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I want to start by saying this is going to be extremely long, but I’m really in my feelings tonight and I need to share with someone. I am a 20 year old female. When I was 7-8 I was molested by my sister who was about 12 at the time. I won’t go into detail about what she did, because it’s not what is important here. I thought there was something wrong with me because it felt good to me. I used to ask my family if the world ended, if all kids would go to heaven. I used to pray that the world would end because I thought if I grew up to be an adult, that I would go to hell. I finally told my grandma, who told my mom. They told me that it was normal, every kid does it, and we were just “experimenting”. I was never put into therapy for it or anything, and looking back this is exactly where my OCD started. I remember overhearing my mom on the phone talking to someone about how “gay people go to hell” (I just want to say that I do not believe this. I am a Christian but I completely support the gay community). After I heard this I went up in the bathtub and just laid there and cried until my grandma got home because I thought what my sister did to me made me gay. I thought I was going to hell for what she did to me. I soon became a severe germaphobe. I would touch something and then all day worry if someone touched it who had some serious illness and I was going to die. I also had severe separation anxiety from my mom. She would drop me off at school and the principal would have to come outside and drag me into the school because I would scream and cry. The next few years I had a lot of thoughts of “I know I didn’t do (insert any bad thing possible) but what if I did and just don’t remember?” I try not to blame my grandma and my mom, but sometimes it’s hard. I always wonder how different my life would have been if they would’ve gotten me therapy at a young age. There was suspicion not too long ago that my sister’s husband may have molested my nephew. My grandma was in the middle of fighting for custody of my niece and nephew, and I wanted to talk to her attorney and tell him about what my sister did to me. I thought it may help the case (because my family agrees that they wouldn’t doubt it if my sister wasn’t involved in molesting my nephew as well) but then I realized I would be harming my grandmas case by telling her attorney about how they didn’t do anything for me as a kid when it happened to me. I’m sorry about the length of this, but I just really needed to tell my story. There are only a few people in my life who know about this.

So lately I been feeling depressed about not knowing how to drive believe it or not . I am 19. It honestly embarrasses me That a this age I still rely on parents and younger and older siblings for rides . I get jealous seeing other people already drive . Literally all my friends drive . I’m exhausted . I don’t know what to do . I feel very stuck in life . Drivers Ed next course isn’t until June 20th-July . It’s 500$. I’m so fucking desperate . A new friend from work has said she’s willing to teach me , but I worry she won’t keep that promise. I feel slow mentally lately like I’m losing memory and I don’t comprehend or process things same way anymore . At work, I easily lose memory all sudden and I have tj keep looking up screen no matter how many times I’ve looked my memeory fades away. I’m feeling depressed. Useless. I feel sad I’m not as good as others and they’ll rather put a 17 year old for manager than me . I’m done with everything . Ocd is worsening . My low self esteem/social anxiety is rising .

Hi fellow warriors 🙂I’m sure it’s different for everyone but I would love to hear about your experiences on birth control, I’m thinking either the pill or an iud. Did it worsen your ocd? I had a baby two years ago and am in no place to have another right now, and I want something a little more reliable than a diaphragm. Thanks for sharing anything you’re comfortable with.

I’m really at a loss for what to do. I am constantly stuck 24/7 in manual breathing mode. I also get really bad blinking OCD at times. I’ve tried meditating and i try to sit with my discomfort when it comes up but that doesn’t seem to help. I can’t get my mind off of it at all. I try to sit with it but i still can’t be okay with it. Please help I’m getting to a dark place

I love my religion. I always have. I’ve always strongly believed in it. But what I suspect to be pure O OCD with religious themes is ruining it. Every single day I go through the exact same questions over and over and over and over. “What if you’re brainwashed? What if you’re indoctrinated? What if you’re in a cult? What if you’re being irrational? What if your brain doesn’t work? What if you’re not actually a critical thinker? Why do you believe this? What if it’s all a lie?” None of these thoughts actually correlate with what I actually believe. If a person were to ask me any of those questions I could easily explain it. But why can’t my brain accept it? Why does it have to go over the exact freaking same questions over and over? I’ve been struggling with this for well over a year and a half now. It feels endless. At first they seemed like regular concerns/questions for a deeply religious person who’s growing and maturing. But it has crossed that point. I don’t want my life to be like this anymore. I indulge by reading accounts of ex-Christian’s who are now atheists and so on but doing this feels like a huge waste of time because I can read the same thing over and over again but nothing will change my basic beliefs. Reading what they say is not a choice but feels like an obligation. I have to read what they say and know every single thing about every single religion so that I can feel comfortable in my own. And I’ve done that. But why won’t it stop? I hate that I can’t think of anything else. I don’t enjoy anything. I can’t have a conversation with anyone without zoning out and retreating into my brain. I hate having to force myself to actually engage in life. I hate feeling like my brain doesn’t work. I hate my brain

Why does it feel like I’m accepting it 😞 like I’m so tired of fighting the idea of being a p I just am accepting but I’m also not at the same time, and I’m not anxious. Idk like I don’t want to be around kids because what if I am a p and I’m letting a p be around children?

Does having tired or heave eyes mean you’re depressed

I have dealt with OCD for many, many years. However, last month I read about real-event OCD, and my eyes were opened. I never made the connection with my worry of a real event to OCD. That was life-changing. This real-event OCD has tortured me for too long. It is a nightmare. I now see the need for therapy. I am scared. What if my real event really is that bad? Will my therapist turn me in? Will I go to jail? Will everyone hate me? Am I remembering it correctly? Yet, I have had all the signs of real-event OCD: the ruminating, constantly replaying the event to make sure I have all the details right, googling about it, researching, all or nothing thinking, feeling constant anxiety/guilt, seeking reassurance, a desire to confess, etc. Fear has held me back from seeking counseling. I’ve shared this event with a few very close people and they’ve all blown it off as something minor that happened long ago. Then I worry: what if I didn’t tell them exactly right? What if they are just telling me that because they care about me? Even writing this causes me anxiety/paranoia. Will someone track me down? Will this be used against me? I HATE OCD… especially this version. Yet, this forum has given me hope. Ok, I’m done rambling.

I'm starting to question if love is what I thought it was. No emotion that I've ever felt seems to get close to what I thought love was. I hope to find in this community answers other than "when you know you know", and "when you will find it, it will be clear" The time I felt something similarish to what I thought love was, it was a disaster. Always for people that treated me awefull, that didn't care about me, and to whom I needed to prove my worth every day. I don't think it's possible that love was that.

its crazy what a few weeks can do. i used to be on here everyday scared, helpless, etc because the thoughts were so intense and here i am living alot better than i was. i never thought i’d think normally again. don’t get me wrong i still have the thoughts, there’s some days i still struggle a little and get anxious but they no longer consume my day. i even used to stay busy and the thoughts were always there, i’ve learned to continue my life and the thoughts don’t even have time to bother me. i still have triggers, its all a working process but PLEASE KNOW IT. GETS. BETTER. those thoughts are not you and that’s why they bother us so much. do therapy, get on medication if needed, or dont?? but know people want to help and there’s no time limit everyone is different. don’t think you’re behind or never gonna get better because someone else beat you to it. life gets better. people love you, i love you keep going.

i have rocd and am in a long term relationship. i have a hard time differentiating between obsessive/intrusive thoughts about my relationship comingfrom OCD and actual gut feelings. for 2 years I’ve thought that i need to break up with my partner but i usually dismiss it because i think its rocd. now im worried that it actually means i should break up but i know that after i do i’ll be obsessing whether it was the right decision … does that make sense? don’t know how to separate rocd from “real” feelings

Can it happen where the physical sensation comes first like for example I’ll get the tingling weird feeling In my wrists and then have an intrusive thought like what if I cut them and then I get suppppper scared . It feels real like it’s about to happen

Part of my OCD is always trying to get into the bottom of things (if I freak out thinking about death or illness or losing someone or contamination, then I will roam all the internet for searching for informations on the subject even though it worsens my anxiety and never leaves me with a "clean" feeling of certainty or peace or acceptance). And recently I realized that if I have an anxious thought that arises in my mind it'll just go away if I leave it be and don't stop what I'm doing. But stupidly enough I feel guilty for doing that because I get the feeling that I should engage more with my fears and if I just ignores them and they go away I'm worsening the situation ... What is the line between ignoring the problem by distracting yourself and simply allowing your mind to move on ?

Sometimes it seems like my OCD can go away for weeks at a time, until I sense it looming and comes back at me full force and I fall back into a vicious cycle of obsessions. Does anyone else have long periods of time they feel they don't have as strong symptoms?

it’s really hard to describe my ocd because ocd always says that i’m not doing it right and that i’m lying to make myself look better. but i want to try because i want to feel less alone. i suffer with pocd and this is my first time experiencing sexual intrusive thoughts. they’re primarily focused on my little brother, and a lot of the thoughts are that he looks cute/nice. sometimes i think that the idea of a guy like him would be attractive if the guy was older and not related to me. but ocd simplifies this and says i’m calling my brother attractive. even if i am, i know that thinking someone looks good doesn’t mean you want to date them or hurt them, and the thoughts make me feel sick to my stomach. but part of me agrees that he looks nice, and my head goes “how nice does he look?” “do you mean that romantically or platonically?” “how do you know for sure?” and some days i don’t know how to cope with it, and other days i wonder if it’s really ocd at all or if i’m just a pedo. if anyone has any advice or just has experienced this i would love to know. ocd is so damn isolating.

Does anyone else fear getting so angry that you lose control? I fear this terribly. I’ve been having anger but I knows it’s just because I’m so tired of OCD and dealing with having it. But I fear I’m going to snap and I don’t want to. Please tell me I’m not alone in this. I have a very short patience span, I’m always tensed up and the tiniest thing can make me so angry. I just don’t understand this.

Intrusive thoughts, groinal responses, the feeling of being attracted to children and animals... I read that from other sufferers as well. But besides that, I do a lot of compulsions and I would love to know, if others do them, too. I avoid children as best as I can. When I am outside (not at home), I check toilet cubicles, if there is a children, even under the toilet, toilet seat and in the bin. I look at the pedals and seat in my car to check, that there is no child, before I enter my car and sometimes before I get out. I tie my shoes in a way that the ends of the shoe laces point inwards, because if they brushed a child in anyway, for me that would mean, that I molested a child. I walk weirdly, when children walk behind me, as I don't want to touch them with the heals of my feet I keep huge distances to children. If I have to walk past close, I press my elbows to my sides and hold on to the ribbons of my backpack, as nothing is allowed to touch a child. Sometimes I left a blanket at home, to check no child is there, before I get under neath it. Does anyone do this kind of compulsions, or similar ones?

I'm starting to work on exposure and I find it frustrating. For context, I check my email constantly. So much so, it is my top used app on my phone. My therapist wants me to think about checking it but not check it. This sounds so simple yet my anxiety and discomfort gets so great I can't do it. It's so frustrating!

I only want to be with cis-girls… this does not mean I am transphobic… I respect people no matter what pronouns someone uses and actively try to refer them as such… I just only want to be with cis-girls because they are my preference and being with a cis-girl feels right to me… 😞😞😞

I feel like breaking up is the right thing and it makes me so sad. The other weekend I had one of the best days in terms of feeling in love but I feel like I’m just wasting his life and I simply can’t lead him on anymore. Sorry for posting all the time