- Date posted
- 5y
- Date posted
- 5y
Hi, me too. I have this exact problem sometimes. I have started using mindfulness and completing breaking all contact to snap myself out of it. Even managed to return to a healthy friendship and rebuild after this was a problem with a guy friend a couple of years ago. The worst part to me is how this is all so internal; other people do not understand how I’m unable to make these thoughts stop coming once they do.
- Date posted
- 5y
right?? i am so afraid of telling people are having people know because i know they'd think that i was choosing to be obsessed over someone when in reality if i never thought about her again it'd be too soon
- Date posted
- 5y
@dietcoke Yes! I have never explained this to anyone, but once my older brother found my diary and read about this. At that point, it was a different man. He said that I was an obsessed stalker- even though I have never physically followed anyone nor done anything that’s invasive of privacy.
- Date posted
- 5y
@Kat9311 oh my god i am so sorry that happened to you. it's such an alienating and scary experience. and the thoughts tell you that you should worship them because that's what's right, but at the same time you're crazy for doing it. i wish that people who don't have ocd talked about the more pure o aspects of it.
- Date posted
- 5y
@dietcoke Yes! I didn’t even realize someone could have OCD in the absence of compulsion... until today.
- Date posted
- 5y
Yes. Though I have a Limerence addiction. I can’t stop thinking about her. I have compulsions to look at her pictures, listen to her voice, email her constantly. And talk about her constantly. I don’t see anyone else’s faces except hers.
- Date posted
- 5y
if you don't mind me asking, do following through with your compulsions give you some kind of temporary relief? because in my case, she's always on my mind but i hate looking at her feed or remembering moments that i wasn't a part of, i think it's because i can control(ish) the ones in my head and morph them to give me a sick kind of hope. but i know that real situations involving her will only end up hurting me.
- Date posted
- 5y
@dietcoke Yes it does give me temporary relief. It can also give me the same high as if I was actually with my (limerent) person. When I look at pictures that I wasn’t apart of I fantasise me being apart of it. I fantasise about her constantly. I can’t help it.
- Date posted
- 5y
@Unelitest Thank you for putting a name to this! Wow, I’ve made it my entire life thinking this was just me. As for their opinions... I imagine conversations with him because it’s soothing and I get a prediction of his opinion. ?
- Date posted
- 5y
@Unelitest i did a little bit of research and limerence addiction seems to put into words how i feel. thank you for telling me about this. i think my symptoms may vary a little but it feels so validating to know not just that i'm not alone, but that there is an actual name for it. thank you :)
- Date posted
- 5y
@dietcoke I love hearing this - The reason I’m studying to become a psychologist. I want to bring awareness to this. To let people know they are not alone. It’s a rarity in the psychology world and even more so in the extended world.
- Date posted
- 5y
@Kat9311 Yes! I always labelled myself as a pervert and thought it was a weird thing that only I felt/do. I do the exact same thing. I constantly have conversations with her in my head and I fantasise what she would say/how she would react. I literally study her and remember her mannerisms, the inflections in her voice, her facial expressions. I could go on to her likes and dislikes but I won’t. Anything I do is to try and impress her.
- Date posted
- 5y
@Unelitest that's really great, i'm so happy for you! it would've done wonders for me if i had had a psychologist who didn't look at my issues like they were junior high crushes and i was just over exaggerating. i've been googling wondering what i've had for years and have never once stumbled upon limerence.
- Date posted
- 5y
@dietcoke I was actually thinking of making a Facebook page for it and share information. Do you think that would be beneficial even though I’m not an expert yet?
- Date posted
- 5y
@Unelitest i think that anything would be beneficial. just knowing that you're not alone can help so much.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 25w
I have OCD around being a bad or a “weird,” person. I use to be in therapy twice a week for two hours at a time because I was in such bad shape with it. Eventually I moved to once a week at two hours at a time, and now I’m down to just once a week, an hour at a time! I was also put on Lexapro, stayed on it for a year and just weened myself off in Nov. I do feel proud of myself, but today someone said something that was pretty triggering and I’m feeling funny now. Since I was a little girl, if I find someone I liked a lot, I wanted to know everything about them. This typically only happened with older adults and always women. It was always very harmless. I just lived in my head a lot with them always on my mind. Then Facebook came out where you could find out anything about anyone. I could go on to someone’s Facebook page, scroll through their page, pictures, and if I was really interested in them, could find out who their family was through their friends list, etc. Then I’d visit their families FB pages all the time out of just interest (or I guess you could call it being nosy, I don’t really know.) If I really felt interested in them, Id google them, look up their house, just weird stuff like that. I could end up knowing everything about them or their family. It had never caused me any harm or them any harm. I never really thought about it being weird or anything. But one day I woke up and was like, “what if I’m a stalker. What if this person knew that I knew who their parents are, their siblings, etc., etc.?” I got in to an absolute downward spiral about it and felt like such a weirdo, a creep, a freak. Seriously, I’m a pretty normal person. I’m married, kids, husband, stay at home mom, have the same friends I’ve had since middle school, high school, whatever. My therapist didn’t think this was a big deal and I was always scared she was just being nice. I made her promise me to tell me if anything I told her sounded off. Anyway, I was on the phone tonight and the person I was talking to, was talking about someone else and she said, “yeah, I mean she just looks people up and needs to know everything about them. That’s why she could be so good at being a private detective, or something like that. She’s kinda stalkerish.” It hit me hard. I felt like I needed to tell her that maybe she wouldn’t like me either because I can be the same way. I didn’t though. I didn’t get off the phone or do anything with it. If this was a year ago, I’d be in the bathroom vomiting, pacing the floor, taking my anti anxiety med. Today, I just dealt with the uncertainty of her not knowing that I can be the same way. I’m doing ok, but I’m so curious, is it just me that does this kind of thing? Is there anyone else that does this kind of thing? Is this abnormal? I know that it is what it is, but my phone conversation tonight kinda opened up that stuff for me a little bit and now I’m feeling like a freak. Thank you if read this and if you respond.😊
- Date posted
- 24w
for the past few years i have been struggling with a certain theme of ocd as well as most of the other themes. but this one i have not figured out a good way to do my own form of erp or non-engaging responses. basically i will be daydreaming or thinking and have a very random thought. i wouldn’t call these thoughts intrusive thoughts because it’s not necessarily fear of the thoughts coming true, its just fear that my thoughts are too unique. my ocd will latch on to random or weird thoughts and may also add in that i was doing something weird while doing the thought. let’s say for example i thought of something random while i was rubbing my feet. then my ocd would be like “why are u having such a unique thought while doing something weird? nobody has ever thought about that specific thought while rubbing their feet before” (just an example). but basically it’s like my ocd bullies me for having thoughts that are too random and things i’ve never heard people talk about before if that makes sense. i am just trying to see if anyone relates even a little and how i can accept that everyone has unique thoughts.
- Date posted
- 12w
Hi! It’s pretty difficult for me to get the courage to post this but I’m really struggling to figure out if what I’m experiencing is OCD or Anxiety or neither. I think I have the “pure O” type of OCD where most of my compulsions take the form of ruminating and trying to figure out something all in my head. When I hear this talked about in forums or online the intrusive thoughts don’t really match mine- I worry often about things that seem more “grounded” if that makes sense. A common one for me is my own identity- i will spend long amounts of time stuck in my head trying to figure out my feelings (often sadness or other real emotions I have and patterns I have) and why I feel that way and what in my life caused that and how it’s impacting other things in my life. I also think often about which parts of my personality are the real me and which aren’t. Sometimes this takes the form of strictly ruminating and sometimes I have fake conversations with people I know. It’s intense and I feel I have to figure it out but with no specific intrusive thought that says something like “you have to figure this out or all of your loved ones will die” but it’s very intense. I think also often of all of the decisions I need to make in the future and how they’re going to affect those I love and care about as well as how much I’ll regret them. I imagine all of the ways I think my actions will emotionally hurt others and how to make the least harmful decision, but to me this feels like a valid concern but go over and over and never come to a conclusion. I often just get scared and never make any move because I don’t see an option that doesn’t hurt someone somehow. But again I’m having a hard time identifying the intrusive thought behind it. But I also don’t choose to think about these things most of the time. This is almost all decisions but especially big life decisions. It’s such a struggle because they are things I eventually do have to make decisions about. There is so much more to it that would take too long to explain but in general a lot of my fears revolve around pleasing others/ understanding others emotions to ensure they’re okay, my own identity and personality, and work/school performance. Someone mentioned OCD to me because in my head it feels like I have to solve these things and will go over and over them but I seriously can’t figure out if it’s anxiety, OCD, or none of the above. It’s all very disruptive to my life. I am never not thinking or not trying to figure something out and I feel as if I have no control over it Anyone have any insight?
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