Why is my OCD mainly based around thoughts of hurting those that I love most in this world?! It distressed me to no end and I don’t understand

Because that goes strongly against your morals, so those intrusive thoughts tell you "danger! you need to think about this!" It's something that scares you that you would never do, and if you react anxiously to it your brain is going to mark it as something it needs to bring up more often to remind you of potential fear/danger.

OCD attracts the things or people or values that you hold dearest to your heart. All your worst fears in life is what OCD loves to attach too and it has very little forgiveness and it don’t care. Pure O is a beast and take it from someone who has struggled for many years with this. It’s not easy to beat and in fact sometimes and in my condition I used to obsess constantly about hurting my children. Punching a stranger, attacking people, friends family!! I thought I was going mad. The more you learn about your condition the better you will react to those thoughts. There never going away and trust me they will never go away. You have already slapped a meaning to the thoughts, and that’s why they haunt you! You’ll get to a point where they will come but you’ll recognize it for what it is which is just that... a thought !!! I used to think if I could only stop thinking of hurting people I’ll be fine. Well OCD also has a tendency to seek out other areas of your life to cripple you so be warned. Just as you finally get the fear of hurting the ones you love the most it can have a tendency to latch on to something else that can cause yiu madness. I’m not trying to distract you but use caution. Accept any thought as just a thought. Recognize your compulsive disorder to react to the anxiety. One more thing. The next time you don’t feel anxious try this. Try and think of the worst thought of hurting people. Call in your thought. Purposely try and bring on a panic attack or make your self sick. Call on the thought when it’s not there and I can almost guarantee you that you’ll hardly react at all. The reason is for this is because you’ve told your brain that I’m not scared of you. I want to think of you I want you to destroy my moment right now. Your brain will associate no danger because you have told it your not scared , and this my friend is ERP in a nutshell. Good luck

These thoughts keep coming because of your strong negative reaction to them. Try to allow them to come without indulging anxious behaviors such as mental checking, reassurance seeking, etc. good luck!

@Curtis what you said really make senses. Thanks for sharing. Have you overcome the thought of harming others? It’s a typical form of ocd called Harm OCD which I also suffer from. It’s weird sometimes I am not the scared and then sometimes I totally freak out. My mind always wants to figure out why those thoughts freaked out before to avoid future panics. Guess that’s a compulsion as well?

Lovemum.. let me just say this. You can take a pill and a pill might work. Medication can work wonders. I’m one who is at a level 8.5 with OCD and I personally chose only my choice to not medicate. I encourage you to find the right medication but while your medicated you NEED to dedicate 100% of your commitment to self help and recovery. The problems I personally found while I was on meds is that in numbed my emotions. Please take advice from someone Luke myself who has been Down the darkest roads and is still here. A pill will work but use causation that if you are not dedicated to yourself 100% and have a goal in mind of where your life will be after medication then medication will only serve you as a temporary solution to a long term problem. I need you and everyone to understand that OCD is a life time of hurt. It comes and goes and with whatever is ones life in present moments needs to be controlled in such a way that your mind is able to cope and accept. I don’t know you. I likely never will and I can only hope that when you find the medication that fits your needs that you are able to not just again cope like we all tend to do but rather embrace your current situation and hit it full fucking force !!! We all hear about the people who are on and off meds and the true background to why this happens is only because the individual or individuals have not chosen to make take that pill very rarely chose to dedicate their life to recovery! I write this in experience of someone who’s been on and off. I find my power these days to be knowledge.please don’t take this as a discouraging factor but know the second you decide to medicate is also the very second that you decide to put in your all to recovery because we all want off meds and the moment that we have decided to hop off the pill factory better be the moment that we also decide to live with our thoughts and our mindset. OCD does not disappear, we would love that to happen but anyone who’s in a good spot without meds will tell you that they still have the same anxiety the same thoughts and sometimes the same feelings. The only true difference is the way that they perceive there thoughts and control them in a way that Does not consume their life anymore. Sending my absolute true encouragement and empathy!! ?

@ T. You’ve made a good point.

Hi guys sorry for the late response. So to answer the first question as to weather or not I have got over the thoughts of harming other the answer is a defined NO!!! The first time I thought of harming my children was when my first born was born. I got to a point where when my wife would leave or even worst head out for a day or two my anxiety would be through the roof. I got to a point where I couldn’t even look at a knife without getting extremely uncomfortable. I have done so much research on OCD and make no mistake I still struggle. My thoughts of hurting the ones closest to me these days are getting pretty boring because they’ve been with me for over 6 years. In talks with my therapist he said something that hit home. If I was going to act on any of these sick and distressful thoughts I would have done it years ago. The fact that intrusive thoughts scare us is a perfect indication that we suffer from OCD. The individuals in life that think something and it doesn’t scare them are the ones that have no conscious. However. I also got to a point with my pure O that the thoughts never scared me as much then my OCD was telling me that maybe I am my thoughts. Thought action fusion is what you guys need to understand in recovery from OCD. It’s having the thought. Putting a meaning to the thought. Having a compulsion that puts ease to the anxiety. Subconsciously thinking about the thought again and reassuring yourself that this thought must be true because otherwise I wouldn’t be thinking of the thought then the cycle continues!! Down load audible app. There are some amazing books to listen to on OCD. One is called OCD anxiety, panic attacks , and related depression.. Adam speaks so much about pure o and this is a guy that was standing in a bridge ready to kill himself. His intrusive thoughts had got the best of him. It’s 8 hours kind and the best 8 hours ever. Explains tips on controlling your thoughts PTT. Pulling the trigger on your obsessions . Also DARE is another good listen. OCD stories google it !! I subscribed it’s $11 USA per month. Gives you unlimited podcast on people just like us !! Try find Catlin story and read it. Listen to the podcast. You tune Chrissie Hogens and watch her you tube videos !! She also has podcasts on OCD stories. Question 2 do I work on ERP with me or theopists. Here’s the thing. I’ve been with an OCD phycologist for a while. He’s $160 an hour but he’s just a trained professional. I personally find that I get more recovery skills from listening researching and hearing stories from people who have walked the walk and what they did to break through. I told my guy not long ago that as much as I respect his position as a professional that he still does not know what’s in my head because he’s never thought the way I think. I need to surround my recovery with people programs books audiobooks, YouTube and podcasts of people that think the way I think. Habitualization to your scary thoughts are the only way to not give them power. Knowing that when those knife stabbing thoughts that hit you are nothing more than just a thought , and the belief in yourself that you’ll never act on them is when and only when they let you go. When I let my thoughts be they let me be. That is a quote from a recovery of an individual that suffered from pure O and I like it!! Knowledge is power and the more you learn about it the less you pay attention to it. Cheers guys.

@cutis and do you do ERP on your own or with a therapist?

@Curtis that was a fantastic point to make and actually incredibly helpful. I have only been dealing with this for a few months, and it’s been hell. Your comment helps so much, truly thank you

@Curtis thank you so much for all of this, truly. I’m currently in the process of finding the proper medication and therapy for myself, so all of this knowledge helps so much. Thank you, truly ?