- Date posted
- 5y
- Date posted
- 5y
I know the feeling I’ve been stuck feeling guilty about something that happened over 5 years ago. Right now I’m focusing on my plan of not engaging in reassurance and googling my worries. It’s really hard when the anxiety hits but hoping to work through it
- Date posted
- 5y
I've been trying to do that as well but it hasn't been going too good, it's terrible to work through
- Date posted
- 5y
@worryqueen Yeah it’s really hard
- Date posted
- 5y
I know exactly how you feel. Not only do I feel terrible guilt I know if I don't continue checking, which is my main compulsion, something even more horrible would happen and I'd not be able to live with myself. All because of my ptsd and anxiety and ocd. But if I live like that for the rest of my life I would be punishing myself. We're all humans and this is what I tell others and I should and have been trying to take this advice; it's easier to forgive others than yourself but you deserve to be loved by you and the first step is learning to forgive yourself. What would you tell your friend if he/she was feeling how you are feeling? You learn from your past and not let it happen. From what you wrote you're only reliving that feeling. Maybe you can write a letter to yourself for forgiveness. Remember forgiving is not condoning what has happened but rather taking it in and learning from it. If someone hurt you, you're not forgiving them but doing it for yourself. I doubt you did anything that's a crime. Maybe if you try to feel that pain in a safe place with a therapist?
- Date posted
- 5y
Everyone makes mistakes. Don't be hard on yourself. Yes easier said than done because I'm saying from experience but it's a useless feeling. You know how I try to right the wrong for me that makes me happy? Donating to animal rescue groups and being an advocate for the animals. Maybe you can help others? Tale it easy, loving yourself is hard thing to do. I struggle with it but you deserve to be kind towards yourself. ❤
- Date posted
- 5y
Thann you, it's incredibly hard to forgive myself for what I did and I feel like some sort of abuser because of it. Like I'm a criminal who got away with a crime. But I'll take your suggestions and try to work on it more.
- Date posted
- 5y
Hi, I think your best bet is acceptance. It’s an incredibly hard thing to do, but if you just try and accept that what happened in the past can’t be changed, and you acknowledge that you made a mistake but realize that mistakes don’t make you a bad person, then you can try to move on from it. I hope that helps.
- Date posted
- 5y
I will try to accept myself but it feels like I need to do more, tell more people so I can get the reassurance that I'm not some sort of criminal. That's what it feels like. Thank you, though.
- Date posted
- 5y
@worryqueen I know exactly how you feel I felt like some sort of criminal too. I asked friends all the time if I did anything wrong and they continued to reassure me that I didn’t. But I always needed more reassurance but this is my main compulsion and I stopped asking and I encourage you to try and do the same
- Date posted
- 5y
@Tmbc2740 Thank you, I will try. It's nice to know I'm not the only one.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 23w
Hi everyone, I'm struggling with what I think are intrusive thoughts, possibly related to OCD, and I'm hoping someone here might relate. When I was younger, in my early teens, I went through a period where I had a strong interest in pornography. During that time, I encountered hentai involving male characters, related to an anime I enjoyed. One of the characters was someone I even looked up to. I feel incredibly uncomfortable admitting this, but I believe I engaged in sexual activity related to it. Years later, I'm plagued by intrusive thoughts about this. I feel intense self-disgust and shame. It's like this memory has "tainted" my ability to enjoy that anime, and sometimes other things. I'm constantly replaying the situation in my mind, questioning my past actions, and worrying about what it means about me. The anxiety is significantly impacting my life. Does anyone else experience intrusive thoughts focused on past events, particularly those that cause feelings of shame or disgust? How do you cope with the constant replaying and questioning? I'm looking for support and understanding. Thank you for listening.
- Young adults with OCD
- Students with OCD
- "Pure" OCD
- POCD
- OCD newbies
- NOCD Therapy Alumni
- False Memory OCD
- Real Events OCD
- Date posted
- 19w
With real event OCD, I don’t know if any of you feel this way, but do you ever feel that the past event(s) that you ruminate about or constantly obsess about are gonna come up in your future and just absolutely ruin you, that’s how I’ve been feeling for months, it just feels like impending doom, and I hate having to even think that my future would be ruined by what I did as a teenager, and I did some dumb things, that I regret so deeply, I just can’t stop thinking about that.
- Date posted
- 18w
I would really appreciate it so much if someone took the time to read this and help me. I don’t know what to do anymore. I haven’t posted here in awhile. I had my OCD managed pretty decently for a year or so on medication, but I had to stop taking it, and after around 3-4 months, the OCD has become unbearable again. It used to be much more surrounding existential themes, eating, and others, not really real event/false memory stuff. But now it’s gotten really out of hand and I don’t know how to do it anymore. It’s surrounding a time of my life a long time ago. It was a dark time. I wasn’t myself and I was going through a lot of things, and I did a lot of things I regret. I self-destructed, embarrassed myself, and wasn’t good to the people around me. I was able to get my mind off of it for a long time, even though I would still think about it a good amount. I was able to be in the present, at least moreso than now. But now that I’m off medication, the guilt has become my obsession again. I can’t move on. I can’t do anything without thinking about all of these memories. I’m obsessed. I’ve started hating myself again, so much so that it’s hard to do anything anymore or believe I deserve anything good. The people around me tell me it wasn’t even that bad, but to me it was. To me, I failed myself, lost myself, and failed everyone around me. I can’t stop thinking about every person I said something wrong to or every time I screwed up. I’ve now started to convince myself I did terrible things I can’t remember, and that my mind just can’t deal with it. And that’s why I feel so guilty. There’s nothing to really support this though. But I’m starting to really convince myself that’s true. I’m trying not to listen to it, because I’ve convinced myself I have hit people with my car before and haven’t remembered when I absolutely didn’t and I know I never have. I drive back over and over to check there’s no one, even though I never heard any bang or felt myself anything. I can convince myself of some crazy false memories. So I know that I shouldn’t listen. But it’s hard not to when I have this guilt gnawing at me constantly. I come to conclusions that this guilt must be because I did something terrible that I don’t remember, even though I already think the things I remember were bad enough. But I would know by now right? If I did something bad I don’t remember? I don’t feel like this all the time. But it’s a lot of the time. But maybe that should be reassuring, that I only start obsessing like this when I think to. The past haunts me though. And I can never be in the present. I’ve started to resort to some unhealthy behaviors to distract myself or help me work towards something. I am starting to hate myself so much and feel like there’s no way I’ll ever be able to get out of this loop. I feel like I just can’t do this anymore. Maybe I need to go back on medication. But I don’t know. I don’t really want to. But will I ever fix this without it? Why do I feel SO guilty, all of the time? I do all these things for people because I feel indebted to them, because I feel undeserving of everything. I feel awful about myself. I don’t know what to do. Does anyone else deal with this?
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