introduction, i guess? 4 parter, sorry in advance

😮‍💨so i’ve been dealing with pocd for about five going on six years and i can definitely say this point in my life is the worst experience i’ve had living with it. before, it was an annoyance and i didn’t need much “reassurance”, from 17-21 i had been working with/teaching kids here and there. i’d feel very gross and anxious having groinal response but interacting with them kinda alleviated that anxiety because they can be very sweet and some can just be cruel. but whatever it took not to hurt them, i’d face it because no child should have to go through being perverted or sexualized. and now….i feel like that’s all i do whenever i see them. i recently graduated college, going for my goals in life, surrounded myself by creatives/artsy people, i thought i was going to just eventually get a grip. but i’ve had very triggering experiences. like nothing i’ve accomplished matters bc i’m inhumane and worthless.

POCD

scaryaoke

Date posted: 2y

I've been suffering with this theme for 9 years. At times it's almost completely managed, at times it's been as bad as you describe here. For me, sitting and running in circles with the fear and rumination is like walking on hot coals. It's physically painful. Stepping off the coals doesn't mean they stop burning, it just means you don't have to be walking on them all the time. Your OCD craves a definitive answer, so here's one: you will never be able to find certainty on this. No amount of worrying about it will lead you to a satisfying conclusion. The worrying itself is the problem, not the question needing an answer. You're trying to solve an unsolvable puzzle. The only real solution is finding a way to put the puzzle down. I realize this more or less amounts to "sit with the uncertainty," but honestly, that's all I got. It's not easy. And the idea of just accepting such a thing as an inescapable is almost as painful as the obsession itself, at first. I usually say something like this to myself when I catch it spiking: "You will never be able to worry your way to freedom from this obsession. Your only way to freedom is to refuse to engage." I hope this helps. Or if it doesn't, I hope it's at least a comfort to know someone else has gone through this too.

bigdreamstob...

Date posted: 2y

@scaryaoke thank you for this

bigdreamstob...

Date posted: 2y

for example: i work at a recreational center where kids come through all the time and i also work at a dance studio. my jobs primarily focuses on watching them or critiquing so i literally have to look at them. of course these kids wear suitable attire for swimming and dancing(like one piece or two piece swim suits, swimming trunks, and leotards + tights)and while i’ve worked in spaces like that before throughout my adulthood, now i feel like it’s almost impossible to avoid, or compulsively look at their full bodies for some sort of confirmation that i’m not aroused, or accidentally notice a private part, or try to ignore it and do my job. i fear these two incidents where parents tried to hide their kids from me or keep them distanced may have given off the impression that i am a pedophile and they have every right to want to protect their kid. i even feel like the kids at the studio caught a bad vibe from me and don’t want to be associated with me. half are sweet and interact w me normally but there’s something inside telling me i’m a hypocrite with bad intentions. so now i’m like….where does that leave me? am i doomed to creep out children and/or parents forever? as i get older, will it become harder to fight this off? am i just in denial about my sexual preferences?

bigdreamstob...

Date posted: 2y

it feels like there is a knife wiggling in my chest and i get shudders just thinking about the idea but now that feeling has grown and the shudders happen way more often than they used to. i have a little brother and i would hate for him to see me like that. imaginal exposure hasn’t helped much either because it makes me feel even worse, like i’m almost chasing the attraction and i wanna regurgitate my insides at the thought of it. i’ve thought heavily of just ending it and i fought hard to get to today. last night, i had my first therapy session and it felt really good to be listened to, like i wasn’t judged and my diagnosis was confirmed. she said i’m strong for dealing with this alone for so long. but everyday feels like pain bc it’s all that’s on my mind regardless of whatever distraction comes along, friend comes around, song plays, anything.

bigdreamstob...

Date posted: 2y

all i can think about are times where i may have been perceived as a pedo and what i could do to avoid that but then i think am i just trying to find an out? am i more concerned with being a pedophile or just looking like one to others? and that is why i want to wash my hands with this. COMPLETELY. but i know that i have to live with it and find treatment any way i can so! here i am. please, if anything has found ways to cope(and please, none of that “maybe i will, maybe i wont” “sit with the uncertainty” stuff), please share them.

HOY

Date posted: 17w

i dont know if its gonna get better

since february i have "POcd". Initial symptoms were thoughts, but then I did a testing compulsion during an intimate time, and I spiraled ever since. I struggle with addiction to smut. I'm cutting that out, but I feel as if it is too late. Ive never experienced this much mental, and emotional anguish in my life. On my time on this application I have given advice to others, and helped around, but I wonder if that even applies to me. Millions of times I wish I could turn back time and be more careful. I want to prevent many things, including what led me to spiral into OCD in the first place. I'm surely having an OCD episode. I have gotten a diagnosis, but I'm still not sure. I feel evil, cause unlike many here, I tested on my body sensations and it backfired (twice) I know I'm not supposed to figure out why that is the case, but now I have to live with it for the rest of my life even if its something I don't desire. This is disgusting for me, it is abhorrent. I could've never seen this coming. Day by day I've become more fearful of living with this, "OCD". I was a normal person before this, I knew what I was attracted to, I know my preferences, so why did this come about? This is singlehandedly the most painful thing that has happened to me and I have nobody but myself to blame. I am scared of death but I also would'nt mind sleeping for years on end. My parents and brother were understanding of my situation, but I failed them regardless. I don't want them to see me this way, nor do I want them to learn more of my predicament. I'm cooked. I know it, Fin, thats all folks. I'm only 20 and I already have other diagnosed mental illness so I recklessly brought upon myself another one. Its agonizing to live through, I wish this on nobody, not even my worst enemy. I can't even identify myself at this point. Its tearing me apart.

Lulu~

Date posted: 17w

False memories + real events (TW: POCD)

Hello 😭, so uhm I’m kind of in the point of my POCD where I’m just tired. I just need to get it all out and get some sort of instruction of how to just idk live? So for me my childhood is pretty blurry. I have a few real event blended with false memory events there but other than that I’m a csa victim. And the way I tried to cope? By fetishising nyself, making CP of myself, seeing my life goal as being used, raped and a prostitue. Self destructive behaviour through talking to pedophiles and seeing my only worth as if I was sexually attractive. Which made me kind of numb to CP as a coping mechanism I guess. And heres’s where my main event of REOCD/false memory ocd comes in. I have a few events in my life when I’ve accidentally stumbled across CP ish mangas or just plan abuse and not had a big reaction. Some of them I even liked the story. And my ocd LOVES playing with it, making me truly believe I enjoy and get of from CP. I’ve also had quite a few dreams. A few days ago I had a dream about me getting triggered by something I did in the dream. Which I now can’t figure out if it actually was a dream. But also moments overall where I’ve unintentionally touched my private part while my siblings are in the room or when I found a guy 2 years younger than me pretty in 4th grade. Or a few of my only friends who turned out to be younger than me, and I had talked about sexual things (like fan fictions, my trauma ect) with them. AHSHB I absolutely hate ruminating and I’m tired so so so so so so tried 😭 idk help me? Please TT

POCD

Anonymous

User type: OCD Conqueror

Date posted: 26d

my POCD has won and I’m a horrible human being

*PLEASE READ* *any help appreciated* So I work with kids and it’s a lightning rod for triggering my POCD. I work with a mental health org that supports kids with autism and other intellectual development disorders. And so I’ve grown really close with one kid since I started since I was his first ever staff and he was the first ever kid I worked with. I’ve grown really protective of him and we’ve become really close and our relationship truly means the world to me. But before I get into my little incident, I have to provide context: so I am hypersexual and struggle with compulsive masturbation and my urges are almost uncontrollable sometimes. I have a lot of trauma from foot fetish stuff/pornography as a kid and it’s carried on into my adult life unfortunately. And so as I was waking up my kid and trying to get him out of bed to get him into the shower (I usually give him a few extra minutes but if he’s uncooperative I have to pull him out of bed gently) and so I just shift him by his legs bc it’s easiest. And my urges and thoughts have been so bad lately and when he wasn’t cooperating, as I was shifting his legs today, his foot touched my private area and I carried on normally but now I feel like a monster and everything I fear. I need some advice bc I’m scared to even talk to my therapist about this bc I think I will go to jail. I don’t want to be like this and I hate POCD so much and I rlly care so much for this kid and would actually die for him to protect him. I just need someone to tell me I’m not crazy bc idk if that contact between us was intentional or not and I have not spiraled like this for so long. I truly am losing my mind and want to give up bc I know I am not the person my POCD tells me I am but now I feel like I am everything it calls me. I feel so ashamed and repulsed and disgusted in myself and wish I didn’t exist. I feel like I’ve exploited my kid and taken advantage of him and that I don’t deserve to have him in my life and that I don’t even deserve to life and would be better off in jail or dead. im so broken and I’m sorry if what im saying is confusing

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introduction, i guess? 4 parter, sorry in advance

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