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Recently, recovered from soocd and now I have a new them that I’m obsessing over. relationship ocd makes me feel like my boyfriend is going to cheat on me or that he is annoyed by me. I literally just left his place after going out for Valentine’s Day last night. I don’t know why but my brain kept telling me “he’s annoyed by you” “you’re so whiny” “look at his face he’s disgusted by you”, even though we had such a nice time and laughed and talked and cuddle a lot. He is the best boyfriend I’ve ever had. He is so understanding and loving and doesn’t criticize me. This is so irrational but I left his place this morning because I had work earlier than him. I didn’t kiss him on his cheek before I left bc I was running late. So, I texted him telling him I love him and I was running late and he hasn’t responded yet and my brain is telling me he wants to break up now. My brain is like “he should be awake by now” “he doesn’t care”. I absolutely understand this is so stupid but i don’t know how to stop it. How can I move to being confident and comfortable in my relationship without needing reassurance he still cares?

I kept using gender inclusive stuff like “I don’t have anyone in my life” and my HOCD is making me think that I’m homosexual or bisexual in denial… I also kept getting intrusive thoughts of homosexual men in movies and tv shows, intrusive thoughts of being attracted to my guy friends, intrusive feelings that were making it feel so real or weren’t there when intrusive thoughts were happening, accidentally saying homosexual things by accident like “togay” instead of “today”… this has been the worst Valentine’s Day ever…

Hi, I am new here, and am grateful to meet you all. Reading your posts has been helpful for me as a newly diagnosed sufferer of OCD. I’ve had diagnosed panic disorder and anxiety for many years, but finally got a diagnosis of OCD- and it has actually brought me reassurance and validity. My most debilitating obsession is my health, and my compulsion is googling, checking my pulse, and going repeatedly to the doctor. This leads to daily panic attacks. I’d really love to hear from others here who suffer from health anxiety and OCD. I am grateful to be here

Okay I didn’t want to come on here but here I am . If you’ve seen my post before about this theme then you already know a little bit about this . I’ve always wonder have my bf ever r word me but I feel like he has not . Something new I’m starting to worry about is when he does oral on me and after I finish I get sensitive down there if yk what I mean . Like it tickles lol. And he continues to lick and I be pushing his head but he keeps moving y Hands and want to lick more . It’s like I have to “fight” him off . Not like actually fight but yk he wants to continue licking but he stops. But sometimes he moves my hands from pushing his head away and continues to lick and I be like “okay okay okay” like that’s enough . And I even sometimes laugh while saying that . This has never bothered me until I started having this r*pe ocd theme . I keep thinking.l what if it’s r*pe even tho I feel like it’s not and it’s really annoying . To me it’s not r*pe . For me r*pe would be his dick inside me and he doesn’t stop at all when I tell him to and hold me down . But i feel like this isn’t but my mind keeps nagging me about it and I’m scared that other ppl might think it is r*pe . I wonder if there’s ppl out there that don’t think it is r*pe. I even remember seeing a meme about this .

Three years ago I began having intrusive thoughts about my sexuality. I had intrusive thoughts that I was a lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, non binary. So many different things. I thought about my friends in a sexual way. Every female presenting individual i met i thought of them in a sexual way and it got worse over lockdown. I tried to quiet the thoughts but nothing worked. The only thing that helped me was not avoiding the things that triggered me and living my life like I always had done before. I have always loved queer media so I continued to indulge in that. I loved gay story books and YouTubers and i have a lot of queer friends so I stopped isolating myself from them. It was anxiety inducing at first but it was empowering and it helped me a lot. Funnily enough, before I experienced these intrusive thoughts I had been questioning my sexuality for many years. I never felt straight enough. But I knew I wasn’t bisexual or anything else. Last year I realised I was on the asexual spectrum. I have never felt so free and happy. My whole life of questioning my sexuality makes sense. The reason why it was so hard for me to not think my intrusive thought were real was because I’ve questioned my sexuality before. I felt like I didn’t have SOOCD because everyone else seemed to have always known very very well before that they were definitely the sexuality that had always believed themselves to be. But I didn’t feel that way. I knew there was something about me that I didn’t understand. Ofcourse, I still have intrusive thoughts sometimes about my asexuality lol. But I’m so much better at dealing with it. This euphoric feeling I now have of knowing that I wasn’t broken and the answer lay in me all along has been pushing me to ensure I do not experience another 2-year depressive episode induced by OCD. This isn’t to say that you are asexual. I worry people are going to read this and think I’m implying that they are. This is just my very unique story about my experience with sexuality as someone who has questioned it before experience OCD symptoms. I want you all to know that it is possible. You may come out of SOOCD finding something new about yourself or you might not. I found something new and i couldn’t be happier because I spent my whole life being very confused. I know now. I’m asexual and proud 🖤🤍💜

I am in crisis right now because my family just went to a crematorium and came back to my sister's house where I am staying. When she left she put towels in the car and she said she would come in first to see if I needed anything doing before my brother in law and mum came in. But instead my other sister, her boyfriend and my brother came in first from another car because they wanted to see my Dad and my sister who lives here, my mum and brother-in-law all came in at once and everybody started touching everything and my brother in law came in and moved two large packages of mine, bumping the side of the couch where I sit with them. I just talked it through once my brother and sister left for their homes and I am feeling a bit better and there has been some accommodation since then which I know is not ideal but this is a level of contamination to me that is beyond what I am ready for and there is still plenty worrying me. I am not looking for reassurance but help on how to try to accept the uncertainty. My panic keeps welling up then I feel numb to it. Please help. I just feel that everything is covered in contamination from deceased persons which is my worst fear. I just eed support and advice. Will I be able to cope? The reason I am also scared is because last time I was here with my family in the UK (I am squally in the US, things happened where people would not accommodate me and I couldn't cope and I ended up not being able to eat daily, went down to 100lbs or less (measured as a size 2 when I had always been an 11 or 12), was spending 12 hours a day unable to speak if I did eat because it would take rituals for me to feel clean again, and 3 hours after using the toilet so I barely slept but then would wake up crying because it would have to start all over again. So right now I need to be able to cope and shut down my brain which is trying to sort out all the possible cross-contaminations which are very many. I need to accept uncertainty, but also accept that the whole house is not now covered in contamination from the crematorium. Thank you all.

I was diagnosed with ocd in second grade, I’m 21 now.. it started out with me being a “clean freak” I would have melt downs if things were out of place or order. I would also have to sing the abcs while washing my hands. If I was interrupted, I would have to start over. As I became a teen, depression and anxiety hit. This made me become messy in a way. Things being in order didn’t matter. However, intrusive thoughts and repetitiveness took over my brain. (still struggling with this BAD) for example anytime I cook on the stove, I will look to make sure it’s off what seems to be a thousand times or else the house will burn down or we will get carbon monoxide poisoning and it will be all my fault. I KNOW ITS OFF DEEP DOWN but I can’t stop looking at it because WHAT IF. I have the same problem with social media. I have to have my boyfriend check to make sure I didn’t post anything every time I get on Facebook or Snapchat. My brain tells me I posted a stupid picture or something embarrassing knowing damn well I didn’t. I can’t stop. This takes up my life. It’s so draining. Every little thing I do I overthink. I seen this app on TikTok hoping to find my people. I feel like I’m going crazy..

My therapist suggested I really think about which of my worries about germs are based in scientific fact, but when I look things up on the internet, it just gives me more worries. How can I do research when I have contamination ocd? Sorry if this doesn’t make sense

I feel like I’ll get these STRONG feelings that my partner will cheat on me or is cheating on me even though I have little to no evidence of this. We even just had an amazing open and honest talk about where we want our relationship to go and he’s been consistently honest and followed through since we’ve started dating. The problem is that he really enjoys his alone time and there’s huge gaps between text 5-6 hours. This isn’t a change in behavior because it’s been this way since we started dating 4 months ago. But now since I’m falling in love with him I am so worried something terrible will happen or is happening and I ruminate looking for evidence and looking for signs that I’m right everywhere because my biggest fear is being cheated on and lied to for a long period of time without knowing. I do have self esteem issues that I need to work through as well, but it’s hard because I’ve been cheated on before and it was devastating and has left me with more trust issues then I’ve ever had. I’m even open and honest about my fear of cheating and no matter what he says or does it DOESNT alleviate my anxieties and my “gut feelings” (although I hate that term because what even is that?) I waste hours looking at videos, reading articles of cheating partners, the signs to look for, stories of the partners or got cheated on. I know I would never cheat on him, my ocd fixated on what he could do, what is he capable of doing, and how can I protect myself. I’m so exhausted and defeated. What do I do?

***Mentions of emetophobia, germophobia, agoraphobia, & related trigger words/situations*** I feel like there’s something wrong with me because I really don’t like kids, partially due to severe emetophobia (I’ll explain) & partially due to my complete lack of maternal instincts or desire to procreate. Both reasons make me feel inadequate as a human. Here’s the deal: I’ve tried to like kids because I feel like I’m supposed to, but they actually frighten me & make me extremely uncomfortable. Interacting with them feels completely unnatural. I’ve never been able to bond with kids, not even the ones in my own family like my cousins. My emetophobia is crippling. Kids always seem to have a contagious illness. Exposure to stomach viruses, seeing someone vomit, and having my own vomiting incident are my absolute WORST NIGHTMARES. If I’m anywhere near a kid, I’m terrified I’ll be infected by them whether they’re actually sick or perfectly healthy. I can’t relax if I see or walk past a kid in a grocery store, a restaurant, or wherever because of the possibility they’ll vomit & cause me to vomit, too. I hold my breath when I’m near them to prevent breathing in their germs. It started in daycare/pre-K/elementary school because kids would vomit in front of me every single day. I’m not exaggerating. It was torture. I developed intense agoraphobia because I saw so many kids vomit in public places, & because I had my own traumatic vomiting incident. To be clear, I’d never be rude to kids, but I also can never relax or enjoy being remotely near them due to my emetophobia & lack of any loving connection with them. Am I broken? Am I a bad person? Society is constantly telling women we should want kids & the fact is that I don’t want anything to do with them. What worries me is that I don’t think I’d want them or like them even if I didn’t have emetophobia contributing to my avoidance. I don’t know if this is a related issue, but I was diagnosed with autism as well as OCD & I wonder if that affects my ability to form connections. What if I’m a sociopath and I don’t know it? These were a lot of thoughts but I had to get them off my chest here because I feel like people on these message boards will be much kinder and more understanding than people on Facebook or Instagram.

I don’t like the ERP for Harm OCD because I feel like I’m careless purposely to prove something to myself like I feel like I genuinely try to do something. Has anyone else felt this way?

So, i just seen a post talking about why logic doesnt work? But really why doesnt it? why cant i just say hey thats not true that doesnt even work? is this just another effect of ocd? The inability to understand the true logic behind it so it can hind the fear?

One thought that suddenly came to me was ‘stop trying to find peace in violence’ it’s become a regular habit of mine to ‘test myself’ on intrusive thoughts, which entails me deliberately imagining and intrusive thought that bothers me to see how I respond and how anxious I will get over it. It’s become a very bad habit to the point that everyday I am ‘testing myself’ I am hoping that by imagining the thought I will get a disgusted feeling or start feeling anxious to prove that I ‘Don’t like that thought’ except I ran into a problem where sometimes I get anxious and feel ‘disgust’ over the thought but a lot of them times when I deliberately imagine the thought it felt super real and worse and even to the point where I would have the thought and it felt like ‘I liked the feeling of imagining doing that action’ in that horrible intrusive thought which made me get into such a bad state of worry. But I jsut thought to myself ‘why are you trying to find peace in violence?’ How is imagining something violent or something horrible going to give you peace? I was under the illusion that ‘testing myself’ will make me feel better because it will let me know I don’t like the thought but it backfired and made me feel even worse. Because it’s absurd to think for a moment that imagining something so awful could bring you ‘peace’. If you want to feel peaceful are you going to watch a violent film? No. You are going to watch something light hearted, like a romance or comedy or something. There is no peace to be found in something violent. So if you are struggling with ‘testing yourself’ you need to know that it will never give you peace, your brain will always come up with something new or doubt your feelings or not believe the evidence because that’s the nature of this problem, to DOUBT. Obviously easier said than done though, it’s been a habit for months now, the worst part of it is, before I knew I hated the thoughts because as soon as they would come I would hate it but since ‘testing myself’ it made me get use to thinking of the thoughts and now I can bring on the thoughts no problem and not get anxious but then the fact I don’t get anxious makes me worry and stress even more. Dwelling on intrusive thoughts or deliberately imagining scenarios where your acting on these horrible thoughts is not going to help you, it’s just feeding the obsession and making your fears worse, it will never bring you peace of mind, so stop trying to look for answers/peace in violent thoughts because you will never find it. I don’t know what ever gave me the impression that deliberately imagining my intrusive thoughts in so much detail would make me suddenly think ‘oh yes I definitely hate that’ I can move on with my day peacefully now’ because that’s not the case, at least for me it just made it ten times worse the questioning became worse, I started focusing all my energy on how I feel and whether I hate the thoughts or not and it became an everyday thing

For anyone who has recovered or found ERP helpful, can you please share your best tips pr words of encouragement for doing the hard work of leaning into uncertainty? So many of us on here, myself included, are really struggling to accept uncertainty and not seek or give ourselves reassurance. It's really fucking hard not to, especially when our OCD is demanding that we find answers, resolve our worries, and get rid of the anxiety. I feel like hearing even just a few words of encouragement from those who have done the hard work could be so helpful for those of us who want freedom from OCD but are so afraid to give up our compulsions.

Hey All, I’ve suffered from contamination OCD for almost 10 years. It ranged from fears and unwanted thoughts about getting a basic flu to contracting something life threatening by engaging in everyday activities. I’ve been so excited about the progress I’ve made over the last year, and have been getting more time back in my life, and have been just generally more happy and peaceful. However, on Sunday, I was taking my dog for a walk on trails that I frequent in the neighborhood. I love them because they’re not traveled much and if they are, it’s local folks. Anyway, while I was on the walk, I tried to get out of my comfort zone and not go on my “approved route.” So, I went for a longer walk. My dog and I jumped over a little snow bank to cross the path and stepped over a condom on the ground. I have no idea if it was used or not (it wasn’t unrolled so hoping and preying it was not). However, I freaked out and had to experience unmanageable discomfort and pain, frankly. I bathed my dog after, wiped the floors quickly, showered myself, washed all the clothes I was wearing and have not touched the boots I was wearing on the hike. I’m struggling petting, or even basic interactions with my dog now, who I love so freaking much. It’s tearing me apart. I was to sit and let the anxiety in, but I haven’t experienced a scenario of this magnitude before and I’m really struggling moving on. I try and think: what would a normal person have done or do? I can’t reconcile my behaviors as extreme, and frankly, maybe I should have done more which is now causing the uncertainty and discomfort. Anyway, wanted to share. I know we’re not supposed to do this but I just want to know that everything is okay and I just want to move on but I’m stuck. OCD remains my greatest challenge and I will never give up fighting it but the likes of normal and ocd behavior have been blurred for so long I’m struggling with how to respond. Matt

Anybody scared or worried about becoming depressed? ?

I’ve been feeling on edge since I woke up, last night my mum was sleeping and I was deliberately having the thoughts (testing myself) and my head was flinching when having the thoughts and it felt like I didn’t want to do that, but other times it feels like I do want to do that or like the feeling of imagining doing that (the thoughts are about smothering) but now all day I’ve been down because I feel uneasy and on edge and still worried I like the feeling of doing that, and also feeling guilty and like I’m evil because I’m as having the thought while my mum was asleep and I even turned on the light to look at her and try to imagine the thought because I’m testing myself and now I’m thinking oh my god why was I doing that and say if I actually did do that in that moment and I’m worried 😞😞 I started crying after I done those test thoughts but still don’t believe I’m good or not evil 😞

Logic and OCD - It feels like if we could just convince our brain, "this isn't logical", then we should be able to get over the obsession, right? Unfortunately, this isn't the case. I know for me, I ended up giving myself constant reassurance prior to ERP therapy but telling myself, "but that isn't logical" or "but logically, this person is proving they care" or "but I liked someone who looked similar, so of course logically I am attracted to my boyfriend" Yet, time and time again I would come back to the same questions, obsessions, and compulsions. Do you find yourself trying to logic your way out of OCD? What did you think of this video? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

I have contamination OCD, and have had it for years but the past year I felt I was really making progress with it, being much more fearless and confronting and doing the things I feared. However, a lot of stuff has happened in my personal life recently, which has triggered my anxiety and OCD to get MUCH worse. Some of it is specific to the OCD itself with some comments being made about how I don't try to get better from people who do not even understand OCD, when everyday I work so hard on exposure therapy. People close to me have also been telling me more about liquids and fluids that they have spread around the house when I have asked them not to because it makes me more anxious and makes my OCD more difficult to confront. I'm writing this because I was so proud of the progress I had made, and now I feel I'm back to square one. I just tried to have a shower, and ended up crying and nearly throwing up because I was so anxious, I used so much soap and was anxious getting out and getting dressed. I'm really disappointed in the reversion because the last time I felt that anxious was a year ago before I started trying to get better. What am I supposed to do when the people in my life do things that hurt me and raise my anxiety levels? I've thrown all my progress away because of their hurtful actions.

I’ve washed my hands until I had contact dermatitis before and my hands bled. I’m on top of that now. I was with only water unless they are really dirty then I use soap. My brain keeps on telling me that this isn’t enough and it is dirty. Can someone give me a bit of common sense please so I can avoid scaly hands