OCD Existencial questioning my every moment awake like Why am i really me? How is it that i am able to think? Why am i doing what im doing? Why am i seeing thru my eyes? Is this really reality?

That’s kinda my question. All my thoughts feel so realistic and so now I doubt if they are ocd and if I just can’t make my mind up about something and I’m using ocd as an excuse or something idc I feel like this post is word vomit.

Really bad theme right now is death, I keep thinking about how one day or at any moment my heart will stop my brain will stop & my memories & everything I know will all fade away. It is giving me so much anxiety I’m only 18, but I realize it all happens to us it is bound, we are born to die. I know it’s a silly thing to be scared because it’s not helping the quality of my life worrying about it and even when I do die, I won’t care , if you don’t have a working brain then how can you care 🤷‍♀️. It is tainting my everyday life currently & honestly making me terribly depressed & it is giving me derealization & making me feel nihilistic, I’ll remind myself it’s okay but then with my ocd i don’t stop thinking and thinking about it and it’s seriously so hard to stay present in the moment because this thought just feels like I can’t scrub it away it’s miserable I struggle with religion, but I do pray to anything that’s out there possibly listening, because it is comforting, it just feels like this whole experience Is pointless & I am afraid of the unknown and what is to possibly happen but I’m subjected to it anyways so why should it matter

I used to get caught in a loop with existential thoughts very frequently. Every question made my stomach drop: (TW: existential questions) … … ... "Why does anything exist at all? What will death be like? Is anything even real? Is there any meaning to this? Is the universe infinitely big, and if not, what's beyond it? Are there multiverses? Has the universe been around forever? Will the universe end for good, or will it keep going forever? What is forever like? What even IS reality?" It would get so overwhelming that I remember lying on the floor in a fetal position for hours because I felt like there was no escape. I spent most of my days reading articles and watching videos about theoretical astrophysics and philosophy in a desperate attempt to "figure it all out." Of course that only made me more anxious, raised more questions, and kept me trapped in the cycle. Things started to improve once I learned to turn TOWARD reality, rather than away from it, and ERP really helped me do that. I learned that these questions weren't the problem. I learned that I can actually handle the anxiety that arises when exposed to these ideas and concepts. I don't have to figure anything out to make the anxiety go away; it arises and passes away on its own. Ironically, bringing myself into the present moment and becoming more aware of reality helped me escape the cycle of existential dread. Because of that, this topic no longer takes over my life. If I'm triggered by something I see, hear, or think, I may still feel a little twang of anxiety, but then it just goes away. "Maybe, maybe not" has been the single most useful phrase of my life. Do you ever get trapped in a cycle of existential questions? Are you worried that the ERP approach would be too scary to handle? If so, I'm happy to give my advice.