Can pure OCD make you ‘adopt’ the mindset of the type of thing you fear being? Like I’ve started thinking differently and I worry I’m perceiving the world how the group of people I fear being would.

Wow no that’s literally what I’m going through right now hahaha

@garden 😂😂 I also had this. You experience this because you are too focused on feeling empathy. But how does empathy feel exactly? I myself can't describe the feeling of empathy. Some people will explain it as the feeling of feeling sorry for a person. But they don't describe the actual feeling itself. Just like other OCD themes, you are too focused on the subject. You become scared of not having the right feeling. Therefore people say OCD is not a thought problem, but a feeling problem. You want to feel empathy, but you can't due to your lens being blurred. The fact that you want to have empathy tells me you do have empathy😅

@Max This goes for any feeling, not just empathy.

@Max Thanks so much. And you’re spot on to be honest. I think the more we fixate on what we ‘should’ feel, the less we’ll feel that. But I just reassure myself all the time lol.

@garden Yes that's the sentence I was looking for😂😂 Yes me too. It's very hard to sit with the discomfort. But that's why we got OCD ;)

@Max Yupppp! But it’ll be okay. What are your main compulsions?

@garden Oké good to hear! Depends on my theme. When I have Health OCD (which I have right now) I'll be searching the internet for more than 7 hours a day. I'm affraid of having bone cancer. I monitor the symptoms 24/7. Every little thing I notice. For Narcism related obsessions I always search the internet for hours. I do multiple (sometimes even the same tests😂) over and over again. I always checky past if there were any signs of narcism. I'm constantly affraid of being a narcist in the future. With sexual obsessions I always look for reassurance by asking people on forums or this app (which is very bad lol). I compulsively look for signs of arousal when I see an object which I don't want to find attractive. My main compulsions are always searching the internet, self reassurance (which never helps), asking others, looking for signs of the obsession being true etc.. What are yours?

@Max I relate a lot. I think google is the worst one! It’s cool you can identify them though. You should try to cut down on google day by day and see how your brain handles it. But I know this can be scary so don’t pressure yourself or anything

@garden I understand. Thanks for your help. The thing is that when I'm in the middle of an 'attack', it feels impossible to cut down on compulsions. The threat of having a terrible disease like cancer is so big I can't seem to stop searching for relief. It's the same with other themes. Sometimes when I'm not in an 'attack', I succeed not doing anything and to just leave the thoughts for what they are. But I literally feel when I suddenly can't see straight anymore and that's the moment I give in. It's like there is a switch that's turned on or off. Do you also experience this? If so, how do you cope?

@Max Yes I experience this! Though for me it’s more about googling about narcissism. Health ocd can be super hard and my heart goes out to you. I think the ‘attack’ is your brain just craving and NEEDING reassurance in order to let you function so you kinda have to give in. But the only way out of it is to trigger those attacks and show your brain you’re capable of not doing what it wants you to. Maybe the next time you feel that way, try to tell yourself ‘okay, I’ll do the compulsion in 4 minutes’ and then slowly build it up until you no longer have to do that compulsion because you’ve proved to yourself than you can live your life without it.

@garden Thank you so much for your kind words. I'm going to try to delay the compulsion like you described! It sounds really helpful, so I hope it'll work.. Thanks again!! ☺️

@Max Aw of course! And by the way I really recommend checking out Mark Freeman. His views towards ocd and compulsions and stuff have been so helpful for me. I just try to keep up with his instagram stories. He has YouTube vids too 😊

@garden Oké thank you😊, I'll check him out! Chrssie Hodges is also really great to listen to :)

@Max Yesss she’s so lovely :)

Aww wish you the best too💜