Can I ask a serious question

Not trying to be rude or cheeky but I seriously have a question. Once you know you have ocd and learn about it, how can you then not know when it's ocd that's happening to you? Once you know all the signs and symptoms and have even had therapy. I dont understand it. I really don't. I guess im asking because I hope this doesn't happen to me. Im hoping through learning il be able to manage it. I know this might annoy some people but I really want to understand.

Generiname

Date posted: 22d

The best way I could describe it to someone is this. It's like having a bad dream only to realise you're having a bad dream and waking up from it. However these can come per minute instead of per evening. It takes practise, but eventually you'll start having that bad dream and immediately clock it. It's rough, but things get better with practise.

☆♡🧚‍♂️ocdwarrio...

Date posted: 22d

That's a really good explanation and I can relate to that as a description. It is like a bad dream. And keep waking up. For me it's like once I've become aware what my specific themes are, I know they will try to trick me again and again but im now aware it's ocd and it's my theme so id like to think its not going to be able to continually trick me.

Generiname

Date posted: 22d

@Paris12 I think the whole point of practise is, it'll never get rid of the bad dreams but some day you'll be so toughened up you'll roll your eyes and be like "a bad dream again." And wake up! Quicker this time!

✨ Sara✨

Date posted: 22d

OCD doesn’t work through logic — it works through doubt, fear, and emotion. The thoughts it creates feel incredibly real and urgent, often targeting the person’s core values or fears. Even if someone has had therapy, OCD can still convince them that “this time it’s different” or “what if it’s not really OCD.” It even makes people doubt whether they truly have OCD at all. That’s why people can fall back into compulsions or mental checking, even when they know better. Awareness helps, but the real challenge is tolerating the uncertainty that OCD creates. That’s why therapy focuses on resisting the urge to get certainty, not on solving the fear itself.

☆♡🧚‍♂️ocdwarrio...

Date posted: 22d

Thanks for explaining this, it makes a lot of sense to me. What im finding for myself personally is that im managing my ocd through logic. Its logic that's helping me so I find that a bit puzzling in a way. Its like my ocd is not logical or rational in anyway but once i bring logic to it, I can see it for what it is. I do understand this might change for me but I struggle to see how it could. Its like I cant unknow something. I now know something. How does that knowledge disappear?

garlicgorl13

Date posted: 22d

So do forgive me, I might get some of the words wrong here but I will say: one of the compulsions i spend the most time doing is ruminating. My most recent fixation it took about a week of me spiraling in the same thought pattern to realize that I was doing this compulsion all day long. What tipped me off was the feeling of not being able to stop ruminating. It started to annoy me that I couldn't think about anything else.

Andrea Wells

User type: OCD Conqueror

Date posted: 21w

Misdiagnosis & OCD

OCD is so much more than just being 'neat' or 'organized'—it’s relentless, exhausting, and often deeply misunderstood. The intrusive thoughts, the compulsions, the anxiety—it can feel like a never-ending cycle that others just don’t seem to get. Many of us have had experiences where even therapists didn’t fully grasp the depth of our struggles. I myself faced difficulty being misdiagnosed and my talk therapist not understanding the full extent of what I was going through until I found NOCD. So many prior therapists wrote off my symptoms as general anxiety, not realizing it was actually OCD all along. If you could sit down with a therapist who truly wanted to understand, what do you wish they knew about OCD?

alex_x504

Date posted: 11w

Hello, someone I care about has OCD.

Someone I care about has OCD, he often gets worried to answer certain things in fear that he might be wrong or gets anxious in times when certain conversations such as dealing with negative emotions come into play and in the event something goes wrong even though we deal with the issue it takes him a long time to put himself back together. Often times worried about his image, hyper focused on being a good person etc etc. I believe I’m doing my best but as someone who doesn’t struggle with OCD I cant fully comprehend him and i wish to learn more about it, not just read it off of google. Any advice would be appreciate it. -Thank you!

hopewrldds

Date posted: 9w

will i eventually understand my ocd better?

i was recently diagnosed with ocd and i think im having a hard time identifying what is my ocd and what isn’t? or im not really sure how to express myself but i feel like i still don’t really know much about ocd and feel like an imposter saying i have it because i don’t know enough about it to really understand it? like all my life these things i would do or say or think or feel were i guess “normal” to me,, so how do i move forward when i don’t know really where to begin?

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Can I ask a serious question

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