- Date posted
- 5y
- Date posted
- 5y
Hey Jenn! You’re good girl. It’s hard to understand emotions and interpret them, but I want you to know it’s completely normal! Let me be your reassurance for the day: you love guys romantically and that’s it! Period! Okay there’s your reassurance! And I know there can be scary intrusive thoughts regarding HOCD and ROCD but the two go hand and hand so let me say some things to make you understand. I’m not a pro, but upon research I’ve learned that everyone is on a spectrum. Absolutely no one is 100% gay or 100% straight. NO ONE! That’s a scary thought to accept, but just accept it and you’ll see your life change before your eyes. Everyone gets gay thoughts and that’s just part of being human! These thoughts are so dang random and it’s okay! You don’t need to fear them-people are sexual beings and it depends on the mood and seasons we are all in but your hormones will fluctuate and leave you sometimes questioning yourself. And all because you once became a bit turned on about something you thought you were appalled by? Having intrusive thoughts about being gay (or for gay people being straight) does not mean you are gay! I’m sure you had underlying OCD and then you had an experience of an intrusive thought related to sexuality that then turned your ocd into HOCD. Let me tell you these thoughts aren’t here to tell you that you’re secretly gay, they’re not here to try and turn your sexuality around, and they’re gonna go away with time! I just want you to do some things that helped me! Put yourself on a spectrum. Accept that no one is 100% straight and that that’s okay. You can be 95% straight. Don’t let that 5% right there scare ya! That 5% could be as random as sometimes you are nearing your period and all of a sudden everything becomes attractive to you-completely normal! I also want you to meditate and not touch any thought during this time. Just let the music move you for about 5 minutes. Then everytime you get an intrusive gay thought say “maybe I am bi, maybe I’m not, but I’m going to continue my life being straight.” This is scary at first but in time these thoughts won’t disturb you as much. I also want you to keep up the good work on your journal! LOVE YOURSELF. And one of the best things I did for myself was write a testimony. I shared everything from why I thought these thoughts developed (example: people being bullied in school and telling me they could see me as gay) and then go on to say your battle with it and why this isn’t you at all and that you’re going to recover! KNOW YOUR IDENTITY AND DONT LET THESE THOUGHTS QUESTION IT!! You’re amazing and the more you learn to give these thoughts no meaning and that they’re just stupid thoughts that won’t define you the more you will continue to find yourself recovering. You’ve got this beautiful, I know you will succeed!
- Date posted
- 5y
Thank you so much for taking your time to write this out! It means the world to me. I love your approach to spectrum! I will definitely try that. Thank you once again for your input! Hope things are going well for you!
- Date posted
- 5y
@Jennnn Always welcome! I’m not a pro but I’m definitely out here trying my best and I’ve felt called to help others to the best of my ability! I am feeling great! There comes a point in life when after so much struggling you stand up to these silly thoughts and you say that THIS IS NOT ME! I KNOW WHO I AM AND I KNOW MY IDENTITY! I came to that conclusion on Thursday of last week and I’ve been doing my best to not give these thoughts an explanation or worry and just accept them as some dumb thoughts that aren’t attached to who I am. After accepting that I feel almost free...not completely yet but I believe with Gods Grace I’m getting there! Best of luck to you, everything will be good I promise.?
- Date posted
- 5y
That actually sounds wonderful. I was kind of the same, had a boyfriend at 14 and dumped him for the next at 16. It wasn't til that relationship ended at 18 and then I had bad PTSD & OCD for a few years and THEN started treating those things, that I started to actually make proper friends. Like, the type where you actually let yourself be vulnerable and you think about them and care how they are and want your friendship to make them happy. Rather than them just being the people I hang out with at school etc. It felt a bit weird, but mostly kind of beautiful. I value my handful of friends very highly now. They've brought me more fulfillment and comfort and joy than either of my toxic relationships.
- Date posted
- 5y
Thank you for sharing your experience. That’s amazing you have more meaningful relationships! I have a wonderful boyfriend. I wanna value him along w/ other people in my life. I get a little scare when I care for others more at times cuz I wonder if I am losing feelings for him
- Date posted
- 5y
I guess it scares me to care for someone besides my boyfriend deeply
- Date posted
- 5y
Its crazy how much i relate on this
- Date posted
- 5y
Tell me about your experience!
- Date posted
- 5y
@Jennnn My experience is my boyfriend got deployed and just a lot of things happened at once so I began lettting doubt and uncertainty creep in! People weren’t always the nicest in high school and then I went to college which was a huge culture shock so it was just a lot to take in at once. When I felt so distant from my boy I wondered how I could begin to lose feelings for such an amazing man? Thanks for that one deployment! Anyhow I began to question myself and since I had underlying OCD the rOCD and hOCD really kicked in. I’ve struggled for about 3.5 months and it wasn’t until last week when I said you know what? This isn’t me! I know who I am and I’m done doubting myself! And that’s when everytime an intrusive thought came in my head I’d just say hmmmm strange situation then go about my day! It’s been better ever since. I’m not 100% cured and who knows if I ever will be which is scary to think, but honestly you just get to a point where you’re done and you step back and realize how stupid it is to let these thoughts that aren’t even your control your life! That is when things get better-when you separate the thoughts from yourself! And my boy and I are doing great and I’ve kept myself busy and I KNOW who I am! I’m done letting people get in my head and I’m done with letting OCD scare me!
Related posts
- User type
- OCD Conqueror
- Date posted
- 18w
Anyone who has had sexual orientation OCD since the “dating age” (middle school/high school)— how did you ever determine your sexuality? I don’t want reassurance because I understand our experiences may be different. I’m just curious— did you try boys and girls? Did you just find your person and know? I started having SOOCD at age 16 and I’m now 28. OCD has ruined my ability to date more than anything else. I feel like it stole my chance at love. I’ve had three long-term situationships with men. I adored them but they were also toxic because I think I subconsciously didn’t believe I deserved better. I felt that if I knew the relationship wouldn’t work because of fundamental differences, at least it was okay that I couldn’t fully be present in the relationship. Not sure if this makes sense, but I’m just grieving that part of my life I missed out on.
- Date posted
- 14w
I tried checking if I like gay stuff and it’s genuinely disgusting to me. I can tell whether or not a man is attractive and when they are it does scare me and makes me question myself yet, it’s always the same response, I don’t get how you can do that with another man. Doing anything sexual just feels so gross and wrong. I don’t think that I am magically turning gay. I don’t think my orientation is changing or hasn’t been explored. I simply find that stuff gross. I have never had anything wrong with gay people and I am a true believer that people have choices they can make with free will so it’s not that I’m homophobic, just keep that stuff away from me lol. Saying so, I don’t get why I am getting these thoughts. These images in my head, constant need of checking if I fall in the spectrum, constant checking whether I like someone of any gender, constant checking whether or not I am getting groinal responses. No matter what answer I get, my mind still wants an answer, an answer to the next question that it’ll create after answering the one before it. I have always liked girls and always been so proud of it, I am in a relationship right now with a beautiful girl I’ve had a crush on since 2nd grade. (I am 19) Whatever mental illness I have has ruined our relationship. Everything feels forced on my side, I don’t remember the joy I had before this but I have glimpse throughout the days of the things we’ve done together that makes me happy and look forward to life. I am constantly checking to see if my attraction is still there for her and the scary part is, when I am stuck in my head, I am not but, to alter that, when I get that freedom and feel like my normal self, I get a hyper amount of love for her and it feels so nice. These thoughts all began after me and my girlfriend had an argument, 5 months ago we got in an argument over her not giving me enough space. She always wanted to be a part of a plan with my male friends. I never minded her when it was just us two so it’s not that I hated being with her, it was just that I had no time to be independent. ( I also had no job and nothing going for myself. ) One odd day after spending so much time stuck in the house due to weather, I had random thought on whether or not I truly loved her. We were only 4 months into the relationship so I didn’t have an answer and since it felt like I needed an answer, it became obsessive, I couldn’t stop checking. After hours with that thought, I started to wonder whether or not I was interested in other things like K I D S. This thought was an automatic no and I began to fight it. I wasn’t going to accept that, each day felt like a living hell. The questions would change each day, do I miss my ex, was my ex better, do I like my M O M, do I want to K I L L so and so, do I want to kill myself. One day I woke up and had it all in control, felt like magic, after I watched a video on ROCD and realized, oh, I am not the only one but, this is where my compulsions got even worse. I couldn’t stop checking the internet, seeing if I relate to others, watching more videos. I regret this everyday because this compulsion created so many new thoughts and questions for me to answer. About 2-3 weeks went by and a thought passed by that has been stuck with me since along with other thoughts. I thought back to what I did as kid and in the past. I remembered a traumatic event where my brother touched me (5yr old M) inappropriately. This made me question whether or not I liked it and I couldn’t find an answer, couple years (10yr old M) after that I unfortunately did the same to my cousin (8yr old M). I feel so much shame and guilt for it. My mind turned black and white, “Maybe this isn’t a do you like your girl or not but instead, maybe you just like boys I mean, you obviously never asked yourself if you like what you did so”. This question was terrifying for me because it meant that I could no longer love my girl, my whole life till now has been a lie. So I began to question everything in my past up to date to find an answer. No matter what answer I fed my mind, it would not be satisfied and simply create more questions. It felt like my mind was forcing me to be gay, whether or not I liked it. 4 months has passed and the questions have just gotten worse, something I was initially so afraid of. I am in constant fight or flight mode, I am always anxious and I can’t feel nothing. I get times of relief when I am reminded of my past, when my gf turns me on, or when I find an answer to question my mind conjured up. I started to go to church but it’s always been a struggle for me to believe. I can’t go to the gym anymore because everywhere I look I am questioning myself. My porn addiction has went away but mostly because I can’t find anything attractive anymore. I can only find comfort and discomfort. Something that was once so easy for me would 1 day be nonexistent and hard to live without. I don’t know what the truth is anymore. My life feels like a made-up lie. Though I have always loved women, fantasized about them, get extremely nervous around them, pray for them, romanticize them, etc. I now have no idea what it feels like to be in love, interested, or even happy for a woman. My attraction hasn’t vanished completely, I still can look a girl and be stunned, l simply just can’t destroy the feeling it gives me. I get so anxious and begin to question everything about the women, the feeling, myself. I am having a crisis.
- Date posted
- 13w
As I’ve posted before, my friends has developed TOUGH hocd and has hit rock bottom :// She told me to ask y’all here if any of you have had a similar experience NOT reassurance (she doesn’t have NOCD). “Hi NOCD community. When I was like 5 I had this distant female cousin whom I played with and grew up. She had super short hair like a boy, but we low key had same interests in toys/tv series etc. and then at THAT age I got a very weird though which said: do you like her? And I remember getting a lot of anxiety and my stomach hurting cause why tf would I have that kind of thought about my female cousin? I remember ruminating about it the whole day, and the next day that thought disappeared and I never had that thought again. We grew up and obviously she’s my family like my sister. But now that I have HOCD, I keep thinking about that memory and I have so much anxiety about it and cry often about it. While growing up I’ve only had crushes on tons of boys at school etc. has anyone had a similar experience?” Thanks for reading if u did! We need support 😭🙏🏻
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