Where do you guys draw the line between reassurance seeking and support seeking? A lot of my ocd tendencies are the result of an abusive relationship. My current partner told me I can always tell him if I’m struggling and what I’m struggling with, even if he doesn’t understand. But I don’t wanna feed into the ocd cycle of checking if something I did or thought is okay

I am at a very difficult spot in my relationship. My boyfriend and I have been together for 6 years, and I have a history of cheating that for years we’ve been trying to work through. To me, it makes a lot of sense that my OCD has attached itself to this and for the last few years I’ve experienced intrusive sexual thoughts of others and relationship ocd. I have been open to him about the content of my thoughts and now, with a proper diagnosis of an anxiety disorder, I am able to reframe them and work through them with ERP so that my brain will *hopefully* get bored and stop sending them. But, things have not been easy. As a result of this and everything in our past, he has become anxious about all the scenarios where I could be having sexualized thoughts about other people. To him, if I am thinking something utterly different than what I am telling him or acting like to him, he can’t fully trust it. And of course, I can imagine how difficult it is to know your life partner is sexualizing others in her brain and to be able find a way to dismiss them as unthreatening, especially when past mistakes say otherwise. Is there anyone that has gone through this with a partner? And other than repeatedly explaining the egodystonic nature of my thoughts and providing reassurance, what are some things you did that helped them? Any advice helps! Thank you

Hi all. I’m writing this because I can’t stop spiraling and I don’t know who to talk to without feeling judged. I (27F) have OCD, so emotional safety and perceived red flags are something I hyper-analyze. My boyfriend (24M) and I are in a long-distance relationship, Im just on vacation right now . We’ve had our ups and downs, but overall, it’s a loving connection. That’s why this particular moment is bothering me so much. Last night, we were on a video call, flirting. At one point I said, “Go to the bathroom first,” before things got more intimate (he has a roommate and wanted privacy). After a few minutes, he came back and said, “Okay I’m alone.” But I hesitated. I was acting playfully shy and holding back. That’s when he said something like, “You said if I went to the bathroom, you’d show me something. This isn’t my (my name)—she’s not shy with me.” He said it smiling, and I was smiling too, but later it started to gnaw at me. My OCD kicked in. I started spiraling: Did that cross a line? Was that pressuring? I brought it up to him, and while he tried to be supportive, I could tell he was caught off guard. He said something like, “I’m trying my best to support you, but I feel sad that you would think I’d ever pressure you like that.” And then, in what he admitted later was a “dumb joke,” he said: “I’m not like your dad—I won’t get mad if you say no or disagree with something.” (For context: I’ve told him before about my father’s anger issues from my childhood. It’s a very sensitive topic.) I got upset and told him never to bring my father into things like that. He immediately apologized and said, “I realized it right after—that the thing I said as a joke to get you out of overthinking was serious. I’m so sorry again, and I feel really bad right now. I respect you and I respect everyone in your family.” After that, he was very gentle. We stayed on the call for a while longer, I felt heard, and we ended things with “I love you.” But today I still feel emotionally sore. Not because I think he’s abusive or manipulative—he isn’t—but because I felt something shift. He saw me cry like that for the first time, and now I feel exposed and over-analytical. My OCD brain is stuck on what if this was a red flag? Even though he apologized and explained himself, I still feel unsettled. What’s making it harder is that I haven’t even told my best friend. I usually tell her everything, but I’m scared to bring this up. I know she already has reservations about him (she’s very protective of me), and I feel like if I share this, she’ll just add it to the “reasons he’s not right for you” list. But I don’t want her judgment—I want clarity. I’m scared that sharing it will make things worse instead of better, and that’s an isolating feeling. I want this relationship to work. I don’t usually cry like that in front of people. I don’t usually feel safe enough to. And he did show up in the end. But now I don’t know how to trust myself—is this a moment to work through together, or am I ignoring something important? Would love some kind, grounded perspective. Thanks for reading.

I am very new to this app and to accepting that I likely have OCD. I am not diagnosed yet, but I have suspected that I have it for years now. I think ignoring it/feeding the reassurance loop led to my first really bad panic attack a few days ago that put me in the hospital and essentially forced me to stop hiding my struggle from my loved ones. I had another one last night, and out of habit I’m already hiding my feelings from my loved ones. I’m having thoughts that I know are OCD but they’re very hard to get past because they feel so logical? Some examples: -I shouldn’t tell anyone because it wasn’t as bad as the one that hospitalized me -my loved ones are already tired of hearing me talking about it and I feel bad burdening them -I just had the last one and if I tell people about this one I’ll look like I’m attention seeking -I don’t want people to ask what the trigger was so I shouldn’t bring it up if I don’t want to have to answer that question I’m naming them here not for reassurance, but to help myself hopefully label these things as OCD per usual trying to keep me from getting help. The hardest part of this journey so far has been accepting that there are so many things that feel like normal, rational thoughts and feelings that having been hurting me and feeding a vicious cycle for years on end. It feels unreal because these things have become such subtle integrated parts of my life and my routine, and telling myself those things are harmful just feels wrong. It’s like what I have considered my “gut feeling” for years isn’t actually my intuition looking out for me, but is an overactive fear response that has been isolating me from everything and I’ve never questioned it because the isolation, the reassurance, feels good and like the right thing to do. How do I push past these thoughts and be honest with my loved ones about my struggling? How do I rewire my brain to stop the reassurance seeking and compulsions when it’s the only thing that’s made me feel better all these years?