i’m tired of fighting, i’m tired of thinking, i’m tired of trying, i’m tired! i have my first therapy session tomorrow, but i don’t even really know if it’ll help any. because it’s the first one, and i hardly made it a week to it. my pocd is driving me insane, im tired. idk what to do, i wish i could just remove it. but that feels wrong because it still happened. y’all i’m trying but i feel hopeless
The biggest thing you have to learn about OCD recovery is that you have to stop fighting the thoughts in your head. You have to learn to ALLOW the thoughts to be there. It doesn't matter what kind of taboo thoughts they are, whether about sex or about violence or about any taboo theme. it just doesn't matter. ERP therapy should train you to STOP fighting them off. I am going to copy and paste something that I've written and have sent to quite a lot of people on this app. Let me know if it helps you. Just remember that what I have written applies to all all forms of OCD. POCD is not different than any other form of OCD. It is just the SAME. And you treat it in exactly the same way. Here is the copy and paste: ------------------------ The key is to STOP fighting off the thoughts. You need to just accept that they are in your head, and that they are MEANINGLESS—so it doesn’t matter if they are there or not. —————— Don’t ever fight the thoughts. This is very important for OCD recovery. ERP therapy trains us to never fight the thoughts. If you try to fight them off, they’re just going to get worse. My therapist explained it like this: Imagine a tree planted by river. The leaves from the tree fall off and float down the river. You watch the leaves fall, but you don’t try to stop them. You just let them float down the river. This is the same with ALL intrusive thoughts. It doesn’t matter if these are bad thoughts about God, violence, sex, attractions, etc. All intrusive thoughts are the SAME. You just let them fall off the tree and float down the river. Here’s another analogy: Imagine a swarm of angry bees around someone’s head. The bees can’t really bite or sting, but they are very annoying as they swarm around the person’s head. They’re not really harmful to the person, but they are disturbing just because they are there. This is the same thing as the intrusive thoughts. They can’t really harm anything, and they don’t have any real power. But they are distracting and disturbing because they are there. If you take a stick and try to fight them off, they’re just going to swarm around even worse and get even stronger. It doesn’t work to try to fight them off with a stick. They will always keep swarming. In the same way, we can’t fight off the intrusive thoughts. It’s impossible. Besides, the thoughts are meaningless, and they can’t hurt us anyway. So don’t try to fight them off. Here’s one more analogy: Imagine your little brother is always saying mean things to you. Sometimes he shout means things; sometimes he whispers mean things; sometimes he shows you ugly pictures that he has drawn. He’s always trying to tease you and always trying to get you upset, and he’s always saying horrible things to you. If you shout at him to stop doing it, he’s just going to do it more. You have to accept that you can’t stop what he says. But if you ignore him and don’t give him any response and don’t get upset , he will eventually get bored and stop trying so hard. It’s the same with the intrusive thoughts. You can’t stop them. But if you get upset every time they come into your head, you are giving them power. You OCD (like a little brother) is going to feed you more of the things that “rile you up.” But if you don’t get upset and don’t care if these things are coming into your brain, then you can go about your life as normal. In this way, you are showing that these thoughts really have no power over you. Your OCD will try to trick you into giving “meaning” to the thoughts by saying maybe you will like them or maybe you will accept them, blah, blah, blah, blah blah blah. Don’t listen to the OCD. Practice strict ERP no matter how you feel and no matter how the OCD tries to tell you the danger you’re in if you start ignoring the thoughts. The truth is the thoughts don’t mean anything, so you can ignore them. You can’t make them go away (like the bees), but you can give them no power by acknowledging that they are meaningless
ERP has a 70-80% success rate. It’s extremely effective :) I was in your position once too. I had Harm OCD and POCD. Both at once actually. I was hopeless and didn’t know if there was help for me. And look at me now, I’m an OCD conquerer ❤️🩹 If I can do it, you sure as hell can too!
I can't afford ERP is there anything else you did?
@Anonymous Great question :) Well I work with a therapist only 1 hour a week. So the other 23 hours- I am also on my own. I do ERP by myself for the most part. A lot of people have even learned how to do self-ERP because they couldn’t afford a therapist. There’s so many articles and YouTube videos describing OCD tips and the ERP process. I recommend watching Nathan Peterson, NOCD’s YouTube channel, Ali Greymond, and Shala Nicely’s blog :) I also practice mindfulness: Always try to stay in the present moment. What are things you can see, touch, smell, hear, etc? Healthy lifestyle habits: Get a good amount of sleep everyday. Exercise everyday. Avoid eating processed foods. Eat a balanced diet. I use the “Yuka” app to scan food and skincare items (and no I’m not sponsored lol). The app tells me which items contain unhealthy ingredients for our bodies. This is important because what we put in our bodies will affect our brains as well. And many items are surprisingly terrible for our health but they’re sold in stores anyways (probably why both physical & mental illness rates are unfortunately so high). I also have depression (caused by OCD) so I practice behavioral activation. It’s basically where you do activities even you don’t feel like it. (It’s to avoid me staying in bed all day, which adds to my depression.) I try to plan to do an activity every hour. They can be small and big activities like washing the dishes, showering, doing work, calling a friend, volunteering, etc.
@Love1another<3 Thanks for this
@Anonymous You’re so welcome! :) Always happy to help 👍
3 years I was too. I could not be in groups of people, which makes teaching impossible. But ERP is a game charger. It will not happen all at once. But, compulsions feed the monster. Stop the compulsions and the monster (OCD) starts weakening!! That changed my life for the better!!!
It helps alot
I’m on track to getting my diagnosis and i’m already questioning it. Pocd feels so real, and even though i once saw someone say “it has to feel real or you wouldn’t worry” which is like god level reassurance honestly, it hurts. I can’t look at children, they deserve better. My usual attraction seems to be gone and i can not think about anything else. At the same time i don’t really feel anxiety. I’m scared i don’t feel bad enough, if i just smiled maybe i honestly wouldn’t feel bad? I don’t have many other ocd symptoms either, except for some stuff when i was a kid and like questioning everything about myself. I’m clinging to the hope that this is Pocd instead of me being a Monster and at the same time i’m so sad that i have to go trough this. I don’t like myself but i’m sorry for my younger self. I just want to be held and be told that everything will be okay but how can i know? Even then i feel like comfort of that kind only really applies to others who are struggling and aren’t horrible like me. In so many ways i sm convinced i am a monster even though it might be a bit irrational. Maybe i’m a monster after all and then i should really get away from everyone i love. They deserve better :( After a lifetime of struggles (nothing super serious) i’m just getting started with therapy and i’m so.. scared. What if it won’t help? What if it turns out i’m the bad person i fear to be. Is there any way i can prepare or some tips or literally anything else? I would appreciate any wise words
The pocd thoughts are making me want to throw up. I feel like I should end it because i cant handle my brain being right
I've been good for a long while but I'm feeling very down and depressed, tired of dealing with all of this. I've been researching things and trying to treat them as exposures, and I'm doing okay but it just feels horrible. Researching things about pedophiles, sexual disorders and dysfunction, appropriate and innapopriate sexual fantasies, etc. I hate all of it. I just wish I could feel okay, go back in time and change all the things I've done, I wish I could just understand why I have to deal with this.
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