How to tell the difference between normal relationship doubts and ROCD? Im going on a rant now: I have avoided relationships for the most part over the last 10 years. as soon as I get past the 2nd or 3rd date I feel like if I dont know that they have the potential to be “the one” then I worry constantly about wasting my life and theirs. I had 2 relationships that lasted about 3 months but the whole time, I just wanted to get out even though they were both good guys. In November, I had my first panic attack and soon discovered what I was dealing with (and still managing it) is SO-OCD. Then I learned of ROCD and wondered if that is something I have struggled with since my teens. As soon as I get into a relationship I have these strong urges to break it off for minor stupid things. Things that honestly make no sense. Like a weird freckle or chin (real examples). Not to mention I am afraid of getting intimate because Im super paranoid of getting pregnant... I started talking to a guy during quarantine and it’s slowly turning into more than friends. I really like him and enjoy spending time with him but I am constantly worried. Being aware of ROCD has helped me be mindful of the present but all my old habits are trying to come back full force and I find myself trying to avoid him. Ive read as much as I can find on ROCD and I can check off almost all the obessions and compulsions that are associated with ROCD. But it doesnt affect me the same way SO-OCD did. Like I felt like I couldnt breathe, and I could barely be in public. I wanted to escape so bad all the time. With this ROCD (if thats what it really is) I dont feel that panic, I just feel worried, stuck, and distracted. Not to mention, if I can manage to stay mindful, how on earth do you even tell someone you just started seeing that you have ocd, let alone so-ocd and rocd. It just adds to me wanting to avoid him. Also, how do you go from being dateless and single for 2 years to starting a relationship in the middle of a quarantine while you’re learning that you have OCD.

This is so long ah I’m so sorry. I’m really just trying to get all my thoughts out/ see if anyone feels similarly/ and what they’ve found helps. I’ve never been diagnosed with OCD, but I’ve looked into it a lot and feel that I might have ROCD. (I was once diagnosed with anxiety, but didn’t keep up with therapy because my parents weren’t keen on it.) Now I really want to invest in it to get a formal diagnoses/help, and I’m going to start looking into that. I’m scared that this isn’t ROCD, and I’m truly just in the wrong relationship, or not actually in love with my partner. But then sometimes I’m certain it is? We’ve been together for a year and a couple of months, and it has been wonderful. She makes me feel so loved and so understood. She is my best friend. But this summer when we were on break from school I started getting major doubts once I’d found out about ROCD and some of my thoughts lined up with it’s description. I’d already started to have doubts before the summer. She is the first person I‘ve slept with, and it took a while for me to have an orgasm, and that made me freak out and start to question my attraction towards her/our compatibility. Every time we’d have sex I’d worry over this. (Though I also think it has to do with me not knowing what I wanted/what I liked in bed) Our sex life got better but I still had obsessive thoughts. I have them daily - “what if I don’t love her” or “what if this isn’t the right relationship” or “should I be dating someone else” When I’m with her I’m constantly checking. If we kiss, I’ll analyze how it feels (or how it doesn’t) and the same thing goes for when she compliments me or says she loves me. I’ll say I love her but something in my brain will say “but do you really?” Honestly, I’ve gotten to the point where when I think of her or am with her it makes me so anxious. I literally feel it in my stomach and chest. It’s so hard to deal with. I can’t make it stop. I think part of it is that I’m anxious that I’ll feel anxious/start to have obsessive thoughts, so I get anxious? I just want to be able to think of her and be around her and not feel so scared and anxious and always checking. I feel like my anxiety isn’t letting me truly experience my relationship.

I believe I (currently) am experiencing ROCD. Growing up as a child, I was always double checking the door was locked, wouldn’t walk on cracks, had to count to step. I eventually grew out of it. But I feel it has grown into ROCD. I currently have a year long relationship with a person I love and has treated me very well. I have plans to move in with him and I went job seeking at his house (we are long distance) last weekend. I had anxiety the entire time. I kept telling myself, I’m scared, what if this doesn’t work, what if this is telling me to break free of the relationship, what if I’m not attracted to him, and I was avoidant because I was so scared to feel the anxiety around/with him and question it all again. Once the anxiety would settle I would cry to him about it and tell him I’m just scared and everything is caving in. But is this normal in ROCD? I found myself googling everything the weeks leading up to me going. I once told him to give me space (he is very affectionate and I am not) and very selfless when it comes to calls/texts. PLUS - long distance adds to that. With everything, I started googling it all nonstop for days and feared we aren’t meant for each other. Now when he calls I feel anxious because I don’t want to feel that “trapped” feeling of not having space again and I googled how to find common and reasonable communication with long distance. UGH just everything is scaring me and I fear my obsessiveness over it is making it worse.

hi so i am pretty new to discovering ocd and trying to figure out why i am feeling the way i am feeling. i’ve never been diagnosed with ocd and honestly thought my anxiety was just super bad until it started affecting the way i saw my relationship. i’ve never had this bad of anxiety in my relationship and around november of last year is whenever i started noticing the cycle of repeated thoughts of “should i break up with him?” ive been with my boyfriend for almost two years. yes we’ve been through our ups and downs and our relationship has overall been such a beautiful relationship (super healthy compared to old ones) we love each other deeply and communicate and just overall find ways to help improve our relationship healthier and i’ve had a doubt here and there throughout these years but since last November i started feeling disconnected with him a little. i started to question sometimes if i really loved him. other times i told myself and asked myself if i should break up with him. if we really loved each other. i started focusing on his features a lot more. to the point where these thoughts around him made me feel so extremely uncomfortable. i’ve done all my research trying to figure out if I love him or not and trying to find reassurance and other people stories to see if they feel the same way I would also see how I feel whenever I was around him and it got to a point where I overall just felt very disconnected with him and a lot of different forms. I sometimes will forget about these thoughts and I will go out through my week throughout my days and I won’t even think about them and then something good will happen actually and it will trigger that immediate thought or sometimes we’re not even doing anything we’re just hanging out and being together and that will trigger the thought of wanting to break up with him and it makes me extremely uncomfortable and it makes me panic gives me anxiety and it just stresses me out because I know it’s not true, but my brain has tried to fully convince myself it is. I was doing really good and I figured out how healthy I wanted this relationship to be recently and because we’ve been so stressed on talking about our relationship and moving on even further and growing together, it started coming back and now I’m very very anxious again. I also have this type of anxiety of obsessing over things such as my health. When it comes to my gut health to my skin I have a very bad habit of having perfectionism not only within, my body face and everything around what is myself. I have a lot of anxieties, and I always thought it was just very severe anxiety until when I was researching why I was doubting my love for my boyfriend I heard of ROCD and I was super curious to know if I even have OCD, I brought it up with my psychiatrist and she doesn’t think that I have any. I have so much anxiety over this I feel like it’s physically and mentally controlling my body from how much it’s overwhelming me. I don’t know what to do. I keep convincing myself it’s not even RCOD and maybe I truly don’t love him but I have no other proof or feelings that that could be true. It’s just a thought that circles in my head and no matter how many reassurance I give myself it will come back within an hour, if someone could please give some advice I will have my own therapy session here soon and I’m very excited to know how I can overcome this