Hello dear friends. I hadn't been on this app for a while, I've been getting by. Today I just need to vent and to feel validated and understood. I have OCD, I consider myself in permanent recovery. It is an everyday job. I am ina relationship with a wonderful guy. I deeply love and care about him, but he doesn't understand anything about OCD. I've explained it to him a million times. I've directed him to online resources. I've talked him through what to do to help me get out of a loop without giving me reassurance. And yet, he never knows what to say or do when an episode appears. It is tiring to pull myself out of the loop and then having yo explain to him what just happened to me, over and over again. I think, in general, he lacks empathy for other people's feelings, but, when it comes to me, I can see that he tries but achieves nothing. I think I don't have ROCD, I have diverse thoughts. But the last few weeks this thought got into my mind: what if he has met someone else and they are texting each other and flirting and he's gonna leave me? (He left his girl to start a new relationship with me). And he are apart due to the covid-19 epidemic, so we didn't see each other almost at all during last year. Of course, I had been able to keep this particular thought to myself, buy yesterday, it just came out of my mind after him not picking up the phone. He was in shock. He reacted defensively (which I completely understand), replied that he had nothing to explain to me as to why he couldn't answer the phone when I called him and that we was surprised that I asked him such a thing (if the reason why he didn't answer me was that he was talking to someone else). I knew it was just an OCD thought of mine, but I just couldn't keep it to myself any longer. Of course, I apologized to him and had to explain it had been an OCD thought. He was supporting and understanding and told me everything was ok and to forget about it. This morning I feel sad that he couldn't recognize this for what it was despite all the explaining I have done. I have dealt with my ocd on my own, despite being in a relationship. I just needed to vent and would like to read your thoughts about this whole thing. Thank you in advance for reading and replying.

hi. so one big factor of my OCD is rumination. i met a guy who i have a crush on the idea of (idea bc there are red flags). my biggest fear is not finding true love, my ex told me no one else would deal with what i have (my ocd, specifically reassurance seeking and getting overstimulated after intimacy). a few weeks ago, my friends and family all gathered and tried to give me advice that sounded like “you’re shy and you’ll never find someone.” after that, i’ve felt off. i’ve been using an unhealthy coping skill, daydreaming, and i’ve just felt unbalanced. my ocd makes everything feel different sometimes, i can’t explain it. life, myself, almost like being in a dissociated state. has anyone else experienced that? i don’t know how to remain balanced during my off times and i know pms exasperates it all. i take ashwaghanda and omega 3s in a multi vitamin daily. i take them all together in the evening but i’ve missed three days recently and also messed with my rocky sleep schedule because of fun times with friends. i hope these supplements work, because i don’t know if i’d be brave enough for medication. i had a bad reaction on prozac and often am forgetful. i just have been battling my OCD consciously for almost ten years now and unconsciously for longer. i am so tired, as my mental health extends beyond my OCD. i’m in talk therapy with some cbt aspects but i only see her twice a month. i’ve broken down so many times and promised myself id get on track or that certain things would work, but it’s like i am stuck in a circle that gets smaller when i’m able to help myself. i just want to be normal. i want to be able to mess up my sleep schedule to enjoy good times and not suffer horrible consequences or fear that i will be entirely thrown off balance. i don’t want to worry or doubt or feel so dissociative that i squint my eyes for a moment and wonder why i feel so unreal. i will never understand why god has allowed me to go through this. i cannot let it be for nothing but i don’t know how much more to bend and contort my body and brain to get somewhere stable but how lovely it would be if i could. i don’t have much of a schedule right now, i get apathetic and give in with things from time to time. one thing can trigger me and i am back to square one wether in a week or month. any advice, any and all is so helpful. your stories, your thoughts. maybe feeling less alone and knowing what has helped you is exactly what i need right now. thank you 💗

Hello. I am on my first relationship, (and I want it to be my only!) I've been at it for nearly 2 years, and it first starting happening a few months in. When the relationship started, it felt perfect to me. We are both extremely different people, we have different taste, different humor (but we both made each other laugh!) and just a different way of talking about things, (I tend to be more analytical, while she isn't as much). But I considered these differences to be fine, I never felt like it was an issue because our core values are very similar and I consider her a very intelligent girl. We just enjoyed time together, and each other, I thought she was cute as hell, and even if she didn't talk in depth about a lot of stuff, that didn't matter, I enjoyed the quiet times with her just as much as the talkative times. When the OCD kicked in, that's when I started to question everything, I questioned if I even loved her in the first place, if our relationship was just a sham, if I even found her attractive in the first place, her intelligence, her point of view, even dumb petty stuff like "oh she likes THAT movie???". After my first major breakdown, I confessed a lot to her. At this point, I didn't even know what was going on until I started to look into it. And that's where I found ROCD. On one hand, it was satisfying to see something I could point to as "the problem", on the other hand, I think it gave me bad motivation, it reassured me that this was something that I could just try and ignore. After I cooled down from this, I once again had a long period of bliss. I had a good schedule with her. >Go to work >Hang out with her (spend the night at her place sometimes) >go home and hang out with friends I enjoyed my time with her, taking part in her interests, and her taking part in mine. She wasn't always 100% into the things that I was, and that was always a bit disappointing to me, but in the same way you'd be disappointed if your friend didn't like the thing you liked. (now I over analyze these moments and question if I did always care more about this or not) This moment of bliss would end after another huge trigger. A part of the OCD I have yet to mention is my tendency to be worried that "getting along with other people that I find attractive" is the equivalent of either cheating on my partner, or backstabbing them. There was someone at work that I found attractive and I had a moment where it felt like I may have developed a thing for them, I still don't know if it's true because I generally found them to be annoying at times. I made a joke during work, that felt like I was propping myself up to them, I still don't know my motivation behind this joke, because it feels like it could have been something that I would have joked about to anyone, but I'm still not even sure about it. Either way I basically had a panic attack and later confessed to my partner. I don't know if I should have done it, or not, because I'm to this day confused about my emotions during that situation. Regardless. She was hurt, but she forgave me. It felt like I couldn't look her in the eye and feel like a sincere person to her. After this major moment, I felt like I never recovered. I started to avoid talking to this person at work, or really many women at work at all because of the fear that I'd fall for them. When an attractive women shows up I try and end the conversation quickly, this has only created a fear for taking to people, and it's extremely stressful. I got by though. And I would continue to love my partner. Until another major breakdown. This one created a new type of numbness to my partner, that felt completely different, and it's way more convincing. I mentioned in the past that my partner and I are very different, and that we even have different ways of talking about interests. My partner very much enjoys things for what they are, there's not much analysis, and that's fine. Me (and my friends) are very analytical. Last month I was showing her a game I like, and I started to question if she was even tracking what was going on, or even understood it, I was obsessing over the idea that she didn't even care about it (even tho I know she has always taken interest in what I like). This way of thought broke my brain and it made me feel completely incompatible with her. I question my behavior when I was showing her stuff in the past, I remember moments in which I questioned if she was actually paying attention even during moments when the OCD was low. I question if she has the ability to even watch something and understand what's going on. All terrible thoughts, and all thoughts that I never want to have. I'm scared to talk to my friends half the time because the thoughts of them being more "intelligent and analytical" pulsate through my brain. My friends and I are extremely cynical, about things like the film industry and sometimes if I'm going in on something it feels like I'm shitting on her by proxy just because she doesn't care about it as much as I do. I've isolated myself from friends and I think that did worsen my condition, because when it's just only me and my partner hanging out, I feel like it started attacking her more. This is the part where it just doesn't feel like ROCD anymore. I used to not give a single shit about these things, I was able to make blanket statements like "I think TikTok sucks and it's users are annoying" knowing full well my partner uses TikTok every day. There was a separation between me making broad statements and then not necessarily being indictive of my partner SPECIFICALLY. Now it doesn't feel like I have much anxiety anymore, because it just feels like I've accepted that my partner is who she is and I "don't know if I love her" when in the past, I've accepted my partner for who she is, and I loved her anyway. I feel like I'm just not as connected to her as I once was. I used to enjoy everything with her, now my brain overanalyzes everything she does and says. I can't just relax. I feel like I've lost any amount of structure and this turned into a ramble. But I guess that's where I'm at now. I've been attempting getting proper health insurance so I can talk to someone and not break the bank. I think about the times when none of these ridiculous nitpicks didn't matter to me, and I cry about the idea of leaving her. Thank you for reading.

Does anyone else struggle with object permanence in relationships? Like whenever my partner is out of the house I immediately think negatively or I find things wrong with the relationship or him… For background my partner and I always fight over chores (I know it’s common but it’s annoying) I definitely pull more weight than him and I think he has ADHD, which makes him struggle to help and be aware of helping. Lately we’ve been somewhat good with splitting meals and dishes whatever, I know it can change with work stress, fatigue whatever. But last week my partner was out of the house watching his uncle’s dog so he was barely home. He was sleeping over at his uncles house and would come home for meals sometimes and stuff like that. I started becoming super fixated on him not helping with the dishes before he left and would constantly feel urges to yell about it. Even though the week prior everything was good when it came to that (sometimes with my ROCD I’ll even question myself and be like was it?) so I have started 4 separate fights arguing about dishes and chores and mentioning that he doesn’t help enough and if this continues I’ll have to leave… it’s so hard for me to snap out of it and just realize that he was going back and forth and didn’t think to help because he was busy with helping his uncle. And then I get such a negative view of him in my head that I nitpick his appearance, I make comments, etc, because my underlying fear is he doesn’t care to help, he will never change, and we will fail. So it’s almost like I’m looking to have a reason to run before I actually need to? It’s a constant cycle for me and I’m truly so exhausted by myself. But also relationships are so hard for me because I struggled SO much with trying to depend on others that I almost don’t let myself depend on others…. Any advice is appreciated but also just like do you also experience this? Thank you & pls be kind 🥺🥺🥺