cat

you know how cat likes being tapped stiffly in their lower back? i was doing that and then i tried it on his forehead and he didn't react he was being cuddly with me, i dont think he was hurt the slightest as i kept tapping but im afraid that maybe i did hurt him. i was in a trance. this happened because i was afraid that in the past i might have tried to discipline my cat by tapping on his forehead lightly but i didnt remember so i tried that again to try to remember. i was like costantly tapping his head and he didn't seem to mind. but now i feel like an abuser. the more i tapped the more i felt the urge to do it again to check his reaction. he's totally fine and he didn't seem to care, he was rubbing against me. they were light-stiff playful taps

Tea and Honey

Date posted: 20d

You didn't hurt him, and everything is fine. Don't worry about it! I was talking to someone else about this. Sometimes OCD comes with these "mini" urges to do something small, and we often end up doing these things. I have nose twitch issues--and I issues with with the way I move my fingers and my wrist. I feel like I might go to hell if I move my fingers in a certain way, but then I find that I can't help myself from doing it sometimes . These little mini urges are just part of OCD. So when they come up, just LET IT ALL GO and continue to go about your day.. In fact , your ERP treatment is to let this scenario go, without trying to go back and figure it out (and without trying to fix it). In other words, your task right now is actually to move on with life . That is actually your "treatment path." You can do it.!!!

ivefailed.

Date posted: 20d

thanks... the fact is that by trying to prevent harm sometimes we end up doing the very thing we want to avoid, by checking that we didn't do it. that's why ocd is so cruel. i had another similar episode with my cat where i tried to check if i hurt him when i accidentally tapped his face and i kept trying to recreate the scenario to see if it hurt him by tapping his face. he wasn't hurt but i could see he was confused. i felt horrible. i hope he can forgive me and i hope that he wasn't hurt, and if i did i didnt have that intention, i was panicking and worried and i got stuck in a loop of checking if i hurt him by doing the same thing again again, light tapping, trying to emulate the original tap, i couldn't stop. But I can't change the past. I have a good relationship with my cats and recently i developed a big fear of hurting them or abusing them; they always come to snuggle with me but I feel like an abuser.

Tea and Honey

Date posted: 20d

@ivefailed. I TOTALLY understand what you are saying. It's OK!!!!! You will have to learn to give yourself grace. You can't help it if OCD feels overwhelming in the moment. All the checking and loops and sort of "trances" get us all caught up in the moment, and we get overwhelmed, and we just end up doing these little things we didn't want to do. And that's OK!! That's part of the disorder. So it's important to give yourself grace. This is going to sound funny, but imagine that you switched positions with your cat. And your cat tapped you a lot. And your cat loves you, and they were trying not to hurt you, but they were being assaulted by a disorder that got all tangled up in their emotions and actions. But at the deepest place in their heart, they didn't want to hurt you and wanted to have a good relationship with you. Would you be mad at all? No!! In fact, you would give them all the grace in the world! You would put your arms around them and comfort them and feel sorry for the afflictions that they have. You would tell them that it's OK. So you have to try to extend the same love to YOURSELF that you would give to others who were going through the same hardships:):):) I am sure your cat loves you and forgives you and that nothing has changed between you. When we have OCD, it's hard for us to see that everything is OK. So it can be good for us to trust people from the outside. If they tell you that everything is okay, then you can probably trust them. I have gone into a huge tailspins when I felt maybe I said words that were wrong. And I felt like I was going to be doomed, and I felt like my life was over. And my mother-in-law told me that it was no big deal that I said those words. Over time I was able to see that she was right. It's totally okay that you were taping your cat. He's OK, and everything is OK. !!! Remember, you only job is to go forward without trying to figure it or or fix it. Every time this happens, practice going forward!! :):):):)

ivefailed.

Date posted: 20d

@Tea and Honey thank you so much!!! 🥲

Tea and Honey

Date posted: 20d

@ivefailed. Big hugs!!! 💙💙💙👍👍👍🤗🤗🤗 You've got this!!!!! :):):)

dee012

Date posted: 24w

pocd real event :(

feels like I violated a family friends son who is 10 years old because I was holding a kitty on my lap and they were scratching under the cats chin and I went to scratch under the cats chin as well but we ended up touching hands bc we were both scratching under but like I didn’t care bc I was just like awww kitty or whatever but then when we touched hands and he moved his hand away it freaked me out like I did something bad or violated him. It felt like I cupped and grazed his hand because I went to scratch under the cats chin but he was doing so as well. And when he moved his hand away it like slid past my hand and it just made me feel like I did something weird. Some people would be able to do this and not freak out and even continue scratching under the cats chin with the little boy and not care but I care and it’s making me feel really weird and bad. And also him moving his hand away when I touched it makes me feel like I did something bad. This all happened in a span of a literal second and I just want to disappear

ivefailed.

Date posted: 18w

fear of harming cats lead to unhealthy compulsions

I've been hyperfixated on worrying about abuse and harm to my cats, and as a result i spiraled into some bad compulsions, and I know I'm a bad person for that. I feel horrible. Some time ago my male cat went to sniff my other female's cat bum and i know it's normal but i instantly reacted and bumped by hand to his face and I believe I accidentally used a bit too force. I got scared that I did it too hard. And I felt the urge to replicate the same move to check that it didnt hurt him and i shouldn't have done it I should have ignored the call of uncertainty, and I bumped my dorsal part of the hand on his face repeatedly to check any sign, i was replicating similar "force" to make sure I didn't hurt him going one slight step above of a gentle tap. It was like a slight stiffer tap, but not hard, but still stiff... Like I would feel the compulsive urge to try to bump my hand slightly harder to his face and that would make me feel horrible and wanting me to check it again... My cat wasn't hurt, but I think he had a confused face, my brain is telling me that he ran away and that he had a hurt face, the first thing i dont think so and the latter I believe it. I felt so guilty I thought I was an abuser. And I checked the same thing on my other female cat but she was just annoyed, she didnt feel hurt. This has been on my mind for a long time and I've been obsessing abt. Just now I compulsively tested "abuse" on my cat. i started tapping on her head lightly with my fingers. it didnt hurt her, she didnt react at all, but the first time she lowered her ears but not in a hurt way more like she was a bit annoyed by my antics, or i think it's just the nervous area because cats generally lower their ears when someone touches their head. I started tapping from her back like people do to their cats because the cats enjoy it and i used the same "energy" and slowly went to her head to see if it hurt her. and a medium tap (not hard) that didnt hurt her triggered me a lot, felt like i had done already something that was too hard. and i spiraled and kept doing the same thing to see if it hurt her. like if i do it to myself it doesnt hurt at all. and my cat didnt react at all she didnt move an inch and didnt even meow. she didnt care. i increased the power a slightly to hear more the sound of the tap and I got increasingly worried. but i kept tapping her too much. i couldn't stop. i had to check continuously that the tap before didnt sound as harsh like it did. like she didnt flinch or hiss or move at all. her ears lowered a bit probably because it was unpleasant. i would try to go above one slight step above gently tapping to see what would happened because i couldn't stand uncertainty and i couldn't believe that it could hurt her. it was never hard, but the medium taps felt abuse. when my cat headbutts she uses more strenght than i used to tap her head... to describe the tap it would be like similar to when your friend taps your shoulder to say "good job" or to encourage you. probably a bit less then that...

Real Events OCD

Kristen

Date posted: 14w

Pet OCD-Cat

I saw a Tik tok video randomly of a woman petting her cat at the base of its tail and it making a funny noise. I read the comments and random ppl were saying she was turning her cat on…which is not true. Anyway, one day I saw my sweet cat and decided to sit on the floor and just pet her and love on her. As I was petting her, the intrusive thought of that video came in and I still petted her near the base of her tail literally for like 2 seconds and now my ocd has been questioning intentions and I’m having the hardest time of my life. 😭😭😭 I just need someone to relate to. 😭 Any advice?

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