- Date posted
- 4y ago
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Sure. First, the brain has a job it takes pretty seriously: making sure you don’t die. That’s like its first priority. 90% of what it does is dedicated to that. The other 10% is just us doing stuff we like or looking at cat videos on the internet. Because it takes its job seriously, it looks for threats. World ending threats could happen, right? It’s within the realm of possibility. All of humanity knows this, but not as many spend their days absorbed in questions about it. So why do you? Well, you’ve got a structural difference in your amygdala that infuses this information with an intense fight/flight/freeze response. As far as your brain is concerned, knowing this information is no different than running into a bear in the woods. And what does the brain do when there’s a bear in front of you? It freaks the fuck out. Then it tries to figure out how to get away. That’s what your brain is doing now. What helps is realizing ALL of those processes happen independent of your conscious choose. What you DO get to choose is taking those signals seriously.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
I’m not the original poster but I wish I could’ve sent this to 10 year old me omg.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Thank you so much for the support and validation! I did not know that about the brain :D
- Date posted
- 4y ago
Following because when I was younger (23 now) i used to CRY AND PANIC over any idea of how the world could end. I would be shaking after watching Deep Impact. 2012 urked me. And the movie The Road, i still can't watch cause its wayyy to realistic. Should have seen the signs for OCD but alas, i only got a diagnosis a couple months ago.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
I dont really get that freaked out anymore about it. Honestly sometimes making a joke about the an asteroid destroying everything is weirdly comforting for me Lol.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@Iwashere2 Lol I do the same thing, I’m trying to be like “welp if we all die then we just die oh well.” 😂
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@BeachedMermaid Hey you can't have the fear of missing out if a an asteroid makes EVERYBODY miss out Lol
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@Iwashere2 Are we the same people?? I’m 20 now and the world ending spontaneously had me running to my parents on more than one account, and the nightmares, omg. Now I make jokes about it all the time 😭
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@aurokoi Its nice to know thaf maybe one day we'll joke about our current themes like this
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@Iwashere2 Ikr. (Can it hurry tf up and get here faster 😭)
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@Iwashere2 True lol😂
- Date posted
- 4y ago
omg yes I used to have those exact same fears as a kid! Both about doomsday and aliens. They used to keep me up at night, and it was like I watched every alien or 2012 related video on YouTube. I had no idea this could even be ocd related. They faded for me surprisingly with the ‘maybe, maybe not’ response! My parents used to tell me that all the time. Like maybe it’ll happen but we can’t know, so are you gonna let your life stop now?
- Date posted
- 4y ago
It is so nice to know that I’m not alone in this! I’m much better with this recently, earlier this year it was unbearable, I’ve been trying to adopt that attitude of maybe maybe not like you said. It’s become exhausting so I’m trying to just be like if aliens take over so what lol.
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@BeachedMermaid I know exactly where you’re coming from. I remember how terrifying it was. You can do this though! I believe in you. I got over it, and so can you. 😊
- Date posted
- 4y ago
@aurokoi Thanks so much for the encouraging words 💗 glad to know someone has gotten over it
Related posts
- Date posted
- 25w ago
Can anyone relate To being anxious to watch a movie or tv show out of fear of being triggered OR fear that your mind will latch onto to some weird idea you got from the movie and it will become a new obsession.. like for example… my hubby wanted to watch lord of the rings tonight. I’ve never seen it and for some reason I had the thought that I didn’t want to watch it bc what if it made me scared of creatures or some weird shit like that lol. Or like I’ll think about watching some Si fi show but then I have the thought “hmm better not in case it makes me believe in aliens or something”. I know how crazy this sounds but why do I think like this lol
- Date posted
- 16w ago
I haven't been officially diagnosed with OCD but when I learned more about it, I never related to anything more. A little back story: when I was younger, there were a couple of youth suicides in my area and the schools felt the need to have someone come in and talk about suicide. Well the person they had come in did a horrible job teaching it and basically made it seem like the smallest negative emotion or feeling or change in behavior made you suicidal. This ended up scaring me so much that I got horrid anxiety. Fast forward to now, Everytime I feel anxiety and panic, I fear I'm going to kill myself. Everytime I feel down and depressed, I fear I'll end it all. I'm scared to be around anything sharp because the "What if" I hurt myself comes into my mind. There are always intrusive thoughts at almost every point of the day. And it's not only for me. Everytime I hear someone being negative, I fear they will be suicidal. I know in my heart that none of this is true but it's terrifying me that it's stuck around so much that it makes me scared that maybe it is true. I've had a lot of death in my family in the past year and a half and a lot of other family drama that I'd never had before that is now also bringing up existential intrusive thoughts. And I'd never questioned anything about life before but now I get the "why is life like this?" and "does anything we do matter?" and I hate it. I don't want to think like that. I just want to go through life being able to handle things normally again. It terrifies me even right now going "what if you give up?"
- Date posted
- 11w ago
Really bad theme right now is death, I keep thinking about how one day or at any moment my heart will stop my brain will stop & my memories & everything I know will all fade away. It is giving me so much anxiety I’m only 18, but I realize it all happens to us it is bound, we are born to die. I know it’s a silly thing to be scared because it’s not helping the quality of my life worrying about it and even when I do die, I won’t care , if you don’t have a working brain then how can you care 🤷♀️. It is tainting my everyday life currently & honestly making me terribly depressed & it is giving me derealization & making me feel nihilistic, I’ll remind myself it’s okay but then with my ocd i don’t stop thinking and thinking about it and it’s seriously so hard to stay present in the moment because this thought just feels like I can’t scrub it away it’s miserable I struggle with religion, but I do pray to anything that’s out there possibly listening, because it is comforting, it just feels like this whole experience Is pointless & I am afraid of the unknown and what is to possibly happen but I’m subjected to it anyways so why should it matter
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