- Date posted
- 4y
- Date posted
- 4y
I understand i was on benzos when I needed them. I stop taking them and allowed the exposures to things I fear help me. The brain eventually gets accustomed to the thoughts from exposure exercises and doesn't see it has a threat. It does take time but it is possible. Keep pressing forward man you got this. There are some good books on harm ocd as I have this theme too.
- Date posted
- 4y
I’m so sorry you’re struggling right now. I used to take benzos too and tapering off was very difficult. If you’re still tapering down, that’s probably a big source of the issue. Each decrease feels like hell. And that may be why your ssri feels like it isn’t helping much. You may want to consider trying a different ssri. Especially if you haven’t found it particularly helpful in general. Also: are you seeing an ocd specialist? While meds can sort of “take the edge off,” the best real treatment is CBT with erp by an ocd specialist. Learning to stop neutralizing your thoughts (which is a compulsion) and practicing managing your fear through erp could help lessen the thoughts and your anxiety overall. You may also want to add a daily mindfulness practice into the works. It can help you stay present and learn to let the thoughts pass by without getting caught up in them.
- Date posted
- 4y
I see a normal psychiatrist. I have seen them for many years and I know alot of the general techniques that your talking about. Most of the time I do fairly well. But about fall time every year I normally hit a bad patch where I have to work much harder to deal with the symptoms. It seems to follow the changing of the seasons. My psyc seems to think I may have some S.A.D going on as well. I started on 15 myself of diazepam 2 years ago and I'm down to 1/4 of a 2 mg tablet 3 times a day. So 1 1/2 mg a day. Not much at all. I know this will pass. Im just tired after all these years of dealing with it.
- Date posted
- 4y
My ocd always seems to get worse with season changes to. Could be SAD. Also could just be our general tendency to struggle with change 🤷♀️ Since you know right now will be more difficult, don’t try to just white knuckle it through. Give yourself some slack. If there’s a commitment or two you can drop, drop them. If you’ve been eating shitty and not keeping up a good sleep schedule, fix that. If you have some big life changes or choices to deal with soon, what about postponing until you’re back into the rhythm of things again. Giving yourself permission to be a little less okay for awhile may be all you need. Beating yourself up doesn’t help anything. And everyone, with it without ocd, needs a break sometimes.
- Date posted
- 4y
Mg not myself lol!
- Date posted
- 4y
The hardest thing for me. Is my family has never understood. I hate the term "I'm a little OCD". People have no clue what real OCD is.
- Date posted
- 4y
I’ve seen some support groups that are for ocd sufferers and their families. You may want to try attending one or two with them so they can learn about ocd from someone who’s not you, ask questions, and see other families who are doing a good job at being supportive and understanding.
- Date posted
- 4y
Getting my stubborn wife to go to something like that would be impossible. She already knows everything. You can't tell her anything, she thinks she knows whats up. She has never really got it!
- Date posted
- 4y
Maybe couples counseling would help you in that case. Sounds like some better communication is in order.
- Date posted
- 4y
Sorry to hear that man especially coming from your wife i know that has to be hard.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 16w
I’m new to treatment and only realized I have OCD a few months ago. I went through a tough and abusive marriage and ended up getting divorced. I had my first panic attack several years ago and ended up needing to go on Lexapro. This helped me significantly and allowed me to leave my partner. Several years later and I decided to stop Lexapro because I thought I was good to go. I’m in a very healthy relationship, have a great job, friends/family, go to the gym and have a wonderful life. It’s been about a year off the meds and I’ve had some panic, but I’ve been able to manage it. For some reason, the last three weeks has been really difficult for me. I have different spirals and different thought processes: what if I’m schizophrenic? What if I have a deeper mental disorder? What if I hurt someone? What if I need to leave my partner? What if I end up becoming so depressed that I end up hurting myself? My brain just goes from one what if to the next and once I conquer one, the next one pops up with even more intensity. I started taking NAC and inositol and I’m taking saffron during the day because I really don’t wanna go on back on medication but sometimes my thoughts scare me and I’m convinced that I’m not gonna get better and I know that’s just the OCD loop, but I’m wondering if this resonates with anyone else!
- Date posted
- 13w
I’ve recently been struggling a lot with OCD. I have had OCD for a long time I just didn’t realize it until more recently. About seven months ago I developed panic attacks one day randomly at work. I thought I was having a heart attack and went to the hospital where they told me it was just a panic attack and I assumed I would snap out and be better within a few days. However it didn’t. Here’s where it gets scary, I was staying at my then boyfriends house while dealing with blurry vision, anxiety attacks everyday, and more (unsure of what was going on). But at some point I saw my bfs (pew pew 🔫) on his table and it sent me into an anxiety attack after sudden thoughts that I was going to hurt myself with it. I begged him to put it away when I’m not looking so I didn’t know where he put it. He did. These thoughts lasted for about four days but began to go away. (I thought that was it and I would be back to normal). Unfortunately though I ended up moving back in with my family when we couldn’t get my panic attacks under control in time for me to get back to work and pay bills. However, coming home brought up a lot of trauma from when I was kid. My anxiety got worse but I didn’t have those thoughts again. About two and half months ago though, I got sick and went to the hospital where they gave me steroid pills and a steroid shot but sent me into some kind of psychiatric event. Ever since then though, I have been suffering from harm OCD, I have had moments of intense anger that I usually have to completely walk away and go on my own because of how intense they are, and it feels like it’s getting worse. Today I felt fine until about and hour and half ago where I started to dwell on the fact that my suicidal thought was influenced by my OCD and at the moment my OCD is at the worst it’s been. This caused me to get suddenly really depressed and I started crying thinking about how I can’t handle this. I then saw a post talking about how suicide rates are high for people with this form of OCD and it made me question if I am mentally strong enough to pull through this. I fear that at times I’m getting worse. I have good days but I have a lot of bad days. Unfortunately this sent me into such a bad panic attack I went over to my nanas crying about how I can’t deal with this. I took a 0.25 mg Xanax which helped calm down the panic attack portion of it but my brain is still uncomfortably active. I guess I just need hope. I’m so saddened by this. It’s like my life took a total 360 in 10 months and got even worse since the steroid shot. Idk what to do about it. I can’t stop the spiral. I talk to two different therapist weekly and start more next week, making it 5 times a week. I feel no improvements…
- Date posted
- 7w
I'm new to NOCD and have been dealing with harm/suicidal, and Pure OCD for some time now. It started off being healthy related anxiety that led to compulsion where I would research information on an uncommon illness or something I thought I had. Now it has snowballed into intrusive thoughts and images of me killing myself in various ways or my wife. The former is what has been the most debilitating and hardest to shake. Recently I seem to find triggers almost every where I look. "What if I killed myself this way" if I see a kitchen knife or a bottle of pills. A friend talked about going to a gun range a while back and an image popped up of me being there and turning a gun to myself which is something I dont want to do. I love life and its so painful to go through thoughts that try to tell me otherwise. That particular image/thought has really stuck with me. I know about ERP and my therapist said I could rip the bandaid off and go to a gun range but it terrifies me. I don't own any weapons but I often think, "what if I buy one and im actually suicidal?" Just typing it makes me anxious. I'm wanting to start a low dose of Prozac which opens up another can of worms about worried my "overdose thought" will come true, on top of potential side effects. This is long winded but im looking for any advice to get through this. I know others are worse off than me but considering I've never been like this and it only started 6 months ago, I'm really struggling. Thanks everyone.
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