- Username
- Anonymous
- Date posted
- 3y ago
hello! first off - the fact that you're so worried and distressed about these things means they're not your true intentions / you wouldn't do them. many people (mental illness or not) deal with intrusive thoughts related to harm. it's just people with anxiety or ocd (even if u haven't been diagnosed) think that these thoughts mean something about them, when they don't. the fact that you're distressed is a clear sign that they're not your values💗 you're not alone in this. intrusive urges and images are also very common! the thing with intruisve urges is that they're not the same as a real urge. for example - you may have an impulsive urge to cut your hair & this is an urge that you WANT to do. intrusive urges are urges that you don't want - hence why they're called intruisve. they can be scary, especially when you don't know much about them. but they're common! @windsor.flynn on instagram (i recommend following her or looking at her page) has a post specifically for "how intrusive thoughts can feel like urges" and it's related to harm ocd / harm thoughts, i recommend checking it out! as for you avoiding people - that will just make your anxiety worse. you see - our brains don't know real danger from danger we create in our brains. you may think that avoiding people is helping but it's really fueling your thoughts (fueling them as in they will become more frequent not that you'd act on them). don't give power to your thoughts! they're just thoughts. hangout with your friends or family!<3 i promise you you're not a monster or whatever else you may be thinking you are. many people deal with this.
i also recommend mindfulness. it helped me with my intrusive thoughts and anxiety! there's many books you can buy. what helps is when you get an intrusive thought, don't pay attention to it but also don't push it away. don't try and figure out what it means bc it doesn't mean anything. just let it flow by, eventually if you keep doing this the thoughts will become less and less. and then when you do get an intrusive thought (bc everyone gets them!!), you would've developed a new and better relationship to it, and you'll let it just pass by because you'll know it doesn't mean anything about you!! and do the same for urges, let them pass by and don't try and figure out what they mean.:)
Thank you so much!! Yes, these thoughts feel very real sometimes, it’s scary, it’s like I have something disturbing stuck in my mind following me 24/7!! I will follow the ig account! And also I feel like this is not OCD, like this is something real, but I guess it’s part of OCD. Yes I feel urges sometimes, like if I could go and act on my thoughts, but I really don’t want to, and it feels like an urgency. Thank you so much :)
@Anonymous that's totally apart of ocd & anxiety! i'm not diagnosed but i have bad anxiety and get intrusive thoughts, so i know what u mean! but that's normal<3
@coucou Thank you! It makes me relieved <3 I hope I cope this, because it’s really uncomfortable :(
@Anonymous you will get through!! <3 theres always blue sky after a storm :)
@coucou Thank youuu that’s so sweet🥰
I have Harm OCD and this sounds pretty textbook. OCD can feel VERY real. And I second mindfulness. A good rule when it comes to thoughts is this: If you didn't choose it, let it be.
Did this happen to you too? And thank you for the advice!!
@Anonymous Yes, I believe it happens to most people that have OCD, and it can be especially scary with Harm. I've definitely felt the urges along with thoughts and images. It's all part of OCD which is how it latches on. It is so scary. Everyone with OCD has questioned whether or not they have OCD or if this is who we've always been. I had that thought just this morning. But honestly, you know who you've always been? Right? You know it. Psychopaths would not have distress over these thoughts. I've been there too. Afraid of schizophrenia, psychosis, turning into a psychopath, sociopath...all of these fears are also common in conjunction with Harm OCD because its like a brain hijacking. OCD loves to ask you what if, what if, what if. I recommend Ali Greymond on YouTube, and listen to a few talks from Jeffery Schwartz as well. Also, Dr. Michael Greenberg has a great interview on the OCD Stories podcast, also on YouTube. It sounds like you're ruminating a lot, and his methods might help!
@CB6236 Thank you! Yess it’s the fear of turning into a psychopath, or going schizophrenic, or the fear that you might act on your thoughts and not knowing if that will happen or not. Yes I ruminate a lot, so thank you for your recommendations, I will check those out!
I fear I might have psychopath characteristics, I really feel like I could be one :(
I’ve been dealing with intrusive violent images/urges/thoughts for months now. Lately it’s gotten worse. Sometimes when I see a person i automatically imagine hurting them, sometimes to see if I enjoy the thought or not, or sometimes it just appears in my head and I try to cut it off immediately. It’s like i just can not interact with people because I can’t tell if I’m a risk or not. If I’m capable of hurting them or not. I hate it because I’m all day trying to get an answer to whether I want to harm people or not. I’m constantly asking myself: have you ever desired the thought? Do you want to do it or not? And all of the above makes me feel anormal and like a psycho. And of course, another doubt comes into my head: do you really don’t want to be a bad person? And it’s a never ending disturbing and frustrating cycle... I can’t stop it, it’s driving me crazy and it makes me desperate. Is all this even normal?
Hey y’all i need to know if someone relates to what I’m going through. I feel almost like if I wanted to act on my thoughts but I actually don’t because this doesn’t please me at all. So if someone told me “You have Harm OCD” I would be like “really? So I don’t wanna harm people? Neither am I capable?” I have no clue why would that be my answer when I haven’t desired anything. But somehow it makes me feel like I do, and consequently makes me feel like I’m in denial. So it feels like if an unconscious part of me wants to do it but I am just resisting. I literally can’t go anywhere, I don’t wanna live any second more, because I feel so disturbed all the time. I feel like I’m gonna end up doing it, I feel so overwhelmed by these feelings,thoughts, images, urges, that I would avoid everything, like going anywhere. I hate feeling like this but I feel like there’s no way back, i can’t picture myself being good in the future because I feel like “this is what i want” when it’s not. I feel like it’s a time bomb for me to do something. I do not tolerate this, every minute that passes by I feel it closer to happen. I feel like I’m gonna collapse and act on it. I don’t even know if that’s what I want, but I don’t think it is, I think it just feels like it. Help I don’t know what to do.
I’m so scared I don’t even know if this is OCD at this point. I keep having horrible intrusive thoughts on acting upon my worst fear and the feelings and thoughts are so strong and intense I’m genuinely convinced I might lose control and do something horrible. It feels to real and it’s so constant that I don’t trust myself at all. There are times where it even feels relieving to think about doing something horrible even though it’s the opposite of what I want so feeling like that is so confusing and it’s convincing me I’ve become my worst fear. I’ve been trying everything to avoid anything that brings these thoughts and feelings up because I’m just so scared I’m going to snap and do something horrible. I have therapy soon and I’m really glad about that but I’m scared to tell this to my therapist because I don’t know what’s going to happen. I just need to know I’m not the only one who experiences this because I feel like I’ve just gone crazy at this point. I’m so scared that this isn’t OCD.
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