- Username
- Anonymous
- Date posted
- 4y ago
i did the same mistake when i had hocd. i would compare my experience with experiences of lesbians even though i identified as bi. that’s a huge mistake we can sometimes make. regardless of the sexuality, comparing ur experience with others is not fruitful at all. just because something like that happened with them doesn’t mean it’s going to happen to you. u cant just become a lesbian, sexuality doesn’t work like that. just keep trying to tell ur brain “maybe i am a lesbian. so what?” and it’ll lose its importance
Yeah I said that and immediately had a mini epiphany. Idk why but my brain likes to compare myself to other lesbians coming out. I feel like every realization I have about my strong attraction for guys is like a compulsion and that I need to be anxious about my hocd all the time for ERP
What is scarying you ?
That I might possibly turn out to become gay. That thought doesn't sit right or feel right at all. Like am I faking my OCD? If I am thats going to mean I had always been in denial which scares me. I don't want to nor have I ever liked a female. It hurts me to know that I could be gay or that I might like girls. I don't think I'll survive another day if I turn out to become gay
But I'm trying to calm down and accept the maybe and maybe not. And just thinking this out more rationally though it hurts me soo much.
@chamomile So this girl and her sayings triggered the fear to have an unexpected orientation ?
@Alex Yes, because I don't want it but it feels like it might happen
@chamomile You need to realize that what a person says doesn't automatically works for you too. Besides, what she's saying is literally impossible. Try not to pay too much attention to what random people say.
@chamomile You can also analyze the intrusive thought. Why does the idea of being gay makes you so uncomfortable? What is the worse that could happen if it was the case ? And so on.
@chamomile Well, do YOU pretend to like boys? Do you feel any romantic and/or sexual attraction towards them ?
@Alex Analization is a compulsion. I know I don't like it since I've been kissed by bi girls and I never felt anything, got asked out by multiple girls, never had any remorse or guilt rejecting them. I've always been attracted to guys, enjoyed sexual and rksmntic thoughts of them (still do) and it's stomach churning when I have to think about a woman
@Alex No I don't. Most of my feelings for them have been natural. I also imagine the naturally in a sexual and romantic way. Like I never feel awkward talking about them. On the contrary it makes me excited and giddy
@chamomile Then it's pretty obvious you like boys. The problem seems to be more related to you being doubt-triggered by people's sayings than by your behaviour.
@chamomile By the way, in the context of ERP, analization is not a compulsion. Rumination is though.
@Alex Yes, now that I think of it it is. But still doesn't rule out the possibililty (or at least that's what ERP says) but I also know that I'll probably end up with a man in the near future deep down so I'm just trying to stay super calm
@Alex Well isn't ruminating and analization almost the same?
@Alex But regardless I still do analyze and I have made hierarchies to let myself do ERP :)
@chamomile No, it's not. Rumination is thinking again and again about an intrusive thought until it distorts reality, because you end up thinking it's true. Analizing it in a healthy way is looking at the thought objectively and realizing it's unrealistic.
@chamomile Good luck on having successful ERP. It's tiring at first sometimes but it works.
@Alex Oh thank you so much. I just analyzed for a bit and I just had a mini epiphany and realization that how irrational my thoughts are. I was ruminating a little at the point where I started crying believing it's actually happening ?
@Alex Yeah I've been doing it for two months now, it's going pretty good but there are some days where I ball my eyes out because I can't deal with a specific thought
It's worth thinking hard about the role posts like this are playing in your illness or recovery
Because writing a post on the topic while you're distressed is not acceptance at all
@NOCD Advocate - Katie Well I write it because I was extremely overwhelmed to the point I wasn't able to accept
@NOCD Advocate - Katie And it isn't like I'm a whole expert at reovery like you, I sometimes need to get my emotions out or at least talk about this. It isn't like I can bottle up this shit all the time
@chamomile It's a learning process. It's ok to make mistakes and learn from them. I still am. Let's try to think of a way you could express yourself without creating opportunities for people to reassure you, even if you didn't directly ask them to
@NOCD Advocate - Katie I'm not asking them to reassure me I just wanted some words of support. Is that too much to ask for? Wow...
You're right, you didn't say "please reassure me". That's good. But nevertheless, the information you provided led people to provide reassurance. Think of your OCD like a dog on a weightloss plan. You don't want to give it treats. Telling people after they've given the dog a treat "hey, don't give my dog a treat" doesn't remove the treat from your dogs belly. In an ideal world here, as a community, no one would give reassurance. However, that's not the reality. Unfortunately, it's on you to protect yourself. Giving the nitty gritty details of your thoughts is like handing them dog treats as they enter your house, and then hoping that they won't feed them to the dog
Oh okay I get it now. But I still sometimes need to just speak what I'm feeling since no body else to talk. Ill try not to give in so much but I just sometimes need to speak out since I'm doing my own therapy and ERP
@chamomile Would writing in a journal maybe be a middle ground?
Hi guys, Straight female here. Having a tough night. I guess I'm ruminating on how this OCD started, I was browsing an app and came across half naked anime girls and I guess sexual images in general arouse me (I'm not sure why), but then I froze and told myself "oh my God, I must be a lesbian and I can't be with my boyfriend anymore." Ever since then, I've been checking and checking and checking some more. I've managed to not research anything (which I'm proud of), but it's just so unbearable, I'm worried I'm somehow in denial or something because the thoughts at first didn't really give me much anxiety but now I'm very stressed out. I keep thinking about my past and if I was a normal "straight" person, and wondering if I'm somehow actually a lesbian. I keep having awful dreams about it. Ironically, I can still be intimate with my boyfriend and somewhat enjoy sex but other times not so much and my brain tells me I am lying to myself. I keep trying to reassure myself that I'm not homosexual. I can't even fall asleep tonight. I checked my stress levels on my health app and its through the roof. I just want to feel like I used to and be confident about my identity, but my brain tells me that I only enjoyed sex with my boyfriend back then because it was new and exciting and just a fling. Before all this, I was only ever attracted to men and only had male crushes. Now, I find it hard to even understand what's going on and I find more comfort in wondering if I'm just asexual so that I don't have to deal with it. I'm physically shaking writing about this because I feel so hopeless. Just a few hours ago, I thought I had a breakthrough and I was feeling alright. I accepted the thoughts as they were and I was going along with it. But now it's triggered again because I'm not sure if they're intrusive thoughts or me being in denial, because I keep having to reassure myself that I'm not homosexual and that I'm attracted to men. The guilt of how it all started is keeping me from moving on because it is somehow proof that I am not straight. This is awful. It feels good to write it out. Thanks for reading.
TW: EXPLICIT CONTENT TOWARDS END I can’t stop crying because it feels like I’m truly a lesbian. I read the stupid comp het doc which was obviously something I shouldn’t have done but I gave in. Relationships when I was younger were never a big thing for me because well I was still too young. So when I had crushes it was always more about the fuzzy feeling and just wanting to be close to my guy crushes or thinking about their touch. When I had my first silly 8th grade boyfriend I remember always being scared to hold his hand and kiss him and hug him because I felt self-conscious of myself and everyone watching but I still did enjoy it. Looking back I feel like I might’ve just liked my him because he liked me but I thought that was normal for middle school things, except the first thing happened my freshman year of high school as well with my toxic ex. It wasn’t love and I hate remembering about him because it really was just something dumb and obsessive but when I did like him I did enjoy being held but now I wonder if it was just the attention I liked. I’m now in a relationship with my boyfriend of over a year and I’m terrified that I’m not actually in love with him and only his attention but that just doesn’t feel right because we have such a strong bond. He was a natural flirt so that definitely caught my attention but it was more than that, he just seemed like such an amazing person to me and that has not changed since we started dating. I used to have major rocd over whether or not I actually loved him but I got past that theme but now it might be back. I love him so much, he’s been there through everything and I know I could be happy without him so it’s not like I’m dependent on him, but I choose to be happy with him because he brings me that warm feeling inside my heart. When I’m with him I feel safe and I want to have a genuine future with him. It also doesn’t help that my family is homophobic, my grandma condemns it and I tried explaining to her but she just told me that even if I was I didn’t have to “act on it” which made me break into tears. Not because I am lesbian, but because it would hurt so much to know she wouldn’t support me if I was. Another thing that worries me is that maybe I don’t like intimacy enough with him, but the truth is he’s the first person I’ve been so intimate with and well we’re both still virgins so we haven’t been able to fully explore. Truth be told I didn’t always like giving oral but I thought it was because porn set me into that mind-frame that intimacy was all about the woman being used. The first time we did things was very exciting and fun for me!But I was also very nervous and scared and well my anxiety doesn’t help but there have been times where I do enjoy giving oral, what I don’t like is when it’s all we can do and I also have a terrible habit of comparing myself to other girls and wanting to be perfect at it. I never thought it meant I was a lesbian. I love my partner and I wouldn’t want to be with anyone else or be intimate with anyone else. I still don’t like the idea of being with a girl like that, I have never even fantasized about it before and well it just doesn’t feel like me but now my brain is telling me that it is me, that it’s always been me and all the things I used to perceive as normal actually mean I’m lesbian and I hate it. Someone please give me advice to fight this and how to recover from such a major compulsion , I haven’t ruminated like this in so so long and it feels like I failed myself or like I’m giving in to something I just don’t want.
I wanted to look up videos of how to recover from Bi sexual ocd but it’s a theme I struggled w back in 2018 and it went away and ever since i was living my life and now it’s back … literally went from harm ocd to bisexual ocd and now I’m getting extreme false attraction and groinal responses. And I saw a TikTok girl saying she had intrusive thoughts about being a lesbian and she came out as lesbian 4 years later and I just can’t stop sobbing. I don’t wanna be attracted to girls I’m sorry. Nothing against them but I feel grossed and can’t accept it. I can’t even do erp because I cannot accept these thoughts. My third time w this theme- what if I’m in denial? Can someone please help me overcome this??
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