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I can’t help but feel so anxious because of guilt. I feel guilty about not sharing everything about my OCD to my partner, but because I understand that confession itself is a compulsion and would not help anyone. I feel so anxious too that if all my fears come true and she finds out, then it would be so devastating for everyone especially her. Does anyone feel the same thing? How could I change my perspective on this?

This is about OCD but also I just want to rant, I feel very lonely at times. My dad died when I was very young & as the oldest daughter I feel like I’ve had to be strong my entire life. My friends & family love and support me but for some reason I’ve never felt comfortable being vulnerable or discussing my feelings. Everyone tells me I’m the person they go to for advice/support but I have never once opened up to anyone, it almost feels impossible to do so. I mask so well that none of my friends or family know I struggle. No one has ever seen me cry. Also, as a college student with a small group of friends who go out of state, I don’t have many friends in my area so that contributes to feeling isolated. I’ve been diagnosed with OCD, anxiety, & ADHD. As long as I can remember I’ve felt like a bad person and undeserving of love unless i prove myself by being good or useful. I try to keep myself working, volunteering & double majoring in school to feel worthy of love. I genuinely do love life & am so thankful because I feel very blessed. I have good friends & family. But I also feel isolated. (Ik I isolate myself but at the same time I don’t know how to stop). Anyways back in December I broke up with my bf who I had dated for yearsss. He really violated my trust & cheated on me after making me feel crazy for so long & swearing he would never betray me again. It hurt deeply. But ofc I handled it the only way I know how. By being strong. I self isolated. I didn’t tell any of my friends for weeks that we broke up and when I did, I didn’t tell them why (to preserve his image). No one saw how badly it hurt me. To everyone else I seemed fine. I started coping with it in embarrassing ways. I had casual sex with multiple people very quickly that clearly only wanted that from me & didn’t care about me as a person. I am ashamed of this. I’ve stopped meeting new people and decided that’s not the way I want to be and I want to put my energy into healthy outlets. But sometimes in moments of weakness I have had relations with past people (wanting to feel loved & desired & wanted). Anyways my recent theme of OCD has been health + morality related, specifically the fear that I have an STD. I started having some bodily sensations (that i’ve had in the past & aren’t STD related) and started worrying that I may have an STD. When I get health anxiety, I sometimes avoid doctors. I did that for about a month but finally scheduled an appt for Monday. But now the guilt is eating at me and saying “what if you had an STD this whole time & knowingly gave it to others bc you avoided doctors?” That causes me a lot of guilt & shame. I know this is OCD so I’m trying not to ask for reassurance. Sorry that was so long, this is the first time I’ve ranted in a very long time. I just want someone to see me.

I am very new to this app and to accepting that I likely have OCD. I am not diagnosed yet, but I have suspected that I have it for years now. I think ignoring it/feeding the reassurance loop led to my first really bad panic attack a few days ago that put me in the hospital and essentially forced me to stop hiding my struggle from my loved ones. I had another one last night, and out of habit I’m already hiding my feelings from my loved ones. I’m having thoughts that I know are OCD but they’re very hard to get past because they feel so logical? Some examples: -I shouldn’t tell anyone because it wasn’t as bad as the one that hospitalized me -my loved ones are already tired of hearing me talking about it and I feel bad burdening them -I just had the last one and if I tell people about this one I’ll look like I’m attention seeking -I don’t want people to ask what the trigger was so I shouldn’t bring it up if I don’t want to have to answer that question I’m naming them here not for reassurance, but to help myself hopefully label these things as OCD per usual trying to keep me from getting help. The hardest part of this journey so far has been accepting that there are so many things that feel like normal, rational thoughts and feelings that having been hurting me and feeding a vicious cycle for years on end. It feels unreal because these things have become such subtle integrated parts of my life and my routine, and telling myself those things are harmful just feels wrong. It’s like what I have considered my “gut feeling” for years isn’t actually my intuition looking out for me, but is an overactive fear response that has been isolating me from everything and I’ve never questioned it because the isolation, the reassurance, feels good and like the right thing to do. How do I push past these thoughts and be honest with my loved ones about my struggling? How do I rewire my brain to stop the reassurance seeking and compulsions when it’s the only thing that’s made me feel better all these years?