I always struggled with what to tell my ocd when having intrusive thoughts about harm of any sort. I hate saying “maybe I will maybe I won’t” because I KNOW my values and morals and I know I would never, hence why I panic and get anxious when thoughts like that pop up. It just feels wrong to say “maybe” to thoughts like that. anyone else have any ideas of what to tell your harm ocd besides “maybe, maybe not”?
Honestly I’m in the same boat as you
@bec15 We got this!! We are in this together
honestly, and this is going to sound terrible so trigger warning if you’re really in the trenches (and my harm ocd is blaring writing this) but the only way i can think to stop this instead of “maybe, maybe not” is to think “okay yeah, i wanna commit this crime, now what”. i feel we often see ocd as this unanswerable question, but really if you commit this big bad thing your brain is so scared of , there will be consequences to that, whether it’s simple as hurting someone’s feelings or even the law. that’s literally it. it’s not some unknowable thing, it’s just a standard process that your brain catastrophises. so to sum up, stop catastrophising. i know this might not help but i know just laying it out plain and simple works for me. (and no this is not me saying i think you do want to do whatever it is you’re afraid of😂 don’t freak out)
@Anonymous That’s so true I know my therapist said to just agree with it and move on kinda like “okay ya haha nice thought brain, anyways” also my mom struggled w ocd when she was my age and she even said she would just be like “ya okay then go do it” then her brain would be like “omg no I don’t wanna do that” so basically your brain just wants to go against anything you say. It’s just tricking us. But ya it’s disturbing to think these things I literally get like sick over it. So just trying to learn how to calm it
@mfzio dw i used to get sick over it too i wouldn’t eat or sleep for days. truly i agree with your mom for the fact that your brain just wants to scare you, (its the danger signal in your brain misfiring), but truly i would t try to change your mindset from “maybe” to “okay i do” and you begin to see relatively clearly that that is not what you want!
Try talking to your therapist about it. Someone mentioned here that “maybe, maybe not” didn't work for them and changing the phrase to something else helped them better . Good luck ! And I understand completely, I myself am struggling with the H-OCD
I have extreme harm ocd. I know it's sooo hard to say "maybe maybe not" to your violent intrusive thoughts, but after many months, here's my advice: do it anyway. I have also experienced severe panic from telling myself that it might happen, feeling like maybe that means I'm essentially "giving myself permission" to act on my thoughts or doing something incredibly risky. But it isn't dangerous. It's so empowering and helpful. And I am not a therapist myself, but as someone who has gone through the same thing, I would say that the more scared it makes you to radically accept the thoughts, the more that shows you actually really need to do it! But then again, if this is just going to make you overthink even more and it's really not working, maybe try saying "I don't need to figure this out right now". I heard that from another person w harm ocd, and i really like it. I guess the most important thing is to not engage in compulsions. Sometimes it feels like harm ocd is different from all the other subtypes in that you feel like you really CAN'T accept those thoughts... but you can. 100% you can.
@kate843 Thank you so much! This is so helpful because as we know it is extremely scary and it makes me so panicky and sick over it. Thanks for responding and helping me out! It is so nice to know other people go through this and that these sayings we tell ourselves like “maybe, guess we will have to see” helps in the long run because right now I’m like wait what I don’t want that!
I’m in the beginning of ERP for harm ocd and I’m in the same boat. Saying “Maybe or maybe not” is hard but it’s slowly working. I also say “Hi OCD, I really don’t care” and also “Hi OCD, Gods got my back.” I also say “No amount of analysis will never give me 100%” wish you the best!
@Anonymous This is so good too! I love acknowledging it’s ocd and then telling it okay nice thought anyways I’m gonna keep doing what I’m doing. I also found that laughing at it and like making fun of it helps because it makes my ocd feel like embarrassment for even thinking that so then it goes away.
@mfzio Love that!! I haven’t gotten to the point of being comfortable with laughing at it quite yet, but I’ll talk with my therapist about it!❤️
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