Does anyone else’s OCD try to tell you if you don’t ruminate you are just suppressing the “real you”? To just admit x,y,z to your self? These things just don’t feel right in my soul. I’m really struggling and I hate this illness. I just want my happy back so bad. I don’t want to feel like I’m loosing myself to this illness.

I had it. But I know that I don't ruminate because i try to keep myself out of the endless and harmful loop that distresses me in order to heal not because I want to suppress anything. I broke the cycle when i decided that I can't figure out my sexuality in such a stressful state. So in order to understand myself I have to make the whole situation peaceful. The only thing is that when you get to the peaceful state the thoughts won't bother you since soocd won't have control over you any longer.

I totally have felt this way. I got stuck in a rut feeling like this non stop and it crushed me. I got past it. I finally learned how to catch myself doing this. At that time I couldn’t write down a single thing I liked about myself... I finally realized I got a doctorate, my boyfriend loves me, people laugh at my jokes , etc. But for like a year I just hated myself because of my own thoughts. It’s a cycle once it starts and can be hard some days to see through it. But you gotta tell yourself reality is humans are complex. No one is perfect. Everyone is still figuring everything out day by day bc sometimes life is just hard. I used to hate myself for ruminating because it was self destructive. Now I catch myself and realize OK it’s ok to be self critical and to reflect on things about ourselves we want to improve or modify... like eating healthy for example... it’s not helpful to sit there and tell myself I’m disgusting and going to develop all these health problems because I drink a lot of Red Bull and eat junk food.... now I’m trying to eat a little healthier and don’t sit there beating myself up over some Oreos and try to catch myself when I freak out over made up health problems. For example

Not so much that same thought but mine is like... is this rumination or something you just actually want to think about. 🤔 🙄ocd smh

Also just read 2nd part of your post. You're not losing yourself. You are you no matter what OCD thoughts you have. Stick with the ERP and you will have more and more moments without it being in the forefront so you can feel more joy and more like yourself.