- Date posted
- 4y ago
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Sounds like you already know that the frequency and intensity of the guilt you're experiencing is inappropriate for the situation. Although our minds don't necessarily acclimatise to guilt the way they do to anxiety, guilt can be made stronger by resisting and arguing with it instead of allowing it to happen. Emotions don't always make sense but they do need to be felt so that they can stop popping up or controlling your life or state of mind. I wonder if you have a day totally free soon where you could focus on letting your guilt happen fully without arguing with it, reassuring yourself or ruminating about the situation or the past or the future or asking yourself or others for reassurance or looking for it. Just feeling the guilt. You can focus on the sensations of it in your body if you need something to focus on to prevent being all up in your brain. A whole day will probably be long enough to feel the guilt through until it's gone without compulsions. If you catch yourself doing a compulsion, try to come back to the body. You can survive the physiological sensations of guilt without doing any thinking about whether it's accurate, inaccurate, right, wrong, or means anything else. This should help your problem. I have had serious issues with doing my own compulsions and avoidance to stave off guilt as it's a very uncomfortable and worrying emotion, as well as getting so drawn into the debate with it that I begin to question myself much more severely. More rumination and analysing and memory checking only equals more opportunities for things to pop up which make you feel even worse or take you into worse self-doubt. In future when you feel inappropriate or overwhelming guilt, your responses should either be feeling it through as described, or doing the "worry later" method if you can't face feeling it, in order to avoid doing compulsions at all costs, including venting/confessing to others with more posts or asking friends to attempt to validate that the meanings attached to your guilt aren't true, as reassurance. Feel the guilt first. We're here to support you in that. Later comes the insight, and the beers and rants with the boys if you like.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
I have very similar feelings my ocd is mostly due to guilt about things I did when I was drunk. And I also have feelings of not deserving to be happy which is miserable. I’m trying to accept and embrace uncertainty like I always want concrete answers if I’m a good person or not but it’s not that cut and dry and I have to live with that uncertainty so it will lessen the anxiety
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Totally man! Like it’s so frustrating like I know I’m a good person. But it’s like because one person has said something ocd will latch on to it and fuck with you like I guarantee if you were to tell me the silly things you’ve done when you’ve been drunk - I would say oh don’t be silly that doesn’t make you a bad person at all! And vice verca!
- Date posted
- 4y ago
What? Man you were drunk! People say dumb things when they’re drunk all the time. If what you said hurt her really bad, why would she stay with you for another year? She’s just trying to find an excuse to justify why she was breaking up with you. You apologized, that’s what is most important. It’s on her for holding onto that memory. She needs to forget and forgive, not you. I hope everything goes fine with the girl you’re interested now:)
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Thanks for your reply man! The thing is so much happened too when we were sober about her attitude towards the relationship she was disrespectful undermining and made me feel like shit a lot of the time. It took the break up for me to realise this. But because when I’ve drank a bit too much and said a few things nothing awful though she’s used this against me in the break up which has made me feel like shit and that I don’t deserve anyone else. And now that I’m moving on I feel like my ocd is trying to hold me back.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 23w ago
I’ve said and done so many hurtful things growing up, especially in elementary and middle school. I was very passive aggressive and mean for a majority of my life, and I’ve hurt peoples feelings. I’m no longer like that now, but every single thing I’ve ever done wrong replays in my head constantly, from the moment I wake up to the second I go to sleep. I know I deserve to feel the chronic guilt and shame, so I feel even more guilty pitying myself. It’s eating me alive, I’m so scared. I know people must hate me, and they have every right to. feel like I don’t deserve to have moments of happiness because I’ve taken that ability away from someone before. I’m not diagnosed, but this has been going on for years and I’m scared to talk to anyone about it because I fear they would look at me differently knowing I’ve hurt someone’s feelings. I feel like a monster. It’s ruining my life and I don’t know what to do.
- Date posted
- 9w ago
Hi, I'm 17,about to be 18. I've been struggling with these thoughts for the past 8 months. I was wondering if someone experienced ever the same because I feel im "different". BACKGROUND: (I'm not diagnosed with Ocd but seeing a local counselor) About 9 months ago I cheated on my boyfriend with this guy S (who blackmailed, manipulated and molested me). Since then when I realized that what i did was very WRONG and so I started ruminating picking apart every single interaction and telling my boyfriend, i tried to remember every single detail because otherwise I felt like i was being a fraud and hiding things to save myself, i had many crisis about it because I had also what i think was false memory ocd. My boyfriend forgave me idk how tbh I still wonder. CURRENT STRUGGLE: Months ago I was sure I didn't wanna S in any way and i was sure even when everything happened. For the past 2 months tho I've been having thoughts like " Do I love S?" "I love S" "S is hot" "Would S find me hot?" "What if I want S?" " What if I don't love my boyfriend enough?" "What if I secretly want S?" "What if I see my boyfriend as a friend only?Do I?" And I tried testing my reaction to intimate scenarios with S, I'm scared I like it i dont really wanna love S or have any secret attraction, I wish I didn't have any of this and I want to be sure of my feelings for my boyfriend because I know I wanna be with him and I see a future with him like he brings me comfort. But a part of me keeps trying to convince me otherwise. Sometimes I think I'd rather die than have these thoughts. Im so scared of not being able to control my feelings, im scared I can't resist S and its giving me anxiety and making me cry. Sometimes when i think of those sexual scenarios with S or I get those thoughts my mind tells me to smile because i like it because I find it funny. It makes me doubt myself all over again. Like I'm always like I need to test if I'd feel aroused to intimate scenarios with S, lately im trying to fight this urge to test and test but my mind is like "just do it this once so you can be sure. I can never watch anything romantic or sexual or whatever because my mind would be like "you and S" or sometimes I'm just enjoying time with my bf and im like " yes we can just have a sneaky cheating thing thats ok" and it makes me want to figure it out to find an answer a solution because idk it just does like I need to find the meaning of it if it means the truth and all. Im worried im just an awful person and these thoughts just ruin my quality of life . Today i had a crisis where i ended up doinf swlf harm, I'm so scared of finding someone that's not my boyfriend desirable or sexual appealing or whatever it is, I also have bodily reactions when I try to imagine and test my reaction to scenarios. Now i keep groing everytime and I dont know why but i have this sensation and I dont want to havebit especially when its something S related. Does someone experience the same thoughts? Am I alone in this? Is this ROCD? What should i do?
- Date posted
- 6w ago
Hey everyone, First time posting here! Wanted to share my story for some support but also to hopefully make others feel less alone. In short - my ROCD has made such a mess of my personal life. I was in a great relationship until spring of last year, at which point we separated mainly due to my ROCD. I struggled heavily with OCD about 10 years ago (harm based intrusive thoughts, sexual orientation ocd, etc). It took a lot of work but I was able to mostly overcome my struggles and truthfully, hadn’t given ocd much thought since then. I thought I was cured. And then 10 years later I am in a very fulfilling relationship with a girl I really love, but at about the year mark in my relationship things really changed. She wanted to have a conversation about next steps (moving in, marriage, kids, etc) and at that point my brain just went into panic mode and the ocd took over. From that point on, I was constantly scanning for red flags, felt very reserved when it came to any sort of statement or commitment and tended to avoid anything that would indicate I was committed to a long term future. It was not that I didn’t love it was just that my ocd was doing anything to keep me from making a big commitment. It eventually got a point where we had a big conversation about breaking up or staying together and my OCD convinced me that it was safer and that I would do less harm to her if we ended things, which was incredibly devastating to me. At the time I felt like my obsessing over small red flags were normal and that I needed to protect myself. I just had no clue it was ROCD. I spent the next 8 months missing her and kicking myself for my mistakes, and I eventually got the courage to reach out and see if she’d be willing to talk again, which she was. But the problem is, at this point I still didn’t know it was ocd. So when we talked again I was still plagued by ROCD as all the same thoughts and feelings came flooding back. We tried to talk through things but once again I was unable to make any sort of commitment to the future so it went nowhere. Once again, I am feeling very sad and angry at myself for not being able to handle ROCD. I feel like I let it control me twice and has robbed me of a lot of happiness and hurt someone I care very much about. I understand it’s probably not best to just look at ourselves with anger and guilt all the time but it’s hard not to when you feel like you just caused so much harm. Anyone feel like they can relate? Or if anyone is going through something similar I am happy to chat as ROCD can really be tricky. Thanks
Be a part of the largest OCD Community
Share your thoughts so the Community can respond