- Date posted
- 6y
- Date posted
- 6y
Have you considered if there's any secondary gains to your OCD? I know I've tried lots in the past to no avail, but have recently been exploring the possibility that I might be clinging to my OCD because it benefits me in some strange twisted way, and if you can find the secondary gain you can work to mitigate it. If you haven't already done so I'd recommend doing a bit of googling around secondary gains to see if anything resonates with you. If not then sometimes it can just be a case of finding the right therapist
- Date posted
- 6y
ERP is the gold standard to treat ocd. Traditional talk therapy will not fix OCD. Act, DBT, and some cbt skills can be helpful additions but exposure therapy (ERP) is what will treat ocd.
- Date posted
- 6y
See, I’ve done all of that in my CBT rounds. And nothing has worked. I’ve started like other stuff and nothing worked
- Date posted
- 6y
Interesting! Did it work at all like any improvements? I'm doing ERP now and have been for awhile. My OCD is still pretty bad but definitely better than it was starting.
- Date posted
- 6y
Nope nothing has worked. The specialist clinic in the UK has given up on me
- Date posted
- 6y
Question, did you do the exposures but weren't able to stop doing compulsions outside of exposure work?
- Date posted
- 6y
I did the exposures all the time, my anxiety never went down. I didn’t do compulsions but my anxiety was so bad I’d have panic attacks and stuff
- Date posted
- 6y
Were you still ruminating when doing the exposures? Rumination is like a mental compulsion. I hope I'm not coming across harsh I'm genuinely interested.
- Date posted
- 6y
Sometimes it doesn't work because the exposures aren't designed correctly to target your obsessions. Other times it could be that you are engaging in mental compulsions that you aren't aware are even compulsions and that is the hang-up. But for a minority of people, they won't improve significantly even with a properly designed ERP program that they are doing correctly. Have you also tried medication and deep TMS? There are also second and third line medications that are helpful to some. Those options could offer some symptom reduction. There are also variants of psychosurgery that have benefited people who did not get relief from ERP, medications, and deep TMS.
- Date posted
- 6y
Could you share more about deep TMS? I have not heard of it before.
- Date posted
- 6y
Search for Brainsway. They have videos and more on their website explaining it. It's a very non-invasive treatment with virtually no side effect potential, but it is newer so it isn't widely covered by insurance yet. I don't know what the situation is where you live.
- Date posted
- 6y
Great thanks I'll look it up
- Date posted
- 6y
Thank you so much guys, I wasn’t expecting the replies!! ❤️
Related posts
- Date posted
- 16w
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…
- Date posted
- 9w
I had OCD earlier in life, but it came and gone. For the last 4.5 it's been one thing after another, though. Today I felt especially grossed out by my POCD and I feellike I'm losing last hope that I had. I hate to sound awfully dramatic, but I want to clarify things a little bit and ask for advice. So I've been taking antidepressants up until some point, had a break and then started taking them again. In the beginning of this month, I finally finished that second course. This time it lasted 1.5 years. It's important to note that for the last half year I was pretty proactive in finding solutions to my ocd, finding new methods and reading articles. It probably did help, but mostly in short-term. Today I felt like my symptoms (it's mainly groinal response) were scaringly prominent and it made me really depressed. Do I have to start all over? It never got good enough in the first place, so I'm not even sure if it's possible to cure. I admit I might've not been pushing myself enough to do the scariest possible things, but that doesn't mean I didn't do ERP. Now, to the venting part. I'm not sure if anything really helped: if I'm relaxed it's probably just a matter of good mood. I'm anxious when going outside. I feel like I don't deserve friends because of my "dirty" secret -- I feel incredibly ashamed for groinal sensations. There were times when I'm sure it wasn't a phantom feeling, but a real one I caused. But I can't undo anything, so it has to stay with me. My family really loves me, so of course killing myself was never an option. But I still hate myself. I'm too tired to keep on fighting with OCD and bearing the burden of those very shameful events is too hard. What do I do? Maybe I'm just not adapted to living without antidepressants, so I'm being too emotional and all I should do is continue doing ERP. But my point is that I'm too exhausted. Thank you for reading. I see many here have a similar problem, I hope you're staying strong. I'd love to help you all, but I'm afraid that right now I'm not suit for giving out good life advice
- Date posted
- 8w
My theme is suicidal OCD. I’ve been doing ERP since last year November and the overall intensity of my thoughts have not reduced at all. I have these thoughts 24/7 and my life feels like a living hell. Not two minutes goes by throughout the day where I’m not suffering from relentless thoughts. I don’t want to take meds because of the side effects and my insurance is coming to an end so it’d be difficult to ween off them by myself. I’m starting to feel so hopeless because I’ve done the toughest of the toughest exposures and I’m not getting better at all. My life is a living hell and I don’t see my condition with OCD getting better anytime sooner.
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