I got the intrusive thought "What if you unknowingly ran into your kitchen, pumped soap in your hands & rubbed it on your TV". My compulsions now are trying to figure out if I did that, looking for potential soap rubbed on the TV. How would you apply ERP to this scenerio? I'm confused about how it works to break the cycle.

One problem - Various themes This is my first post. I had a relapse a few months ago. Life was amazing and then boom, I got triggered by something and started spiralling about my sexuality (having finally been at peace for two years, entered a healthy new relationship and come out of the closet as an older women). How do you, when you're not triggered practice ERP? I'm able to try and accept the thoughts every time I see a man. What should I be doing when I don't encounter these triggers. I was to say as well that I also am starting to get real event OCD about some of the sexual things I did in the past when I was married and in an unhealthy toxic relationship with my ex husband. I am shamed and disgusted and I'm working on it but there's a certain subsection of the LGBTQ community that trigger these thoughts, groinals and thing for me... I feel like I'm beginning to realise I need to maybe be a little more active in my recovery instead of waiting for triggers... But I don't know how

So I've been working to address my OCD for about a month now. So far, I haven't been working on it with a therapist and have instead been trying to create my own exposure exercises. The primary obsession I'm working on is the fear that I'm somehow flawed or invalid on a fundamental level. The best way I can describe it it is that its similar to the feeling you get when you have germ OCD and you feel contaminated, except my whole existence and being feels contaminated, so to speak. I've identified a list of triggers, and a list of compulsions (pretty much all mental) that I've noticed myself performing. I started out by doing imaginal exposures and scripts where I'd write out triggering fictional scenarios and read them over and over, combined with mindfulness techniques to focus on my breath and bring myself back to the present when I noticed myself performing compulsions mentally. At first it worked to some extent, but eventually I started to feel like the stories I was writing about this obsession weren't triggering any anxiety anymore or a very low level. So I stopped reading them and focused solely on improving my ability to stay present and identifying compulsions as I perform them, and disengaging. Now, I'm at the point where it seems like my general anxiety levels throughout the day are lower, and the triggers I've identified are producing noticeably less anxiety. But that makes me wonder if somehow I'm just secretly doing mental compulsions without knowing it? Is only a month of rather disorganized and unstructured ERP enough to produce this much improvement? To avoid giving me re-assurance, I'd appreciate if you guys don't directly answer those questions, maybe just provide some possibilities or your own experiences so I can get a better idea of where I'm at. Any info would be appreciated. Thanks!

I've got a smart watch that tracks my sleep. It gives data like heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), respiratory rate, sleep cycles, restfullness, etc etc etc. Well, since the health OCD has gotten to its peak, I am noticing a false patterning coming from it. For context; I was sick 2 times in recent memory where sleeping heart rate and HRV became metrics that I could use to sort of track the illness. In the days leading up to it, I'd notice my heart rate going up and HRV going down (higher hrv is better.) Then when I was fully sick, my HRV would be up to 15ms less than normal. So now, when I look over my sleep data (because I like to look at data like that, it is interesting to me) and notice my HRV is lower than normal, it triggers intrusive thoughts of "am i getting sick again?" despite no other symptoms. Ruminating begins as I try to "figure out" the cause, despite knowing that stress can lower sleeping HRV. My question is; is it a compulsion to be looking at my sleep data? Should I avoid it altogether? Or is this exactly what ERP is; exposing myself to a triggering event and preventing the response? I look at the data either way and it is only alarming when I see something out of the ordinary. So, do I stop tracking my sleep, or is this a good small step for ERP?