OCD and superstitions

13 and 666 used to trigger me a lot.

Yes, lately I have been super paranoid about crows. They say that crows are a sign of misfortune and bad omens.

I never say good bye because I fear it will mean forever if I say it, I only say see ya later

Yup, saying ‘see you later’ or something wont happen is jinxing it. And a crow means death… but this one isnt too bad for me, mainly the jinx ones

I believe so, I’m not sure if I have ocd but often times since I’ve been told all my life that there’s always a reason for something I feel like I’m always paranoid about “signs” from the universe

13 is a lucky number in Italy!!!! 🇮🇹

I have spent over 30 years having a morbid fear of Sundays. I’m not talking about “the Sunday scaries,” I literally get sick, have panic attacks, can’t sleep, can’t do anything to stop it. I start dreading Sundays on Friday and spiral from there. It started with a concussion when I was 10, some memory loss and forgetting to complete an assignment for school. Mix in some OCD…fun recipe for disaster every single week. FINALLY with ERP, I have had about a month without the dreaded Sundays. It’s just another day…🙌🏻

Most definitely.

Used to have the superstition that I HAD to make a wish at 11:11 if I saw it on the clock and the had to look away for exactly two minutes or it wouldn't come true. This was something my mom who also had OCD used to force me to do.

Yes! It was odd because I normally have issues with the (9.11) numbers and now it’s like oooh 13th in December is creepy… like okay then. 😭

Wow, completely new to this app. Soon as I opened it I saw the “crows” superstition and had to make a double take…I fought with that when I bought my new home. Crow landed on my front porch during walk through and I felt doomed…wow

No as I’m an atheist

-sort of- if i’m scrolling and i see one of those skip and something bad will happen video sends me into panic i know if i interact with them ill just get more of those kind of videos but i feel like something bad will happen so i have to pray for a few minutes after seeing one

Yes 😭 I hate to feel unlucky

Absolutely! I hate to admit it, but I'm secretly so much more superstitious than I often think I am. I think growing up in a Catholic home with parents that sent me to a small private Catholic school K-8th grade really just exacerbated my obsessive beliefs, thoughts, and paranoia. I had a HUGE fear of the devil and demons growing up, and I remember once I accidently saw a scene from The Exorcist from the 1960s somewhere online when I was about 10, and I had to sleep in my mom's bed with the lights on and a "friendly, safe" show or movie blaring on the TV. It's like when you tell a child not to say a certain word, and suddenly they want to say it constantly. But with me, I'd know that I shouldn't continue to bring up the traumatic scene that had only furthered my fear of "evil", but the more I tried to push the thought away, the more intense and jarring and gruesome the thought/image in my mind become and it would just play on a loop randomly in my mind for several minutes that could be triggered by various different things. I'm now 30 years old and have since left the Catholic religion. However, I am very spiritual and have found my own way of connecting with God, Spirit, Source, Light, The Universe, etc. But you bet your a** I'm saying the "Our Father" and "Hail Mary" over my family and friends every single night of my life before I fall asleep or else someone I love will certainly perish!

Yeah, sometimes I ruminate on a whole scenario where a scary masked killer breaks in to murder me 🤣

Cultural superstitions are big for me. If I spill salt I absolutely have to toss it over my shoulder. I’ll freak out if someone sweeps my feet. And I can’t look owls in the eyes. In the grand scheme of things it’s not too bad but 🤷🏻‍♀️

Yes, I used to say knock on wood anytime I said something that I was scared I would make happen by saying it. Then I heard that phrase comes from summoning tree spirits/demons or something and now I’m too scared to say it

Since COVID I have been paranoid of getting sick. So much so that I wear a mask wherever I go.

A little it was way worse as a kid.

I never thought superstitions as OCD until I started doing the therapy. 😭 i used to have flareups of seeing 6:13 on the clock and was convinced it was a time that something terrible would happed or happened at that time. 😭

Whenever I see an image of a devil or demon I feel evil lurks behind it

It used to a lot. Now it kind of makes its own superstitions. I don't know how to say it.

Yes. For me it’s knocking on wood or jinx’s.

Knock on wood! I absolutely have to until it feels right. If I don't..oh gosh the things I imagine happening if I don't

I have crows reminding me of not a good past have ptsd

No, not a trigger

I was watching a TV show of my mom's and they said in native American culture how when you see a coyote it's bad luck and I get scared that since I live in the desert, once I see one, I'm going to kill me and my boyfriend in a car crash

I had a therapist who clearly didn’t know how to deal with my OCD’s fascination with birds and crows in particular. Like that was more made up than the rest of the obsessions. He wasn’t my therapist much longer after that.

Yes it f*cking sucks

Yes they do all the time and they scare me to death

Yes

Podemos conversar em portugues

Too much. Too much.

Yes, the phrase “knock on wood so you don’t jinx yourself.” I knock on wood everytine i get an intrusive thought, and sometimes i feel the need to knock on wood for a long time just to “reverse” it.

YES omg, i feel like something bad is going to happen all day and it exacerbates everything ugh

knocking on wood. i’ll pull over and find a free, frantically search for wood until i can find it so i do not rejoin the future

“Knocking on wood” or “an eyelash will give you good luck if you wish”

For sure, I’m afraid to say lots of things if there isn’t wood around to knock on. I also have to knock 3 times since once isn’t enough and 2 times (or an even number) will jinx it. Sometimes this doesn’t feel like enough and I believe I’m talking bad things into existence so I don’t say these things

I also spent my entire childhood thinking that if I did anything wrong my parents were going to beat me and then god was going to kill me. Lots of trauma there…

The number 13 overall really triggers me.

Yes, black cats and birds, thoughts, numbers, dreams, etc.

Yes. I have to wear certain things when it feels like things are going wrong. Like, when my daughter was sick and my son was 2000 miles away, I had to wear a locket with their initials on it or I thought bad things would happen.

All the goddamn time

YES! I've never been superstitious but I have to knock on the wall or my head 3 times if I think of something bad.

Always have to smile and through a peace sign any and every time I pass a mirror. It’s ridiculous and I’ve had this for as long as I can remember :/

I grew up in a superstitious household, my mom always talking about how “____ equals bad luck” or “doing ____ will give bad luck.” For some reason I latched onto the word “Luck” for a really long while. (multiple years.) where I refused to say it or even think it because i made it synonymous with doom and convinced myself if I said it that something horrible would happen. Looking back now, It could have been any word but my brain just picked something random to catastrophize lol. ocd sucks

For me its the “knock on wood” + somatic ocd that is tough.

No, not at all. I'm an atheist and a sceptic. 😉 I did love the dark-comedy Inside No. 9 tv show episode on it, though (Paraskevidikatriaphobia, which is the official name for a phobia of Friday 13th). The scriptwriters sliiiiiightly changed the meaning of Exposure Therapy for dramatic effect (it's done without the patient's consent in the episode, whereas in real life it's always done with explicit consent), but that didn't spoil my enjoyment of it at all 🙂

I used to have to avoid certain drains, cracks in roads, I'd count magpies. One day I figured whatever I was doing for luck it wasn't working. Stopped almost everyone almost at once.

Yes they do. I once heard that if you walked on your Universities seal you would never graduate. Ever since then I will go out of my way to not walk on any of them no matter the inconvenience.

Yes! I had a bad obsession/superstition about the numbers 13 and 666. There are some others that still come up for me, but I can’t think of them right now.

Yes, it used to be really bad. But now I force myself to ignore it and nothing bad has happened

It definitely got to volunteer my biggest fears. That’s for dang sure! unlearning that this is supposed to mean something deep and dark about myself has been a challenge but I’m learning.OCD is a damn trickster. That’s all it is!

In a way. I struggle with what I think may be religious OCD as a result of being exmormon. Because of this I have superstitions that are specific to the mormon religion that have wormed their way into my thinking especially now after leaving the church.

Only in one way. I can't help but feel that bads will happen when the skies are clear. I always get scared and uncomfortable when I cant see any clouds. Even if I know it's not true. I'd I was to right a book it would be called "cloudless skies" because of that odd superstion. It doesn't help that I've had coincidentally horrible and traumatic events when skies are clear.

I associate red cardinals as a sign that something great or new beginnings will happen like a sign from God

I cannot step on cracks without thinking I’ve “cursed” myself

It 100% gas in my past, childhood especially 💯

Yes- when I was a kid I really believed if I stepped on a crack I would break my mother’s back…

Yes, unfortunately.

A lot of the women in my family all agree that we get premonitions. Like all of us did, and I’ve seen proof of it myself in them. So when I get an intrusive thought of something bad happening sometimes I can’t tell if it will happen for real or not.

Yes, sadly when my OCD was really bad. I used to do everything in groups of fort because that was my favorite number and I usually thought that if I didn’t do things in groups of four that I would have bad luck.

Seeing a specific butterfly I saw during a horrific time in life. I see it and I struggle to stay sane

Sometimes it does when I was first diagnosed with OCD rituals where a big compulsion