Religious OCD is terrifying because I can't logic out of it. I can try saying "that's not how God works," but then my brain will be like, how do you *know*. Like does anyone else have religious OCD and feel the need to pray all the time? If so how do you avoid that urge? How do you find a healthy relationship with religion when even the smallest mention of it triggers you?

Do you have anything that works for you? One thing that's helped me is to hand responsibility for the thought to god. To just trust god and say god will do what he will do. It's not my responsibility to be in control of this it's his job. But it only works sometimes.

The lord does not want you to suffer! He knows this life is full of positive and negatives, of both thoughts and actions!

OCD is all about that 1% of doubt. It is doubt we can never resolve no matter how many compulsions we engage in. The way to ultimately stop performing these compulsions is through ERP.

Okay I am going to make a different suggestion to you. I’m not sure if you have tried this before. The next time you feel the need to perform your compulsion (praying) go ahead and set a timer on your phone for 5 minutes. Or 2 minutes even. However long you feel is doable for you. During this time do not allow yourself to engage in the compulsion. Once the timer ends, if you still feel the need to do the compulsion (which when you first start doing this, you probably will) then allow yourself to do the compulsion. If you don’t feel the need to when the timer ends, then don’t. Over time try to increase the amount of time on the timer. With this method you are not resisting doing the compulsion entirely, but you are at least delaying the compulsion which is progress.

I feel this all the time! I’m a Christian with ocd and I always feel like I’m sinning whenever I have certain thoughts. Then I realize that God calls us to cast our anxieties on him, and when I can’t do that, I feel like I’m sinning even more. I have yet to find a way to resist the need to pray and ask for forgiveness 7 times every time I have a “thought”

I’m a Christian and I struggle with this too. It’s a really long story but OCD has attacked my faith since I was 7 or 8. I’m still trying to make my relationship with the Lord healthier and not live with such guilt all the time. I understand your pain.

Thing is I was raised in a secular family so I don't even know where this came from. I've always had my own beleifs about God and stuff but my parents attitude was basically here's some tools to learn about it believe whatever you want. But now I just spend every moment of the day praying it drives me crazy.

Sometimes I just have to pray like I feel the physical urge to.

Like right now I feel like I need to pray.

We were not made to be perfect. We’re not that special :). We were made to live!

I know it's supposed to work. But. Maybe I'm doing it wrong.

If you ever feel that low please reach out to a resource who can help you. Please never give up hope because you can get through this. I also have a question for you, are you on medication Nikki? (Not that I am suggesting it to you, I am just wondering if you’re on medication or only doing therapy on its own.) I know medication isn’t a cure but I also know it can help a lot of people if you find the right one. If it can make the symptoms less strong maybe it would be easier to do ERP. This is something I have been considering myself. Also I think starting tiny is a great idea. If you are able to resist those compulsions it should give you some confidence because you’ll know that you ARE able to do it.

Yeah I'm on medication. I've been on meds my whole life for autism but now I have new needs so the meds are in a state of change. And I do have places I reach out to. Friends, hotlines, textlines.

I don't plan to kill myself so. I guess I'm safe.

Ok. Maybe.