- Date posted
- 3y
- Date posted
- 3y
You tagged this with religion themed OCD. I’m curious what role religion plays here. Years ago, my religion made my OCD much, much worse. Be careful that you haven’t “criminalized” normal sexual desire in your own mind (which some religions tend to encourage). Whether you believe that you evolved to desire sex, or that a Creator designed you that way, one thing that all religions acknowledge is that human beings are (among other things) sexual creatures. As a sexual creature, you are expected to notice other people, to notice their bodies and admire some of them. I don’t think it’s reasonable or realistic for any religion to tell you that is wrong. My thought is, you may be fearful of fulfilling your normal sexual desires because in your religious framework doing so would make you “bad”, or worse yet, destined for hell. As a result, you have a ton of anxiety around the question, “am I a good person”, and that leads you to a) attempt to convince yourself that you have no immoral desires, and b) constantly check to see if you do have these desires (by noting how you react to stimuli, such as, a pretty girl at church). Now that you are checking your sexual reactions so often, to monitor for evidence of immorality, you are sure to see minors, check your reaction, and at some point be confused or disturbed. This confusion could be caused by something like an erection right after seeing a minor. Sounds bad, right? But why might that happen to a perfectly good natured guy like you, who has no desire to harm children, nor any pedophilic tendencies? Well, when we put so much focus on our own sexual reaction, we put a lot our attention on our genitals, and that’s all it takes to get an erection. And that’s just one common example—there are other possible explanations, including totally physical ones that have nothing to do with any stimuli (sometimes I get an erection and I’m not turned on at all—literally just typing emails at work—it’s blood flow—it’s not always sex) But of course, if we don’t understand this is OCD, we take this as evidence that we are pedophiles. But again, we don’t want to accept it. So then we look for more evidence. And the cycle repeats, each time getting meaner and more painful. My advice: look at these people you are afriad to look at, and just breathe. When the thoughts come, don’t engage them, don’t comment on them, just breathe. Don’t ignore them, but don’t look them in the eye. Just let them float by. I hope that helps you. It helped me a great deal.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 23w
since february i have "POcd". Initial symptoms were thoughts, but then I did a testing compulsion during an intimate time, and I spiraled ever since. I struggle with addiction to smut. I'm cutting that out, but I feel as if it is too late. Ive never experienced this much mental, and emotional anguish in my life. On my time on this application I have given advice to others, and helped around, but I wonder if that even applies to me. Millions of times I wish I could turn back time and be more careful. I want to prevent many things, including what led me to spiral into OCD in the first place. I'm surely having an OCD episode. I have gotten a diagnosis, but I'm still not sure. I feel evil, cause unlike many here, I tested on my body sensations and it backfired (twice) I know I'm not supposed to figure out why that is the case, but now I have to live with it for the rest of my life even if its something I don't desire. This is disgusting for me, it is abhorrent. I could've never seen this coming. Day by day I've become more fearful of living with this, "OCD". I was a normal person before this, I knew what I was attracted to, I know my preferences, so why did this come about? This is singlehandedly the most painful thing that has happened to me and I have nobody but myself to blame. I am scared of death but I also would'nt mind sleeping for years on end. My parents and brother were understanding of my situation, but I failed them regardless. I don't want them to see me this way, nor do I want them to learn more of my predicament. I'm cooked. I know it, Fin, thats all folks. I'm only 20 and I already have other diagnosed mental illness so I recklessly brought upon myself another one. Its agonizing to live through, I wish this on nobody, not even my worst enemy. I can't even identify myself at this point. Its tearing me apart.
- Date posted
- 23w
I am 15 years old and my POCD feels like its not POCD, i feel like i like my intrusive thoughts, but i have more intrusive thoughts about having intrusive thoughts, and i feel like i cant enjoy the things i normally enjoy anymore, like calling with my girlfriend and joking with her because this is still in the back of my mind, its making me question morals and if i ever even viewed P as completely wrong and i hate this so much, i love my nieces and nephews and when they're over i know id never do anything with my intrusive thoughts but when they arent present i feel like i like my thoughts. Before this i was dealing with HOCD and ROCD and i wish i could go back to that
- Date posted
- 19w
I’ve recently been struggling a lot with OCD. I have had OCD for a long time I just didn’t realize it until more recently. About seven months ago I developed panic attacks one day randomly at work. I thought I was having a heart attack and went to the hospital where they told me it was just a panic attack and I assumed I would snap out and be better within a few days. However it didn’t. Here’s where it gets scary, I was staying at my then boyfriends house while dealing with blurry vision, anxiety attacks everyday, and more (unsure of what was going on). But at some point I saw my bfs (pew pew 🔫) on his table and it sent me into an anxiety attack after sudden thoughts that I was going to hurt myself with it. I begged him to put it away when I’m not looking so I didn’t know where he put it. He did. These thoughts lasted for about four days but began to go away. (I thought that was it and I would be back to normal). Unfortunately though I ended up moving back in with my family when we couldn’t get my panic attacks under control in time for me to get back to work and pay bills. However, coming home brought up a lot of trauma from when I was kid. My anxiety got worse but I didn’t have those thoughts again. About two and half months ago though, I got sick and went to the hospital where they gave me steroid pills and a steroid shot but sent me into some kind of psychiatric event. Ever since then though, I have been suffering from harm OCD, I have had moments of intense anger that I usually have to completely walk away and go on my own because of how intense they are, and it feels like it’s getting worse. Today I felt fine until about and hour and half ago where I started to dwell on the fact that my suicidal thought was influenced by my OCD and at the moment my OCD is at the worst it’s been. This caused me to get suddenly really depressed and I started crying thinking about how I can’t handle this. I then saw a post talking about how suicide rates are high for people with this form of OCD and it made me question if I am mentally strong enough to pull through this. I fear that at times I’m getting worse. I have good days but I have a lot of bad days. Unfortunately this sent me into such a bad panic attack I went over to my nanas crying about how I can’t deal with this. I took a 0.25 mg Xanax which helped calm down the panic attack portion of it but my brain is still uncomfortably active. I guess I just need hope. I’m so saddened by this. It’s like my life took a total 360 in 10 months and got even worse since the steroid shot. Idk what to do about it. I can’t stop the spiral. I talk to two different therapist weekly and start more next week, making it 5 times a week. I feel no improvements…
Be a part of the largest OCD Community
Share your thoughts so the Community can respond