I don’t see a path forward with this. I don’t even know why I’m writing this. I can’t stand the feeling of feeling guilty all day and having a headache all day. I’m probably too afraid to do anything, but I don’t know what to do
Please please don’t do anything, I promise it will get better I’m saying this as someone who was in your position and felt as if they were absolutely done. It does get better I promise and I’m here if you want to talk or vent or whatever I’m here for you 🫶
Hey hey, it’ll be alright. Do you have a therapist you can contact? You’re writing this because you’re still holding out for hope, you’ve still got some fight in you! It’s stressful, hurts like hell, but it does get better. I say this as someone who’s currently struggling now, you can smile again and you can live on this earth without always feeling so guilty. We’re all here for you, everyone at NOCD!
@Julian2006 I don’t. I’m having a horrible time with ocd with prayers, and the worst thing is that prayers basically changed into actions and I don’t know how to address it. I’ve allowed myself to pray for whatever I want to try to get rid of ocd, which is probably correct, but it has turned that into actions. I don’t want it, but it’s essentially impossible to not have this happen. Now when I’m writing, it actually turns it into a compulsion that when I place certain words in certain places, it is a compulsion that leads to me hoping that other people die even if it has ZERO logical basis. I phrased things certain ways on posts before including the word “suicide” before versus after a certain part in my post, to try to get more people to respond in a positive way subconsciously. My brain has had this happen with something else much worst than now involves a resentment and people dying. And it’s almost unavoidable. I can’t avoid it easily when typing out things. The more I don’t want it the more it comes
@Julian2006 This was the comment: It involves some horrible topics and people dying and I don’t think it’s all just intrusive thoughts, but it partly is. One of the things was world war 3. When I was feeling desperate, I thought “you know what I don’t care I’ll pray for world war 3.” I almost did, but realizing how close I came, it freaked me out, and put me in that “mindset” constantly. I realized I could do this with literally anything which was worrying. To try to get it to stop, I allowed myself to pray for anything I could possibly want and let my mind go to dark places. I wish it could stop but it won’t. To me the part about where I said: “When I was feeling desperate, I thought ‘you know what I don’t care I’ll pray for world war 3.’” was subconsciously to get the bad thing to happen. And it was never that way before ocd gave me that idea. There is nothing in there I think that would logically cause someone to be suicidal. So maybe it can’t count as attempted murder, but I’m worried about my intentions. At the same time, I can’t even control that being there. I’m sick of this
@Julian2006 Same thing is gonna happen when I’m driving too (which won’t be for 2 more weeks because I’m in college right now). I’m going to have one of these prayer things, going to have to mean it to get rid of the obsession, and then blink or look down for a second or do something small while passing someone, and my mind will deem it as “attempted murder.” The main issue with this was really just the prayers, but this is an add on I don’t want
@Anonymoususer26251 I’m so sorry, that has to be so exhausting to carry all the time. I don’t blame you for feeling so exasperated and defeated. Unfortunately, the toughest and most painful part of OCD is facing these fears or obsessions head on. I can’t say I know exactly how your OCD works, because everyone’s is different, but I know how OCD in general works, and it’s the same fix for everyone with the different subtypes. We have to bite back. Make fun of your OCD, go out of your way to do exactly the opposite of what your OCD is telling you to do. This mental battle is exactly what OCD wants you to do, it wants to keep you down and keep battering you until you can’t even move. The fact that you don’t want this tells me everything about you. You are a good person struggling with the dark parts of their brain, everyone has a dark side. People with OCD just tend to try and deny that dark side a lot more. Truth is, the human mind is brutal! It’s grim, but that doesn’t mean it’s what we are.
@Julian2006 What I’m confused about is if I have to actually do the prayers and mean them to get rid of it, and then it starts hijacking things like my posts, and making it almost automatic that a word I type will have the “intention” of getting people to die, I guess I still have to do that? It’s not like it blatantly involves telling someone something like “kill yourself.” It’s like placing one word somewhere which my brain can’t really control, and then my brain associates that with the prayer
@Anonymoususer26251 Notice how it’s not causing any real harm to anyone but yourself though! It’s an obsessive thought process that makes you feel as if you’re “basically” attempting to kill someone, when you’re not! OCD loves blurring the lines for yourself, making it seem like you’re “basically” doing that when you’re not. It’s a super excruciatingly long process, but you can get through it!
@Julian2006 I guess you’re right, but with the prayer obsession, I believe I have to mean the prayers in order to get rid of it. When I’ve typed posts before, I think I’ve placed words in specific spots to try to get a better reaction from people, or make people feel bad that I’m suicidal, and have a better response. Sometimes there’s no logical basis for it and it won’t even make people react differently at all. The same thing applies here, and ocd saw an opportunity and took it. This could become something like that. It’s not like I went out of my way to send a threat or tell someone to do something but to my ocd mind it might actually mean an attempt to kill, even if it makes no logical sense. My brain would say that’s “attempted murder.”
@Anonymoususer26251 Ah, I apologize! I must’ve misread that. The prayers are definitely a compulsion (even if they come from a good place/intent!) Unfortunately, OCD latches on anything that’s core to us.. religion, people, kids, whatever.. it’s a brutal disorder. Your brain tricks you, same with how our brains trick us for different subtypes! The fact that you’re experiencing all this distress and whatnot shows it’s hurting nobody but yourself.. and it sucks, but we have to sit with that uncertainty! Try weening away from praying the thoughts away, and sit with it! Once it gets too bad to bear, perform your compulsion to feel better! You can do this.. it’s just a lot of time and patience involved!
@Julian2006 You might be right, but I’m not sure. There’s an anxiety around the prayers whether I mean them or not. This is a reassurance question, but legally, for something to be attempted murder and get prosecuted, wouldn’t there have to be some sort of something substantial? Like if you walked up to someone and said “f you” randomly, hoping they would commit suicide, that’s probably still not attempted murder right (maybe it’s a bit different if you know they are suicidal, but still I doubt it). If it has no logical basis, is it unlikely that it would be considered that? Cause I don’t think there’s anything in the comment I wrote that regardless of my intent would make someone suicidal. It’s not like I said “kill yourself” or something like that
@Julian2006 And even if I said that, which I wouldn’t, I still feel like it’s hard to get prosecuted for that. I really don’t want any harm to come to anyone, but my brain is going crazy with thoughts
@Anonymoususer26251 There you go! You just said it yourself, you don’t want any harm coming to anyone! OCD makes you believe anything, when it’s not your true beliefs and morals. And no, attempted murder would be far more decisive than that! Again, you’d be going out of your way to hurt somebody in a significant way, you aren’t doing that! It’s all just OCD playing games, and I’m sure as you’re reading right now, it’s trying to trick the text and make you think you’re still a bad person! You’re not! We just have to sit with the uncertainty OCD brings.
@Julian2006 You’re probably right. If I meant it, it is little more than how much I’d mean it if it were a prayer (I think). I would stop myself before I did something I logically knew would do something. I also know deep down that a prayer isn’t actually going to do anything
@Julian2006 Also, the whole reason it is here is I was worried about it. As erp I have intentionally prayed for bad things or “prayed to pray,” which is me saying “yes” to it basically which feels like a prayer. It is seeping into this now, and I probably just need to sit with it. I might even need to allow it to happen, because then it’ll go away. I can’t just stop posting either because I have ocd, and it is going to show up every time I do posts about ocd if I am afraid of it
I have been where you are at now, but I'm here to tell you that it CAN get better! OCD is treatable. I strongly urge you to contact NOCD for a free consultation. They can hook you up with a trained OCD therapist who uses ERP therapy, the gold standard for treatment. It's what I did, and it made all the difference. Please think about it. You don't have to go through life like this!
I feel this everyday I promise it gets better
I’m where you are, I think. I don’t have any profound insights to share, but I have found some help in thinking about the worst consequences of whatever I’m upset or obsessing about, then asking “so what” afterwards. I’m not quite to the point at which I can genuinely believe the “you are enough” encouragement, but I find confronting my obsessive thoughts directly at least somewhat useful.
I wish I could do that but my subtype is the worst of all and saying “ so what ? “ e literally like saying “ yess yess its okay yess I’m a P person a” and the groinal responses it’s hell. I really don’t know what else to do or how to face this anymore
@Vagogogo I’m probably a hypocrite for this, because I am obviously not doing a good job listening to other people with my obsession, but I had pocd and ocd about the same thing with my brother. Sitting with the gronial responses is the best thing to do. I was completely convinced (I know I am for this too), but sitting with it helps
@Anonymoususer26251 Wym ? Ur convinced that ur a P??
@Vagogogo I meant that I was convinced but I turned out not to be
some days I wake up with so much dread and guilt. It makes it so hard to keep going. I open my eyes and I’m hit with a wave of nausea and terror. I feel ashamed of my compulsions and my OCD. I feel like a monster for my checking compulsions. For momentarily sexualizing things that shouldn’t be sexualized out of anxiety. I’m ashamed of a lot that I give into because of anxiety. Confessing things that are meaningless to my boyfriend. I feel so awful and unworthy of existing and of love. I feel hopeless I don’t want to keep pushing, the more I push the more meta my OCD becomes and the more guilt I feel for this mental illness. The more confusing it becomes to do ERP. If compulsions are a choice, they feel like life or death and it’s driving me insane, I beat myself up so badly over them I’m scared of compulsions, I’m scared of thoughts, I’m scared to be awake, I’m even scared of sleeping because my intrusions and compulsions haunt me there too. I spend my dreams trying to explain or justify my OCD and compulsions to people. I’m exhausted, I want this to stop so badly. My severe OCD isn’t feeling any less severe and it’s been months. I don’t want to keep questioning my every move but I’m so hyperaware of everything I do. I’m so tired. Some days I don’t even have tears to cry with. I’m just so full of despair and shame
I’ve done things in the past few years that I’m not proud of - only a couple of things I can think of and they didn’t directly hurt anyone at least with is relieving (but maybe indirectly they sort of did or could’ve which makes me hate myself because why did I do that… *how* could I do that…) If I could back and stop those things from happening, I would. I may not have thought about what I was doing at the time, so I didn’t really recognize that they weren’t okay, but that doesn’t excuse them, and I would smack some sense into my past self if I were able. I feel like if anyone knew what I‘ve done, they wouldn’t want anything to do with me. They’d write me off as worthless. And maybe they should to be honest. Now yet another thing has come up - I haven’t done anything, but I had an intrusive thought pop up that made me *think* about doing something and this would be unforgivable in my opinion. Though, to be honest, the things I’ve done before are also somewhat unforgivable in my opinion… 😞 Regardless, I don’t want to do it because I don’t think it’s okay, but I worry deep down that I do. Or that I’m looking for an excuse to make it okay to do. I don’t know, it’s complicated. And I’m upset I even thought about it. I wish I had never seen the thing that triggered that intrusive thought. Yet another thing I would stop if I could. I’ve tried to not think about it or focus on it, but it doesn’t work. Even if it goes away, it just comes back again. I just keep thinking about it and it’s overwhelming. Anyway all of the guilt of this is killing me. I feel like an irredeemably terrible person and it makes me want to give up. I can’t get on with life because it’s paralyzing. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, and at this point, it feels like I don’t deserve to just move on. I can’t live with myself and I feel like I don’t deserve anything anymore. I know a lot of this is probably OCD, but I’m not sure all of it is and I don’t know what to do… if I spoke to a therapist about it, I don’t think I could bring myself to say what I’ve done or what thoughts I’ve had. But if I was told to move on by someone who didn’t know the truth, I would worry they wouldn’t really say that if they knew. Agh, it’s all just a mess 😞
Never feels like I can fully put my mind to rest. The problem with OCD for me is once I'm over one worry there's another buried deep into my mind that I'm not fully over. The two events I'm not completely over is when I tried to help a 17 year old with POCD when I was 19 and the topics unfortunately were detailed and even then I explained to them I wasn't comfortable with talking to them. I guess I just had a hard time saying no to someone needing help but it eventually made me so uncomfortable that I stopped talking with them altogether at some point. Then the other thing is being so worried that I committed a crime because my elbow touched someone's behind when I didn't want that to happen at all. I didn't want to listen to my OCD by saying move my arm or something horrible is going to happen so I didn't and then something bad actually did happen. I thought it would just be a light touch while zipping a bag up but then it was worse than I ever wanted it to be and it was so awkward and I hated it. I feel like I just won't be able to get back to the way I was before OCD started all of this. Aside from that I've just had extreme health anxiety but am too afraid to reach out to a PCP even though I need to. Something deep down is telling me I should do this but I'm just so anxious and embarrassed about sharing things to them. I can't even enjoy the things I used to do because this is constantly just messing up my life. I'm hoping I get a start of positivity next time I see my therapist. This just sucks. Feels like others around me are doing so much better than I am and I'm just kind of stuck on these same problems and feeling absolute shame and guilt from the past over and over again. I'm just so sick of dealing with this every single day so I just use escape whenever I can. Even that doesn't really work. I just wish I could go back in time.
Share your thoughts so the Community can respond
