Depression Anxiety and OCD

I’ve struggled for POCD for years, since I was 17 and I’m 22 now, about to be 23. I had other obsessions, HOCD being the second worst, but now even that doesn’t bother me anymore. When I developed POCD it was a very traumatizing day. I was just figuring out that I had OCD and researching pure O OCD and saw POCD listed underneath the types of obsessions. I was so freaked out by the possibility of that that I developed it. I ended up spiraling into a panic attack and watched videos on YouTube that had children in them in order to try and prove that I didn’t have POCD. But of course that just made it worse. I went to therapy and did ERT which made it a lot better, but even back then I was still uncomfortable talking about my groinal responses and false attraction responses so I don’t think I fully treated it. I was able to be fine for a long time, years, of me being able to be okay with dealing with POCD even when It popped up. It mainly only bothered me when I saw children in media for some reason but not in real life. Now it’s just both Oh and I’ve been a summer camp counselor since I was 15, so I’ve worked with kids every summer. I think POCD is especially difficult for me because I’ve always enjoyed working with kids and it deeply scared me.😭 It wasn’t until last summer that I started to notice it being more difficult to deal with again. Then I went through a rough patch in my life and since then it’s been way worse on and off again. I will go through the motions of feeling like “okay I’m just gonna think maybe, maybe not. I don’t care, I know myself so I’ll be fine. I’m a great person. I can handle this.” To something actually triggering me and me feeling this intense and gripping feeling of anxiety, like a sinking pit in my stomach and then it’s so hard to turn away from. I’ve tried doing ERT on my own but as soon as I stop I always feel like I move backwards. I just don’t know if I can ever move past this like I have with my other obsessions…it is so haunting and has traumatized me more than once. I’m working on seeing an OCD therapist, most likely through the NOCD app. So I am planning to do that as soon as I can, I just feel so frustrated right now…I’ve kept being triggered the past 2 weeks and I just want it to leave me alone. I don’t want to think about these things. I just want to focus on living my life. It’s so annoying and awful, and it makes me feel sick and so uncomfortable. It’s like telling someone to stop but they won’t; my brain just won’t stop even though I want it to. And my intrusive thoughts are paired with images, so it’s also like having something awful shoved in my face that I can’t turn away from because it’s in my mind. I just really felt the need to vent some of my feelings out…I’ve been going through a rough time again, had a lot of stress over college exams & projects, had a misunderstanding with my partner, got a random tooth pain, and also got screwed over on said project by my team members giving me awful scores for no reason. So yeah it’s just been rough 😔I will be going to the dentist soon. Ugh just so many bad things are happening and OCD just makes it feel worse. Sometimes I think what if the universe is punishing me for having POCD? Then I try to remember to be kind to myself instead. If you’re dealing with this you’re not alone ❤️

Hey everyone. This is my first post here and it’s probably going to be a long one because I guess I feel comfortable enough to be open here. I need help. When I first got diagnosed with OCD, I figured it only impacted a small part of my life. I thought I was only affected with compulsions and obsessions that dealt with contamination, tangible perfectionism and the obvious intrusive thoughts and that’s it. Well, I’ve come to realize that most of my thinking has been impacted by OCD. At this point the only way to describe how it feels to me is a forest of thorny vines growing in place of my mind or maybe through and around my brain constantly growing every-time I give into this type of thinking (which is basically all the time because I wasn’t aware this was OCD). I’ve definitely felt it more recently, but I know it’s always been there from what I recall from past memories. I got diagnosed not so long ago with OCD and I was happy to because it explained this thing I knew was wrong with me but I didn’t know how much it will and has impacted me in the past. So, I think I’ve created a matrix in my mind or strengthened the OCD thought patterns because now I feel like my OCD impacts everything I do. And I guess I’m saying I need help here because maybe you guys will be able to see it, maybe validate me and point me where I can get help. I’ve been telling the people around me, I think my thinking is disordered and I need help but I don’t think they really understand the amount it’s affecting me or grasp what I meant when I say “I Need Help”. I did have a therapist before but because of a insurance change, she can’t work with me anymore and I’m not sure when I’ll get another (just to clarify). Back to the matter, the past couple of months I’ve been in my head just thinking and thinking. About everything. To the point where my head starts to hurt or until I feel sick of thinking about it but I can’t. I find that’s my obsessions and compulsions (other than the need for order [which can also be mental]) are very mentally based and I find myself ashamed of them so I hide them so maybe that’s why the people around me don’t feel my need for getting help as much as I do. Anyways, examples of this have been, -constantly thinking about what’s the purpose of all of life and the hidden messages in life -feeling like if I don’t do everything perfectly then what the point or being very mad at myself -being obsessed with how I present to the rest of the world sometimes even in close relationships -having calculated movements and actions (having to move my body a certain way or it doesn’t feel right) -obsessing over an absolute truth -questioning friendships and other relationships - obsessing over achievements or failures -obsessing over people -obsessing over decisions and outcomes because I want to make the perfect decisions I could go on and on but basically it’s just a lot of thinking and ruminating and obsessing to the point where people tell me I look like I’m some where else all the time. And I’ve started to feel like I find comfort in it now. I’m also diagnosed with depression and anxiety and I feel like it’s all just OCD. And same goes for my dissociation. I feel like they all root from my OCD. I’m so tired of feeling like this all the time and without my therapist I feel like I’m stuck here. I can’t make decisions, I’m never present, I can’t make or keep friendships/ relationships, everything impacts me deeply because I create a emotional obsession to it, I can’t just be without questioning everything and I’m constantly in my head. I’ve also started getting high all the time because I feel like it’s the only way to escape my brain but I’ve felt like it’s getting out of hand. I’m starting to lose in any type of hope of getting better. Does anyone have an advice for working on OCD by yourself or identifying when it’s OCD (especially mental obsessions and compulsions) so I can start to chip at this boulder that’s weighing down my life and energy?

Sorry this is long I don’t know where to begin but, at the beginning of the year I went through something that was hard. And I was so mad at God bc I was so hurt and I felt like I was in so much pain and I was so alone. And I remember I had some bad thoughts. I don’t remember these thoughts exactly but lietrally months later I was sitting down all normal and dealing with other forms of OCD that were so painful, but less painful than this. Anyways so then since then I have been stressing that I might have acted of these thoughts. I don’t have a memory but my brain keeps telling me I did that. Anyways I have been having intrusive thoughts since and it hurts so much. It hurts so bad and I can’t do this anymore. I don’t wanna do this anymore. I keep having these thoughts and it makes me stress so much and want to throw up. It makes me hurt myself. I have bruises all over my body and I’m just so done with this. And sometimes my brain will bring these memories of these intrusive thoughts into my mind or say my trigger thoughts and it makes me hurt so much. And then I start to go over these thoughts bc I feel so bad and I don’t want to have them. Sometimes when I am stressing about theee things they pass by and it makes me panic so bad. I was lietrally just eating and I was punching my hand so hard while thinking about all the thoughts I have had and the things my OCD had made me believe I did, and while I was doing that a thought came to my mind about what my OCD keeps telling me I did and I panicked so hard. I had to eat so fast just so I can lock myself up in my room. I didnt want to have the thought. I think I was just lost in listening to my OCD and then I started talking to myself about what I think I did and when I had the thought I was punching my self so hard that I didn’t even have time to shake it off straight away. I have this conclusion where whenever I have a bad thought I write it down bc my brain tells me that I’m a bad person and I should forget about these thoughts so I grabbed my phone as soon as the panic set in. Sometimes I question whether I had those thoughts intentionally or if i forget them and then I remember the wrong thing and it makes me feel even worse. My brain tells me that if I don’t panic staright away and hurt myself then it means that I mean the thought. I’m in so much pain. I’m really don’t want to think about it but it happens and it feel so real and that it comes from me and that I did something bad. I know this makes no sense but I don’t want to be like this. I go to bed most nights hoping I never wake up. I really don’t mean theee thoughts, sometimes they come when u I’m justify thinking about all the bad things my OCD has made me believe I did and then I panic over remberinf these things. What if im thinking this on purpose? What if the thought I had is so much worse? What if God will never forgive me? I don’t want to live anymore I hate my life and im never going to get out of this. I was just trying to have a normal dinner but my mind never stops. Whether it’s me imaegnitn things or thinking about my thoughts and going over them, I feel so guilty. I can’t even get any help bc I can’t afford it. No one knows I go through this. Ok all alone. Im all alone .