"We suffer more in imagination than in reality" - Senaca

Hi all, I’m really grateful for all the support I’ve gotten from people in the last few days. My mental health is at an all time low and I really appreciate the relief people have brought. I had a question about whether an intrusive image of a potentially imagined event can feel just as real as a real memory. I’m doing my best to stop ruminating over an image I have in my head, and have gone so far as requested security footage of myself and have been told both through that and by my friends that nothing bad happened, but the image in my head feels just as real as other memories. I was also drinking the night in question, which makes it harder for me to dismiss the image and makes me feel like I shouldn’t. I was just wondering if imagined images can feel just as real? I’m trying to use tools to ignore the image, and have therapy scheduled for tomorrow, but I feel like I can’t responsibly dismiss the image even with the evidence I’ve gathered if there’s something about a real memory that looks different in the brain and that if so, that suggests my memory is real and I should confess it. I’m really working on stopping reassurance seeking as well, especially now that even after being told that nothing bad happened when the establishment I was at reviewed security footage, my brain is telling me “they’re probably just lying and never reviewed it.” I know I need to just stop ruminating, reassurance seeking, and mentally checking the memory, but I just don’t know if I can/should in case the image is what I should trust more, if that makes sense.

Here is what I say to people: I wish I could make it stop. I really do. I also wish I could stop tinnitus. What is tinnitus, you may ask? Well, have you ever gone to a loud concert and after it had a ringing in your ears. Or, in movies when a loud explosion hears, first it is often muffled, and then there is a very loud ringing sound. Well, I have hear that sound for over 30 years. Turns out the medications I took as a kid for allergies and all the antibiotics I was on for Strep had a side effect for some people - tinnitus - that sound that I have heard every decade, year, month, day, hour, and second, for the past 30 years. I have learned to live with it. As I type this, it is REALLY loud, because I am paying attention to it. But, in a few minutes it will fade into the background, and, while I will hear it, I will not pay much attention to it, and therefore I will go on with my night. I will listen to music, practice my story for the MOTH radio hour, and work out. I will clean up the kitchen and load the dishwasher, and I will eventually get ready for bed. I will go to bed hearing that sound, and fall asleep for a few hours until tomorrow morning when I start the day all over again. I cannot make the sound stop. There is nothing to do for it - no surgery or medication. Just learning to live with it, and that is what I have done. It is the thing that I hate the most in my life, and, if granted three wishes, it would be the first thing to change. For now, as I have for 30 years, I will live with it, and I will ask you to live with your noises in your head - the thoughts, the images, and the urges, and we will practice together accepting that things are not always as we want them, but we can handle that. We got this.

does anyone has any tips how to stop the "what if cycle"?? i have very disturbing what if thoughts on daily basis and they're rlly scary always. i know they're not real but sometimes they feel so real and possible to happen and i hate this