I struggle so much with my past, particularly the way I behaved and the people I associated with towards the end of high school. I know that as a kid, and I was under 18 at the time, we all make poor decisions or do things that are wrong. I can’t stop ruminating though, and have a hard time letting go of the past. I know concretely, that who I was back then, is NOT at all who I am now and that I am in all honesty, disgusted by my past mistakes. Does anyone else deal with real event OCD and struggle with rumination? Especially feeling like they don’t deserve happiness or love because of their past?

TW: Abuse/Pocd Im feeling really hopeless right now. I have an extensive history of sexual abuse, neglect, physical and emotional abuse as well and a significant amount of trauma from my childhood. I didn’t get any help until my late teens. During this time period I was an incredibly troubled child/teenager and I made a ton of really bad decisions that go against all my morals and values now as a grown adult. I feel like I messed up so bad I don’t deserve to recover. I don’t want to discuss all the events because they are quite personal to me but I’m really struggling with past sexual mistakes and feeling like some sort of deviant because of my past. I never hurt anyone and I never to my knowledge did anything illegal but I definitely had sexual behavior issues from my abuse. I sexualized my own abuse to cope with it. I feel horrible about this. Like I’m a monster. It also convinces me my thoughts are true and it’s evidence. Should I go to a OCD specialist for this or a sex therapist? Is there anything they can even do.

Does anyone deal with rumination with their childhood past mistakes. Deep down I know I didn’t know any better but then I start having thoughts and it gets worse after that. I also recently have dealt with death in the family, started my period, started college and just moved to my own apartment this last month. :-/ I genuinely just wish I could let go of my past I feel like I could be a better person for myself mentally if I could just let it go.

With real event OCD, I don’t know if any of you feel this way, but do you ever feel that the past event(s) that you ruminate about or constantly obsess about are gonna come up in your future and just absolutely ruin you, that’s how I’ve been feeling for months, it just feels like impending doom, and I hate having to even think that my future would be ruined by what I did as a teenager, and I did some dumb things, that I regret so deeply, I just can’t stop thinking about that.