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Anyone here with POCD with false memories? I need someone to talk to please

My SOOCD journey started around 2017 when my boyfriend and I broke up because I no longer wanted to be with him and remember thinking omg what if it’s because I’m a lesbian and I was dreaded with anxiety and fear. I kind of forget about it after that tbh. My partner and I got back together and I struggled to enjoy sex. I think because we had a friendship (originally ended on good terms) I found it hard to get back into a sexual relationship. Anyway cut long story short in 2020 during lockdown we weren’t having sex, I just had a really low sex drive and if I’m honest I think it was because we didn’t have a very good sex life, we didn’t explore one another etc and so I surpassed sex for a good few months and that’s when the intrusive thoughts started. I became so poorly, I lost almost two stone from stress and anxiety, I had panic attacks and if anything it brought me and my partner closer because I DID NOT WANT TO LOSE HIM AGAIN. This went on for a good 18 months, I was diagnosed by a NOCD therapist with OCD and I started to accept and do ERP. Around 2022 things started to really look up for me. It was like my life was getting back to normal. I got into my fitness, my partner and I were really enjoying sex, having it more frequently and we still are. We are in a very very very good place. I’m actually currently pregnant and we’re expecting our first bundle of joy. However the last few weeks I’ve had some thoughts again, dreams too but this time not as much with the anxiety. It’s really upsetting me because with the anxiety not being there it’s making me think am I enjoying them? Do I want to explore that? I’m very good with the uncertainty now and I always tell myself ‘Ahhh well you’ll never fully know so don’t stress yourself out’ kind of thing. I’m wondering if the surge of hormones has triggered it. I don’t know I just don’t want to go back into a spiral. I love him so much. He is my rock and my best friend. We have a great sex life but the dreams and thoughts are so frustrating.

this time it kind of feels like the fear is valid and that even after therapy i’m gonna believe the thoughts. because before they felt real but never felt as valid and truthful and the reasoning behind them never felt so real. damn bro it’s days like these where i sometimes feel like my old health ocd was paradise in comparison.. any other subtype i could deal with but this sucks booty and feels like the fear WILL come true.

is there anyone who can talk I really just need someone who can maybe leave some insight about the specific issue im having I'm so scared and everything is too vague and it's important

A different type of title, I know. ☕ ☀️ Little bit of a read, but hopefully adds some positivity out there by the end. Here's the thing, I used to get up EVERY morning with excitement and experiment with different types of coffee or flavors. It was a joy to just make it. I would never mind if I made a bad brew, just learned from it. It was an activity that made me happy, arguably a routine that made me whole. Since being diagnosed with OCD (rOCD sub category) 3-4 weeks ago that morning activity fell apart. It suddenly became hard to get up, followed by a longing to "go back" or like a "last saved point". Long story short, tragically the French press that made me feel like "me" lost its glitter and glam. All the stresses of rOCD and happiness ROBBED me of experiencing this small and simple joy in my life that isn't even the focus of my ERP. Over the last few weeks I have been feeling better after taking my first few sessions. Healed, cured, completely treated? No. Absolutely not. On the journey to recovery? Yes. Absolutely so! So what does this French press have to do with anything? Well, I'm making a point to try and reconnect my happiness by making it today, even if it doesn't always feel comfortable or "the same." Why? Because I'm making a stand. I'm refusing to let OCD try and live IT'S life when I want to live MY life instead! I don't want it to win, nor do I want it to take any further steps in telling me not to experience happiness. Especially ones I used to enjoy! I'm GOING to make that French press coffee as soon as this is posted and BELIEVE I can have a good day. I don't care if I fall down, relapse, get stressed, have anxiety, get into an argument, panic, have intrusive thoughts etc. etc. etc later today OR if I already did have those things happen! All that matters is at this moment I go do what I WANT to do, not what OCD tells me to do. I'm going to make the French press coffee because that's what I LOVED doing. WHAT'S THE POINT?: If there is something that you used to appreciate doing no matter how small or big and it brought a sense of identity or peace - you don't have to let OCD tell you that you can't do it. Even if it may not feel the same anymore, I know deep down I like making French press coffee. I'm tired of having OCD anxieties ruin that morning routine. Maybe there's something out there you did for peace or fun before OCD took hold of you? Just know you're not alone. I'm not a doctor or anything, just a man trying to get back his life and wants to fight for it. Don't be afraid to try and reconnect some of that positive "former self" that brought peace to you. If this resonated with you, I hope you find your strength to do that small but meaningful thing that makes you happy. You can do it. We can do it. Thank you. Now if you excuse me, I'm going to go make that French press coffee. ☕🙂

I know it may sound like reassurance seeking but it's actually a sincere question. During these days I've been struggling believing it's ocd and I've let my thoughts race a lot. I had to study for an exam but I wasn't able to concentrate very well. So my question is: if I try ERP but then it turns out it's not ocd, could I create some damage? I'm so afraid I will confuse myself even more. But the worst case scenario is that it won't work, and I'll change my approach to it... am I right? (I'm diagnosed, I've changed therapist recently, but I struggle to accept it truly is ocd)

Some examples of my thoughts, images commands, feeling and sensations. Who relates to these? -stomach dropping making my chest tight -rapid heart beat/skipped beats -images of horrible scenerios like driving off a bridge or hurting someone or images of what me “snapping” would look like. -looking in the mirror and getting scared that my face will change into a demon face so I stop looking in the mirror. -looking too long at my son and having to look away so I don’t hallucinate a different face on him (even tho I’ve never hallucinated) -what if you’re a horrible monster and you’re going to off yourself -what if your husband and son are demons -you shouldn’t be left alone with your child in case you hurt them -images and scenerios of me texting my husband while he’s at work and telling him I’m killing our son and then myself (even tho I would literally never do this. It makes me sick to even type it on here) -what if you you have schizophrenia even though you’ve been professionally diagnosed (twice) with ocd -what if the ocd specialist was wrong and you don’t have ocd and you’re dangerous -what if you go into psychosis. -what if you are In psychosis right now -what if you were scared of your hands…?¿ this one is so weird lol -what if that bug isn’t real -what if you hear voices -kill them -they’re better off without you -you’ll never get better - you’re crazy. -this can’t be ocd it must be more -nobody else gets these thoughts and feeling -feelings of scared, worried, uncertain, intense anxiety -fears intensifying at night as I’m drifting to sleep -nonsense thoughts that don’t make ANY SENSE at all as I’m trying to fall asleep -what if you believe people are after you one day like a crazy person -what if you already believe this. What if you are delusional. The list goes on. I hope these help some of you feel not alone if you have them as well

i was really nervous yesterday and scared on losing my morals but i had a moment of almost.. like peace and acceptance and i just couldn’t get scared no matter how hard i tried to get nervous and my mind was like.. “your not losing your morals and if you have different opinions on certain things it’s not the end of the world” i could finally fall asleep and i felt.. peaceful? but it makes me question if i have ocd in the first place because it really didn’t feel like ocd yesterday. but now i woke up and im nervous but not for the same reason. i’m nervous cuz whenever i get a worrying thought that im losing my morals i get nervous but i also just idk, it feels like i get little thoughts telling me it wouldn’t be that big of a deal and i almost feel like i believe it now even tho yk how can i suddenly stop fearing what i felt all along? im very confused about this and am wondering if im genuinely losing my morals (which i dont want happening still) but idk i just dk. i wanna be more black and white in my values like i was before this ocd but now i see the shades of grey and idk if i should be worried but it makes me feel like im losing my morals

I’d like to preface this by saying I know this is really niche but it’s been effecting me extremely bad since the moment i woke up today and for many days. Every time I start to like anything a lot no matter what, for example if I’m with a good friend and I’m in the middle of laughing, I will feel the need to specify that I love God over this moment and person, and if it doesn’t feel *just right* I will punish myself like by slapping my leg a certain amount of times etc. If it doesn’t feel *just right* it feels like I am putting them over God and then I feel extreme guilt. With every thing that I love I end up stopping it because I feel like that’s me saying I’m putting it over God. Even now, I was talking to this person I liked and had the thought come up again and it didn’t feel right so I blocked them because I want to prove to God that I love him more than anyone else. I convince myself that I’m putting things over God when I feel intense joy, and that God will punish me for that. Anyone have any tips or been through something similar? Thank you for reading it you did.

TW: Parent loss My OCD has spiked since losing my mom in March. Like my nesting is trying to find its new obsession to hold onto. Not sure how much more of this I’m going to take.

Is someone just willing to talk please? I’m struggling.

Hi all, I wanted to share that I am trying hard to exercise frequently with many different sports/activities, but I’m finding that it’s keeping me in my thoughts even worse and making my brain increase and accelerate the unwanted intrusive thoughts passing through. Does anyone experience this/ and have recommendations to combat this? I need to exercise not only to get healthier but I also want to enjoy it and not dread it with the seemingly increased OCD thoughts and compulsions/rumination it causes. Thanks! 😊

I was diagnosed with ocd right as I lost my insurance and was no longer able to seek therapy. I am now trying function with this diagnosis all on my own. But its starting to harm my relationship with the love of my life. I am constantly worried I am going to get cheated on, or that he will leave, or that I will cheat or die or he'll will die etc... you get the point. All of this is unfounded and I know this but I can't help but be riddled with doubt. I was hoping to get some tips as someone new to this on how to manage the intrusive thoughts or build up those structured routines everything keeps telling me I should have. I've started doing research but some help would be appreciated. Thank you all for your help!

OCD makes me feel like I’m holding in the biggest secret about myself and I don’t deserve happiness. I feel red faced and nervous all the time, when the thoughts come on it feels like a big rush of “truth” hits me and I can’t not believe it

I don't know why I'm being so much concerned about my mom's sexuality from few days. I always have this thought that she's not straight and she might be not aware about it. There's one thing which she does that makes me think she might be not straight, She appreciate the beauty of women a lot. Like once she was telling me that she saw a very beautiful girl in a bus, that girl was so beautiful that my mom couldn't look away from her and it's not just about one incident but there are plenty of incidents like this. Whenever she sees a beautiful woman in any show, TV, movie etc, she keeps staring at her and saying "my god look how beautiful she is" and she rarely talk about the men's good looks but most of the time, she just talk about women's beauty and keep staring at those women and I find it a little weird. She was asking me in the morning about the name of an actress whom she had seen in a movie. When I asked him "why you're asking about her", she said that " I was thinking about her, she looked so beautiful so I should have know her name" and I felt so weird like I also appreciate women's beauty and find women attractive but the way my mom talk about it most of the times make me think that she might be not straight. You might be wondering that why do I care about my mom's sexuality but I've to do that as I don't want her to be bi or lesbian because I can't bear this. I'll never be as comfortable with her like before. Also, I've read that "the daughter of a bi or lesbian mother can't be straight" so I can't bear this. I don't know if it's real or my brain is misinterpretating things due to Hocd but I still sometimes find her fishy and I keep ruminating about it all the time 😔

Do you guys experience harm OCD homicidal, intrusive thoughts and suicidal thoughts the OCD feel so convincing in the urges feels so real that I feel like I’m turning into a psychopath. I’ve been seeing a psychiatrist for the past 10 years I found a new psychiatrist about five months ago he started me with TMS therapy. But is not working for me. He’s going to start me on ketamine to see if it will work for OCD, but these intrusive thoughts make me feel like a terrible person and I hope ketamine will work because I try a bunch of antidepressants, a bunch of antipsychotics and a bunch of mood stabilizers. Nothing is working. The homicidal intrusive thoughts are still there almost feels like I’m liking the thought which is very scary. I get really confused and I tell myself is this really OCD my psychiatrist told me that a psychopath wouldn’t worry about that intrusive thoughts about killing or he wouldn’t get help but I don’t know. I hate OCD. I wish i was never have it.

Hi it’s been a while since I’ve been on here but to those who has real event, have any of you confronted the person about it since they were like involved?

Got triggered and I tried to do an OCD homework, but I failed: when writing the "automatic thoughts" I fell to an OCD cycle and ruminated and reviewed the triggering episode. But I will try to abide to the objective of the homework itself, which is doing the challenging part. This is what an "Automatic Thought Record" is supposed to look like: trigger (what set you off?) -> automatic thoughts (what is OCD saying?) -> challenge (what is an alternative to the distorted thinking?) Automatic Thought Record: Trigger [What set you off?] I saw on instagram a reel of girl playing the violin and I noticed that her chest area was unusually big, and I got triggered by it because I couldn't tell the girl's age because the video was quite blurry but was very suspicious that she looked young, that's what triggered me. I really wanted to be reassured that she was an adult. I don't think I felt any attraction, I was immediately worried because I saw the two things at the same time: the fact that she looked young but that you couldn't tell clearly and the fact that the chest area was noticeable. Automatic thought [What is OCD saying?] You noticing the chest area means that you're attracted. Also you can't quite understand the age of the girl, so you need to find a way to know that to disproof this fear so you can feel okay again. All the things that I did wrong: 1. I compulsively looked at the girl trying to figure out her age, looking for characteristics that disproved my fears and confirmed she was like my age. Was also trying to avoid looking at the triggering area but I couldn't help noticing it. At one point I compulsively stared at it, trying to see if I was attracted. 2. I needed to verify the age, couldn't let the uncertainty be there. Found out she was fourteen in a post where she clearly looked that age and there wasn't any noticeable triggering element, looked very different from the first post I saw. Got triggered a lot more by this fact. Wondered if I could have been actually attracted when I first noticed the chest area. Or if I noticed just for itself and without any ulterior ill intentions. Tried to reassure myself and practice uncertainty. Wondered once more if I would have allowed myself to be attracted if she were an adult but with the same physic in the video. Second trigger that it's refraining from moving on, all the thoughts that I had: I had an unwanted terrible association that I feel a monster for even thinking about it. I don't want to write it, I feel like a ****, it feels unforgivable and a proof of my fears. In the video where you couldn't really tell her age, the green colored dress and the blurred face's head shape reminded me of an adult-video actress that once wore a green dress. Does this association means that I se&ualized the girl? If I think rationally about it I know that these two things are different and my emotional reaction two each of them are different and that the one that I'm really attracted by is the adult woman and not the young girl. If I think rationally I know that this association happened randomly and not with ill intentions, because I found an unwanted similarity. I don't know if it was unwanted, it become later because it triggered me, but it was a similarity that came out randomly, with no moral attachments. But what in my head makes me feel all the more creepy and gross is that the association initially started because of the noticeable chest with the green dress, that is what I think prompted me to think about the other adult woman, so it must have been an association of some kind of se&ual nature, right? Did I like watching that girl? Did I look for her age because I WANTED to be attracted? Is that why I made such an association? Because of this association happened I feel more triggered, and I'm afraid that when I'm going to see a video of that adult actress I'm going to think about that association and that I'm going to like it. I don't want it to be this association at all, but it didn't feel like an irrational one, it was a believable connection, the similitude in my head was there and I didn't want it to be similar but it really does. Maybe if I check again I can disprove this association but once it happened everything that I did felt like it was corroborating the association, like I didn't think the head shape would be similar but when I checked it felt like it kinda did. After reading a segment of the "Mindfulness Workbook for OCD" I came to the conclusion that maybe that association happened because I saw adult characteristics, and the association was limited only to that part, it didn't correlate with the fact that she looked young, those are two separate things, in fact the young part came in later to confront the unconsidered dangers of that association. What happened probably wasn't even an association, I was just reminded of that adult woman from the green dress, and then when I got worried about it the association happened, and I got all the more triggered when I noticed that the head shape was kinda similar, and then I spiraled trying to confirm and deny the evidence and a lot of things that I said in this paragraph are not real but conditioned by OCD. 4. On second watch, how could I not know she was young? You could tell she had a small face. Maybe I wanted to reassure myself so much because I noticed the chest area and I couldn't tolerate that because she looked ambiguous at first so in order for me to be okay with having noticed that chest area was for me to look for adult characteristics, and to grab on to that hope. Also it's probably because there were times that I thought a girl looked a bit young but was actually an adult, and maybe I was hoping that it would also be this case so that I could go on with the day without obsessing about the episode, de-triggering myself. Challenge: Ignoring all of this. Not engaging with it and moving forward having uncertainty. Accepting this triggering episode in all of its aspects. Maybe yes maybe not, uncertainty in this case means winning over OCD, even if you feel bad about it. Realising that I'm overthinking and blowing things out of proportions, nothing really happened, I'm just exaggerating because of OCD. After considerations and worries: 1. After reading this OCD book I'm aware that all people have postpubescent markers and that is normal to notice it, noticing doesn't mean having se&ual desire, but because of OCD it mutates into something sinister by the subsequent analysis from OCD itself. 2. It bothers me the fact that I found the young girl's age ambiguous and that I didn't realise sooner 3. I was so uncomfortable in all the scenarios of this one episode, because I needed to check instead of just being okay with it, which is what the people I'm scared of being actually do. So I know that I'm not attracted to young girls (and I don't want to be). That's a fact, because it sent me in a spiral. If it was an adult instead I woud have felt comfortable and wouldn't have obsessed about this one particular episode for like 2 hours. 4. Obviously the association that happened later triggered me heavily 5. Fear of instagram analytics misunderstanding why I looked at that video many times, and the fact that I clicked at the tagged profile and the orchestra account to find informations about the age. 6. When writing this I had images in my head of the young girl, but I didn't "mind" it, I didn't realise they were appearing in my head. Were they actual intrusive images or just memories? And it they were memories, was I not paying attention because I liked those images or because of the effects of this (half-assed) session of ERP not making me care? The truth is that I will never know because OCD is the doubt disorder, but the chances are that is nothing like what I'm scared of it being. 7. Needing to move on from all of this without the reassurance of a second party.

Does anyone else feel like your OCD goes after everything that’s important or precious to you? Like if you have a dear memory of something, your mind will try to tell you why that’s wrong or bad even when you know it’s something perfectly pure and a happy memory. I feel so beat up by this illness.. it steals my joy. Only Jesus can help me, only he knows just how bad this torment in my head is.

So lately I've been able to control OCD after a long time. If I have a harm intrusive thought or image, I just let it go. By doing this, I am able not to feel anxiety with these intrusive thoughts, and therefore improving over time. But sometimes I start to feel anxious for not feeling anxious with these thoughts. It's like: "If I don't feel anxiety with these awful harm thoughts/images, does that mean I want to do them??" It drives me crazy. Also, as I tend to have intrusive thoughts and sudden images at some point everyday, I think "what if maybe it is not OCD, but another kind of mental issue? What if I don't treat myself and I go crazy over time? What happens if I think I'm improving, but I'm not?" Anyone feeling this way as well?