I was so happy being a new father. OCD has taken all of that away from me. I loved taking care of my son and laughing and playing with him. Then 6 months in, OCD got ahold of me, and now I can’t even enjoy my time. It has caused me to be so depressed. When I look at him I can’t smile. I just want this to go away. He’s only a year old and I wonder how long this will last. My wife wants to have more children, and I did too, but now I can’t...I just couldn’t handle it. 😭😭

Fellow parent here with ocd ❤️ I have a two year old. You’re not alone. Mine started about 6 months in as well. I’m so sorry you’re dealing with this. It is the worst 😓

It’s just terrible. Everything was fine. In my 32 years of life I never struggled with ocd before and then one day poof. When I look back I can see ocd like symptoms, but I also had general anxiety disorder. It’s so hard for my wife to understand but she’s been so supportive. It still takes a toll on her though. I’m thinking I will try meeting a NOCD therapist here soon. Since this started I’ve had multiple subtypes, but this one is the main one and really sticks. 😞😞😞 I hate this. I didn’t have an extremely present father growing up, and wanted to be everything I didn’t have but needed to my son. I feel like I could maybe have another kid if I knew for sure it was going to be a boy. Somehow this makes this slightly more bearable, but I couldn’t imagine having a girl 😭😭😭😭😔😔😔

@Ocdislame - This is my exact story. 38 years old, never thought I had OCD...then BAM, it hit me hard one day, and hasnt gone away. I have 2 children, and it's vey difficult. I just started Therapy here though, so helping it works.

@Ocdislame I’m here if anyone on this post ever wants to chat. I really appreciated everyone’s response on this post, it certainly made me feel a lot less alone to know there are other people and other parents experiencing the same type of torture.

@Freemeofocd Yeah sure !

You’re so brave. I have this theme and can’t imagine how terrifying it would be to have a child and deal with this. I’m so sorry you’re going through this, this theme has ruined my life as well.

Yeah that’s what makes this one so bad. I’ve had multiple themes appear since then that have all since resolved. It’s easy for me to hit it with ERP when it’s something else. This one is tough though, and it always seems to linger. It adds to the question of if it’s OCD or not 😒

@Ocdislame If we were really pedos we would enjoy the thoughts and not care, but instead we’re being tortured and living in hell. The reason it lingers is because we care so much about not hurting anyone and we need certainty that we never will.

@Ocdislame Also, I’ve done a lot of research on ocd and studies have shown that people with ocd have less grey matter in their brains which is why we have so many intrusive thoughts and can’t stop thinking them. It’s not even us, it’s our brains malfunctioning.

@Anxioushumanchels Yeah it’s weird because my ocd only focuses on my own kid. I don’t have it when it comes to other children. It just doesn’t bother me.