- Date posted
- 2y
Intrusive thoughts
HELP!! Does anyone have any tips for intrusive thoughts I have been having some really bad ones lately.
HELP!! Does anyone have any tips for intrusive thoughts I have been having some really bad ones lately.
Try to accept and watch them. I know it’s so hard and our gut instinct is to panic and resist them because it isn’t us, but what helps to overcome this is acceptance. “oh here is an intrusive thought, and I just observe what the thoughts that are coming into my mind is” An exercise I will do is pretend there is a door way in my brain and that’s where thoughts come in, I watch them enter the doorway and then I place them in a chat in the imagined room. If there is a thought I want to interact with and think about I can pick it up and think about it, but I am choosing to allow the thoughts in the doorway, and placing them in the chair.
👍👍👍
@Anonymous 99 Thank you this really helps🫶🏻
i havent started erp therapy, i start at the end of this month. but one thing that has helped me, is i tell myself that the intrusive thought is not my fault. that helps me. i dont argue with my OCD as to why i am not my unwanted intrusive thoughts, because that can become a compulsion for me, but I say once to myself, in my mind, that unwanted intrusive thought is not my fault. For me it helps me not feel bad about my unwanted intrusive thought, and I can let go of the thought easier. I don't know if other people with OCD have ever felt guilty for having unwanted intrusive thoughts, but I did. I felt guilty for having unwanted intrusive thoughts, because often the thoughts I have go against morals and values, and the thoughts are of things that I do not want to do. Now that I have accepted that it is not my fault that I have unwanted intrusive thoughts, and that my unwanted intrusive thoughts are not secret desires that I have, they are thoughts in my mind that could have come from anywhere, things I've heard from others, things I've seen on TV, things I've heard in the news Etc. Wherever my unwanted intrusive thoughts come from, I know they don't represent what I think feel or believe is right, and I accept that the unwanted intrusive thoughts, can never make me do anything that I don't want to do. And since I don't want to do what the unwanted intrusive thought is, I can accept that it is just a thought that I will never act on and I can let it go. Now it has got to the point to where I don't have to always tell myself that the unwanted intrusive thoughts are not my fault, because I know longer blame myself for having unwanted intrusive thoughts. I believe the guilt I used to feel for having the Unwanted intrusive thoughts, made my OCD worse, and the guilt made me think more about the unwanted intrusive thought, and caused me to have even more unwanted intrusive thoughts. I still have OCD and I still have unwanted intrusive thoughts, but they aren't as often and when they come into my mind, I don't feel guilty about them anymore, because I know I did not invite the unwanted intrusive touughts into my mind. It is hard for me sometimes, to not feel guilty for having unwanted intrusive thoughts. But I try to not feel bad myself about things that aren't my fault, and unwanted intrusive thoughts are not my fault. This has been my personal experience with my OCD unwanted intrusive thoughts. I hope me sharing my personal experience of OCD with you helps. Take the parts of this message that helps you, and just leave the rest.
@SunJade Thank you this really helps🫶🏻
@SunJade thank you so much for this.
correction, i meant to type... often my unwanted intrusive thoughts go against MY morals and values.
I also meant to type... I no longer blame myseld for having unwanted intrusive thoughts. I typed know instead of NO.
Remember with ocd, you are not your thoughts! Best of luck!
@Anonymous Thank you
I struggle so bad with intrusive thoughts. They can be so bad that I'll cry because I KNOW that's not how I feel or want to do. (Too embarrassed to say what they're about) I'll constantly try to figure out why I have them, and constantly figure out what they mean, causing me to constantly circle around and around. I had to get on anxeity meds, which helped a little but the thoughts still happen. How do you help yourself with this? How do you know that you're just not some physcopath? 😅
This is hard to admit, but I’ve been struggling with intrusive thoughts where the central theme is racism. I don’t use racial slurs but my brain worries that I have said something that hurts or offends someone and now I find myself analyzing every social interaction.
How do I stop letting my intrusive thoughts control me? Ive been having them for almost a year, once I graduated, become more isolated and lost more friends they've become worse. I feel like when I had friends and was still going to school they weren't as bad probably because I was living more so I didn't take them as seriously. But now that Im home all day and alone they've gotten worse and it feels like they're starting to control my life. Theres times where Im on social media and eventually I forget about them but then when I realize I forgot about them they come back. Sometimes the thought just lingers it doesn't even just pop in my head and go away. I can't tell anyone in my family because they'd judge me for the thoughts and they don't really believe in mental illnesses. I also sometimes think of what other people may think of me if they knew the thoughts I had and it makes it worse. How do I stop letting these thoughts control/trigger me and stop reacting or feeling some type of way about them.
Share your thoughts so the Community can respond