- Date posted
- 6y ago
- Date posted
- 6y ago
18 years? I have to give it to you, that's incredibly inspiring that you are still fighting this battle and not giving up, bravo! And your advice is spot on, reassurance and rumination only worsens the situation, just takes a long time to slowly break the cycle.
- Date posted
- 6y ago
If your brain train tries to reassure you just let it. But don't encourage it. Don't do any effort whatsoever to reassure yourself. There's no magic trick, just sit through the pain while refraining from actively trying to reduce it.
- Date posted
- 6y ago
Yeah I can now see that I’ve hade OCD since 21 (and maybe before) and I’m 39 now. Unfortunately I’ve only really understood my condition over the last year or so.
- Date posted
- 6y ago
I've been trying recently to "chase the bully", i.e. to purposely bring the anxiety back when OCD isn't bothering me. OCD hates it! Do your worst, bully!!!
- Date posted
- 6y ago
Wow. Eighteen years. You are strong for fighting through it. Can I ask.....how do you get yourself to just bring on the thoughts without seeking reassurance or trying to "prove" or disprove them. I find that since my thoughts are always about death or dying in some form whether it be a fear of some disease or even a fear that my partner is going to hurt me...I feel as though the thoughts are too important to let go. How do you not try to rationalize them when you think your life is in danger?? I've tried deep breathing and allowing the thoughts to happen....but my brain always tries to reassure myself or find proof for my thoughts. I really don't know how to stop
- Date posted
- 6y ago
@LGB83 I’ve started to be really strict with myself, like if a thought enters my mind I say something like, ‘Yeah, it might happen’ and that’s it - end of conversation. Sometimes it doesn’t work but I think I’m getting better at it! For me it’s about catching my mind going down certain roads and turning it the other way. I think in the past I’ve just decided that I can’t control my thoughts, but now I think maybe I can.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 18w ago
Where do I begin with this…….. so my OCD has been around since childhood and has had many themes over the years. I only realised I have it just over 2 years ago. I’ve tried many things to help it not be such a monster and thought I had a good grip on it for a length of time until now! Some of my strategies have been acceptance, change of perception of thoughts and sometimes on hard days just telling myself that no matter what, I have to be brave and go out and live life. In the last few months I’ve developed none OCD related anxiety as well and so have been looking at ways to help with that. Sunday morning I was just casually scrolling TikTok and a video only about 30 seconds long or so comes up, seemingly a therapist of some kind, straight away the video began something like “you cannot replace a thought with another thought” along the lines of “you can’t THINK your way out anxiety” I don’t know the full context of the video it wasn’t long enough, I don’t know who the therapist was I didn’t look but now purely because of that one sentence my OCD has gripped onto it so badly and is trying to tear down some of my strategies because I have used changing my thought patterns a lot to help me, self compassion etc but now because of that video I’m struggling! I’m not looking for answers but I am just really upset and it feels like I’m in an impossible grip of OCD again
- Date posted
- 17w ago
This might contain triggering content, but I'm also wondering if others have dealt with this similar thought, and if so, how to deal with it? Overall, I've been doing so well these past few days. I'm able to eat again, which I hadn't been able to do because of how much anxiety I'd been experiencing. I'm spending time around loved ones and not just rotting in my room, and I've been able to wake up without immediately being bombarded by intrusive thoughts. When things first got really bad, I'd wake my mom up every night for reassurance, but I haven't done that in a while either. I'm really proud of myself, but there's still this nagging thought in my mind... While looking through others posts on here, hoping to find advice that'd fit my situation, I ended up making things worse. Someone mentioned how they had a fear that they'd purposely search for illegal content (related to POCD). I panicked, and "what ifs" flooded my thoughts. "What if the intrusive thoughts affect who I am as a person, and I do that?" I'm terrified that I'll search for those things, which I know means I wouldn't do it. But then, another person on here said they'd actually looked for those things, and that freaked me out even more. Does that mean it's possible for that to happen to me? I don't want to do that, but I keep having intrusive thoughts surrounding it. I've been doing so well these past few days. I'm just... stuck. I don't know what to do. I've spoken with other people who have the same fears, but how do I manage this? It's not something I've even thought about before seeing those posts. I've been practicing accepting the uncertainty, but I'm really struggling with this one. I hate this. This morning, I woke up, and the intrusive thoughts were back. It's just disheartening.
- Date posted
- 9w ago
I want to beat OCD because I have seen and felt the benefits of clearing my brain from unnecessary, pointless, thoughts. OCD is like 0 calorie food. It’s pointless. No nutrition or benefits come from my obsessions or compulsions. I don’t care to have answers to everything anymore. I catch myself just trying to stress myself out so that I have some worry to feed on. But like I said, it’s a 0 calorie food. I get nothing from it but wasted time and energy. My brain feels more spacious when I’m not consumed by OCD. I’m present. My personality has room to be herself without making space for bullshit. I tell myself now that worry is poison. I think Willie Nelson was the person I got that quote from? Anyways, that imagery of worries being poison for the mind has been transformative for me. I’m evolving. 💖 Thanks NOCD community.
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