What does recovery for harm OCD look like?

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Like how do you get there? Or what does it look like when you get there?

Both preferably

@iamstrong Well, for me it took months to get to a point where I was comfortable. I had to do a lot of ERP which included reading articles of people who killed people, reading news articles, writing a script of how I would harm someone, being around people and intentionally thinking of harming them. It was hard. Very hard. However, you will see immediate improvement. Recovery for me was being able to have harm thoughts without batting an eye. I’d let the thought come and go without looking into it or assigning meaning. I was able to go back to do the things I enjoyed doing. It didn’t interfere with school, work, or family anymore. Once you grasp how OCD works and controls you, recovery gets easier.

@Kdeemz It’s crazy though. All of that seems so impossible. What made you strong enough to do it and why do I feel like I can’t reach that point?

@iamstrong It seemed very impossible in the moment. You feel you’re not ready because your OCD tells you you’re not. When has your OCD been right? Never. Don’t listen to the doubt it feeds you. You have to push yourself to do it with the mindset of recovery. Once you start you’ll be one step closer to recovery and retraining your brain.

I’m currently doing a mixture of medication and ERP everyday. I’m at the point where I have some good days/Moments. But that’s usually followed up With a bad day/overwhelming moments where my brain is giving me over 100 thoughts a day. When I have these days I tend to doubt my recovery and I feel like I’ll never get to the point where I want to be. I also obsess over my OCD, And every time I get a thought I get scared that I’ve never really get to recover.

I was definitely like that in the beginning stages of my recovery. It was usually every other day. I’d feel good and then the next I’d be terrible. It made me feel kinda hopeless as well. However, the longer I kept practicing and moving towards uncertainty and purposely doing things that made me uncomfortable I began to have more good days between the bad days. I remember wanting so bad just to go back to “normal” but this is our new normal. You will continue to have bad days but they will be few and far between if you keep practicing. I promise! Remember, once you get closer to recovery and over one theme your OCD is going to try to obsess about something else. Try to keep it in the background as best as you can. Sounds like you’re on the right track. Keep it up!! :)

@Kdeemz Thank you. How often do you have bad days now? I’ve been doing recovery work now for 4 months. I’ve definitely better when I first started, but I still get thought everyday and have bad moments. I have sudical ocd and that scares me the most. I just was this theme to end more then the rest.

@Fran223 I still have nervous moments everyday. And a bad day happens Once or twice a week. But I realize my definition of a bad day has changed it’s .not as traumatic as they used to be

@Fran223 The new normal thing scares me 😱