- Date posted
- 7y
- User type
- Staff
- Date posted
- 7y
It's great to have you in the group! Hopefully you'll find the group a helpful place to get encouragement for continuing on the fight against OCD from others who truly know what it's like. Have a great day/night!
- Date posted
- 7y
I have Pure O too!! We will keep fighting! ?
- Date posted
- 7y
Hillary: the SOS feature in this app was made for the exact reason. If you are having an episode and need to do ERP hot SOS and it will walk you through the episode using ERP
- Date posted
- 7y
and thank you all, for your kind words and encouragement. it means so much to me, I’m sure you all understand how important it is to share this with others that understand it. ♥️
- Date posted
- 7y
@hillary Here is an article that talks about what you might be going through. http://laocdtreatment.com/the-cruelest-obsession-obsessing-about-obsessing/
- Date posted
- 7y
Hi Hillary, I have harm-ocd too and just started ERP. I completely agree that the exposures I do with my therapist don’t necessarily make me anxious it’s when I’m alone with my thoughts. I’ve been trying to write all my thoughts down and rereading, so doing things in real time. Are you also on medication? Hang in there, there are SO many people that experience this - we can fight this terrible disease together.
- Date posted
- 7y
@KL - I am on medication, been taking sertraline for about 8 years and it has helped reduce the anxiety greatly. but I agree, when I’m WITH my therapist, I can’t get my anxiety up and I end up very discouraged and frustrated, and wondering if I really am going to go through with those thoughts since I can’t conjure up the fear.
- Date posted
- 7y
@hillary You can use this time of discouragement as an opportunity to do response prevention. It seems like you’re obsessing about whether your treatment will ever help you get better and this naturally happens during treatment. Try to work on accepting that you will get better through treatment but progress will be slow. Maybe try journaling like @KL to keep track of your thoughts so you can catch yourself. It’s possible if you haven’t been doing ERP for four years your OCD could have spiraled out of control. Try to push this thought that your therapy isn’t working to the back of your mind. And work out how much better you’d feel right now if you weren’t obsessing about whether treatment is working.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 21w
I’ve recently been struggling a lot with OCD. I have had OCD for a long time I just didn’t realize it until more recently. About seven months ago I developed panic attacks one day randomly at work. I thought I was having a heart attack and went to the hospital where they told me it was just a panic attack and I assumed I would snap out and be better within a few days. However it didn’t. Here’s where it gets scary, I was staying at my then boyfriends house while dealing with blurry vision, anxiety attacks everyday, and more (unsure of what was going on). But at some point I saw my bfs (pew pew 🔫) on his table and it sent me into an anxiety attack after sudden thoughts that I was going to hurt myself with it. I begged him to put it away when I’m not looking so I didn’t know where he put it. He did. These thoughts lasted for about four days but began to go away. (I thought that was it and I would be back to normal). Unfortunately though I ended up moving back in with my family when we couldn’t get my panic attacks under control in time for me to get back to work and pay bills. However, coming home brought up a lot of trauma from when I was kid. My anxiety got worse but I didn’t have those thoughts again. About two and half months ago though, I got sick and went to the hospital where they gave me steroid pills and a steroid shot but sent me into some kind of psychiatric event. Ever since then though, I have been suffering from harm OCD, I have had moments of intense anger that I usually have to completely walk away and go on my own because of how intense they are, and it feels like it’s getting worse. Today I felt fine until about and hour and half ago where I started to dwell on the fact that my suicidal thought was influenced by my OCD and at the moment my OCD is at the worst it’s been. This caused me to get suddenly really depressed and I started crying thinking about how I can’t handle this. I then saw a post talking about how suicide rates are high for people with this form of OCD and it made me question if I am mentally strong enough to pull through this. I fear that at times I’m getting worse. I have good days but I have a lot of bad days. Unfortunately this sent me into such a bad panic attack I went over to my nanas crying about how I can’t deal with this. I took a 0.25 mg Xanax which helped calm down the panic attack portion of it but my brain is still uncomfortably active. I guess I just need hope. I’m so saddened by this. It’s like my life took a total 360 in 10 months and got even worse since the steroid shot. Idk what to do about it. I can’t stop the spiral. I talk to two different therapist weekly and start more next week, making it 5 times a week. I feel no improvements…
- Date posted
- 13w
My theme is suicidal OCD. I’ve been doing ERP since last year November and the overall intensity of my thoughts have not reduced at all. I have these thoughts 24/7 and my life feels like a living hell. Not two minutes goes by throughout the day where I’m not suffering from relentless thoughts. I don’t want to take meds because of the side effects and my insurance is coming to an end so it’d be difficult to ween off them by myself. I’m starting to feel so hopeless because I’ve done the toughest of the toughest exposures and I’m not getting better at all. My life is a living hell and I don’t see my condition with OCD getting better anytime sooner.
- Date posted
- 12w
Hey everyone it’s been a while since I posted on here. Honestly, I try to stay off of this app unless I really need advice because I find it triggering at times. But right now I’m feeling pretty down and just would like some hopeful and helpful advice. Has anyone ever felt like they’re just not capable of getting out of this? Has anyone ever felt like ERP therapy isn’t working or that they just can’t get it’s a click? . I’ve been in ERP therapy for over a year just about a year and a half actually and I literally feel so stagnant and stuck still. I show up every week I do my exposures, but my body is in such a chronic fight or fight all the time that it feels almost impossible to apply the tools. I’m super sensitive to begin with and I feel things very deeply and because of that it feels like I’m not gonna be able to ever change. It feels like no matter what I do or experience I’m just gonna always feel it so deeply and it’s gonna just rattle me all of the time. I’m honestly so frustrated. I’m tired and I’m overwhelmed. I so badly wanna change these patterns that I have and grow and be out of this OCD spiral, but everything just feels impossible. I’m just wondering if I’m alone here?? Has anyone ever felt this way? Has ERP taken a long time for anyone else or am I the only one that just can’t get my brain to click with it? Any encouraging and helpful words would be greatly appreciated thank you 🙏
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