- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 6y
IK!! nothing I hate more than when people say 'I'm soooooo OCD' like it's a quirky personality trait. LIKE if u say it in full 'I'm so obsessive Compulsive disorder'????? makes no sense does it. just being tidy is not a disorder? it's like those instagram accounts 'Satisfying OCD videos' OCD isn't satisfying, it's incredibly destructive, MY OCD ISN'T CURED FROM WATCHING A VIDEO OF SOMEONE LINE UP CRAYONS IN ALPHABETIC ORDER OF THE RAINBOW. Stigma is something that prevented me from realising I had a ocd SO as u can see nothing irritates me more!!!!!!!!
Allgood. I understand COMPLETELY. I thought I was a sociopath because I would have NEVER in a million years thought to myself (when the images in my mind first started appearing) “I may have OCD” because that was for people who liked things orderly, which I do but they’re not connected, it isn’t a Compulsion. Which is another thing NO ONE knows that when you are a “clean freak” OCD person you don’t just do it you do it as a result of an image in your mind and you don’t just clean the bathroom once you clean it 3 times. Etc etc. The stigma around this disease prevented me from seeking help for it for YEARS and has caused more damage than I will ever be able to explain to anyone.
Ugh ?
Saammeee. "I feel like that's everyone though" "everyone is like that sometimes"
Yes yes yess when I was young I totally disregarded it because of its stigma and what I thought it was so I didn’t think I was dealing with that until I read comments under a buzzfeed video abt weird things ppl do that’s when I finally looked into it more and I just think if I had known earlier from way younger it would have been more credible to my parents when I tried explaining to them that it was happening to me since I was a child
I remember when I caught a bad case of the OCDs.
Omg this is so true, I tried telling one of my friends and it’s exactly like that, and then they saw this app and they were like I need that! And it’s so annoying this stereotype of “OCD” that everyone says. I want that to end.
The tricky part is sometimes you might not know if they could actually need it or not bc you’re used to hearing ppl stigmatize it youre not sure if the symptoms they relate to might be serious
OCD is so much more than just being 'neat' or 'organized'—it’s relentless, exhausting, and often deeply misunderstood. The intrusive thoughts, the compulsions, the anxiety—it can feel like a never-ending cycle that others just don’t seem to get. Many of us have had experiences where even therapists didn’t fully grasp the depth of our struggles. I myself faced difficulty being misdiagnosed and my talk therapist not understanding the full extent of what I was going through until I found NOCD. So many prior therapists wrote off my symptoms as general anxiety, not realizing it was actually OCD all along. If you could sit down with a therapist who truly wanted to understand, what do you wish they knew about OCD?
My mom will sit and listen to me for quite a while, but she interrupts a lot and gets angry/upset. While I appreciate her passion, it's often stressful. Every time I come to her, if I even *mention* OCD, she gets frustrated and says, "Everyone deals with these issues, you know. It doesn't mean it's OCD." And I repeat, "I'm not saying my issues are unique — I'm saying the way I respond to them is a problem." But she just shakes her head and says, "Okay, I need to get back to my day." Full context, I'm an adult, and I live with my boyfriend, but I'm staying at my mom's for the next month. After living away from home for years, I went back to living with her during the pandemic, and I only recently left to live with him. Honestly, I think living with her for so long in my adulthood really messed with me and made me feel like a teenager all over again. I feel like my mental growth is stunted, and that's part of why my OCD is so bad lately. Not blaming, just noticing. She doesn't seem to understand how relieving the OCD diagnosis has been for me, because it explains so so so many things I've struggled with for years, and it's exciting to have more resources that can help me. But I think she sees it as me finding an excuse to *not* work on myself, which is just untrue. I'm not going to let OCD hold me back or use it as an excuse, but I'm also not going to pretend it's not a problem when I know it is — I was even diagnosed through NOCD. The whole point being to fix it, not use it as a crutch. When I have an issue, it's unbearable. Any issue, big or small, feels just the same. I feel a sinking feeling, my mind races, my heart beats out of my chest. I end up running to my support systems, crying, ruminating for days on end. Then, months later, the same exact issue can feel like nothing anymore, because it's no longer an obsession. I'm sure everyone deals with issues in a similar way, but I *know* there is something specific and debilitating going on with me. This is reassurance seeking, but in the face of being told I'm making a big deal out of nothing, can someone diagnosed with OCD tell me if they relate to the specific intensity of these feelings??
If you are anything like me (and most of you are, because let’s face it, we are all on this chat), you have OCD. Real OCD, not the organisation, matching colours everyone thinks it is. Real OCD. I’ve always known I was different, known that my brain does some waking things and deep down, I’ve always known I’ve had OCD. But there is just something that changes when you finally get the diagnosis. It makes more sense, you have an explanation for your behaviours. So naturally I told my friends. When they ask why I had to stop and step four times on a tile I said ‘oh, I have OCD’. I finally had a word, a tangible concept that I could explain to people. But nobody warned me about the massive misconceptions about OCD. Instead of support or acceptance, my friends seemed to question the diagnosis saying ‘that’s not ocd, don’t you just like things organised?’. And no matter how much I explain it they don’t seem to get it. And that’s the part that feels so cruel. I go through hell in my head and it can all be reduced to a phrase of ‘oh, aren’t you organised’. So please be careful out there you guys, and if someone try’s to downplay your experience, know that you are valid and that what you are going through is probably something that they could never handle. It’s a lesson that took me time to learn, but it’s important because our experience matters. Our real experience.
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