- User type
- Therapist
- Date posted
- 5y
I find separating triggers and thoughts easy enough, but separating obsessions from compulsions more difficult, especially when your compulsions are things like mental rumination.
Thank you for your input. It is much appreciated! I agree that the obsessive thought tends to run right into the compulsion. It’s hard to slow down enough to catch these things isn’t it!
For me at least, sometimes when you have mental compulsions, it almost feels like there is an “automatic transition” from obsession to compulsion. What I do is this, when that happens: 1) I first identify that I just did a mental compulsion (mental compulsions is when I purposely try to push my thoughts out of my head by reassuring myself, reviewing past events, etc) 2) then after I identify the mental compulsion, I accept the thought saying “maybe this (insert thought) is true, I’ll accept the uncertainty”. This gives me an opportunity to practice response prevention in the moment.
@NOCD Advocate - Stephen Smith By practicing response prevention after I did the compulsion, I look at this as a “retry”
I like the “retry”! Thank you for breaking that down too. That’s very helpful!
My compulsions are physical (i.e. touching the stove to ensure it's off). I already know hours in advance that I will start becoming anxious at a specific time of the day and will start doing compulsions. Once I start a compulsion, it is very difficult for me to stop because I know I'm letting my emotions overtake my logical thinking. I have to stop and think outloud, "What is it going to take for me to get this!" Then I panic and go back to doing the compulsion.
I've been through scary moments in the past and was able to get through it, so I'm asking myself why can't I get over this dumb fear !? The fear now is "being okay" with not doing any compulsions rather than the feared "worst case scenario" (stove causing a fire) because I already know the latter is highly unlikely.
I find my compulsions sometimes hard to identify too like maybe sometimes I don’t know if it is an obsession or a compulsion I don’t know if I am obsessing about a past event or if it is a compulsion to prove a point (that I am a terrible personn, a narcissist,...)
It makes a lot of sense. And sorry for the late reply. Thank you all for your posts, it’s super helpful for others to know they are not alone in these situations. I hear so often, how difficult it is to separate the trigger from the obsessive thought and to separate the compulsion from the obsessive thought. That’s why I call it a toxic cycle! It feeds itself. The self monitoring worksheet is very helpful. It breaks it down and possibly will help you to think differently about each part. I like to recommend that you listen to your body - when it starts to become uncomfortable, just that small flutter of worry, that is the obsessive thought. Sometimes it’s easier to think of the unwanted thought. The thought you are thinking that you don’t want to think but do not seem to have control over. Catch the thought and you can back track to the trigger. See a trained ERP therapist and they can help you do this. Once you have separated the trigger from the unwanted thought, image, urge it is much easier to see the behavior you are doing to distract, suppress, neutralize or make that though go away! Let me know what you think and thanks again for being here.
Hi bluegrass, I couldn’t pull that up but I can assure you there are lots of examples of the worksheet online, try therapistaid. You can find all kinds of workbooks etc. However, these tools are much more successful when you work with a professional that has been trained to do ERP. I shared a post about being a therapist for 20yrs. I’ve worked with many OCD clients using CBT and since joining NOCD I have been extensively trained to use ERP. My clients are more successful and obtained positive benefits - moments of peace from their obsessive thoughts came much quicker using ERP. I hope that is helpful!
I’m new to treatment and only realized I have OCD a few months ago. I went through a tough and abusive marriage and ended up getting divorced. I had my first panic attack several years ago and ended up needing to go on Lexapro. This helped me significantly and allowed me to leave my partner. Several years later and I decided to stop Lexapro because I thought I was good to go. I’m in a very healthy relationship, have a great job, friends/family, go to the gym and have a wonderful life. It’s been about a year off the meds and I’ve had some panic, but I’ve been able to manage it. For some reason, the last three weeks has been really difficult for me. I have different spirals and different thought processes: what if I’m schizophrenic? What if I have a deeper mental disorder? What if I hurt someone? What if I need to leave my partner? What if I end up becoming so depressed that I end up hurting myself? My brain just goes from one what if to the next and once I conquer one, the next one pops up with even more intensity. I started taking NAC and inositol and I’m taking saffron during the day because I really don’t wanna go on back on medication but sometimes my thoughts scare me and I’m convinced that I’m not gonna get better and I know that’s just the OCD loop, but I’m wondering if this resonates with anyone else!
Hi all! I was wondering if anyone being treated with ROCD and/or SOOCD has some advice on how they handle the things *with* their partner. For context, my ex and I were together ~7 months before we broke up a year ago, in large part due to my severe anxiety from untreated ROCD/SOOCD. I’ve gotten a lot better through NOCD treatment and we’ve been friends since then. But we’re currently in a “situationship” kind of stage, where I think we’re both trying to figure out if the relationship is still feasible, and I’m finding that I’m a lot more triggered as the relationship nears becoming “serious” again. We’re both really trying to figure out the healthiest way to handle when things get hard for me. Does anyone have input about what they’ve learned or found what has worked in their own relationships? Some specific questions: - I’ve found that when getting really triggered in my own head, I have no clue if I should explain how I’m feeling to my partner or how we should address it together. How do you differentiate between communicating versus falling into the confessing/reassurance trap? - Related to the above, my partner and I are both a bit lost on the best way for him to respond when I’m really paranoid (for examples, I have major I’m-being-cheated-on paranoia and overanalyze if I’m enjoying sex enough), or if I’m overreacting to feeling rejected/misunderstood (e.g. “he didn’t respond to my comment just now, he doesn’t care/he doesn’t get me/maybe we shouldn’t be together…”) - How much does your partner know about ROCD/SOOCD in general? How much have you shared with them about your thoughts and experiences? I’ve explained both subtypes and some of my thought processes to him, but definitely not all of it, and I’m not sure how much is helpful for him to know. Answers to any or all of the questions are very much appreciated. Thanks so much in advance! Hope you’re all well 💗
Hello, I’m new to this app. I’ve always had an anxious brain, and I’ve had coping mechanisms for as long as I can remember. When I was a kid, from as early as I could spell, until I was probably early teens, I would constantly write words in my head along to the beat of music. It’s such a vivid memory because I never stopped doing it. The word had to perfectly match up to the lyric and I loved that it kept my brain busy. I grew out of that, but felt like good context. My anxiety increased drastically around ages 17-19, and I began therapy. I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety and panic disorder, due to having a panic attack nearly every day at that time. I overcame that as well, and now the panic attacks are every now and then, but the anxiety is constant, and some recent symptoms have led me to believe I might have some form of OCD. Maybe not. I’m trying to understand myself and get better so I joined this app to make sense of things. Lately I’ve been having really intense intrusive thoughts. I’m really embarassed and they make me feel like a bad person. Thoughts pop in my head seemingly out of nowhere. It will be an image of me harming myself or someone else in a really bad way. (Trigger warning) for example the other day I couldn’t shake the image of me putting a knife through my own forehead, although it’s not something I want to do. Or I’ll imagine someone killing me. I imagine my loved ones dying often. The thoughts feel so out of my control it’s insane. I hate them. Another persistent issue that isn’t as new is replaying social scenarios. I’m a hairstylist so this one is difficult since I meet a bunch of new people every day. I obsess over how I act and if people like me. I will impulsively say things all the time and they will haunt me for weeks. I question even my closest friends and family who show their love. I find myself so angry and numb and like I have so much built up emotion and a busy mind always. While doing my job I spiral really badly if any little thing goes wrong and it’s embarassing. I know there’s more but I can’t think of it now. I just want to feel better and like I’m not constantly battling my mind.
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