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the NOCD Community

I just want to feel normal again. My new theme is destroying me. I feel so lost and I just needed to say it somewhere. I'm glad this group exists. One of my few comforts has been knowing I'm not completely alone.

Went to the church for the second day in a row to help with some decorations. I asked the priest to say a prayer with me. This was the first time in my life I ever said a prayer in church with a priest. It was much needed but I feel horrible I got a bunch of intrusive thoughts throughout the entire time there. I know god loves me but I feel bad for getting these intrusive thoughts. It doesn’t help that I hear people talking the entire time judging me for my thoughts. (I know hearing voices isn’t part of ocd)

unfortunately I'm having a rough few days with OCD this week, even though I'm super excited to be finishing college and making progress in my treatment and therapy, last night I had a dream about an intrusive thought and it made me worry and it's on my mind throughout the day, I couldn't even sleep very well because I kept waking up and ruminating about what that dream could or couldn't mean. I hope tonight is calmer and that it doesn't affect my sleep so much, I really wish I could get rid of OCD for good, it's just too tiring and confusing some days.

Today I feel like I want to d!e and do something to myself for the WHOLE day. Yesterday I was ok. I made sure that my family is with me, even tho I’m not the person to do it, just to feel safer. I need some relief. Does anyone has a suggestion?

I would like to get an answer for this cause i want to know why this keeps happening. I compare myself with others cause i dont see others having the same problem. When they have a setback its usually because of a hard day or a big trigger, however for me its just forgetting what i have to do. A month ago i was really good, i dont say i didnt had setbacks but i saw that im going somewhere, you know the setbacks were weaker and weaker, and one day i just someone understood how emotions and thoughts works and i was able to enjoy my day while i had thoughts and emotions, but it didnt affected me. Then i was like this is so good, but im afraid i will just forget it like everytime and believe me or not, the moment i said it i felt that im slowly losing what i learned and after some time i didnt know what to do with the thoughts and emotions when before i realized it and i was living my life like that. And then i was unable to do the same thing, it was like my brain deleted it. It really feels like theres something wrong with my mind, how it foegets just like that what i did before? And now after 1 month im still struggling, the videos that used to help me and made me realize what i need to do doesnt help me, its like im watching nothing, my mind doesnt realizez this video made me understand what i need to do before, now it doesnt make me do anything. And im keep falling back to the point that my panic attacks are back, and it makes me feel so bad cause it means i did nothing, after all this work it got back and im still dont know how to deal with it. Im feeling like how i felt 2-3 years ago, like these years were nothing. Im really afraid that sometime i will get the night panic attacks again when i will be afraid that i will hurt myself or be afraid of i will unalive myself... It doesnt seems like im learning something. Look st my other posts, it seemd like im so close to recovery and im learning alot, but now if i read those i cant relate to those... its like a different person and it doesnt started slowly, like i engaged in unhealthy behaviours, it all started when i thought "i hope i wont forget this" and then i actually forgot what i learned... just like that... and now im again questioning acceptance, what to do with my emotions when i understood that and i was working on it. Im sitting in bed and i try to remember what i did when i get these bad emotions and all i can remember is when people say "you have to let yourself feel the feelings" and im letting myself but all i do is im drowning in them. After anxiety it comes anger then anxiety again and then im depressed and hopeless and then panic comes... i dont get why letting these to come helps me, it makes me drown and become depressed which will only send me to a therapist who will say accept it too... It doesnt make me learn anything it just drowns me, i dont get this acceptance and letting myself feel bad... Im just letting negative emotions take over me without trying to stop it cause now im accepting it...and it doesnt makes me realize anything.

I’ve suffered with OCD to some extent most of my life—rituals, counting, religious themes, etc. After some bad episodes of family abuse + a bad breakup + work toxicity, I developed some pretty bad OCD-related anxiety. I went through a few very bad panic attacks, and became badly depersonalized/dissacotiated. My obsessions and panic began to focus on my bodily sensations—like vertigo/dizziness, worry about floating into the sky forever, the ground falling, the ground disappearing, the ground warping/rotating, etc. I’ve been applying the 4-Step process by Jeffrey Schwartz, and it’s been very very helpful in snapping back to reality and preventing anxiety/panic cycles. So I got his book—Brain Lock. In the preface he talks about a woman who seemingly recovered after 25 years, but still has these thoughts. My question is: Will I be stuck like this forever? The very nature of my thoughts make it very difficult to live happily. I felt discouraged reading that, because it feels like I’ll always have these thoughts and be doomed to undergoing this anxiety/OCD cycle forever. Is there any hope?

Hiii, I have feeling i found comfort in my OCD and sitting home because of that, i am also so depressed but I can’t change it, i am also doing exposures and going out with my friends, but it gives me anxiety and next day I don’t have energy to do same. What do u think take it slow and do it step by step, or doing as much exposures as I can and try to resist anxiety. Btw I have harm OCD and my biggest fear is to hurt someone, so that is why I prefer to stay at home

So I have been 5 days without intrusive thoughts which is a big accomplishment for me. Yesterday broke the streak. I was job shadowing and this girl i thought was so skinny and pretty how does she not have a boyfriend and i thought I was a dude i wouldn't turn my head away and now I'm thinking no one has said this before and that this means something. I know it's my ocd acting up but it's annoying. Plus it also tried to say in a narrative that sounded like me that I would date her and i immediately felt disturbed which just again told me everything about who I am sexually as a confident and comfortable straight woman

Frist off, I am not asking for reassurance nor do I have concrete plans of suicide, so please don't flag. I am just asking because my therapist was asking if I had Suicidal OCD or actual suicidal ideation, but I am unsure how to exactly tell them apart. I mostly get thoughts of "I am worthless and don't deserve to live" and intrusive images of seeing myself commiting suicide, but they theme ego-dystonic. On the other hand sometimes there are feeling of actual worthlessness and being overwhelmed with life.

I just woke up from a disturbing dream. Here’s what happened in the dream: my family member wakes up from an odd dream, then asks me to look it up. I look it up, then a bunch of LGBTQ+ flags and labels come up. The family member’s dream wasn’t specifically about me, but what if that was some weird sign that I’m not straight? I’m really scared that I’m not straight because yesterday, I was worried about not being straight. I’m not homophobic, just to be clear I just want to be straight. I’ve been straight my whole life, but I’ve always wondered if I am attracted to girls romantically. I know that I’m attracted to them sexually because when I used to watch porn, I would mostly look up girls, but I’m not romantically attracted to them. And I’ve never been attracted to women in person. That dream made me highly uncomfortable because I’ve never thought of myself as anything other than straight because I know that i wouldn’t take a girl serious. Please help, my anxiety is through the roof right now, but also be honest

How do you deal with the feelings of numbness?

I cannot picture myself in a relationship with a woman, never have. Any daydreams/fantasies I have are men. I've always had a new male crush. But because I enjoy GOG pxrn I worry it means I'm into girls in that way. Even chatting to men my ocd is telling me I'm only doing it because I want to prove I'm not into girls. I don't think of women in a sexual way and don't think I'd ever want to. I just enjoy GOG corn but not because of the act because they seem to enjoy it more than straight where its just 10 min BJs lol. Help me out.

does anyone ever feel weird about explaining their compulsions to people? my mom doesn’t believe i have ocd (haven’t been diagnosed) because she hasn’t “seen” me do compulsions and when i try to explain it to her, i just feel so awkward. another thing is most of my compulsions are more of an in the moment thing than me doing the same thing everyday. while i do have ones that are typically a daily occurrence, mine are reliant on being in the moment and when i need do something a number of times to feel “just right” if that makes sense. anyways, it’s just hard to explain that to people and i almost feel embarrassed to. i know i shouldn’t, but i just feel abnormal in a sense.

Today i feel like crying. I am so upset today. All my thoughts are negative and they just make me upset. I feel like i need a break from life. Everything is so hard. I just can't do it anymore. I was strong for so long but today i feel like giving up. I want to feel free atleast for a day. Everything seems so tough. I am not that strong enough. 😭😭😭

My daughter is done with therapists. I don’t blame her. They shame and laugh. I quit trying to push that as it doesn’t help. Every few months she breaks down crying how bad her OCD and life is. She also turns her hurts on me. I’m broken watching her, not being able to help her. She can’t even work. She was told by disability she has OCD but no financial help was awarded. I guess she is high functioning which is a joke. Her life is shattered. My heart is broken.

Mornings are terrible. During night i feel awful. I have intrusive thoughts during night. And when I wake up i had quite stranger feelings.

My mind keeps going in circles and it’s so much to think about and I don’t know how to stop it and I’m all alone. I don’t have anyone I can go to and it’s hard for me to feel like anyone cares about me. Maybe my head is spiraling right now? It feels like it is 😭😭😭 I just want it to stoppppp it’s putting me in a fog and I’m so scared ):

Does anyone else get really anxious at night and have a bunch of compulsive habits at night to try and feel calm about being safe at night? For me this includes pushing repeatedly on door bolts and locks and also touching random items over and over again, as well as other random motions I do. Even with these things I can’t seem to relax and feel like I have a constant irrational fear about having my home being broken into, especially at night, and a fear of me or someone in my family being hurt. I don’t know what to do because we have an alarm system and I just feel like I am somehow always thinking of the possibilities and subconsciously listening for noises and I just wish I could calm down:(

Im scared of what’s gonna happen when I die like im so uncertain and I get BAD panic attacks about what’s gonna happen to me like I get these thoughts like if my gonna live forever, like is just a forever loop or is just gonna be nothing. Im catholic and I believe in heaven or hell but im really not sure. I’ve struggled with my faith since I’ve been 13 and it’s getting worse, I’ve heard about all these theories about what’s gonna happen after we die and I always get so scared about them. One time my aunt told me that we are souls, spirits that we are energy and just being in our body having an experience but our souls are immortal so im scared about the thought of living forever that scares me so much because at the same time I want to have peace. There’s other things that really really give me panic attacks about that subject but I can’t list them all here if you want to help me out then I’ll tell you more.

I am looking for some insight to support my 8 year old autistic daughter. She has developed health concern OCD after a bout of norovirus that hit the whole family right around Christmas (the discomfort of the nausea seemed amplified by the fact that it affected the holiday, to which she is strongly attached). She has been struggling significantly with emetophobia since then, seeking constant reassurance. We have trialed an SSRI for the past two months. While the health anxiety reassurance seeking has diminished (from maybe 70% of her day being taken up by it to more like 5%), a new kind of behavior has cropped up that we, her parents, have never seen before. It goes like this: she is doing some very minor, everyday, benign activity like picking up a stuffed animal or putting on a seatbelt. She "sets a goal" for herself (her words) to do xyz in a certain way, such as pick up the stuffed animal by its fabric tag only, not touching any of the stuffed animal's fur, or putting her seatbelt on herself without touching her skin/body with her fingers while she's doing it. If she then "fails" this "goal," such as accidentally touching the fur or herself, then she starts crying, screaming, flailing, and begging us to "get this feeling out of my body." She will hit and scratch her arms and legs, because she says this "failure" leaves her limbs feeling like they are weak, fuzzy, wobbly, numb, or "wrapped in a numbing net." It takes quite awhile for her to calm down from these episodes, and we have tried a lot of things to do so: going for a car ride, me lying on top of her, taking a walk, etc. She has a lot of patterns that she makes walking on the floor (hopping and stepping in certain ways according to lines, scratches, or shapes on the floor), but none of those patterns seem to result in these same kinds of "failures" and subsequent distress. Is this OCD-- specifically Perfectionism OCD? The element of failure really stands out to her. I have been having a hard time even figuring out what is going. Any help would be so deeply appreciated-- this has been so rough on our family.