- Username
- Lucyel
- Date posted
- 6y ago
I'm obsessed with heart attacks. Any arm ache chest pain or stomach pain I link to something being wrong with my heart since I have high cholesterol. I google every symptom I feel.
Some of my OCD is health related. When I did residential ERP treatment they had me record every time I submitted to a compulsion so I could better resist and Some exposures I did were writing “I might have a heart attack” over and over, reading personal stories of people who had had heart attacks, reading stories about people who died from heart attacks, reading about symptoms of heart attacks, exercising without monitoring my heart rate, etc. Most of those exposures could be twisted to work for any health related fear.
I keep a log and every time I check something (usually on the internet) I need to record it. Knowing that I will have to write it in my log almost always prevents me from doing the compulsion (usually internet search). I have done this with many checking obsessions/compulsions, not just health related ones, and I have been very successful using this method. New obsessions pop up, but as soon as I recognize them I create a specific checking log for them and quite quickly the obsession dies off.
Thanks for your responses wonderful people ?
What are common ERP exercises for Health OCD? I just feel exhausted and I know I need help... My compulsion is going to an urgent care. I also google my symptoms. Going to the urgent care all the time cost so much money. :( And of course google makes things so much worse because everything is deadly according to google. This past month I’ve convinced myself I had pancreatic cancer, brain cancer, Parkinson’s disease, ALS, and colon cancer. I’m exhausted and just want this to stop.
anyone got any tips/advice on how to overcome somatic ocd/ sensorimotor ocd
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