I think I’m starting to realize that I didn’t handle my grandpa’s death right. He died back in March and it was obviously very traumatic for all of us. We weren’t even with him when he died since he lived in Ecuador and we are in the US. The last time I saw him was in September 2019. I remember when we left us at the airport he was the first first one to start crying that we were leaving. He was such a sweet and tender man. His death also greatly affected my OCD in that it solidified and intensified my existential OCD. Anyways we’re going back to Ecuador next month to spend Christmas with that side of the family and it’s going to be the first time with him not around. He also died in the house we’ll be staying at so I’m already feeling that it’s going to be a very emotional trip to step into that house and be there with him not there. It’s just making me realize I didn’t process his loss right or hid the pain away or something. I didn’t think it would bother me so much now but its hitting some raw and painful emotions tonight, like I want to cry. I saw that my church was offering a grief counseling seminar this Saturday and I was interested in going, maybe it could help. I don’t know if I’m being overalls dramatic or not but it’s hitting me. Just wanted to share and maybe someone has words of advice. Thanks

Hi there I talk about religion (but I'm not trying to force it down anyone's throat) So my main event (which is the one that truly bothers me) happened in 2015 when I was 14. I won't go into any details or anything. I will say that it got so bad once that I almost committed something detrimental to my health earlier this year. Not long after that I spoke to a doctor and basically confessed what's been happening to my brain and my mistakes, he mentioned things that really resonated with me, I'll paraphrase a bit: "Okay, so what you did was not good but it's not something to condemn yourself for. It falls into the grey area, you've apologized and have been forgiven (even though I apologized over text, which comes across cowardly)but it seems that you haven't forgiven yourself. There's a whole lot of difference between you at 14 and you at 23. Try to have some perspective." This really helped and it still does, but unfortunately ocd tries to find a way around this. I'll get a thought of "oh but you forgot to mention that other part of the event" and it magnifies it. Can anyone relate? I've done everything but fully move on because I sometimes feel like I don't deserve to move on. And I'm still worried over the future.

This is my first post and I wanted to post because my ocd feels like something that will always control my life and nobody truly understands because no one in my life experiences this. I’m hoping to maybe find a community who can relate. I’ve always had an intense fear of death. The fear is of my own death and my loved ones. I’ve had 2 debilitating episodes of this and the most recent episode being a month ago. The first one lasted about 3 months of constant intrusive thoughts about death and the meaning of life. I also feel as if I’m not real and the world around me isn’t real. It’s almost like I’m completely gone and I can think of nothing else. I would sleep to escape it. Nothing has purpose or meaning. I even question happiness of others. I question why anyone would be happy if they’re gonna die eventually and why aren’t they thinking about it?? I know it’s ridiculous when I come out of it. But to be honest the thoughts never fully go away. They pop up every once in awhile when I’m in a good state with my ocd, and almost everyday when I’m in a bad state. The severe episodes I’ve noticed have happened when I’m in a period of high stress in life. For example I’m moving in with my boyfriend next week. All that my therapist has told me is to work on my grounding techniques but it’s hard to explain to anyone who’s not experienced it that grounding doesn’t help when I’m in that headspace. It seems like when I get there I just have to wait it out and eventually it’ll pass but not fully. Does anyone have anything that’s helped them?

I have posted here before and barely got advice so let’s try this again. It’s been a long week of doubts fears and obsessions. I already know that it could be worse so I’m staying hopeful. But anyway for the past two weeks I’ve been wanting to attend this concert. The artist is know for his hopeful bubbly music. I wanted to go because his music makes me happy yk. For background the past few times I went to concerts I used them as distractions that I hope would help me overcome SOOCD which eventually led me to idolizing them. Overtime I realized that concerts weren’t going to cure me so I started to rely on God talk to the people around me and go through therapy Fast forward to now I’ve been wanting to attend this concert but had obsessions about if was wrong or not. Then I started to obsess over that fact that it secular and that I’m sinning because i should only listen to gospel and nothing else. To help me overcome I bought it anyways. Right after I bought it I felt a split second of peace before regret took over. I felt that it was sinful to be excited about going or about picking out my outfit and so one. I tried to overcome by listening to the set list and during that time I heard that artists say “can we do that s**t and started to panic I went down this rabbit hole of how I shouldn’t go and how God wouldn’t want me to be there about how cursing is against God and if I were to go I would be inviting sin into my life. I felt that I could no longer go even though my intentions were to have fun and enjoy my life mind you this was planned for my birthday. I find myself in this loop stuck. I’ve had this happen before but have never felt this sad and overwhelmed by it. It just feels like u can’t do anything that every thing i do is against God to the point where I can’t even enjoy a moment of peace. I even prayed and invited God into the experience. I still feel like this is all sinful and searching things up on the web doesn’t help but just cause me to doubt and obsess 10x more. I’m actively looking for a new therapist I’ve been out of therapy for the past few months and maybe I just need that extra help 🤷‍♀️any advice