How do you go about reframing thoughts around how much life and time has been wasted because of ocd. I hate that ocd has stolen so much of my joy
What a great question. I understand this 100% sometimes i feel resentment about this too and it's hard to reframe it. i think it's okay to feel mad about it sometimes. I noticed It's much easier to reframe after I've gotten some treatment and am starting to feel better. On reframing: I think having OCD has led me to have a deeper relationship with others than i might have otherwise had. Due to suffering, I have learned to become more open with others, more empathetic, more authentic, more connected with people. People seeing me be vulnerable then often open up about their vulnerabilities. Also I got to see very clearly who were the helpers and friends in my life -- the people who really cared about me and really loved me. I also learned through OCD about tolerating discomfort and pain-- something all of us (with or without ocd) will benefit from knowing. I learned there can be joy or peace in the midst of pain. I have periodically experienced this myself too. Also, I think some of my worst suffering has resulted in a gratitude that I might never have had. For example, when I was discharged from the psychiatric hospital, the experience of finally having a warm shower in my own place, having the freedom to just go where i wanted when i wanted, seeing friends again, dancing, sitting out in the fall breeze, was an entirely different and deeper experience. The simple was not mundane. It was powerful and beautiful. I remember crying a lot of happy tears over getting to do really basic stuff. Also i think when i got treatment, i started to see the world for what it really is, in all it's probability and complexity. I am letting go more and more each day with the 100% absolute certainty and black-and-white mindset that ensnares all people to some degree. Thanks for asking this question. It helped me to reflect on my own reframing!
I feel for you in this moment. In the depths of OCD, it can make you feel so guilty, so sad, so isolated, and so hopeless at times. I want you to know that there is *so* much hope for to recover and to live a life where you don't feel this way. I know it's hard to see it now or believe that it's true, but OCD is very responsive to treatment. Have you checked out some of the free tools we have on the app? Maybe some of our educational webinars? I know we have talked a lot there about guilt, shame, etc., and I think some of that might be helpful. It might also be helpful to check out our support groups just to know you're not alone. Wishing you the best of luck and the NOCD team is here for you if you are ever ready to take the step with therapy!
Thank you so much Stacy!
This response was so thoughtful and made me cry. I really appreciate this reflective insight. Thank you. You’re so right. I have one of my best friends because of my OCD, as we might on a Facebook forum about ocd.. and I have also learned a lot along the way too that I wouldn’t have otherwise.
Thank you for sharing and taking the time to write that. I think it’ll help a lot of people.
In hindsight:: I’m so glad for the ocd and the tips that it has given me. I’m so much better even than before I had my ocd.
Yes this is often the source of my pain and my continued journey. I find myself reflecting and hurting but then I remember I'm doing it again and that's wasting more time.
So, I know my capacity to get fixated on things. And it's normally something that's relatively remote but, my latest issue is really getting to me and I was wondering if people have any advice. I'm avoiding getting too into specifics, as I don't want this to get reassurance-y but, in essence.. I came to the realisation recently that people who I'd been "friends" (feels like the wrong term now) when I was younger were not very nice people, and normalized a lot of very unpleasant behaviour towards other members of the group. They really normalized it, sold themselves as figures of authority, as older and more responsible and grown-up than others, and looking back, they acted horribly. And coming to this realisation, that I'd been manipulated into just accepting their behaviour has just... broken me. My OCD has latched onto it and I can't stop feeling irreversibly tainted by it. I've talked to others about it, and they've reassured me, told me it's not a big deal and that I hold myself to too high a standard, but none of that sticks. I feel better for a bit, then think 'Maybe when you told them you were skewing it to make yourself look better' or 'Did you leave out a crucial detail'. I keep ruminating over and over, trying to remember exactly how everything played out, trying to figure out if I fed into the behaviour, if I did something bad myself (because y'know, I feel like I was accepting of it at the time, so what does it say about my own values?). I know I need to stop doing all this if I want to improve, but then some part of me keeps saying 'So, you're just going to let yourself off the hook then?' Normally, I can rationalize my own fears to some degree, assure myself something won't happen, but the realness of the situation, and the fact I only came to understand the reality of it because the thought had been bothering me means it feels so much more all-encompassing. I know confessing in itself is a compulsion, but I keep feeling that if I'm not I'm somehow concealing what I 'really am' from others around me, and any positive interactions are me deceiving them in some way. I feel like I can't enjoy anything in life right now, and a good part of me feels I should not enjoy it ever again. If anybody has any advice on it, I'm all ears. Or even hearing if you relate to these feelings, I might appreciate the solidarity at least.
Hello, I unknowingly have lived with ROCD or OCD (not sure what one. I’m new to this). It has ruined so many amazing romantic and platonic relationships and I am so sad that just now I am finding out what the hell is wrong with me. Maybe life would be different if I have known. My OCD and anxiety is at an all time high (ATH) due to some horrible events that have happened in the recent months. I am at the point where paranoia has taken over my life now. I had my first panic attack a few weeks ago where I fainted. My anxiety attacks are so extreme I go thought cognitive distortion that has lasted days. My girlfriend of 3 years is my emotional guardian and she no long has the energy to be that and honestly it’s not her responsibility to be that. She is bi and wanted to have an open relationship and for someone who has OCD this has not been good for me. She also was assaulted in my own home by a good friend of ours when I was out of town but it’s not a clear situation because it sounded consensual at first. I just left my very high paying job. I am financially secure but the job was emotionally abusive and looking back made my OCD worse. I am taking some time off to get my head right…but now, all I have to do during the day is live in my OCD. I’m very happy I finally figured out why I act the way I do but I don’t know if I can get better quick enough to save my relationship. I have never been so worried about myself (M 28 years old). I am a confident young professional and never thought I would be writing on a page like this. Anyway…I hope it gets better.
I want to beat OCD because I have seen and felt the benefits of clearing my brain from unnecessary, pointless, thoughts. OCD is like 0 calorie food. It’s pointless. No nutrition or benefits come from my obsessions or compulsions. I don’t care to have answers to everything anymore. I catch myself just trying to stress myself out so that I have some worry to feed on. But like I said, it’s a 0 calorie food. I get nothing from it but wasted time and energy. My brain feels more spacious when I’m not consumed by OCD. I’m present. My personality has room to be herself without making space for bullshit. I tell myself now that worry is poison. I think Willie Nelson was the person I got that quote from? Anyways, that imagery of worries being poison for the mind has been transformative for me. I’m evolving. 💖 Thanks NOCD community.
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