I’ve never had an official diagnosis but I’m in a miserable place right now. I experience terrible anxiety (usually pass out whenever I have a panic attack) but what has been bothering me is this overwhelming sense of guilt. I keep ruminating over conversations and events, so much so that I feel ashamed of everything I’ve said or done. Moreover, every time I hear, watch or read something even remotely related to a less than positive experience in my life, I feel overcome with fear and tend to escape into this make-believe world where an idealized version of myself articulately clarifies whatever I’ve said or done. All this has reached a point where I feel racked with guilt even about the few things I might’ve achieved or the happy times I’ve had in the past: can’t help but think that the only reason I experienced them is because I had the comfort and opportunities to do so (I feel like I’ve robbed someone else of their chances because I haven’t earned any of this). I’ve started feeling like I lack a moral compass, and my thoughts are torturing me. Every time I overcome one intrusive thought, another come rushes in and so forth. It’s like I want to remain miserable. I posted it here because I’ve been trying to figure out what this isn’t and from whatever I’ve read so far, the symptoms seem most like ocd. I’m planning to go to a therapist soon but feel terrified about sharing all this!

Hey, this is my first time posting… so I am a little nervous. I have OCD, along with Bipolar 1, and Autism (autism was assessed by a therapist and psychiatrist but not an official diagnosis cause of the cost). I used to have my OCD treated with Effexor until it revealed my Bipolar disorder and instead I can only be on low dose Prozac (alongside other meds for bipolar) One of my biggest and oldest OCD symptoms has been a constant need to confess everything hidden about my life to my parents. It started when I was 15. I suddenly would become so stressed about something I did in the past (usually regarding more private topics, stuff no one wants to talk to their parents about). It would be so bad I would struggle to keep food down if I was fighting those thoughts. Although it’s gotten better, it hasn’t left without leaving me completely exposed, and it still pushes me to want to confess my private life to them. I always think “but X or Y was wrong of me to do, or was private” and then I’d feel like NOT confessing was me “lying by omission.” It’s hard to explain it… but I just wondered if anyone had and advice or just messages of solidarity. Thanks to anyone who read this long message, I appreciate it.

Theres so many effed up things i’ve done or said in the past which still bother me to this day. One day i’ll have one obsession, like ROCD over being scared i’m cheating on my partner, then another day i’ll have POCD because of a past experience with an underaged friend, and im just so burnt out from all the thoughts and overthinking. I feel like the most horrible person each and every single day, a constant urge to confess, a constant feeling like im a traitor, and then thinking im just using OCD as an excuse for everything. Im so SICK OF IT ALL. I can’t catch a break. There’s too much going on in my head, like this constant rumination and analysis and then compulsions to search up these obsessions. However searching up things relating to it is probably the most harmful and worst mistake for me, because then I see stories of allegations e.g like dream being exposed for grooming a minor and people exposing others for other vile acts and it just triggers me so much, because it feels like I BELONG on there but never in my life would i actually want to do such things, and if everyone knew what i did then i feel like everyone would agree i quite literally deserved to be burned at the stake. Should i just get a therapist at this point or can i get through this myself with the use of some mental gymnastics like i’ve been doing the entire time? I feel too much guilt, it’s eating me up alive.

TW for mental health issues, death, ptsd, ED i guess ill just start off by saying that i have struggled since i was young with severe anxiety and panic attacks since i was about five but an onslaught of CPTSD worsened a lot of things for me. i developed an eating disorder in my teens and was hospitalized for it. i’ve been in and out of therapy since i was ten and while i do my best without medication to live my life to the fullest, i often feel like i don’t deserve the successes and support i’ve received in the last few years b/c i feel like i don’t deserve to be happy at all. i saw a video recently of a girl talking about her obsessive hypochondriac thoughts that i resonated with and when i read the comments, a lot of people pointed out that it might be ocd. it hasn’t ever been a thought that crossed my mind and now im wondering if im twisting that video into some sort of self diagnosis for myself. im wondering if it’s just my high anxiety that’s causing these severely intrusive thoughts. for example, i have had a really hard time sleeping recently because the thought that i or my partner might die in my sleep keeps me up. if i have an aneurysm or a heart attack in the middle of the night and die, or worse, if my partner has an aneurysm or heart attack, is it because i don’t deserve to be happy with him? i don’t deserve a wonderful relationship? another thought i have is when i drive with us both in the car, im going to crash and severely injure both of us or kill us both. i have never once crashed my car or gotten into an accident btw, but for some reason i just get this extremely morbid thought that im going to crash and it’ll be the end. i had a weirdly spiritual experience/revelation in 2020/21 about the multiverse and i keep thinking that every night i actually die or that i get into accidents or something morbid happens and im somehow timeline jumping and going to a different multiverse and that’s been my odd way of coping with these thoughts. i guess im just trying to figure out if this is even remotely similar to OCD or if im just over analyzing it bc of my anxiety/hypochondria i guess?? i dont know i just want help. if this isn’t OCD, please tell me and i will delete this post and app and ill sincerely apologize to everyone who actually suffers. 🙏