Anyone have any good tips for resisting the urge to ruminate? My compulsions are mainly reassurance seeking and ruminating and while I can resist the compulsion to check something on my phone, it’s really hard to resist ruminating, because ultimately, the ruminating is just thinking thoughts, which we all know we can’t control.

I’m having a big OCD relapse and would like to hear anyone’s tips on how to be present and healthily deal with these intrusive thoughts and the “need” to preform compulsions. Thank you!!

So maybe the title wasn't the best to to put it but when you guys start having obsessive thoughts how do you stop them before it turns into compulsions and anxiety?

OK, this might sound really dumb, but when you guys get intrusive thoughts, do they just come once and then go away? I’ve heard that repeatedly thinking about an intrusive thought is considered ‘checking,’ but it doesn’t feel like I have any control over how many times it comes up in my head. It’s not like I’m trying to check anything—it just keeps showing up, almost like it’s terrorizing me every time. I can’t seem to stop it from looping, stop remembering it, or prevent it from coming up. Every time it does, I feel horrified, and I already know it’s going to horrify me. I don’t think I’m actively trying to see if my feelings have changed, so is this still considered checking? How do other people get an intrusive thought and just move on? Doesn’t it pop up a million times for them too? I always thought that was normal, but now I’m hearing this could be a compulsion, and I feel really confused, scared, and lost. Is this why my OCD feels so extreme? Because I really don’t feel like I can control how many times the thought pops up.