I haven’t really had real friends in years, except for my cousin which is like my best friend. But for all of these years at school when I would be alone with my school friends, I would constantly talk, but in my head. It was like my mind was my comfort place kinda. I didn’t really talk what was on my mind so I said a lot of it in my head. I would have thoughts such as “she’s/he’s cute” even when I wouldn’t think that and would say no in my head, but I would still constantly get these thoughts. Now, I have Harm OCD so it’s very tough because I feel like I can’t control my thoughts and it feels like sometimes I force these intrusive thoughts. What if my intrusive thoughts never go away and they just act like the thoughts I had before?

Hi, I’m new here!! I’m praying I don’t get judged for this. But, back in late May of 2022 ( literally right before I graduated high school), I added this one random girl from my school on Snapchat. She posted something about a graduation party , so I swiped up on her story basically saying how I can’t believe we’re almost graduated. She replied and we had a really short and simple conversation. The next day ( i believe) , we started talking a lot , and I just so happened to see her at the highschool when we were grabbing our graduation outfits and doing the rehearsal. When I saw her irl, I kinda got turned off ( I heard she was kinda crazy) , and on top of that , she was a little ugly irl. I remember seeing her Snapchat bio , and she was close friends with my female cousin ( a year younger than me) , who I happened to experiment sexually with when I was 10-11 years old. I remember going to work later that day and having sort of a lightbulb flick thought ( it wasn’t a good thought though) , what if my cousin told her about what happened when we were younger? So I started to kind of panic and immediately distanced myself from that girl. I also experimented sexually with one of my female friends when I was 10-11 , and from that day onwards, I’ve been pretty much living in paranoia and a little bit of guilt about someone finding out and my life being ruined . On top of that, It’s gotten worse to now sometimes I wonder if a girl I added off of quick add ( Snapchat) is underage even if they told me they were 18+ or had 18 and above in their bio, and I get so much guilt and anxiety about that. I even had a quick thought last February on what if I did something inappropriate with my younger cousin when I was 15-16 but I just can’t exactly remember when it happened , and it still eats me alive when I think about it, because I don’t know if it happened or not. I’m sorry for the long vent, I just wish I felt normal again. No matter how much I try to do things that old me used to do, life always feels “ off”. I always kept the top part about when I was younger a secret up until early (ish ) 2024, then I vented to one of my best friends and he told me that that’s a normal thing to do at a young age. Since then, I have told multiple friends and they all say they did similar stuff, but my brain just can’t accept that. Please help me, I quite literally overthink everything nowadays. 2021 was the last full year that I felt normal ( coincidentally, the best year of my life so far) . It’s not just about sexual related things either, sometimes I’ll wonder if I messed up something at work or hit a car while driving/hit someone and drove off. I just wanna live my life how I was supposed to live it after highschool ( carefree and happy) before whatever it is ( I think it’s ocd) hit me unexpectedly. Thanks to anyone who read this , I just needed to pour it out regardless of how negative I felt typing this, I hope someone can relate , because I feel so alone in my head at times.

I don’t know how to deal with the thoughts that come and barely gone. Usually, the brain often remembers and forgets things. People with OCD however struggle with trying to forget the intrusive thoughts because of the imbalance trying to convey what is real and if the thoughts in your head will come true. Just for the past few days, I was having fun and suddenly hit with a wave of obsessive thoughts and making me stuck with nowhere to go.

I find that the intrusive thoughts that hurt me the most are the quiet ones. The ones that, at a glance, can be hard to differentiate from your own thoughts. The louder thoughts are easy to diffuse, to say "maybe, maybe not" to but the quiet ones leave me ruminating for hours trying to figure out if they're mine or OCD's. They leave me feeling disconnected from those around me and even from myself. I can go from happily thinking about marrying my boyfriend in the future to feeling like I have never actually loved him in a matter of minutes all because a thought was a whisper rather than a scream. This is my first post and I'm not sure what I'm looking for in making it. Advice? To know I'm not alone? I guess if there's anything you feel the need to share I'd love to hear it.