fear of criticism: advice please

hello, my ocd turns me into an extreme perfectionist. i can’t take criticism well and noticed it gives me so much anxiety when anticipating it. i’m trying to learn a new language (swedish) and i even have a pen pal who’s willing to help me. i could tell in his text to me in swedish that he is providing some sort of criticism tho i’ve been so afraid to translate it cuz i get so scared that i’m being judged or thought of as stupid when really i know he’s just trying to help me. tips for dealing with this? i hate feeling like people think i’m ‘stupid’ i know it’s rooted in past experiences of bullying and social rejection etc etc

Perfectionism OCD

Username: littleoldme littleoldme

Date posted: 36w ago

it’s like i have to immediately be good at anything i do. i’m just starting out learning the language and i know i’m gonna have to get over this fear if i want to learn: i know i have to embarrass myself to get better but i hate that feeling

Username: veronikaaaaveronikaaaa

Date posted: 36w ago

I relate to this! I’m studying German in school. It was a huge learning curve being able to accept criticism. For a few years I wouldn’t speak German unless I knew I was going to speak a perfect sentence. One thing that has helped me is that when learning a language, it is impossible not to make mistakes. It’s such an opportunity for growth in a low risk environment where no one is judging you for making mistakes. It’s a tough pill to swallow, but once you accept that you’re going to make mistakes (and can still be an intelligent, worthy, wonderful human), you’ll make so much growth in your language learning! I can relate to it being rooted in bullying. it’s good that you recognize this. Can you use this to give the perfectionism less power over you?

Username: veronikaaaaveronikaaaa

Date posted: 36w ago

@veronikaaaa I recognize though that it’s so much easier said than done. I’m currently struggling coming to terms with a mistake I made. Just know that nobody is judging you as much as you’re judging yourself

Username: littleoldme littleoldme

Date posted: 36w ago

@veronikaaaa hi thank you so much. it helps hearing someone else’s experiences with this. I do see how learning a language could be a good environment to gain more control over my perfectionism. I’m excited to give it a try! thank you again for being so kind i needed hear this

Username: veronikaaaaveronikaaaa

Date posted: 36w ago

@littleoldme I’m so glad :) it always helps me too when I hear I’m not alone in a struggle. Best wishes to you! You’ll be amazing at learning Swedish :)

Username: BollyGolly829

Date posted: 2y ago

Feedback at Work

This week has been tough for me. My supervisor at my job gave me some feedback that really triggered some intense OCD thoughts. They told me I was making careless mistakes on a task and that I am not being detail oriented enough. I’m sure that all of you are aware of how crazy this might sound to someone with OCD who double and triple checks everything they do. Anyway, because of this error they took away my other responsibilities because the mistake I was making was apparently bad enough that they felt they couldn’t trust me to do anything else. On top of it being terrible management and that it doesn’t teach me anything or show me what to do differently, it also seriously triggered my anxiety. Now anytime I do something at work I have been checking it 100x over because I’m afraid of another mistake. I wish people would be kinder when they criticize. Sending love to anyone who checks their work for perfection ❤️

Username: Nerdwithocd

Date posted: 1y ago

Work related ruminations

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?

Username: myheal06

Date posted: 1y ago

self confusion and uncertainty

i’m trying so very hard to overcome ocd and try to live my live above it but i can’t seem to get through a single day without that annoying little voice in my head saying “you’re crazy”, “youre a bad person”, or “you’ll become a bad person”. which is probably the most terrifying thing to hear it’s like i’ve become afraid of myself a fear of becoming crazy which is making me crazy🤦🏼‍♀️ i’m not looking for reassurance, but any advice😭 i’m really struggling.

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fear of criticism: advice please

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