Lost job

Hey everyone! I’m new to this app, but not new when it comes to OCD treatments. A few years ago I had to leave school/ my job in order to work on my mental health which was hard but needed. Mentally things have more or less gotten better OCD wise but I still really struggle with protectionism. I started a new job within the past 6 months that is challenging, but I enjoy enough to hopefully stay at for a few years. As of the past two weeks I have been really struggling with ruminating over my performance at work. I have been trying really hard to learn all the moving parts of the job, but because of lack of mentoring and constant little hiccups I have been stressing. Currently I have been overwhelmed/ overthinking so much that I have been messing up my work and it seems like my coworkers are pretty annoyed by constantly having to correct me. It’s honestly my worst fear as a perfectionist to feel like a burden. My intrusive thoughts as of late is that they are going to think I don’t care or try hard enough, that they talk bad about me to each other, and that they are going to fire me. Has anyone else experienced this type of OCD perfectionism that affects there performance within school or work and if so is there anything that you did in order to help recenter yourself in the moment to stop your brain from running in circles?

Not sure about you guys, but I’ve been desperately looking for a job since last December and I’ve had no luck. The uncertainty of whether or not I’ll find a job drives me nuts and triggers my OCD like nothing else has before. At the beginning of my job search, it was the typical I’m afraid to do it response from OCD. But I realized that a good way to treat the issue was through exposure and applying for jobs. Just put myself out there and eventually something will land… right? Well… it’s been 6+ months already and 300+ job applications in. And not a single interview. Just a bunch of automated rejection emails or at best, a recruiter saying “I’ll forward this resume to the hiring manager” but I get ghosted in the interview process. Not sure what else I can do to treat the anxiety at the point. No job=worthless=loser=no $$ or so I’m led to believe by my OCD. I’m also getting the “you’re lazy” response from those around me whenever I tell them I still haven’t found a job. I’m staring down a black bottomless abyss at this point. Is there something else I can do to treat my OCD? Should I just accept the worst case scenario that I’ll never find a job and I’ll be indeed worthless?

I am dumbfounded by how my whole life has been laced with OCD, and I never thought my anxiety was OCD-esc, since that’s not how it is portrayed in media or discussed in society. I also never truly gave therapy a shot for 25 years since I didn’t think I was mentally ill enough. It took being diagnosed with severe ocd, and depression that made me take a step back. I was not expecting OCD or depression, since i thought i was just a “high strung anxious individual” and since i do, on paper, enjoy life - how the hell could i be severely depressed (when literally i spend an allotted 5 hours a week on crying and being a disgruntled emotional mess) I’ve been through 4 sessions of therapy and each time I cry, even though I never think I’m gonna when i enter the session. I’ve been told i ruminate and all the planning, and thinking and attention to detail and journaling on journaling is not helpful how does one stop ruminating? when rumination is the only thing i do in my brain i am ruminating about ruminating if i don’t keep myself occupied with some form of stimulus i’ll think myself into a panicked state anyone break free from rumination, or have any perspective to share thanks 🫶🏼