym. After I got done swimming, I had a thought of, “what if I my brain becomes confused of when to breath? What if I end up holding my breath in my sleep? What if my brain becomes confused when I’m swimming and tries to take a full breath when I’m under water?” Immediately I started becoming panicky and had a panic attack. “I thought I was on the right track! Why am I having these intrusive thoughts!?” I went back to the basics. I said- “Ok, I want to experience this anxiety. It’s fine to have anxiety. It’s fine to experience any feeling. I still enjoy swimming, and it’s something that is positive in my life, so I want to continue doing that, no matter what feeling, thought or sensation I experience. So, now that this is understood, I need to know if I’m “training” my brain to check, control and cope in my everyday life. Low and behold, I definitely was doing things in my life that involved checking, controlling and coping. I would make a post on FB or Reddit in the mornings, and I didn’t think it was the best post, so I would constantly check on that post to see if it offended anyone. I would check to see if I got X many FB likes. I would then get a little anxious when I would imagine (aka-rumination) others getting upset with me about those posts. I would then head off to work and ruminate in the car and think about what conversations to talk about to co-workers. I would then check to see if my boss was in a good mood by sending an email or text, before I said hello and striking up a conversation. I had a minor problem with one tooth, and I know I need to go to the dentist to get it checked out, but I hate going to the dentist.. so I “coped” and tried googling all day about remedies on natural ways to cure my tooth ache. It was also raining outside that day, and I kept asking it to stop raining, because I had errands to run outside. Almost as if I could “control” the weather. As you can see, I was doing many things like; checking, controlling and coping ALL day leading up to my panic attack after the swimming session. What I quickly learned was- How can I expect my brain to learn how to accept my breathing thought and the anxiety, when I’m doing all those compulsions all day long? It’s simply not fair to my brain. Your brain is very logical and reasonable. If you’re doing compulsions all day long, and then when something difficult comes up, your brain is going to be logical, and helpful by spiking your anxiety and telling you to either “check, control or cope with this thought, feeling or sensation now, because that’s what you have taught me all day long to do!” So my advice would be to take a good look at what you’re doing all day. And it really starts in the morning. Are you doing things that positively effect your mental health, like getting out of bed when your alarm goes off, brushing your teeth, drinking a glass of water. Or are you laying in bed when your alarm goes off and your on your phone on social media or ruminating about the day? 😊
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- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 18w
As a 20+ year OCD vet and OCD conqueror. I wanted to share some tips and tricks that help me. 1. A thought is not the same as a belief. You can think something, and not believe it in the slightest. 2. Thoughts DO NOT represent ANYTHING. They are not indicators to who we are as people, they are pop up ads for the brains computer. 3. We DO NOT control our thoughts! The average person has about 60,000 ( yes, 4 zeros) a day! NONE of which are controlled. 4. We DO have control over which of those 60k thoughts are important. i.e. thought A. I could murder my entire household- survey says? not important ( because yea, sure, you could, but you probably don't really want to) thought B. i need to do my laundy-survey says? important... unfortunately, i hate laundry. which brings me to number 5. 5. Emotional reasoning ( where you let your feelings impact your decisions) is a COGNITIVE DISTORTION. It is a flawed thought process and should NEVER be used. "wanting to do something" does not mean you SHOULD do it, same and sometimes NOT wanting to do something doesn't mean you shouldn't do it ( picked what is important) my brain might tell me i WANT to break up with my husband, ( unimportant) and it might also say i don't want to get up and go to work in the morning ( important). 6. YOU-ARE-IN-CONTROL. Not to be confused with HAVING control. We don't control our thoughts, we control which ones are important, we don't control our feelings or emotions, but we control how to react (or not react) to them. We don't control our OCD, but we can control how it affects our lives, and that can mean that is has all the power, or none. 7. If the action you want to do ( confess, get reassurance, check, analyze, avoid, re-do) are to gain relief from anxiety, IT IS A COMPULSION. DO NOT DO IT. Sit with the anxiety and train your brain to realize its not dangerous or important with ERP ( this takes time, but practice makes perfect) 8. Know your enemy. NOCD has a HUGE amount of articles and information on ALL subtypes of OCD and how to respond and how to treat them. OCD is MUCH easier to combat when you understand how it works. 9. BE PATIENT. BE KIND to yourself. Prioritize healthy habits, a healthy body is better equipped to handle OCD. Good sleep, whole foods, sunlight, social interaction, exercise ( walking especially). When the mind feels weak, make the body strong. 10. You are not alone. OCD is classified by the World Health Organization as one of the top 10 most distressing disorders. Reach out to people, seek medical help. Medication is not evil, it can be life-saving, TALK to people. Bonus Tips * if the question is " What If" its OCD. * Total certainty does not exist, be content with 99%* *"But this feels different, this feels like its not OCD, that its real*- emotional reasoning... its OCD. Hang in there. You got this. Im here for any advice, questions, or support. Today is a great day to have a GREAT DAY.
- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 11w
Last week I fell into a bit of an existential spiral, which hasn't happened for a long while. Now that I'm mostly on the other side, I think it's important to reflect on the lessons I learned from it. I hope this is helpful for others who find themselves in their own spiral, existential or not. 1. The thought, "I'm never getting out of this one," will always be there, and it will always be a lie. Whenever I fall into a deep existential spiral (which is pretty rare these days), it *always* feels as though I've uncovered some horrible thought that I'm never going to be able to get past. As if I've finally found that one existential thought this is going to ruin me for the rest of my life. When that happens, allow the thought to come and go just like the rest of the thoughts, and take some time to reflect on how you've been there before. For me, it helps to sarcastically agree with it: "Yep you're right! THIS is the one that'll do me in." 2. Keep doing what you do A major difference between this spiral and past ones is that I forced myself to not cancel any plans because of it. I played at an open mic, accompanied my friend on mandolin for his performance, and I attended a run group, all while experiencing an existential crisis. I definitely think this shortened the length of the episode. I proved to myself that I could do some pretty demanding things despite the thoughts. I was also able to reflect on how when I was forced to be present (such as while performing), the existential crisis totally subsided. Which brings me to... 3. Trust in mindfulness I absolutely get it; when you're in the middle of a spiral, the idea of just "bringing yourself into the present moment" seems laughably unhelpful. This time in particular, it really felt irresponsible to *not* attend to the thoughts. It genuinely felt like I had to *solve* these existential questions before I could move on to anything else, including the present moment. But when I reflect on the times that I felt the most at-ease, it was always when I was present. It was during the 10 seconds I took to breath and notice my surroundings. It was when I disengaged from the thoughts and allowed them to come and go. It was when I smelled the fresh air after a thunderstorm, or during a conversation with a friend about her breakup. It was when I named the feelings and emotions I was experiencing, and welcomed it all. Existential thoughts are supposed to be about reality, but when you're lost in them, you aren't actually *in* reality. They're only scary in the virtual reality of the mind. And finally... 4. Yes, the compulsions are the problem I did a LOT of research last week. I watched videos, Googled, and even dove into ChatGPT. The compulsions were obvious, and they were never enough. Every answer that made me feel a little better was followed by doubt less than 15 minutes later. In the moment it genuinely feels like you HAVE to keep doing the compulsions, but you need to trust that that's exactly what is making you feel worse. In order to stop researching, I just had to...stop researching. It was hard at first, but eventually the spiral stopped spinning, and the longer I waited between compulsions, the easier it was to move on.
- Date posted
- 9w
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 ?
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