- Date posted
- 5y ago
- Date posted
- 5y ago
A lot of people who have HOCD have had similar experiences in their childhood, called childhood experimentation (I think). My experience lasted from when I was about 4 to about 9 that bordered along sexual abuse. The experiences I had truly fueled my HOCD. I have always been attracted to women. But in my early 20's I became obsessed about what if my experiences made me gay. The thoughts plagued my mind. I began to see a therapist and for 5 years learned techniques of ERP and mindfulness based CBT. I made peace with the experiences from my past by accepting them as my experiences but I an choose how they define me. And whenever I begin to question or the thoughts come back I use ERP by thinking "maybe I am gay". I also purposefully made friends with and forced myself to be around people who triggered the intrusive thoughts. It was hard and the thoughts didn't just go away. But I learned how to respond to the thoughts. Now years later the thoughts don't appear as frequently but they still will from time to time, however now I know how to respond. You can't control your thoughts but you can control your response. You are not your thoughts.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
A lot of things that happen in childhood are strange and undefinable and they don’t upset or confuse us until we try to go back and look at them through the lense of adulthood. As a child, this didn’t bother you. And it’s because it’s related to your OCD theme that you’re now revisiting it over and over looking for some kind of explanation or confirmation that it was a sign of something. It makes total sense that your mind would latch onto this. Keep in mind that you have 1000s I’d other strange and undefinable childhood experiences that might also strike you differently now that you’re an adult. But your mind doesn’t care about those because those wouldn’t help fuel your obsession. It found this one because it knew it could be another trigger for your OCD. I know it’s a difficult memory to think about because it’s triggering, but I’d use it for ERP. Think about it again and again and respond by accepting the uncertainty, “maybe I am gay and maybe that was a sign early on. Or not. Can’t really say. Oh well.”
- Date posted
- 5y ago
The same thing happened to me when I was about 8 or 9. It bothers me still today
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Like when I think or fantasize about women it feels good. Idk why it bothers me
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Tips?
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Honestly I don’t know. I’m too embarrassed to tell anyone in person so I’ve never asked a professional what to do
- Date posted
- 5y ago
I’m 100% attracted to females but because of what I did I think maybe I am gay. Do you feel the same way?
- Date posted
- 5y ago
It’s not that I think I’m gay it’s that the event is repulsive. The thoughts in my head are intrusive and bothersome and take up headspace
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Yeah I feel the same way
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Thanks! It feels good I’m not alone
Related posts
- Date posted
- 25w ago
18+! When I was child I was VERY hyper-sexual I’m not sure when it started. All I remember I was being very sexual with other kids at the time, I think I thought it was normal and nobody was stopping me either at the time so I had no idea I was in the wrong. I think I had to be 13 or 14 where it hit me out of nowhere that I was wrong. The floodgate of anxiety was horrible I had so much guilt it was eating me up. I had to stay home, I quit going to family gatherings, quit hanging out with new friends I’ve made, I cried a lot. Til this day I think about it everyday and the amount of guilt on my chest. If I could go back and change it all I would. I wish I could have a better understanding of me and why I was doing it. It’s the guilt and anxiety I deal with every single day. I never meant to hurt anyone.
- Date posted
- 15w ago
Trying not to seek reassurance, but rather connect the dots on my OCD and possible reasons as to why I am the way I am. I have severe OCD (or at least I hope I do) mainly surrounding POCD. I've had symptoms of OCD the majority of my life but this theme has come up more recently. When I was a kid, and i'm talking 6-7, I was first exposed to some really gross adult content online. It was introduced to me by a friend of mine around the same age of me. I saw some really disgusting things that a 6-7 year old should definitely not see. This was not a one time occurrence, as I had been exposed to taboo topics online years to come after that, such as the same friend introducing me to Omegle... And i'm sure you can imagine how that went, theres a lot of genuinely disgusting human beings on there. Coming back to the reason for making this post; is it possible to early exposure to this content could be one of the reasons I struggle with POCD? It genuinely scares me to death because you hear that real p*dos dealt with simular situations when they were kids, so thats kind of making me feel that this could be more than OCD, and I could be a genuinely bad person. My POCD feels so real, that at times i'm fully convinced its not OCD. Sometimes I can't even distinguish the feelings of attraction between a younger person and an older person, except for the feeling of anxiety and fear. Its really hard to explain without going into detail, but it just feels so real. Some feedback on this would be great, thank you all.
- Young adults with OCD
- Students with OCD
- False Memory OCD
- Mid-life adults with OCD
- "Pure" OCD
- POCD
- LGBTQ+ with OCD
- Date posted
- 12w ago
Being exposed to taboo p*rn as young as first grade ruined my life and now ocd is making me pay for it. I have so much guilt for being a child/teen and looking at taboo stuff, and it was all fictional or anime or whatever but it was still so so gross. and I didn't realize It because I had been used to it at so young 🫠 I think what haunts me most is when I was a kid/young teen (like 12-14ish) and didn't have access to p*rn I'd imagine stuff similar to what I'd seen in the art. I can't even believe I'd imagine scenarios involving kid characters or whatever because it had been so normalized to me and I assumed it was normal since it was fiction. I'm 23 now so it's been a decade since I've done anything like that and I've never had the urge to since but still. I've NEVER been attracted to kids or had any urges or anything ever, even when I was addicted. The thought makes me want to vomit, I'd rather die than associate anything sexual with kids/minors and I think people who groom or assault kids are vile. But I still feel like the fact that I imagined stuff similar to the things I read sometimes when I was young is proof I'm a p*do. I don't think people would believe me if I said I'm not. I just feel like I don't deserve to live or that if I do, I'm living a lie. I know 'I was a kid too' but even when I was 13/14 I read/imagined stuff with characters younger than me because I thought it was normal. I'm so disgusted. I've had this theme for so long I'm starting to wonder if ocd is right. I feel too ashamed to tell my therapist.
Be a part of the largest OCD Community
Share your thoughts so the Community can respond