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I have reached a point where I can’t see any family member without a groinal response. I know I’m not supposed to give it any investigation but it’s to the point where it’s all consuming. Any tips on ‘un’feeling?

So.. I'm not okay. I'm not doing okay right now. For this week I haven't really been okay. I don't think I've ever really been as happy as I used to be since high school began. I can still be happy and laugh at things and enjoy some parts of my day, but I'm not fully enjoying these things. There's always things I'm worrying about. There's always imperfections that I notice about myself. There's a lot that I need to work on, and it's been here. OCD hitting me in 2020 made everything in life even harder than it already was. For four years now, I've been struggling with this. Horrible anxiety that is making me question everything about my life. The things around me, myself, and the future. There's things around me that aren't in my control that are bothering me and things in my control that are bothering me. All I can do is try to distract myself from these things, but that's becoming harder and harder. Lately, I've had a terrible relapse in my OCD and it's caused me panic. I was feeling absolutely horrible about something that I remembered a couple of years ago. It led me back to my old habits and everything came back full force. I'm just not happy at all. I'm not happy with myself. I'm suffering from OCD and it's not fair. I have extremely low self esteem, I don't believe in myself often, and all I see are the problems that I have. The mistakes. The screw ups. There are good things that happen, but they never seem to outweigh the bad ones. I really hope medication will help me with this. I can't really take dealing with this anymore. I don't even know where adulthood would have been like without OCD. It hit me when I was 18. In questioning so much about my life and I don't feel like I'm ready to handle all of this. I don't feel like I'm ready for the adult world at 22 and it just doesn't feel like I've prepared myself for this. I'm not really sure how I can to begin with though. There's someone that I fancy in life. They're an introvert like me. We have common interests. I love seeing them. I love talking with them, even if it's not much. I love listening to them talk so much. I just really enjoy their company. But I'm not ready. I don't feel like I deserve to be with this person because of all of my problems that I'm dealing with. My OCD. My 10 year porn addiction. My low self esteem. My worrying. My relapses. I'm just not ready. I'm really trying to just find myself as an adult in the world. It feels like I can't really live my life because of OCD picking on me in any way that it can. I just don't know what to do. I get vivid images in my head. They sometimes enter my dreams. I compared my childhood to my adulthood and it hurts. A lot. I just don't feel well. There's things and people that I'm thankful for. There's things and people that I appreciate. There's things and people that I cherish. I wish those were all easier to focus on. Instead, I'm constantly thinking about things I can't change. Bad habits that I have trouble undoing. Mistakes that I wish I hadn't done when I was younger. Things I wish I knew at the time. Should've. Would've. Could've. I guess I just want to go back to life where I was hopeful about things. When I didn't have any reason to doubt something or someone. Or even myself. Back when I could have so much fun with things without a care in a world. Back when I could truly live my life. I want to cry but I just don't feel like it. I just want to be able to forgive myself. Believe in myself. And not worry about myself so much. I just want my life back. I just want to be where I used to be. I just want to be OCD free.

TRIGGER WARNING FOR CSA AND CHILD ABUSE so I had a friend named Asher He was really okay before he started to traumadump on me He was talking about sh as something normal and I didnt care enough about him to try and do something with it He was also talking about his obsessions,there wouldnt be anything bad in it if I have agreed on that because with my severe anxiety I started to mirror his obsessions,th3y are still with me till this day I only cared about him cause he was alwayd reassuring me and I thinked of him as someone with the aesthetic I like The end of our relation started when he was smoking ciggarettes at the age of 13,because of that I was so scared and disgusted Ive been in a constant anxiety attack for a whole 4 days Then he told me about his disgusting relationship with his parents and sisters It was just making me want to vomit Talking to him was hard But I build a really strong obsession over how he made me feel so I kept with contacting him The thing that made me completly despise him was when we were joking and he told me about how he had sex at the age of 12 while his ocd was really severe I was so fucking disgusted,especially because he didnt wanted to answer on with who he did that I was so scared,I didnt care about him but on how did that affected me I feel complete disgust to him,and I feel awful with it I know he was a victim but the way he said that and just all of this was too much for me(I also have sexual trauma and I hate any kind of sexuality,and the worst part is that I feel complete fear and disgust towards people who got graped or are hypersexual.I know its wrong and disgusting but I dont know how can I help it) I got so scared I had a severe anxiety attack where I could barely breathe It was all so scary and overwhmeling The second he told me that I started to feel this extreme rage disgust and hatred Since then,I didnt talked to him I dont know why but I immediately started looking for new friend I would call in automatically Because I was so fucking scared and panicked All of this made me go into socd episode which lasted for a month or two Now I have intrusive thoughts about "what if something will start to remind you of him" and thats awful I know Im not a good person and Im dissapointed with myself,but when Ill just get a therapist I surely will try to work on it

Trigger - The threat of a sexual assault in a movie. I went to see a movie that I mostly enjoyed. She didn't actually get stripped down and assaulted but she was in a struggle and it almost happened which is terrifying in its own. The way she talked about it is only the words of someone who has been through it. I was overwhelmed physically and emotionally. My heart rate increased and I wasn't even moving. I could feel the tears streaming down my face as I stifled my whimpers and even in the dark felt embarrassed and ashamed. It is not fair. He doesn't walk around with this feeling. He doesn't get triggered and potentially have breakdowns because of it. I have to forgive him so I can heal myself. I can't let go of the hate that is eating away at me. I don't know how to do that. Even now I sit in my bed and can feel my stomach turning. Trying not to ruminate. My thoughts are pouring in. How long will you be able to keep this at bay before it sends you into a break down. Do you have the tools to actually work through this? Are you broken? Why don't you want to be touched. Pray. Pray to forgive him. Pray to get rid of this hate. Pray to release this burden. Pray that the Lord will provide the justice that is deserved. I want to see the positive side. I need to be confident that I am able to do this. I don't want to be triggered when I just want to watch a movie. I don't want to fear seeing him in public. I don't want to think about it. I want to forget. How do I make it stop?

Something about my bf is bothersome to me and makes me anxious in public, but I can’t entirely figure out what it is, and it’s so exhausting trying to make sense of it. I can’t tell if it’s the way he acts in public with our friends, or if it’s just the way he sounds when he’s being cheeky and having fun with our friends, or if it’s both, or if it’s neither. I’m worried because the more I try and think about it and try to figure it out the more I feel like maybe I won’t be able to ever handle it, maybe I’ll dislike it forever, and maybe it’ll be the death of my relationship. It’s so stressful and exhausting. I feel so anxious when I know I have to hang out with my bf together with other people. I just want to be able to hang out with him in public around our friends and be happy. I want to stop being so anxious and worried and bothered. > and I want to stop feeling the impending “ick”! < I’m worried that me feeling bothered and turned off by his traits means I should just leave. I want this to work out so badly, but I can’t even figure out entirely what it is that bugs me so much, and even if I did I know it’s not something he can just change, nor do I want him to change. I want to learn acceptance. But how do I learn to accept when it bugs me so much. I just want to stop feeling this way all the time.

does anyone else have like videos of ppl with gofundme’s or like sick animals who need donations pop up on your fyp? i sometimes get overwhelmed when they do pop up bc it kickstarts my compulsions and i start praying for them and then share their video to boost it. and that’s fine, i want to help. but the problem is that on my fyp it pops up back to back sometimes and then i get really overwhelmed. i was just wondering if anyone else feels this way 😭

Hi. Welcome to story time. Back in 2019 (wow, long time ago) was the first time a doctor first mentioned the possibility of me having OCD. I was 19 back then. During childhood, my mom would call me “impressionable”. Anything could trigger me into a spiral of crippling fears, and I had rituals to try to escape them. At 13, I started picking at my skin. It was mainly about need for perfection, and when I felt I couldn’t achieve it, I hurt myself. I had bad acne that triggered me into picking a lot, and even worse things, like I needed to expunge the “imperfection” out of me. Doctors never took it seriously. They wouldn’t even treat my acne because they’d say my problem was only my habit of hurting myself, but then they’d send me off with a “just stop doing it”. I never stopped. I hated myself. I hated myself for how much I felt things, so uncontrollably in a highly sensitive and even irrational way. I’d pick at my skin for hours on end all throughout my teenage years. At 19, a neurologist casually mentioned to me that skin picking could be related to OCD. The ground seemed to shift beneath my feet. He sent me off with antidepressants after 10 minutes of appointment at best. I was just left with this piece of information and no guideline at all, no afterthought about how that might affect other pieces of my life. I found this app and started engaging myself in every discussion trying to piece together what I really had and what was going on. Ironically, anything OCD related became my obsession. Then I went to a psychiatrist, and he brushed it off saying I only had bad anxiety. A really shitty therapist I was seeing at the time told me very rudely that I was only trying to justify my bad actions by blaming them on a possible disease. So I told myself to forget all about that previous nonchalant and catastrophic diagnosis, but still took my meds and went on. All was fine for a while, until it wasn’t. Because things never truly went away. I still couldn’t understand why I reacted to things the way I did, and how to make it better. I then started thinking I might have ADD – grasping onto anything that might explain my chronic procrastination, getting stuck in my head so intensely that I block everything out, and my need to move my hands (essentially picking at my skin). At this point, I’d been to other four psychiatrists. One of them only listened to me for like 5 minutes then told me I was really exaggerating and took me off my meds. I went through a really dark hole. After a while I got to another one, he listened intently, and finished it off with “I don’t believe in diagnosing people but you seem to be going through it”, and gave me another prescription. The third one followed that same line, but asked me to consult with a neuropsychologist. So there I went. 10 stupidly expensive sessions later, she tells me I’m too depressed for her to really assess if my lack of attention is really ADD. But, yeah, the tests indicate severe OCD. I thought it was funny at first – I mean, too depressed for a diagnosis, I guess –, then I was relieved. Ok, so it wasn’t all in my head. Then I was pissed. So, so pissed. Because for years and years on end no one had the guts to tell me what I’m convinced was very obvious to any trained medic. I mean, except for that first guy, who said it in a way that made it feel like he was telling me I had cancer then sending me off with some aspirins without even saying where the tumor was. For years, I’ve had so much pressure, from others and myself. That I could make myself less miserable, I just didn’t! Just stop hurting yourself, how hard can that be? Just stop obsessing over every little thing. For god’s sake, don’t apply enough insect repellent to get intoxicated or worry about every little bug around you until you’re unable to do anything except trying to get rid of them, what’s wrong with you? Just let go, be happy! Not to mention the crippling, ever-present GUILT for not being able to do so. For years. And even now, the doctor just told me the fact and sent me off. She never tried to discuss with me what part of my habits, feelings and thoughts might be OCD related, to the point where I still feel like I made it all up and one thing has nothing to do with another. Some part of me is relieved – there’s a reason for all of this. It takes me closer to embracing myself. Another part still feels like I was ditched in a dead end with no directions out. I have no idea what “type” of OCD I have and how to figure it out, and no one seems to care enough to try and help me understand. This was long and angsty, so thank you so much if you took the time to read my senseless rambling. Just desperately felt like I needed to share ♥️

My themes change so quickly. Two months ago my ocd flared up again. I thought I was having a heart attack for like a week, then I thought I had something wrong with my eye. Then that turned into the fear of schizophrenia, then to dementia now to schizophrenia again. These are all health issues but those illnesses change so quickly. I don't know how to deal with this anymore. I'm so tired. If I'm out doing something with my friends I'm okay but the second I leave everything comes back like a tsunami.

98% of dudes now i get nervous, weird tight chest feelings and other sensations and feelings, thoughts coming in, it feels like real attraction and I hate it. And it feels like real attraction and the thoughts make it harder, how can i beat this once and for all?

I hope someone can respond... im genuinely struggling and i need support... I joined an OCD group three years ago that was from NOCD. There were minors in the GC, and when I was triggered by my hocd relating to stuff that was 18+, i vented about it to the GC and to some of the people in the pm's to a minors discomfort... my pocd says I engaged in P*dophillic behavior because of this... when i was just venting about my hocd... i dont ever want to ever be attracted to minors or kids at all... After doctor disrespect admitted to inappropriately messaging a minor my ocd is saying I did something similar to him and that I should be punished... I pm'ed and vented to several people in the gc about my 18+ hocd struggles, including a minor who felt uncomfortable about it... but i stopped venting to her... my pocd is saying I inappropriately messaged her and that im a P for this, when I only wanted to vent about my hocd struggles... i dont ever want to ever be a P at all... i dont ever want to ever be anything like that at all...

Many times i feel like ocd is just a label that i use for anything and even real problems. The idea that we just ignore everything and dont think about it is not possible cause if you have a problem and that problem generates thoughts and feelings, you have to work on it. Cause how do you know if thats ocd or not? We say we dont try to figure it out, but if its generated because of a real problem, how we know if its something we leave there or we have to work on it. I will give you many exemples, my problem is now with my sexual needs. It got strong cause one day i just lost control and i engaged in some sexual thoughts and that made the sexual need stronger. So this is a real problem right? Its clear that i have to work on it, now i noticed that the sexual need got to a point where it gave me feelings about things that are really bad, basically what pocd is about, and you can say its ocd, but i have a real problem which is repressed sexual needs, and how do i know that it didnt got that bad that it gives me those feelings? Its easy to say its ocd cause i dont like it but i heard stories that there were some who didnt wanted to do it but still did it to relase the feeling. Another exemple, i say i have harm ocd and suicidal ocd, but what i experienced now was what i read before about suicidal people, i got angry at my family, i felt like i dont get attention, so i had thoughts aboit something bad happening to me so than i would get attention. It even jumped in my mind when i was so angry that if i would die they would feel bad now that they didnt gave me attention, and these are very similar to people who do self harm to get attention. When i shared this to my therapist she said im like these people, cause i want attention. Maybe the attention part is true, but i dont want to harm myself to get attention... Many times these suicidal, self harm thoughts are very similar to real suicidal thoughts, cause the whole situation is like its actually real cause im angry or im sad because of something, i feel a little hopeless for a second and because all these situations i cant say its just ocd, ignore it... For me its like there are signs that might show that these are actually real feelings and thoughts and then i spin over it. And about religious ocd, i spin about sin, we all have sins and we will never be free from them, so when i sin i feel shame and sometimes i dont know if its real sin or ocd, but i just cant say its ocd when i know i have a sin battle, but then accepting that i did sin just makes me tired mentally cause this is happening alot now...

When i was dealing with a bad bout of depression and ocd i found reading other people’s mental health wins (and posting my own)very encouraging. Nothing is too small! My wins have ranged from showering to working out. Be proud of each step you take to improve your mental health!

Hi guys, i’m really stressed out as my intrusive thoughts and urges have been more frequent regarding ROCD. Do urges feel so real for anyone else and give so much anxiety? For context, my rocd revolves around being unfaithful towards my boyfriend and i’m always super careful. my brothers friend came over and he was showing me pics of a recent wedding he went to and i was anxious as my dress was low and i was kind of covering it. also i moved away and didn’t make much eye contact. but before rocd i was normal. but now it feels like all these intrusive thoughts and urges are so real. like when i was talking to him he was sitting sort of near me and then my intrusive thoughts were like “oh you wanna kiss him” and the urges kept coming and i was really cautious about talking and moving my head / lips and i am so scared i was unfaithful or did something wrong because i still spoke and turned my head towards him when i was talking with all these thoughts in the background. it feels so real and i was really anxious the entire time. is this ocd just blowing things out of proportion snd catastrophising? i really need some advice :(

Hi guys I just shared my story recently and I’m scared. When I keep busy it’s a little better, but I feel really awful right now. I’m remembering what I said to my sister during our fallout from what I did and the result of it. Is making me really sad and scared. I found out she is also joining NOCD so I’m a little worried she will see my post and I realized I never said my “intrusive” thoughts were not true. What if she thinks I meant all of them, I don’t think a lot or even everything I said to her was even true it was practically all false and untrue intrusive thoughts but I can’t seem to totally trust myself on it since I feel like I’m just saying it because she might see this, but also I’ve been wanting to tell her it wasn’t true what I said and did. I feel a relapsing of emotions I want to go back and change it I hate my reality it’s good but I’m constantly reminded of what I did and I feel sick. How does one live with this change and move on when the person you love the most you push off the edge and now she drew boundary off of our relationship it is getting a bit better but it’s nothing like before we were so close we shared and told each other everything, I feel like I want to die and come back to everything back in the past to be different. How do I live like this…. She is doing it and I know it’s really hard and I know I’m victimizing myself but I wonder if I was even doing my best I wasn’t working on my techniques because I felt it didn’t work and I let go but I didn’t realize how bad it could be I mean that’s why I went back to therapy but even then I wasn’t working completely on it despite feeling like I did sorta. Was I doing the best I could then? I hope so but if that was my bets I feel like a loser. how do I go through my day and be excited for life when I feel so distraught and depressed. I need help so bad.

I’m just feeling so freaking upset. I’m constantly having to talk myself down from panic attacks and self-sabotage. I’ve suffered with the same theme(s) for YEARS at this point and I’m just done I’m just so sick of it. And, I’m so freaking scared for when me and my boyfriend get married and have children because I want children so bad but I can’t even be off my meds for a week let alone 9+ months (my medication can’t be taken during pregnancy). I’m also scared because I feel awful that my boyfriend will be “stuck” with me once we get married. My OCD wants me to confess my innermost (obsessive) thoughts and feelings to him. Reality is blurred, when I have these flare-ups I’m sick to my stomach worried I may have done something bad and I’m constantly ruminating on whether I did or not. I just want this feeling to leave, and knowing that this is a persistent theme that I may deal with for a much longer time just makes me want to cry. I’m so afraid of hurting my boyfriend or having already hurt him, and it’s the same with everyone else in my life. And, I am Catholic, and the sacrament of confession for me gives me so many mixed emotions because it’s healing for me but at the same time I have to be so careful of what I say so I don’t start confessing as a compulsion, but then afterwards my OCD tells me I’m just not confessing because I’m guilty and I know it. I’m so so sick of this. I didn’t sleep last night and I can tell I’m tired physically but emotionally I’m too anxious to rest so I took some Benadryl and maybe it’ll help me fall asleep. But I just maybe need someone to talk to on this post.

i feel like i’m faking everything, like ive read it all and my brain has mesmerised it completely. i first started struggling with feeling like i was faking it when my pocd episode started, i’d research pocd to see if what i was experiencing was similar or if i genuinely was one. i read something that said some people with pocd avoid children but i don’t do this. i don’t purposely put myself them around them but if my mum is going shopping i’ll go with her and my head will be screaming at me saying im going for different reasons. the other day i went my sisters and i was wearing kinda a mesh top and my head was telling me i can’t wear that because there will be children around and that i can’t expose that to them even though ive wore the outfit multiple times before without these thoughts, ive always taken my time with what i wear because it’s not often i go out so when i do go out even to the shop, i attempt to dress as nice as possible. i still wore the outfit and it convinced me it was for that. another thing ive read is that some people with pocd can’t say the p word but i can say it, i just chose not to. i started to not say that word after i had read that piece of information. it’s not a word i’d usually say before all of this anyway but if it was brought up in conversation i wouldn’t overthink it. another reason why i feel like i’m faking it all is because im not getting anxious or anxiety around compulsions, i don’t even know what my compulsions are technically. i don’t know if i don’t feel the anxiety anymore because i take medication for it or what. i just know i don’t feel anxious anymore. when i see people on here who i relate to, i can’t do the thing ive read again because otherwise i’ll feel like im just copying them? the post could be made today and ive been doing something for idk weeks beforehand and i’ll still feel like ive seen a post similar.

My brain constantly finds things I need to “confess”, to for example my partner. Things that are not relevant now, nor important in the present moment (it is for example something that I did 10 years ago). I get so stuck on these thoughts, and when I confess them there always pops another thought up that I obsess over and I feel the extreme urge to confess again and it gives me so much anxiety. Those confessions are all things I am ashamed of, or I judge myself on immensely. The anxiety stays till I confess it, then the anxiety calms down for a bit, only to flare up again with another thing I get stuck on. Is this a symptom of OCD? Is there anything that can be done about it?

Can any one recommend any grounding techniques to help me through my horrible panic attacks please, or any tips that can help me manage as I’m am at my ends with this 😩

I saw a TikTok video talking about “aesthetic attraction” and now I keep having to try and prove that I’m really attracted to women. I’m trying my hardest to analyze the types of attraction and make sure I’m feeling the right one, and it’s hard because I’ve already panicked about this before but ever since I saw that video I’m constantly worried that I’m somehow faking it or not really attracted to women but just don’t know it yet. Anyone else relate?

not really sure how to categorize this but I’ve been consumed with anxiety and fear for a few days now and I’m having an extremely hard time coping with it. I’ve been obsessing over dying recently but not in the sense that I am suicidal or thinking of harming myself, more so of how afraid I am that one day I’m going to die and that everyone I know and have ever known will also eventually die. I keep getting intrusive thoughts about me dying and different scenarios all in which I realize I am about to die. It’s been incredibly distressing especially since I can physically feel my chest tighten and myself panicking as soon as I think too much about it. The bigger issue lies in that I can’t help but ruminate over the thoughts which eventually leads to a panic attack. I’ve been crying over these thoughts for the last hour and I just can’t seem to make them stop and none of the exercises have helped because somehow someway I end up thinking about it all over again. I’m not sure if anyone else has dealt with this kind of intrusive thought or existential crisis. It’s just been even more difficult for me because for the most part I’ve felt happy this past month and have made progress with my symptoms and my overall anxiety. It feels like I just took 10 steps backwards in my progress due to this random surge of thoughts. Anyways, sorry for the long post. Writing this all out has helped calm me down a bit even if I don’t end up being able to sleep tonight 🥹