OCD is playing with exposure therapy & has turned my life into a twisted game of "let's see how far we can go with exposures until your life is backwards, with everything the way you don't want it to be". Out of all my OCD themes, this is by far the worst & the hardest to shake off. In some ways, I don't understand what's happening. I used to be able to conquer OCD themes by experiencing my obsessions and not doing compulsions. Now, OCD is adding extra nonsense to this technique & it's really hard to ignore the thoughts being thrown my way. First, they come in the form of intrusive thoughts pretending to be exposures. Next, I worry I've followed through with the thoughts, which creates more problems. As an example, if I first get the obsession of "What if dropped some money over there?" And my compulsion is to check to make sure I didn't, my mind quickly jumps to this new thought of "Now go drop $50 and habituate to that. Make it your new reality. Get 100% comfortable with it, or else you're doing treatment incorrectly." It's like the OCD has switched from the initial trigger/obsession/compulsion to this new fear about how to expose and habituate. Basically feeling like I need to prove to myself that I'm 100% comfortable with dropping moderate amounts of money on the go. There's a lot of anxiety, guilt and shame around this new fear. Another example is when I'm taking a shower. Initially my thought is "What if I didn't rinse all the shampoo/soap off", so I go back once or twice to double check it's rinsed. BUT THEN my mind jumps to "Now Everytime you get out of the shower, put pumps of soap/shampoo on yourself, leave it to dry, and never rinse it off. Habituate to it. This is your new reality." I hate this, I don't understand what my mind is doing. Now I'm trying to figure out if I have alot of soap on my body dried because my mind demanded me to do that as an "exposure". Same with the demand to drop $50 and "habituate". This feels like it's never going to stop. I just want to get back to how I've been able to conquer OCD in the past (Experience the Obsession, Don't Perform the Compulsion), but I'm losing hope of getting back to that place.

ocdillustrated

Date posted: 5y

So maybe you need to not check, and then when the second obsession hits, use acceptance self talk

canigetawitn...

Date posted: 5y

I'll try to do that. Thanks for helping me sort through this mess.

ocdillustrated

Date posted: 5y

Can you identify the obsession and compulsion in this case?

canigetawitn...

Date posted: 5y

I think the obsession is "expose yourself to these demands" & my compulsion is trying to figure out what to do, leave it be or "expose" The other obsession is "What if you've put soap on your body on purpose" and my compulsion is to check. The next obsession is "What if you've dropped $50 on purpose?" And my compulsion is to check. Again, I'm not sure, but I think these are my issues. I get intrusive thoughts about what I'm supposed to be doing.

ocdillustrated

Date posted: 5y

Perhaps there are two obsessions interlocking- the initial ones about the money and the soap, and then a second one about "what if I'm doing therapy wrong'

canigetawitn...

Date posted: 5y

I think so too. It's like experiencing the initial obsession of "What if I left soap on me?" And then I check to see. Next comes, "Rub soap on you and leave it to dry or else you're not going to recover" It's like right after I do the initial compulsion (checking to make sure the soap is rinsed), I feel a new instant guilt & fear because I've done a compulsion & now I need to make up for it by doing an "exposure". This is what's getting me everytime. This is what's getting in my way I think.

ocdillustrated

Date posted: 5y

"it's good that enough" might be a useful acceptance phrase

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