Anyone struggling with intrusive thoughts that only seem to pass when faced with evidence? I had people knock at my front door to hand out leaflets. After looking back at my ring doorbell and the video cutting out after a while I realised the video didn’t pick up on them leaving. I now have intrusive thoughts of what if I did something and now I have no proof of it. Anyone else have this?😭
Yep. Technically, all compulsions tend to pass (albeit temporarily as the overall theme remains) with reassurance. Evidence can be the ultimate form of reassurance! It introduces certainty where uncertainty was king. And that’s why we always latch onto proofs or try to find it, it scratches that itch of uncertainty. Unfortunately, it doesn’t help at all in the long-term fight against OCD, which is why it’s not recommend to search for “proof.” Sometimes, the proof doesn’t help at all and we can even doubt that proof! Crazy how the brain battles itself. 😅
hey, i totally get how those intrusive thoughts can really spiral, especially when you're relying on something like a video for peace of mind and it just doesn't capture everything. it's super tough dealing with that uncertainty, but you're definitely not alone in feeling this way. 😔 have you heard about "unstuck"? it's an ai-powered therapy tool specifically for ocd (check it out at unstuckmyocd.com). it's been a game changer for me this past month and might be for you too. another member here recommended it to me, and i just wish i knew about it sooner!
Does anyone else know they didn’t do something but than they can’t be certain they didn’t ? I have intrusive thoughts that make me terrified I have abused a child. One minute I’m positive I haven’t and the next I can’t be 100%. I end up going over a situation so much I add details that then become real to me and make me doubt myself more. For example, I just changed her diaper and now I’m terrified I did something I wasn’t suppose to even though I know I didn’t. But now I’m sitting here concerned I did. How do you cope with this?
I keep finding myself almost automatically checking or trying to disprove my intrusive thoughts before I even get chance to agree or ignore them. Does anyone have an advice on this?
POCD has become the most exhausting and disturbing intrusive thoughts to me. It’s so frustrating because I would never do anything related to that in my life but now I can’t even look at my brother/his wife’s pictures of their kids because of the intrusive thoughts. I recently had an exhausting intrusive thought that I still haven’t completely gotten over since last Wednesday. I was at a restaurant with my friends, and I went to the bathroom and was waiting for a stall/urinal to open up. A kid walked out of one of the stalls, I did not say anything, I did not do anything at all but of course my intrusive thoughts started spiraling out of control saying “what if you just inappropriately touched him or grabbed him or said something messed up” and all sorts of stuff. It definitely did not help that we smoked weed before which I know made my anxiety spike even more with the intrusive thoughts. But I know I never did that and would never do such a thing, plus my friend was in the bathroom in the other stall and another random person was at the urinal so obviously if anything were to happen they would’ve been aware. But I made the mistake when I got home with going through my usual disproving process and listing all the reasons why I did not do that and why I never would do that and recalling all of the people who were in there with me and how they would’ve known if that happened and recalling small details like joking with my friend about “being that guy” because he was not about to wash his hands and him saying “usually I am that guy but since we’re about to get food I’ll wash my hands.” And then me holding the door for a random guy plus my friend and then my friend saying “see he’s that kind of guy” because he did not wash his hands. I know I wouldn’t be able to remember small details like that and just completely forget or be uncertain with something as serious as those intrusive thoughts. But the OCD keeps saying “how do you know for sure, are you certain, what if you’re suppressing it”? Does anyone else deal with this? If so, how do you get through this?
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