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the NOCD Community

I started lexapro a week ago and I feel that it’s making my anxiety worse. Does anyone have experience taking lexapro? Did you notice the same? Thanks!

Has anyone ever had an intrusive thought that they have a crush on someone else while they’re in a relationship? I had an intrusive thought about one of my co-workers who is female. I don’t believe I am even gay but for a moment I had a small panic attack that I had a crush on her. I know I love my boyfriend and want to be with him but now I feel like I betrayed him by thinking about someone else like that even though it was an accident. I know I can’t say anything to him about it because I’m pretty sure the crush isn’t real and it would just make things weird between him and I. Anyone have any suggestions or can relate to this?

I have family coming tomorrow for the first time to see my new place and I want to be excited because I love them, then there’s OCD, which ruins everything. I need my family not to worry about me. They don’t know how much I’m struggling. Asking for prayers ❤️

I was diagnosed with ocd like 2 months ago. I have excessive rumination about my orientation. As long as I can remember I’ve only been attracted to woman and never with men. I’m having intrusive thoughts like I’m gay and that u have to come out to everyone because your gay. I’m just worry I’m in denial.

Is there anyone out there who suffers from probably the worst kind of ocd, the so called emotional or thought contamination ocd? I have lost basically almost all one can lose in life because of it. It almost ruined my life. I've been seeing a psychiatrists and a clinical psychologist, but none of them have much knowledge of ocd in general , and have never Heard of my type of ocd. I get no support whatsoever. I am all alone fighting Ocd, Well with the help of an AD, that helps somewhat, but has such side effects that I can hardly function anymore. Without it, I would have killed myself sooner or later. Exposure Response prevention therapy is not for me. I would rather commit suicide. I dont know how to fight it. Is there anyone outthere who knows what I am talking about? Is there Anyone who has actually found a way to wink the war with ocd? I only have a husband. Nobody Else. He's been through hell with me. How do I help him understand what I am going through and why and what ocd is. I dont want ocd Take him away too. I've lost everybody Else due to ocd. I feel so much love and compassion for each and everyone of you suffering with ocd. I wish I could hug you all. I Feel So hopeless from time to time and I wish I had someone who understands to hug me. My hubby is far away for the time being on account of his job. Well, He would hug me, but still, after 18 years together, he does not understand it. My Best wishes to All of you. Love.

Hi there, I’ve been dealing with OCD (harm) most of my life but was just diagnosed at 30 years old.. I am now a mom of an amazing 2 year old so when my OCD flares up it’s a bit more disturbing to me than it was in my past.. news stories have always triggered me. And most recently there was the story of the nurse mom who strangled her 3 kids and tried to kill herself. I’m obsessing over it, comparing myself to her trying to convince myself I would never do that, looking into the story on the internet, the whole 5 yards… I just can’t stop thinking of this woman and I’m so disturbed and scared, it’s making my OCD so much worse. I just started treatment last week and I can’t wait to learn the tools I need to help. But I wanted your guys opinion as well. And was curious if there’s any other moms on here that struggle and how they cope ♥️

I’m not going to harm myself but I’m ready for god to come take me out of here . I’m tired of dealing with this 😭😭😭

For everyone who believes In Christ don’t let your faith waver because of this, no matter the theme remember that if we are able to overcome this mental hell then it is a testament to his sovereign power. Let His love and grace saturate you and illuminate out of you, I know how low the lows can get and your emotions are valid, He also will never change and His word endures forever. “I can do all this through him who gives me strength.” Philippians 4:13

So recently things have started to take a turn for me. In January I started having awful harm intrusive thoughts. It was awful and I couldn’t get out of the house for weeks. I was scared to be around anyone and even my boyfriend thinking I would lose control. Recently I have got ahold of these thoughts. I still get them but I am able to shake them off much easier. This happened when I noticed I may have some form of OCD (I have not been clinically diagnosed). As these intrusive thoughts have been easier to manage all of the sudden I have a near fear that circles my head often… the fear of a psychosis or schizophrenia… I am constantly on edge recently. It is almost like the moment I noticed my intrusive thoughts were just thoughts… my brain found something else to worry about. I have not hallucinated or heard things that were not there. But I am TERRIFIED that I will. For example… I’ll look down a hallway and be convinced if I look hard enough for long enough I will hallucinate. Or I will have an image in my head of an object while I’m driving that is in my house and I’m scared that I will hallucinate the object moving when I get home. I’ve become very afraid I will lose touch with reality. I have told myself they are just thoughts. Which I know they are. But this has become very distressing for me. Also, I am a performer and I’ve had the fear that I will get on stage and I will see a hallucination in the audience. Which I know won’t happen. I just can’t stop circling in my head about this. If anyone has any suggestions on things that have helped them or have the same story feel free to chime in. I’m really sad, I’m tired and I’m sick of living in constant fear that I have a psychosis and I’m tired of living with intrusive thoughts (I know I’m not the only one). This is very new to me and I would love help and encouraging words. Thanks so much everyone.

Anyone know how to miraculously reignite a flame? I’ve been trying to tell my husband I’m unhappy but he told me last night it sounds like a heart issue/spiritual problem. He said I was unhappy before we got together (I was struggling with depression and got on meds), but I’m just not really happy with my life lately. I don’t feel like I have any choice but to stick it out cause we’re married. He said he’s just waiting for me to come around and that he’s fine, he’s not going to voice his opinion anymore and just let me do whatever I want. I’m going to look into counseling again for us but I just feel kinda numb. It’s nice to have someone close but I wouldn’t say “I’m happily married.” I didn’t think I’d feel this way so often when I’ve been married only a year. I feel alone in a lot of ways. Should I just keep trying to do things that make me happy and just accept what is?

How do you deal with ocd latching onto some you care for? Not once in a million years did I think I would be struggling with this. It’s awful because I genuinely don’t know who I am anymore. I feel so confused most of the time and I hate not knowing how I truly feel because of the doubt. My mind is scaring me more and more everyday. It tries to trick me in any way possible. I’m worried that one day this will actually be my reality .

Hi guys - writing because I want to know if anyone else has experienced this. Hopefully so! I have seen people in here articulate the situation with OCD, commonly with Harm, where they feel “evil”, their intrusive thoughts are “I want to do X evil thing”, there is little/no anxiety present. I have experienced that on and off for the past few months, and it’s truly terrifying. I reguarly experience bouts of dissociation where things either feel ultra real/I”m hyper aware that I’m experiencing life through a set of eyes, in a body, look at my hands, they don’t feel like mine. Etc etc. Standard dissociation stuff. I have just about got to grips with it after a very bad episode, triggered by the latest season of “You”. In true OCD style, this harm-evil OCD has manifested into a fear of developing DID/splitting personalities when I experience dissociation and that feeling of “being evil”. So while all that is going on, I’ll look in the mirror and the intrusive thoughts go “I’m not Lucy (my name” and other ridiculous statements in order to participate in the act of being someone with DID. I can see the tricks being played by OCD this time: I have experienced virtually all subtypes, and particularly with schizophrenia OCD and harm, the intrusive thoughts would present as statements that correlated with the theme at hand. Eg schizophrenia “people out to get me” *seeing faces in patterns* (all other things a “schizophrenic” would think; harm “I want to kill this person/I’m going to stab them now”. Blah blah blah. I can see the OCD for what it is and how sophisticated it can be. I am just partially reassurance-seeking, but mostly curious. Has anybody experienced this in a similar way to me? It feels very niche, but I thought that of a lot of my subtypes until I used this app, and felt way less alone! Any tips on how to deal would be great. Thanks in advance!

I hate to keep posting on here as it’s a compulsion but I want to know I’m not crazy, basically through the past 3 weeks I have been stressing over multiple mental issues like.. the world not existing, schizophrenia, harm ocd and then I saw someone mention trans ocd which I did not know was a thing and then I was like am I a boy? And now I’m worrying about dissociative identity disorder, it feels so realistic and I am scared I’m also struggling with depersonalisation at the moment and apparently a lot of people worry about DID with it. It’s basically been a theme of different things to worry about but before this state I would think of these things and I’d be scared but I wouldn’t convince myself of these things? I just wanna know if someone has gone through a similar experience and gotten through it and what to do here.

OCD ruined my life at one point. I'm scared that I can never fully and satisfyingly express/articulate the STRANGE, BIZARRE, and SCARY ways I acted in public. Talking aloud, fiercely, to myself nonstop. Taking my feet out of my shoes and rubbing them incessantly so it would relax me in a specific way that was never achieved. Doing this in all my classes. Having all of my teachers contact my mom talking about my strange behavior. Not being able to tell people the truth about anything. Not being able to adequately express my reasons for doing these things to my mom or siblings or anything. Seeing myself as a martyr for continuing the compulsions and watching them spiral and feeding the spiral because if I didn't I thought I would be depressed forever. Seeing my Being pulled out of school. Having blisters break out all over my feet and having the strong, sweaty smell linger on my feet and my hands. Doing these compulsions at school, at the doctor's office, at church, at giant church gatherings, in front of huge huge crowds during choir performances, at home, in every room, deeming every room contaminated, everywhere, all the time, all-consuming. I sat in the same position I had a whole scheduled network of checkpoints. I continue to be absolutely appalled at what I trained my mind to do. I lost my siblings' trust. I watched them cry and run to my mother after seeing me get a worn-out tank top from the trash because, even though rubbing it around my waist didn't relieve me anymore, it was less emotionally contaminated than the other one I wore. Then I wrapped it around my waist and tugged and tugged as if no one was nearby, even though I knew my brother was in the room and that he was gawking at me sobbing and blubbering, "Why did she get it out? Why did she get it out of the trash?" I could only wear very very specific clothes with very specific textures. Soon, rubbing with the cloth didn't do anything. I needed a more intense sensation around my waist, to zap my brain the right way and give me some comfort. Bear in mind that, all the way through this, I was NEVER comfortable. I was in MISERABLE MISERABLE AGONIZING SOUL-CRUSHING PAIN. My thoughts were stabbing ny heart, telling me how horrible I was, how horrible the world was, how every single object and person and idea and dialogue and action and movement was HIGHLY CONTAMINATED, indicative of my less-peaceful past, and I needed to press EVERY SINGLE external and internal stimulus through MY SACRED FILTER or GOD'S SACRED FILTER to retain peace, stay PERFECTLY FOCUSED, and succeed in every little task PERFECTLY WELL, with no emotional distractions from the people around me (including friends and family), and no extraneous thoughts that distracted me from my holy task in ANY WAY. My mind sped up and sped up and soon I was producing nothing but adrenaline and cortisol. This is according to a psychiatrist. It certainly felt like this. Sometimes, I hear my mom's voice and I think of how she talked to me when I was sitting in a chair hunched over, rubbing my feet, coursing through a million thoughts with my hair thrown over my face. I was in this position for at least fifteen hours every day. Moving or looking up at all erased my spiritual progress. My little brother came home from school one day. He walked in on me in the kitchen. I was home from school. My mom had left me a meal, but the chairs were my safe zones where I could continue rubbing and avoid any distracting stimuli like eating. I couldn't cope with opening my eyes, seeing the world, and moving. At one point, somehow, I actually stood up. But I was stuck there for HOURS, doubled over, jerking crazily and grunting out of exhaustion and anger and desperation. I absolutely could not move until I felt some relief. The amount of distress that came with moving was insurmountable, like I was losing losing losing all my compulsions progress. At one point, I was holding a bowl with my medicine, and I was stuck holding it for so long that I screamed with all of the anger in my lungs (I had been quiet as possible before then), hurled the bowl at the floor, and quickly returned to rubbing. I was still standing up, doubled over. This is how my little brother found me when he walked in from school. He said, "I'm home..." then, "Oh," in dismay. I was grunting, panting, and desperately twisting the tank top around my waist. Everything was pitch black for me because, for 95 percebt of the day, my eyes were clamped shut and my face was hidden behind my hair and I was doubled over. I jerked and twisted like a zombie, staying in one place and exhibiting no awareness of my surroundings. I heard my brother scramble up the stairs and call my mom. He started sobbing about how he found me. I put my siblings through a traumatizing situation. I made their home lives distressing. I don't give a damn if it's my fault. I feel like it's impossible to overcome the pain of losing their trust and making them both sob the way they did. Their cries deeply wound and haunt me. I thought I lost the respect of everyone I loved. Again, I don't give a damn if it was my fault or not. I was super concerned about my friends' thoughts, but my siblings' and mom's most of all. I wrecked my mom's life. I did. Every day she was on the phone talking to a friend about my mental breakdown. Between bouts of compulsions and not eating the waffles she made me, I looked up in brief, distracted moments and saw her inside or on the porch sobbing in the phone. I became an animal. My family didn't address me. They talked about me in the room like I wasn't there. All the time, every day, while my face was in my hair. My brother said to my sister and maybe to me that he had researched it and he was certain I was schizophrenic. In any case, I fully heard him, and for a minute, I was the pain and frustration and anguish in his eyes. It's been three years. I was an insane person. My mom told me to my face that I looked like I was going to kill her. This was after she pinned me down in my bed because I would never stop rubbing and trying to get relief. I was furious at her and I wouldn't stay still. I rebelled and disobeyed my mom because I thought I was a martyr---Mom, I'm so sorry, but you don't understand---I MUST and WILL fulfill this noble cause of rubbing my feet and rubbing my tank top around my waist even though I'm bleeding and wounded and raw. It's okay that I'm bleeding; it's GOOD to suffer if it's for a greater cause. I'll suffer forever and ever. This was all about 3 years ago and I don't know if I will ever overcome the shock of this horrible hell.

Any automotive techs here with OCD?

Lately I’ve been hearing that criminality is a social construct and people agreeing and explaining and it’s super triggering with my sensitive ocd brain because then I start thinking my harm and horrible ocd thoughts are going to come true and that I’m going to start thinking it’s ok to do bad things ugh😭

I struggle with taboo themes, so I'm usually always depressed (diagnosed with major depression) and I lost interest in things I used to enjoy (going outside, drawing, even music) I get triggered sometimes doing fun things because I get intrusive thoughts , and also thoughts that I don't deserve to be happy so I usually just stop halfway through. I've been trying to workout daily and I don't feel happy or like Im doing anything really. I've been in a tough spot since August of 2022. I'm used to being alone,but my family has started working longer shifts so I'm alone at home more than usual. This is scary for me, and also makes me feel like lazy garbage because I could be out with a job like them if I didn't have such bad anxiety. I wish I was normal. I wish I was like my friends who have stable mental health, money, a car etc. Then again even if I did have those things I'd still feel empty. I feel stuck and don't see a point in life sometimes if I'm suffering every day and I have to do the most just to feel okay. My theme will always just make me plummet and feel like I'm not worth anything no matter what.

Does anyone have any advice for overcoming binge eating? I know it doesn’t have much to do with ocd but I did have an unhealthy obsession with eating “right” and would avoided a lot of food on fear of gaining weight. I realised this was unhealthy and I fortunately when I stopped I ended up binge eating and gaining lots of weight back I can feel myself falling back into binge eating again and I don’t even know why I do it it feels almost like a hobby or comfort but I just don’t wanna be fat anymore. What can I do to control this unhealthy habit?

Hello there. So I have harm OCD thoughts about hurting people in general, but they started out as targeted toward my mom, whom I love with all my heart and have a great relationship with. I was starting to feel better after months of struggling, the anxiety associated with the thoughts has lessened. However, the fact the anxiety isn’t as present is freaking me out. I’m not sure if it’s the fact that my meds and ERP are working or if I am becoming okay with the notion of killing people. I keep freaking out because the thoughts about my mom have returned and are really detailed scenarios in which I kill my mom. I don’t want to hurt my anyone, let alone my mom. But every time I tell myself I know i don’t want to do these things, it’s always followed up with, “What if I do want to?” Sometimes my thoughts will even say I want to. But I don’t, but these thoughts come in anyway and I question if I want to no matter how many times I say, “I don’t want to hurt anyone ever.” “What if I’m in denial?” “What if I’m planning?” “Why isn’t there more anxiety like before?” “Am I purposely having these thoughts or are these automatic?” I’m getting really bad suicidal ideations from this because I’m so scared that it is not ocd and I need to take myself out of the equation before I hurt someone. I can’t not say to myself, “I don’t want to hurt anyone ever” because I feel like if I don’t , I’ll suddenly become murderous. I’ve never hurt anyone, I consider myself to be a kind and gentle person, but these thoughts are making me question every aspect of myself. I appreciate any insight anyone may have. I understand this may be triggering to read.

i feel like no matter how hard i try to explain how i am feeling about my current thoughts, im just overthinking everything. if i start to feel bad i get intrusive thoughts that im lying to myself or doing it for attention. its so hard to ask for help when im the inly one having a strong reaction. im not sure if that makes sense but i don’t know what else to do.