- Date posted
- 3y
- Date posted
- 3y
ERP is the gold standard for OCD treatment. It forces you to face your fears. Avoiding your friends is just reinforcing your fears. But I would first seek therapy/treatment before jumping back into hanging out with them. These are just ocd thoughts and feelings and it makes me sad that it’s preventing a real, fulfilling relationship for you.
- Date posted
- 3y
Ok thanks for your reply. I will look into ERP, so far the no contact has been good. When I had contact and was messaging her and got a reply it made me so happy and then I would think of ways to make her happy or have the perfect reply back. I would write notes in my phone and literally say I'll message her on this day and ask this even though I knew I would never break my friends trust or betrayl him I allowed myself to manifest this relationship in my head but talking to her alone was enough to make me happy and it prevented me from any other relationship, how does therapy work on her? I've seen free call to a therapist and then what happens after that, thanks again for your reply
- Date posted
- 3y
I just started seeing an ocd therapist in person. I don’t use NOCD for a therapist but I still think it’s a good resource. I just didn’t go that route. Anyway I don’t know if you have ocd (I’m not a expert) but it definitely sounds like an obsession. They say ANYTHING can be an obsession with OCD… I’ve seen posts on here where the ocd sufferer finds herself obsessing about her sister’s bf but she knows her true self doesn’t want that. They are intrusive bad thoughts, the thoughts of wanting her sister’s bf. Even though the thoughts and feelings feel very real when triggered, she would have to learn to sit with the thoughts and not act on the urges she has. Eventually you get to the point where the thoughts matter less and less to you. It’s hard work but it means getting your life back. I feel like I’m not explaining very well. My past therapist diagnosed me with OCD and she suggested watching Katie D’Ath on YouTube. She gives a good explanation of ocd and erp. She has a lot of videos but they are numbered 1 - 33. The first ones give explanations of ocd and erp. Dr Patrick McGrath also has YouTube explaining ocd and erp.
- Date posted
- 3y
Ok thanks again for your help, I'll look into both those YouTube videos and try to use ERP to treat my OCD. I have just allowed my mind to develop an obsession about this person that it becomes a daily habit to think about them. It's comforting to know people have gone something similar and there's proven methods or startgeies to prevent or minimise the effects of my obsession. I will look into the YouTube videos and try to incorporate ERP into my daily life and hopefully over time these thoughts begin to fade or become alot less frequent and if that dosnt work I'll seek out a professional who deals directly in ERP therapy. Thanks again for your help, I appreciate it alot
- Date posted
- 3y
There are also books and support groups. Good luck. I personally like the mindfulness workbook for ocd by Jon Hershfield.
Related posts
- Date posted
- 21w
I’m a good man and I know that. My OCD revolves around relationships. While dating someone a truly enjoy, I find myself needing to compulse everything on my mind or else I feel like I’m being a liar or keeping secrets. I also am pretty confident I suffer from false memory ocd. I don’t like to put a label on things but I’m 99.9% sure I do. My compulsions a lot of times come from things I’m not even sure are real. The more thought I put into them, the more I start to believe they are real. One of the worst compulsions I had in my relationship was I had a thought “what if I find my ex more attractive” and “what if I thought the sex with them was better”. I ended up compulsing these things to my gf. After lots of time to think and get a ahold of myself I was able to remind myself that these things weren’t true and I was just in a downward spiral. There was a 2-3 month period where every time I was relieved of something then I would instantly think of something else. These compulsions have caused insecurity in my gf and I feel like a terrible person. Never meant to hurt her at all and was just trying to find a sense of relief. While I know it is not true, I can’t fix things with words and I feel terrible. I would love to hear from people with tricks and strategies that can help. I love my gf and want to fix things and understand this is not a relationship fixer app but I would like to know what are some ways you are able to deal with these kind of things.
- Date posted
- 16w
I’ve posted this under a comment before, but if anyone has the time to read it and maybe share their experience or tips with me, I would really appreciate it. This is just kind of the reason why Idk if I only have OCD or if I should get checked for BPD aswell as emotional dependency is (as far as I know) not a common symptom of OCD and neither are excessive changes in emotions/moods. I think the worst part my situation is that one of my biggest and most damaging if not destructive obsessions I developed earlier this year was this constant fear that my friend would lie to me about meeting up with a boy she liked (we are both girls and queer, she didn’t know that about me until recently, but I’ve known that she is and we both sort of crushed on each other). Not just lie, but do it behind my back, keep it a secret, and then maybe even end our friendship without saying anything. And the thing is... that basically happened. Two weeks ago she started acting strange one day out of nowhere, and then I found out (through another friend) that he was coming over to her place. We had already talked about this before, I had cried in front of her and confessed how much it hurt me. I know doing that probably wasn’t the healthiest thing, but my emotions completely overwhelmed me in that moment. And even though nothing physical happened between them, it still felt like a betrayal. I’m not saying it was cheating, obviously not, we’re not in a relationship and it is unfair of me to try and tell her who or not to date, but it still hurts. Especially as weeks ago, we already had a detailed conversation about this. She told me she didn’t actually like him that much, and that if they were going to meet again, she’d be honest with me about it. But instead of being honest that day, she said nothing. Worse, she suddenly stopped talking to me, which made me think I had done something wrong so I completely lost my mind. She knows I’m emotionally dependent on her to some extent, so when she goes cold or distant, I spiral. And that day, I saw them talking and going quiet as I walked by, and then she literally turned to walk into a different direction. I don’t know why but it just crushed me. I thought she was mad at me, and I just felt like I was being shut out and lied to. And as I’ve mentioned, later that day, after eight hours of crying, another friend told me what really happened. She even drove me to her place so we could talk. We did talk, but since then, we haven’t had any contact. And it’s driving me absolutely insane. She told me it would be “people-pleasing” if she didn’t try to date him. And I know she’s kind of right, but she still lied to me. She didn’t care if that meant that she would throw away our friendship, or at least she treated it like it was worth less than a potential (!) relationship with a guy who, as far as I know, didn’t even respond when she told him she had feelings for him. It’s honestly devastating. I feel betrayed, discarded, and totally lost and I know I can’t even logically be mad at her as the reason she didn’t tell me is obvious and as a good friend I should just be happy for her, but my emotional side is so much stronger than my logic.
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- Date posted
- 14w
I’m gonna try to make this make sense, and any support or advice would be great. I have a beautiful girlfriend, who I’ve been dating off and on for a year. We were really rocky but got our shit figured out 4 months ago and have been strong since. I truly love this girl more than I’ve loved anyone. And I know based off the sheer amount of ocd that has come up on our relationship, that she means a lot to me. Me and her were in a friend group in 2022 and we never liked each other. However she had a sexual relationship with one of my old friends. Fast forward to now I haven’t talked to him in a long time and I don’t see it as an issue. However… I keep having this vivid flashback to him touching her some kinda way in 2022. I can’t remember exactly what happened or the details but it’s running through my head. I guess this is retroactive jealousy but it’s really almost hurting my feelings. I wish it would stop but I know ocd doesn’t work that way. I just wanna be happy with my girl and not upset at her past experiences
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