- Date posted
- 2y
Body Dysmorphia
Does anyone else suffer from body dysmorphia in addition to OCD?
Does anyone else suffer from body dysmorphia in addition to OCD?
All - BDD can be treated with ERP. So can food avoidance (ARFID) that is BDD based. I saw a peer successfully manage both when I was in residential for contamination OCD and ARFID. I would note that eating the same foods everyday- even if healthy- can cause absorption issues. It did for me - my ARFID put me in the hospital. ERP saved my life.
@Erin P What are absorption issues if you don’t mind me asking?
@anonymous700 When I are the same food everyday for years I stopped being able to absorb the nutrients and was told that I was no longer digesting properly. I’m not a doctor so I can’t really tell you more. But my blood work was way off when I was hospitalized because of the lack of variety in my diet as well as the limited calories. It was bad enough that increasing my calories 3x didn’t stop my severe weight loss from continuing.
@Erin P Thank you for sharing! I hope you are on the road to recovery and I wish all the best ❤️ ED and OCD are no fun at all . ❤️❤️sending you all the peace and love you so righteously deserve!
@anonymous700 Thank you so much. My ED is under control - I eat lots of foods, am a healthy weight, and manage the concerns that OCD throws at me about food. Most of my OCD is much better except my core fear which I am working on. Thank you for your kind thoughts. Sending you the same ❤️❤️
Yes i suffer from this as well!
How do you deal with it? It's been very challenging for me :(
@Anonymous if im being honest i havent been dealing with it in the healthiest ways, but my best advice would be to maybe practice positive affirmations for yourself (do this while meditating & deep breathing) to have a better relationship with you & your body. Sorry if it sounds silly but word affirmations go a long way!!
@Sydnxyr - I've tried yoga and meditating which hasn't worked, but I'll try the word affirmations. Thanks!
yes and it sucks so much. i’m constantly looking and fearing weight gain
My weight is a constant roller coaster! I lost 40 pounds after having COVID, and I'm so worried that I'll gain it back!
@Anonymous i totally under i’m the same way. i fear gaining weight back after having wls and am always checking my body and scale. it got to the point where my mom had to get rid of my scale.
@ocdhaver22 Omg same!! feel like im having a constant war between myself everyday to avoid foods when i get on the scale & when i see that i gained just a few pounds or look in the mirror too much i panic and try to avoid or hide food
@Sydnxyr that is exactly how i was and it has gotten somewhat better but at times it get so bad. i used to workout before and after eating or had to move if i ate something.
Yes same
I have had it since I was 9 I am now in my late 20s….it’s a roller coaster ride for sure…it all began by counting calories then it went from omitting certain foods…as of now I eat healthy but I literally eat the same thing everyday and if I don’t eat that I will get major anxiety and I also have to exercise for about two hours and day and I have to only eat certain foods…it’s so stressful because my whole life revolves around my body and how I look it is exhausting
Hi, everyone! Thank you so much for responding to my post! I do worry about weight, but sometimes I see one limb larger than the other, my face changing like color, etc. Anyone else experience this?
@Anonymous I don’t but know that many people with BDD have similar worries. I know OCD won’t let you truly absorb this but it is normal for one side of the body to be different from the other. I hope you can get ERP therapy to help you with this.
@Erin P - I have been in ERP therapy with an NOCD therapist.
@Anonymous I hope they are helping - it is a process that takes time which is hard.
Hi guys, This is my first post on here, as I’ve been scared to be vulnerable in this way. I’ve had a lifelong journey of mental health, diagnosed with a myriad of things, and misdiagnosed with others. When I got diagnosed with OCD, things started to click and treatment has been going well. There’s still a disconnect, things I do that are different than others and aren’t compulsion or obsession related. The reason I’m posting is to ask if anyone has been diagnosed with OCD/Autism and how you navigated that comorbidity. Thank you to anyone who shares
Does it happen to you that when a person is specific in your ocd thoughts (my sister is my sister), that everything about her is a trigger for you when you see her? And the way he moves, talks, eyes, you suddenly sexualize everything, or is it just me? it really bothers me, because I constantly feel my groin, so I wonder if it's really OCD, or if it's something in me...
My OCD diagnosis is still very new, but now that I know what it is, it is clearly something I’ve had for as long as I can remember. Contamination/bugs and health have been a consistent theme since childhood, but religious/existential themes emerged during adolescence. Around that same time, there was also a good deal of trauma, and during middle school I started experiencing hallucinations. Tactile (like bugs crawling on me or biting me, an eyelash being stuck in my eye, but nothing was really there); visual (like moving shadows or things that would dart past in my periphery, and then I would just have intrusive thoughts of scary things around corners or under things); and auditory (an angry male voice that grumbles or yells indistinctly, or a high pitched noise like a microphone/speaker feedback but muffled and less sharp). Because of the religious denomination I grew up in, I initially assumed these were demons and tried to address it that way, but when I was 14 or 15, it occurred to me that those voices/sounds sounded like the way I felt, and the visual/tactile experiences happened during times of stress too — and so all of those experiences could just be seen as an expression of a fragmented part of myself. That acceptance didn’t make them go away — I still experience them now and I’m in my 30s — but it made those experiences less scary and more manageable. I also see now how these all pop up specifically when OCD obsessions are super triggered and when I’m super sleep deprived. Anyway! Since this diagnosis, and talking about the hallucinations at all, are new to me, I am wondering who else has had similar experiences. I don’t really know how much of the hallucination experience is OCD versus trauma, but it seems like this might all make sense under the “quasi-hallucination” label.
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