ERP for Pure OCD

@redmuse22 Thank you I appreciate it! I would say the main thing I am confused by is the sitting with your thoughts. Are you supposed to purposely think of triggers? Wait for them to come? How do you react to them? Do you think them through or observe from afar?

@jess890 You can practice ERP with thoughts that come up organically but I'd say thats usually when you are more advanced, but its always good to try to practice resisting compulsions. ERP is triggering yourself in a controlled environment Ideally you observe your thoughts and feelings but don't interact or engage with them, especially if mental compulsions are your thing! I try to kind of make internal statements like "oh that's an intrusive thought. Its making me anxious." And just observe whats going on. Sitting with thoughts is sometimes literal if you're say at work at your desk but it doesn't require that you always just stay still. Sitting with your thoughts ultimately means continuing on with your life and not pausing to practice a compulsion or some form of avoidance. Harm/maybe pocd examples from my own homework. I start "rough housing" with my son who's currently 18 months. So playing airplane, swinging him, bouncing him etc. I get a thought that I could just let him go right now and see what happens. I keep swinging him anyway. I start to worry that maybe the way I'm holding him is "wrong" and too close to his diaper. I keep playing with him and only stop when we're ready, not when OCD is ready. I didn't say the "good" word to cancel out my "bad" thoughts. I also have started on worst case scenario scripts. I uh sometimes haven't always kept up with them. But like I picked a scenario, in this case my son being kidnapped by a baby sitter and just wrote it out. Sometimes these are done by dictating in an audio recording. The idea is basically to trigger the fear/disgust/anxiety etc in a controlled way and then not do compulsions in response. Depending on the severity, sometimes delaying the compulsion or reducing it in some manner is a good first step if you're trying your hardest and just can't complete quit the compulsions cold turkey. So only say the good word once instead or five times or wait thirty seconds before doing it.

@redmuse22 This is such a good description. Thank you.

@NOCD Advocate - Evelyn I struggle with mainly pocd but also sometime rocd and hocd

@jess890 Here’s a good site to check out that lists some examples of ERP for POCD specifically, but you can come up with other types for the other themes as well: https://www.madeofmillions.com/ocd/pedophilia-ocd/amp You are trying to purposely trigger yourself and then sit with the discomfort/anxiety/distress that comes from it. We wanna avoid doing compulsions for these exercises. Anxiety will naturally go away if you let it

Can you help me with ERP exercises? Basically the worst ones rn are PureO about me being a bigoted person, or wanting to be one, which I don't obviously. Any resources I can use?

@Chad2 Writing feared sentences/questions could work here - write down sentences based on that fear, read them, and sit with the discomfort. So “I’m a bigot” for example, once you read it and feel that anxiety you sit with it. Writing a script based on your fear could also work. So what is the fear that goes along with your fear of being a bigot? Let’s say for example that if you were a bigot then your friends wouldn’t want to be around you. So write that into the script, you are making the worst case scenario. Make it in the present tense as well - there are some site that can help you to write good ERP scripts. You write it, read it, then sit with the anxiety while avoid compulsions - this is the most important part! Hope this helps!