I fear that a word of phrase or song will endlessly repeat in my head. I know that this is kind of normal of sensorimotor ocd and I’m not alone... but I still don’t know what to DO about it. I don’t even have the word, phrase or lyrics right now, but I just worry they’ll come. It’s essentially just the fear of fear. I remember a couple weeks ago, I heard someone say the N word and I was so paranoid that it’d repeat in my head forever. Or even worse, I’d feel a never ending urge to scream it out. That scared me. It still does. My birthday is next week, and as silly as it sounds, I don’t want to be affected by this then :(

Hey there Eden. I’ve experienced similar. Sometimes I get a horrible line from a song stuck in my head and it feels like torture. If I can be honest with you, that’s happening to me right now. Other times I hear a slur and I can’t stop hearing it. The impulsive thoughts are hard too. Sometimes I’m scared I’ll hum along to a bad song or even blurt out a slur like a Freudian slip. Those things are really scary, I know! It seems like you have a lot of fear. This is gonna sound super dumb, but it’s true: fixating on your fear of the thoughts occurring can actually make them worse! That sounds agonizing, but it’s true. We often see our fear and anxiety about something (like intrusive thoughts, sensations, or impulses) as an enemy, but it doesn’t have to be that way! Now I have a little assignment for you, maybe think of it as an early birthday present. Please play the game “Adventures with Anxiety.” It’s a text-based game that is free and really short. You can even play it on your phone’s web browser! It sounds silly, but this game really helped me see my fear of intrusive thoughts differently. It was super therapeutic and honestly a comforting experience! I even replay it sometimes! We can’t control the thoughts we have and we can’t even control the fear regarding those thoughts! However, we can control how we respond to fear. Our fear is trying to protect us from a perceived threat, but there is no threat! You are in control of your body, even if OCD tries to tell you otherwise. And the more we learn to tell our fear “thanks for caring about me and trying to keep me safe, but I’m safe right now so don’t worry about it,” the more our fears will subside. I hope this helps and I hope you have a wonderful birthday! :-)

I thought I was the only one who has the fear of the fear, where the song isn’t even in your head but you’re afraid of it being there.