- Date posted
- 5y
- Date posted
- 5y
Set up a really calm environment. When I was finishing school I was really overworked with A levels and EPQ, and my perfectionism OCD was out of control. I would never hit my deadlines because I was working so hard to write and rewrite my essays and even if I got say 96% it didn’t matter. The thing I found useful was setting up a calm environment, for me that was a clean space, with low light and quiet. I’d play classical or ambience music without any lyrics because it made me focus. Then the task I set myself was just write the whole thing in one go, pushing through the OCD and taking deep breaths when I felt really anxious. Then once I had the general essay I would go back and work through my essay paragraph by paragraph correcting or improving what I had written. Then I would take half an hour to an hour to just breathe and relax, to try and bring down my anxiety. Not sure if this helps, but hope it does! x
- Date posted
- 5y
As a former college student (quite a few years ago) who experienced the same thing, I recommend placing a limit to the number of times you permit yourself to rewrite/revise the paper. You will never break this compulsion unless you take the risk that there might be a few spelling errors, "better" word choices than what was used, perfect formatting, etc. Then, accept the uncertainty of not knowing what the overall impact will be on your paper's grade. That is how I learned to manage it. All the best!
- Date posted
- 5y
You hit so close to home :)
- Date posted
- 5y
Hey! I have a similar problem with my schoolwork. I want everything to be perfect and so I check and check and check, and I never end up changing anything. Try setting a timer and stopping when it hits 0. You trick your brain into thinking you don't have time to rewrite, rethink, and restart.
- Date posted
- 5y
I get so worked up that now the hardest thing is even just starting. What sometimes helps is knowing my/my OCD’s level of “perfection” is no where near other people’s. So we don’t have to do as much as we think we do a lot of the time. It is so much better to hand something that’s not perfect in than nothing at all. (I have to use that as a mantra after having so many incompletes that turned into Fs.). Another trick I’ve learned from my artwork. Sometimes it will never feel “done”, but at a point, reworking it makes it worse. Then I stop and call it “finished (for now)”. (The “for now” is just when you need that. It’s so much better to just feel “finished” even if it doesn’t “feel done”, but sometimes I have to pretend in order to trick my ocd.) Hope that makes some sense. Best wishes your way. And when you do turn it in, then my pup sends you puppy magic. (Once I handed something in and had no more control over it, my partner, my mother, and I would joke about it being left up to the universe and the magic of all doggos. 😉😁). Puppy snuggles if you like them. We’re rooting for you!
Related posts
- Date posted
- 21w
I had avoided a lot with school specifically, but I did do it in other areas of life as well. School for some reason has been the biggest trigger that sends me into avoidance and it has been for the longest time. Does anybody relate? If so, what did you do to help besides therapy? In high school I used to sit in the bathroom stalls for hours so I could avoid going to classes. I was struggling to keep up because my OCD makes me perfect my school work so much so to the point where I’d never turn it in because I’d never be satisfied with what I’d produce. I’d get so incredibly frustrated with myself and the fact that I could never meet my own standards, never mind the rubrics given. I took ages analyzing all my writing, all my answers, all my google slides and I burnt myself out. So I stopped trying. I stopped turning in work because I’d never be satisfied. I’d cry because I felt I wasn’t good enough. Then I’d be missing assignments, getting them done but not submitting them because I was too ashamed. So, I avoided classes because I’d be in trouble or be called out for not getting anything done. Unfortunately this habit bled into my first year of college last year, and OCD coupled up with depression, made going to the dining hall and attending classes even worse. So I avoided it all together. It’s so hard being a freshman in college, so so hard. I unfortunately failed out of that school but I tried to medically withdraw either semester. No, I wasn’t partying, or drinking or smoking or hanging with the wrong people. I was a college freshman struggling with ocd and depression. I’m trying to not make excuses for myself either because I’m well aware this is my fault and I’m trying to reverse it now at community college. Right now I’m trying to get those Fs turned into Ws from my old school so I can fix my gpa. I want to transfer, I want to be a forensic psychologist, I want to be independent, I want to be ok. It’s gonna take me so long to transfer from community college but that’s on me. I’m willing to put in the work. I’m so embarassed, please help me.
- Date posted
- 19w
I’ve been stuck in this cycle for the last month or two and am not sure how to get out of it. Basically, I will work on ignoring the thoughts and not responding or engaging plus limiting/completely eliminating compulsions. After a week or two of constant work, the amount of intrusive thoughts in a day goes down. The anxiety each thought causes also goes down with some, but not all, thoughts passing without notice like they would for a normal person. The thoughts that do stick cause anxiety and make me want to ruminate or do other compulsions but I make sure to limit them. After a bit, I’m in a pretty good head space. This is usually when it goes down hill. I’ll start to question if I even have ocd because some of the thoughts (once again not all) pass without notice. The difficulty resisting compulsions goes down and so does the anxiety, only increasing the questioning. I spend a while questioning if I’ve ever had ocd in the first place and then something sets me off or the questioning itself becomes a trigger and I get stuck back into the same ocd cycle with constant rumination, anxiety, and other compulsions. This lasts for a week or two before I know I need to stop and try and work hard to get back to ignoring the thoughts. And the cycle just restarts over and over again. Does anyone have any tips to stop this from happening? It’s really harming my recovery as every few weeks I dive back into the same negative place I was.
- Date posted
- 17w
For a while now, I've been having trouble concentrating... especially when studying... so I'd play the sound of rain or a forest or something similar to distract myself, and when I'd finish and turn it off... a pile of thoughts would come back to me as if they'd piled up on me!!! Anxiety, rituals... what should I do?
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