- Date posted
- 3y
- Date posted
- 3y
OCD is tricky. When you go through a change or something stressful happens it will try to attach itself to it. Usually people with OCD also tend to suffer from other conditions as depression and low self-esteem. You are not going to beat OCD with logic. It's hard to accept but it is what it is. Right now you need to be compassionate with yourself. It's something that only you can give to yourself. How can you do it? By telling yourself that thoughts are just thoughts and they are not you. Understand this and let yourself feel ok that you are not ok. Write it in a piece of paper and put it somewhere where you can see it: "it's ok that I am not ok". Anxiety is telling you that you need to solve this and get your feelings and thoughts "just right". Basically anxiety is lying saying you need to think and feel perfectly or something bad is happening. It's a lie. Try to get your mind to the present moment. Close your eyes, breath and notice your breathing. You don't need to focus on the thoughts that pop into your mind. Gently focus on your breathing. Then open your eyes and realize where you are, what day is it and what can you see around you. This are just some exercises to be present in the moment. It's not a magic cure but something that can help you not escape from the anxiety at the same time that you refocus. Be patient with yourself and practice being present. Don't condemn or judge yourself because that will not do any good to nobody including you. Treat yourself as you will treat someone that's going through something hard. With kindness, compassion, patient and love. Be there for you. There's a lot of guilt and shame attached to OCD. Trust me I know. I have come to understand that OCD is here to teach me to be compassionate with myself. Let's use it to learn that and that way we'll be more compassionate towards others. One last thing. There's a guy called Mark de Jesus on YouTube that talks about OCD. His videos on the 7 distortions are a good place to start because they will help you identify some of the ditches OCD will try to make you fall into. Again, the most important thing is for you to be compassionate and patience with yourself.
- Date posted
- 3y
Thankyou so much for the lengthy reply, it truely did help. It is so hard soemtimes but you are right, I need to be compassionate with myself and realise I’m strong and it’s okay that I’m not okay. Thankyou again
Related posts
- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 22w
Hi guys! I had really bad harm ocd about 2 years ago and I went through therapy and eventually got really good at handling it when it would pop up. The other day, I was scrolling on TikTok and came across a girl talking about a guy who was presenting a lot of schizophrenic symptoms but no one paid attention and got him help, he was having a lot of delusions, hallucinating, thinking everyone was out to get him, thought he was Jesus and his dad was the president and ended up doing horrific things. The day after that, I was dealing with some work drama and had the thought of “what if all my coworkers are against me and trying to get me fired”. That really stressed me out, cause I don’t normally think about them like that and I went down a rabbit hole of thinking that was the beginning of me developing schizophrenia, ended up googling stuff all night, taking tests, crying and seeking reassurance. I had a thought the other day “your dad is the president”, this one didn’t stress me out as bad as I knew it was just the video I had seen and it was an intrusive thought about it, and I also didn’t believe it. Today I was with some friends and I got a prize at a place we went and it said “lonely” on it. I do have my moments of feeling lonely and this week has been specifically trying so I had a thought like “oh someone’s out to get me cause I got this”. I know this isn’t logical and it wouldn’t make sense to just randomly get it if someone was truly after me and it was just a stupid prize at a random place, anyone could’ve gotten it. Im just struggling a lot with schizophrenic OCD and thinking I’m in the pre stages of it. In my good moments, I don’t think I am at all and it was all just sparked from the video I watched but in my bad moments, these thoughts feel real!! They really stress me out and make me feel like I’m going to lose my mind causing me to lose my job/ end up in a psych hospital/ never live a normal life/ end up alone, never see me my loved ones/ hurt my loved ones. I just want to feel normal and not like I’m about to lose my mind and everything I care about. Please help!!! Anyone else going through something similar and can help me get through this!
- Date posted
- 9w
This is a late night thought I get a lot not all the time but most nights sometimes I feel like my ocd would make me think that I have this thing trying to talk to me or getting me to do things that I do NOT want to do AT ALL. This is also why I try to stop being online or not talk or do anything at all. I'm trying to explain in the best way I can. The best way I can describe my ocd or mental health right now would be like Jeykll and hyde. Especially in the musical the most popular song confrontation cause like false memories or something like that. Having false memories of doing something especially online in my past that was so bad at least to me and I just have forgotten about it. Trying to remember feels like as if it was a different version of me or a complete different person cause I do be wanting to think of my past self as a completely different person cause I personally feel like I did or even said something so wrong or bad (even though I didn't do anything...) that I just want my old self to be a completely different person. My ocd has also gotten so bad that it made me have developed severe delusions of the government or government services like the police or FBI coming to get me. So sometimes I would think about turning myself into the station or mental hospital one because I also developed S**cidal ideation because it got so bad though I never wanted to acted on anything. I haven't really experienced ideation that bad until I first developed it but I just get scared of my mental health getting bad again.
- Date posted
- 7w
OCD has been in my life since 2019, and I have no idea how to get rid of it. Everything started when I was 14. I had just started high school, and when I walked into the classroom, I was trying to figure out the atmosphere there. I was a very quiet kid in high school. I usually hated my skin, so I would wear my cardigan in a way that covered my hands and listened to lessons with my hand on my face. A few weeks later, people started insulting me, hitting me, and verbally harassing me. The bullying got worse, and from then on, I started bottling everything up. At that time, I cared too much about what people thought, and I began to believe others would harm me. Because of these thoughts and fears, I failed around 8–9 classes. In 2020, when the pandemic started, classes went online. I hated it, but I was happy because I wouldn’t have to see those people again—at least until I lost my grandmother. She passed away due to COVID, and that pushed me really far down. Back then, I had an edit account on Instagram. I loved making edits and I had friends I really liked. Talking with them made me so happy, but over time, their behavior toward me changed. They turned into completely different people I no longer recognized. They became horrible, and all of this happened just because I replied late to their messages. I wasn’t always online—I’m human too. They added me to groups, threatened me, and sent me awful messages. I began to hate myself more and more. Around that time, I also started becoming paranoid about people. When I met someone new, I approached them with fear, and this dragged me down further. For almost a year and a half, both online and in real life, I developed prejudice against people. This prejudice was mostly fear—fear and prejudice made me antisocial. When the pandemic ended, in 2022–2023, I had to do an internship in a place and a job I absolutely hated and couldn’t manage. The people there constantly mocked me, which pushed me down even more. I didn’t know how to deal with these situations because I was alone. I did the internship for about two and a half months, and when 2023 came, all the traumas and obsessions echoed in my mind. I felt terrible because of the disgusting events I had experienced. It felt like my brain had completely shut down. By January 2023, I was in an unbearable state. When I walked into the classroom, my teacher noticed something was wrong and started asking me questions. I immediately burst into tears and told her, “I hate myself.” At that time, the students in the back were making a lot of noise, so they couldn’t hear me. My teacher said, “Don’t turn around so they won’t see—come with me,” and took me to the teachers’ room. I told her everything, and I think I respect myself for that. But at the same time, my orientation felt like a burden on my shoulders, because I felt pressure from my family—as if I was supposed to meet a girl and start a relationship. I explained all the pressures, my obsessions, everything from beginning to end. She guided me and supported me. Almost all of my teachers supported me, and my prejudice toward people completely disappeared. Back then, I really thought I had beaten OCD. But in the following years, it came back stronger. I started hating my body. I took too many showers. The traumas replayed in my mind over and over. The more I tried to erase them, the more I thought about them—and I wasn’t the one controlling it. I couldn’t. When I do something, I often repeat it 4 or 5 times. I can’t pass through doors. I can’t touch certain objects. Even when I play games on my phone, I feel like I have to choose a character, but I keep choosing and canceling again and again. It repeats endlessly, and I can’t stop it. It feels like everything that once made me happy just disappears in front of my eyes, and I’m still fighting this. My family, my sister, my aunts, and my past teachers have supported me, but I feel like I’m disappointing them. That makes me feel terrible. On this site, I see so many people sharing their struggles with OCD, and knowing I’m not alone makes me both sad and, at the same time, a little happy. I just wanted to express myself this way. There are still things I couldn’t write—I really want to—but my thoughts exhaust me so much that I can’t.
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