Hi! I feel like I have no one close to me that is around my age that has ocd!! So I just wanted to know some more people who have ocd! I’m Kay from the US! I’m 18 and am going to college and just applied for honors! I am getting a degree to teach kindergarten and also am wanting to get a second degree, either to become a math professor or a dermatologist one day! I have had different types of ocd but for the past few months, it has been scrupulously, and I have been fully diagnosed and am using lexapro, and want to start therapy after everything is safe to do again!! Comment and let me know some stuff about you!

Hi everyone! It’s been a while! For anyone that doesn’t know me, I’m Daisy :) I’ve been a part of this forum since it first opened and boy has it come far! I’m 18 and live in Australia ?? I’m currently 8 weeks into an inpatient hospital stay due to the severity of my OCD. So believe me when I say, I’m very, very familiar with OCD and how truly horrendous it can be to live with. I just wanted to let others know that I’m here to listen if they need someone to vent to. Sometimes it’s hard to open up as an obsessive-compulsive because our thoughts are so terrifyingly intrusive. Our friends and family, although supportive, can be unfamiliar with the mechanisms of these horrific thoughts and how to approach them. Feel free to ask me anything! I’ve taken dozens of medications, seen many specialist and engaged in multiple different therapies. If anyone’s interested in life as an inpatient, I’m more than happy to answer some questions ? Hope you’re all wonderful ? d a i s y

Hello new friends! My name is Graham and I just got diagnosed with OCD in December. I’m 21 years old and a music student at a prestigious conservatory in New York City. This is my OCD story. I have had OCD like symptoms since a very young age, for example, at age 3 I thought I would die if I left the house without a bottle of water, and refused to do so for almost 7 years, and I had countless sensory issues with food and clothing. However, around age 12, the thoughts began to become increasingly horrible. Violent intrusive images, urges to yell obscenities at people, overall intense fear of hurting other people emotionally or physically occupied my brain for hours a day. Additionally, I began to have intense contamination fears - obsessive hand washing, (although not nearly as bad as many people’s) having to carry hand sanitizer everywhere I went, and even worse, as I began to grow body hair, that was as “unclean” as it could get to me. I *had* to rid my body of it. These thoughts then began to plague my performances as well - I would obsessively worry about a certain thing, and it would ruin the whole experience for me, no matter how well I pulled through. As I also was trying to come to terms with my sexuality, (I’m gay) my brain produced tons of sexual intrusive images of both men and women, leaving me lost and confused as to what I actually was. I did not dare search what my thoughts meant. I thought for sure doing so would lead me to be put on a FBI watch list, inform me I was clinically insane, or something along those lines. One day in late October, I was on my commute home from school. This commute is an hour each way on crowded public transportation - between contamination and harm OCD, you can imagine how this experience goes for me every day. For 30 minutes, my brain thought of everything horrible I could do to the person next to me. Strangle them, stab them, rape them, call them racial slurs, rip their hair out. It was so overwhelming that by the time they walked off the train I thought I was going to faint from the panic I felt. I decided enough was enough and googled what I was feeling, which lead me to discover this subset of pure O OCD, which I knew nothing about. A friend of mine was diagnosed when we were 15, and I assumed it just meant obsessive without compulsive, and didn’t look into it whatsoever. I began to see a counselor at my school, and he sent me to the psychiatrist through the school who diagnosed me with OCD. Almost immediately after my diagnosis, my grandfather fell ill. I couldn’t bear to tell my parents while we were dealing with that. He ended up passing away a little less than a month later. This has been so beyond hard on my entire family. It’s been a little over a month now, and as more things have gone wrong for my mom - her company being hacked, getting in a car wreck (she’s totally fine other than whiplash) - I haven’t been able to bring myself to discuss with them. I feel as though I will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. But I know I need to tell them. Hopefully it will happen as soon as possible...but it’s plaguing my mind a lot. If anyone can offer words of advice on what to do, I would appreciate it greatly. Thanks for reading. That’s my story. I hope to meet more wonderful humans who understand what I go through - have a wonderful day all! :)

Hi everyone! I am a University student with moderate OCD. I was wondering if anyone else on this app is also a college student? If so, how has OCD been impacting you during the pandemic? I would love to discuss with anyone who is willing how COVID has impacted you and what tricks you’ve found for coping. I’ve had a bit more trouble with my OCD than normal.