- Date posted
- 5y ago
- Date posted
- 5y ago
If they find them hurtful then it's probably best that you don't share them. They're going to naturally find it hurtful if those thoughts you share make them feel judged or unsafe, and get frustrated if you continue to share them when they have told you that they find it hurtful and upsetting. In fact for me it would be a deal-breaker if my partner continued to say things which made me feel bad when I've asked them to stop, and that includes if it was OCD- and I have all the understanding of the condition which you could hope for your partner to have. Understanding that it's a mental illness isn't going to make those things much less hurtful or annoying. Your partner isn't your therapist, and acting on your confession and reassurance-seeking urges by telling them about your thoughts is not only going to reinforce and worsen your OCD, but drive them away. OCD is about dysfunctional patterns of cognition, emotional processing and behaviour, not about the content of your thoughts or obsessions. If you must share with her and want to feel supported, try sharing your struggles with patterns of thinking, stuck emotions and behaviour without detailing the content to her against her will.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Would you say it would be good to let them know I'm having intrusive thoughts rather than say what they are?
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Exactly
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Alright, thank you very much. I'm quite new to dealing with my ocd and I didn't realise this.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
That's alright. I have been in a relationship and had severe OCD at the time but I didn't know it, and I didn't get the same urges to get reassurance etc other than always asking my partner if he was ok and what he was doing when I wasn't with him, and I'm sure that was annoying enough. It's important to make the distinction that it's all OCD and that the content of the fear or worry doesn't matter and can't be alleviated by other people, despite it feeling so important.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Okay. Thank you that really helped. Not to say you've been mean, but reading that made some tears prick so that's definitely the triggers.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
You can do it!
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@Louw Just wanted to say my partner is actually a boy, didnt want me correcting you to get in the way of your advice:)
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@smolbean Oh yes sorry I was trying to keep gender neutral as you didn't specify but I must have slipped into heteronormativity based on your profile pic, gah
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@Louw I mean I'm a gender neutral female, I just liked the dog hehe oop
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@smolbean I just realised the dog does look masculine wow
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@smolbean Hah I didn't even realise it was a dog I thought that one was a bearded man with a funny hat ?
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@Louw Oh that's brilliant hehe. I think it's a shibe
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@smolbean I'm agender myself, maybe I should start using the dog ?
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Saying "I am having a bad day with rumination/guilt/fear/checking" is going to be much better received AND much less hurtful and damaging in all ways than saying "I keep getting thoughts that you're ugly and annoying and I don't want to be with you and I want to be back with my ex" or something. She CAN support your emotions and struggles with kindness and compassion, but it is not possible or even healthy for anybody to support you with the content of your obsessions. Even a therapist won't do that.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Thank you so much, it never clicked in my head that the content doesn't matter. I realised my anxiety was partly ocd in October when it was really bad, but it flared up this week. Do you have any other advice for starting out dealing with ocd? I'm trying the erp on this app but I find it hard to focus on thoughts when they're not there for the exercise and I'm not always in a position to use the sos.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Well, the app ERP just asks you to imagine that the idea is true and sit with all the feelings that the idea causes for 5 minutes or as long as possible, without trying to figure it out even once more thoughts come which are disagreeing with the intrusive thought or offering other evidence. And it offers suggestions like focusing on your physical feelings and taking deep breaths. It should be possible to do it without the SOS as a guide, your memory is perfectly functional even if you have a worry about doing it on the go. The idea is to notice the thoughts but not spiral down intro trying to untangle them. Over time you'll find that sitting with the feelings doesn't kill you or make it true, and eventually it will reduce the emotional response you get to the thoughts. If you feel up to it, you can trigger the thoughts deliberately when you don't have them to do the ERP. This can usually be done by remembering occasions which have triggered the thoughts before, or looking at exposures about the topic on the internet in order to get that spike of anxiety. It's going to feel counterproductive to deliberately name yourself anxious but so long as your response to the anxiety and fear is to sit with it rather than avoiding using compulsions like problem-solving/ruminating or asking for reassurance or confessing, then it's a good thing to do.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Try to remember- don't push the thoughts away or berate yourself for having them. Just don't try to weigh them up or figure out if they're true, because that is the compulsion and that is the thing which is hurting our lives, not the initial thought. Just feel the anxiety they cause. It can't hurt you.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
@Louw That's really helpful
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Okay. I'm not too sure how to find things to trigger my anxiety. I feel like my intrusive thoughts are always based around me not being good enough and other people not wanting me and me being a bad person, I'm not sure how to get a visual on that.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
So you know which things and situations tend to bring up those thoughts? Perhaps you can think of a time when your partner wasn't as responsive as you'd like and it triggered these feelings. It seems by your post that her not wanting to comfort you about the feelings can be a trigger, assuming that you were feeling quite bad about yourself when you wrote this post.
- Date posted
- 5y ago
:)
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Some of these articles might helphttps://iocdf.org/expert-opinions/family-issues/
- Date posted
- 5y ago
Thank you :)
Related posts
- Date posted
- 15w ago
So i play in a band, and we were having practice, and my girlfriend was there listening to us, then this girl around our age walks in, and my head tells me to cheat on my girlfriend with her. I know i would never do such a thing. And it bothered me for days. And i ended up telling my girlfriend, and tried to explain my ocd. It hurt her and she believes that the instrusive thoughts, are my thoughts so in that, i must feel something behind them. And she feels hurt because i explained to her the obsessive part of ocd and how this thought wouldnt leave my head. And she got upset knowing that i was constantly thinking about cheating on her. I cant help but feel its all my fault. And now that she doesnt understand i feel really guilty for my thoughts and they are coming more often and worse. When i was fine for months, but my ocd always acts up right as i get in relationships, then i usually tell my spouse and tell them i cant feel guilt for my thoughts or they will get worse. And they usually just accepted it and it was easy. But with her it seems she just cant seem to understand, ive tried to explain it to her countless times, she isnt willing to do research with me to help better understand it or anything. Maybe for my first ocd issue telling her that wasnt the best idea.
- Date posted
- 14w ago
Last night I was staying at my boyfriend’s house and couldn’t sleep. I felt like i desperately needed to go back to my parents and clean and organize my room. This has happened a few times before when I was staying at his place. Since then he’s been very upset with me. Does anyone else’s partner do this? Any advice? It’s been hard. He’s made me feel so shameful for having OCD. As if it’s not tough enough /:
- Date posted
- 13w ago
Specifically how can my fiance best support me without offering reassurance? I'm trying to encourage myself to grow and keep trying ERP, but I'm not sure how I can include my partner in a healthy way. I plan on talking to my therapist about it soon, but I wanted to hear thoughts from people who have been dealing with it themselves.
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