- Date posted
- 1y
Obsessions - losing control (mental compulsions)
I posted a big post earlier but couldn’t really fit this in and wondered if anyone can specifically relate to this. This may be potentially triggering if you are at a very difficult stage with mental compulsions so please don’t read if that’s the case. I find mental compulsions stick with me. Unlike physical I find ERP impossible as with physical you can do ERP and then just walk away from wherever that compulsion would have taken place. So it’s out of sight out of mind and you can forget it, anxiety can come down and if you did think of it, you can think ‘well it’s too late to fix it because I’m not there’. So you can go about your day, your brain understands there was no threat and then when you come across the situation again, you feel less fear. But with mental compulsions, I find as it’s in your head, it feels like you could engage in the compulsion at any time. Like you can try resist the compulsion, but then you keep remembering it as you’re not leaving it anywhere, it feels attached to your mind. If you start to forget it, you check if it’s gone and then it comes back. It feels like the opportunity to carry out / fix the compulsion is always accessible as it’s done in your head so wherever you go you can do it. So it follows me. And then because I keep thinking about it, I ruminate and the fear factor increases and the consequences get more irrational. To make it worse, I’ve developed an obsession that mental compulsions are more dangerous and that by ignoring them I’m subconsciously accepting my intrusive thought (fear of losing control) and training my brain to make my intrusive thoughts reality, so that when I feel better and have forgotten this compulsion and think it’s in the past, my intrusive thought will suddenly come true all because I didn’t give in to the mental compulsion and I’ll suddenly lose control and become some evil person against my will. Now obviously that’s OCD talking, right? And if I were to over come it, that would seem silly and wouldn’t happen. But having This thought process completely prevents me from ever being able to let go of the mental compulsion. As when i do start forgetting, I suddenly freak out and remember the consequence that may happen by allowing myself to forget. Then it resets my need to carry out the compulsion. It’s horrible. The obsession also says that if it came true it could happen at any point in life like ‘remember that time you didn’t do that compulsion… well you’re about to be a psycho’. So it’s not like I can apply ERP and accept that nothing happening means avoiding the compulsion was the right decision because my obsession and fear isn’t time framed. Urgh it’s exhausting! I just hope I’m not alone in this. It just has be doubting everything and fearing for my life