Date posted: 2y

SOOCD struggle

Long story short - never had a thought of my sexuality (always assumed I was straight) but fair to say I wasn’t ladies man. Shy etc. Met a girl, stated a relationship, infatuated, then a random thought popped in “you don’t have feelings for her”. Destroyed me, obsessed to figure out how and why. That led me to the question “it’s because you are gay”. That was me at 25. I’m now 35. I relate to a lot of what is online, However, it’s like my mind BELIEVES that I am actually gay, and that seems to be the sticking point. In online material it seems to call out that deep down you know you’re straight. I’m so confused I actually have no idea. I’ve never (that I can recall) even had a romantic thought about a guy until that thought. Then the thought/question, and this strong belief it’s true, but I don’t want it to be true. - can an obsession make you believe it’s true like this? - can someone help me feel less alone. - if this is OCD, how do you get yourself to believe it’s OCD and not real? Even when you believe it’s true? I struggle so hard to see the content as irrelevant because of the belief. Advice would be great!

Anonymous

Date posted: 2y

My OCD therapist reminded me the other day that OCD latches on to our core values. So if you feel this is wrong, the OCD gets stronger until you expose your brain to the idea more then you start to see the truth. OCD can be extremely blinding.

Scaredpossum

Date posted: 2y

OCD can for sure convince you that things are true that are not. If the thought that you may be gay is causing you distress, it sounds like OCD. Also, sexuality is a spectrum so if you don’t think you are attracted to one girl that doesn’t automatically make you gay. The OCD stories podcast has some good stuff about different forms of ocd treatment if you feel like therapy hasn’t been helpful.

Date posted: 2y

@Scaredpossum Therapy has been informative and helpful for sure. My therapist has diagnosed me with OCD (which I doubt all the time) So the main things in therapy have been: - treat the theme as irrelevant. - identify compulsions and stop them. 1) reassurance seeking 2) rumination (lots) 3) checking emotions/feelings 4) avoidance (although for me, I don’t know wether I avoid because I’m scared of a trigger, or I avoid because I’m panicking/anxious and just want to hide away. 5) research (rumination) - googling and comparing my symptoms with others - recovery isn’t anxiety going away, recovery is behaving in a healthy way that aren’t compulsions. - act as though a man is shouting nonsense at you, and if you notice what he’s saying, maybe/maybe not it. Do these sound about right? I really struggle with the part that is seeing OCD as the issue. As in, my mind fully believes and is convinced I am gay without wanting to be if that makes sense. I can’t help but feel if I could think of this as ‘ocd is happening to me’ rather than the content is the issue, then I can introduce a gap? Does that make sense?

Scaredpossum

Date posted: 2y

@gp All the therapy tools sound like what I’ve experienced. It’s a hard practice to not play into the rumination, but it works. I don’t fully understand the sexuality questioning ocd since that hasn’t been a main issue for me. But I do know OCD will convince you that it isn’t OCD, that it’s your conscience. But OCD is the pathways in our brains that we reinforce by thinking about and giving in to compulsions. And if it wasn’t OCD, it wouldn’t be causing so much pain and stress. Also, as with most forms of OCD, it may be helpful to think about “what’s the worst that could happen?” If you are gay. I don’t know the circumstances you come from that it could be a tricky situation due to culture, religion etc. But when you can take away the power of the fear, it starts to fade. When you feel like the OCD is just happening to you, it may be helpful to look into the biological info on OCD, how our brains work. OCD is the doubting disorder after all.

tuchi

Date posted: 2y

It feels so real

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