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What medication do you guys recommend for OCD?

I have suffered with HOCD for over four years. Even though my compulsions have decreased, I still have zero libido which is making me doubt everything. I feel like I am asexual and I’m just tired of living this way. I t hurts my heart that one tiny little thing (OCD) has completely destroyed my life and I feel like there is no way out of this. I’ve done ERP therapy, still no sex drive. I now feel so scared when I imagine myself in a relationship and I don’t know if that scared feeling is truly me or my OCD. I am totally hopeless. I don’t see myself ever getting married, having a boyfriend, or ever having a crush again. I don’t want to live my life like this, this isn’t living. I had so many plans for my future but now it seems like I’ll never reach them because of this burden.

my intrusive thoughts are so scary and i hate it so much. they are also just so annoying it makes me cry a lot. i don’t wanna live like this im only a child. (i am not suicidal btw im just upset)

this has been happening for a couple of years now but it has been plaguing me even more lately but i find it SO HARD to stop feeling weird and overly conscious of myself around other people. like i cannot stop myself from thinking that everyone thinks im acting weird and being awkward. My brain keeps telling me that anytime i open my mouth i sound stupid and childish (another things I've been struggling w: actually feeling like an adult) and i feel like i can't be in public sometimes bc it's too overwhelming to interact with others. this doesn't happen to me w people who are close to me thankfully, but anytime im around anyone who is new in my life, such as the people at the place where i volunteer, i feel this overwhelming sensation of desperation to not come off as socially inept. The social anxiety is causing me to have all these chaotic and very useless thoughts that i know are not true. Like i highly doubt people are having negative thoughts about me and my behavior but my brain refuses to accept that and keeps whispering "they don't like you, you're annoying them, they don't want you here, they thought what you just said was stupid, etc" I wish i could go back to the times where i didn't feel all of these things so strongly!!! Like what went wrong!!! (I mean I can think of a few reasons but still. I thought getting older would mean I could shed some of my fears. Not that they would get worse) anyway im sure there are other ppl who can relate. If anyone has advice about how to deal w these feelings, I appreciate it <3

for the last several months, OCD has had an absolute chokehold on my career as a self employed artist. Just constant new subtypes and intrusive thoughts popping up one right after the other, all boiling down to the fear of me potentially losing my career. I'm not currently in therapy (nOCD does not take my insurance) but currently waiting to hear back from a therapist and OCD specialist while taking advice from OCD resources in the meantime. I've been doing everything I possibly can to keep my life going and working through my OCD, but it is so exhausting. I'll be working on a project and when intrusive thoughts pop into my head, I do my best to do some self ERP and tell myself the usual "well, maybe!", or "oh well!" ect, ect. but the anxiety will still linger and i will experience such extreme anxiety symptoms like sweating, dizziness, disassociation, and nausea to the point i will start gagging while I'm still trying to get my work done. It's become physically debilitating to deal with, it takes so much longer for me to finish work, and I don't even enjoy what I've created once it's done. I decided in a few weeks I'm going to take a short hiatus from my art account, so I can take a break from having to deal with the constant physical symptoms ontop of dealing with social media/algorithms which have also been frustrating me. I even plan to wipe my page so I can come back to a clean slate when I decide I'm ready to post again. But now my OCD has taken a hold of me wanting to take a step back. 'What if you don't recover when you come back?' 'What are you hiding/running from?' 'Maybe OCD is just telling you to take a break?' I am so tired lol. I don't know what the right choice is for me right now. But I do want to take a step back from work to work on my mental and physical health. So I think I'm at least going to listen to what my body and brain needs. if anyone has some advice or words of encouragement (not reassurance) pleaaase drop it here bc I'm gunna need it!!

Does anyone else do repetitive actions?? And I’m not talking about when we think “oh I have to do this three times or else my family will die”, I mean more like turning on the shower and just sitting there while it runs bc it’s the only thing that brings me comfort. I know it’s horrible of me and a waste of water which is why I’m trying to stop and find something else that brings me that comfort. But when my ocd strikes I just wanna sit in the bathroom with the shower on😭

Hi all, I’m new here. For the past 5ish years of my life I have lived with what I called health anxiety but recently have been researching more into OCD and I’m wondering if that’s what I might actually suffer from. I have tried multiple different therapists and types of therapy (mostly CBT and talk) but nothing has helped me. Every day I think about death and it plagues most of my thoughts in any given scenario. Usually I think about it in terms of myself because I am terrified of dying young but slightly less often I obsess over losing my husband as well. For myself this usually manifests as thinking I have specific diseases (cancer, bone disease, heart conditions, brain tumors) that are undiagnosed and underlying. I am doing constant checks and googling of my symptoms and thinking about what will happen after I die and how it will affect my loved ones and everything around me. I also become very triggered when I hear about young people dying and whenever I hear something like that or see something on social media about death or disease I think it’s a sign from the universe about myself and I spiral. I am terrified of the doctor so I actually haven’t been in a very long time but I have been trying to talk myself into getting blood tests. I’m just terrified of hearing what I feel are going to be bad results. I try not to think about my thoughts because I also have thoughts that thinking this way will manifest bad health even if I don’t already have it so then I become in an obsessive loop of thinking and then thinking about not thinking and then thinking about thinking about not thinking … I don’t know if any of this makes sense and I don’t know what I can do at this point but I am just so so exhausted of living my life this way so here is my word vomit.

I’m looking into different supplements and I’ve heard good things about N-Acetyl Cysteine (Nac) to help with OCD, but wanted to ask if anyone has had success with it? Of course I’d need to ask my doctor about it too, but just wanted to hear from you guys as well.

I just cannot accept being a lesbian. I can’t. I don’t want it

I haven’t done a Q&A in a long time, but I finally have a few hours of free time! Please ask any and all questions about OCD and I’ll do my best to answer ❤️

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to stop ‘joy checking’? Like I feel the need to keep checking my emotional state, both in the moment and in the past, to make sure I am feeling happy and joyful. This is due to my fear of developing depression which will lead to suicide (or so my ocd tells me). It’s quite distressing. Any suggestions? Thanks so much!

My fiancée and I are planning a wedding and up until recently I haven’t had any “cold feet” or doubt, but now that the wedding is getting closer and closer I’m feeling very anxious about if he’s “the one.” I love him so deeply but I think the permanence of marriage is scaring me. Like I would spend my whole life with him but now that there’s a label on it I’m freaked out?? He’s done nothing to cause this either. He’s an amazing beautiful lovely soul that I would LOVE to spend my life with. I just can’t get over the ruminating part of it. :( I wish I didn’t feel like this. I’ve posted about my ROC before and have posted one during this engagement process. it comes and goes but I’m just feeling very sad that it’s ruining this period of time for me.

I have the “i want to die thougt” everyday!!! Is this normal with suicidal ocd?? Anyone relate?

This is so bad I don’t know how I’m going to survive this life this new problem I have is taking its toll on me I feel like life isn’t the same now. No one cares no one understands. I started suddenly having pocd I’ve never had it before But I deliberately imagined something really disgusting about licking/sucking and it’s bad and I imagined it on purpose it wasn’t an intrusive thoguht but I don’t. Feel disgusted or anxious or anything I jsut feel nothing now I keep imagining it in hope I will get anxiety but I feel like I can make myself have shudders/anxiety on demand so I think it’s fake now and Soemone on here wrote as long as you feel disgusted that means it’s not a desire and your not a p but now I don’t know what I feel and i just want to live a normal life

I’m trying to figure out the best medicine for ocd/anxiety I’m currently taking 20mg of Prozac and have been taking it for awhile but no success. Can anyone tell me what they are taking and how it’s helped them

My real event OCD has mostly gotten better over the past year. I've come to terms with my events and even though sometimes they make me anxious, I don't have as visceral of a reaction as I used to and im learning to accept that they happened. But sometimes it the thought still hits me that my family wouldn't love me if they knew, my friends wouldn't love me if I knew. I'll never be able to have a romantic partner if anyone knew what I did. That im morally a bad person if I don't tell people. Etc. My event was having unfiltered internet access as a kid and getting exposed to bad fictional porn. Basically having seen a lot of problematic NSFW fiction, mainly feral furry stuff. Its been over a year since I realized how bad that was and stopped. I'm not into animals or anything, was just groomed by an unsafe internet as a kid and it took me a long time to realize that stuff wasnt normal. My biggest shame is that it took me until adulthood to realize. Still, I know not everyone would be understanding of this and think I'm a freak or a z**phile. It sucks because I feel like I need to compulsively confess or else nobody knows the real me or they don't love the real me, and that im hiding that I'm a horrible person. Does anyone have advice on how to deal with these thoughts?

Hi! is it possible to live a happy life with OCD? Can you see OCD as a disorder in which you are sensitive to reacting with obsession and compulsion in stressful situations? I found it very difficult that OCD is an chronic condition. It suggest that things will never get better. how do you guys see this?

Ok… ive had fears of pocd for as long as i can remember when i actually got to baby sit my little cousins those fears went away. But that was years ago and the fears are back. I always do little mental compulsions against them even though i know in therapy you arent supposed to but now… i had a dream and i feel sick… i can lucid dream. And i had a dream about a father and daughter and them growing up and dating one another and being sexually aroused at the end of that dream. I woke up and felt disgusted. Automatically thought suicide. Then questioned if i really had tht dream. I calmed myself by saying that a pedo wouldnt feel so bad about having such a dream but… wouldn’t they? Are there not pedos who wish they werent pedos? I use to ignore every post relating to pocd on here. It was too triggering and i felt like it would just make things worse. And now here i am. I just cant handle this subset my stomach felt sick.. im supposed to be hanging with a loved one but i feel terrible. They sent pictures of their beautiful baby and i feel ashamed looking at them after the dream. In the past when i had a dream like this and was in nocd therapy my therapist said we cant control dreams but i can lucid dream?! So i can control mines knew that was a wrong thought to have (the dad grooming their daughter for when she was an adult to have a relationship with then) and pushed past it until i became uncomfortable enough and woke up…. I cant take anymore.i just cant take it. Im confused on the complete dream

All my days are pretty much consumed by real events I obsess with. I don’t know how to stop. I don’t want to lose my life, but I’m also tired of living like this.

Hi guys also another question I’ve been doing ERP for awhile now. And I’m just getting into exposures and when I’m doing them with my therapist like writing out the things that scare me and saying them out loud it doesn’t seem to scare me. It’s more so when I’m alone having these constant thoughts daily is what becomes overwhelming and makes them feel real. Any insight on this?