- Date posted
- 2y
erp by yourself
has anybody been working on doing ERP therapy alone without a therapist? has it worked for you? i’m attempting to do it alone but it is soooo hard. any tips would be wonderful as well :)
has anybody been working on doing ERP therapy alone without a therapist? has it worked for you? i’m attempting to do it alone but it is soooo hard. any tips would be wonderful as well :)
Yeah I have to do it alone in between sessions, it’s gets easier.
For the past year since I’ve learned about ERP I’ve been doing it on my own. Too scared to ask to see a therapist or get a diagnosis just yet. Some tips I can absolutely give are to keep going! There are some self help OCD books you can buy. I don’t have any but there are some :) just push yourself and remember after the bad there is always good. ERP doesn’t immediately make it better, it takes time and a want to keep going. Do not fall into the trap of “oh god I’m not worried about this!” That’s OCD about OCD. Keep ERP’ing it and don’t avoid things out of fears. I believe in you
I do one session every morning. Part of my routine. Def gets easier. :)
Yes, I have had therapy, but I still work on ERP everyday. LOL, it is really just my life. There are things that trigger me (the exposure) and then I practice the response prevention. I don't ruminate, check, reassurance seek etc. I allow time to pass, I am willing to be uncertain. So, at this point, it is not a specific time set aside for an ERP exercise, but, for example, I know later today I have to pick up a prescription from the pharmacy. There was a time where I would ruminate about this, and then after I picked it up there would be a lot of checking compulsions. So right now, I'm not ruminating, I'm doing things I value, I hopped on here to see if I could contribute anything, I am heading to the gym, etc. I allow and am willing to have uncertainty. A really great book that helped me was "Needing to Know for Sure" by Seif and Winston https://a.co/d/8Hi7oHs Hope this helps! Take care, and it's great that you are working on ERP!
Ye, I don’t have a therapist, or even a proper diagnoses yet, and so I’ve been trying to do ERP on my own but it’s so so hard
@Catinabox i believe in you, we can do this together. you have the potential to be so great and although i don’t know you, i know you are a kind and loving person who has good intentions. you are not your thoughts and i believe in you.
@formyfuture Thanks, that means a lot
At first I started doing it by myself, which did help and kept me afloat for a while. Now that I’ve been doing it with a therapist, I’ve made progress a lot faster - but mostly bc I had a specific structure to follow. Outside of my sessions I did ERP 5+ times a day for about 4 weeks which reduced my symptoms significantly. Then I decreased it to 1-3 times per day. Don’t go as hard as I did bc it can get extremely overwhelming, but the most important thing is to stay consistent. So doing it just once a day for 10 minutes can make all the difference. Don’t be discouraged if you have some setbacks along the way, it’s totally normal and you’ll gain more confidence in your abilities to get through it. Also check out the Mindfulness Workbook for OCD by Jon Hershfield, it gave me a new perspective and hopefully you’ll find it insightful too! You got this, keep going!
Hi! I've been on my OCD healing journey for about half a year and I have seen a lot of success. I'm reaching out for advice, I am very willing to do exposures because I know the more I do them, the more I get better, but I struggle with the response prevention part. I don't know how to control my brain when it comes to facing the fears especially since most of my compulsions are mental. I can tell myself the typical things "I am okay with the uncertainty of this happening", etc. but its like my brain doesn't believe them. I've been stuck in this disconnect for a while and would love advice you have heard from a therapist or learned that has really help you.
How do people start practicing erp on their own? Because I tried yesterday, and it helped for like two hours, but it always comes back and scares me. I don’t think i can practice it the right way without help.
It could be possible to treat a severe scrupulosity OCD without taking medication and asking guidance from the psychiatrist? I can't afford for professional consultation 🥹. Can anybody give me some advices on how to deal with these intrusive thoughts? 🙏
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