We are the faces of OCD

I feel like everyone "healed" from their SOOCD and yet 6 years later I'm still here. All the people who used to post on here have moved on (and good for them) but im still here. Even when im having sex with my bf I'm like "am I enjoying it because Im enjoying the act of sex itself + the fact that Im used to him by now but with women its way more exciting and its about the women itself?". Ugh I just feel so alone, no one relates to me romantically nor physically.

I get feelings that I don’t like or don’t understand and then the thoughts come. Response prevention gets tricky here. Sometimes the feelings are intrusive other times I’m just having feelings. Often, letting them be there and acknowledging them helps and is good but when I don’t know why they are there or uncomfortable I ruminate on them comes in and I spiral. Not trying to figure them out makes me feel like I’m doing something wrong.

So recently I made a post about having the theme of fear of psychosis and schizophrenia which has led to the fear of not getting sleep and being scared I’ll go crazy and start hallucinating from the lack of sleep. Last night I was able to sleep some hours after not being able to properly sleep for 4 nights (like I actually dreamt) but of course when I woke up I got the the thought “what if you didn’t sleep and you think you did” “what if you’re just hallucinating it” it made me instantly sick to my stomach! Of course I know I slept but these thoughts just get crazier everyday making me feel like I’m actually crazy. I just want to cry. It’s a constant battle everyday and I’m just so tired. I’ve never had these thoughts before. If anyone has gone through this please tell me what helped you. I miss getting home and looking forward to sleeping not being scared I won’t. And I miss just living my life and not having thoughts questioning if it’s my reality or not. Please I could really use some advice.

I just started high school and my OCD is horrible. It was bad the couple weeks leading up to it but now it’s even worse. All of the stress triggered my pure OCD and now my brain is believing that I am evil. And now whenever I try to pray I feel I can’t. Then when I try to use ERP, it just feels like I am going against God by saying maybe I’ll letting evil in.

How vivid are your false memories? I didn’t have this FM until i kept thinking into if something happened on a night i was drinking Now ive come up with the worst possible scenario and my brain is convincing me its true with IMAGES Anyone else go through this?

The theme i struggle with most is suicidal OCD. And with September being “national suicide awareness month”, My anxiety is sky high. i’m back in my spiral. I’m back with the panic attacks. My mind keeps comparing itself to all of these people and now i’m convinced i want too or i have these symptoms and im next. i’m freaking myself out and idk what to do. I get scared i have suicidal ideation when i know i don’t because i would never ever actually kms nor hurt myself in anyway. Does anyone know how to comercome this??? I just got out of my spiral not even 1 months ago and im scared im going deeper this time. My mind is all over the place scared im actually going to do it when i know im not and i feel like i have to go to the hospital or something idk what to do.

I am always worried about medication/drugs and I am so anxious about whether I might be under the influence of something or not. has experienced anything similar? I have derealization and panic attacks and I am so so tired of worrying about whether or not I am “feeling” real or if something I ate had drugs in it. I am so sick of doing compulsions and living in constant fear!!! I tell myself that it’s fine and that derealization is just my body’s natural coping mechanism and even though I always fear for the worst nothing bad ever happens but I just can’t get it through my head!!! It’s so frustrating!!

I dont know if I have ocd really but I think I do because I have the intrusive thoughts and I always try and do things to soothe the anxiety. I've been dealing with this for a few months and this is a debilitating cycle and I wish I wad normal. when I first spoke to my therapist about it, she said that people with ocd like to clean and count a certain amount of tiles and stuff like that. I really want to get tested because I want help but im scared that if they say I don't have ocd then that means my intrusive thoughts are true and that I'm the person that my mind makes me think I am and it scares me. I mostly deal with symptoms of pocd so I try my best to avoid kids and sometimes I won't even want to go in public because of it and I count in my head a lot and try and see if my body is reacting any kind of way. I also try and just push the thoughts a way and do research and sometimes it makes me feel better but in reality it's just a cycle and it's terrifying so can someone please comfort me or give me advice and tips to help me feel better because I really need it. I just want to get help and stop this cycle because it's slowly killing me. I don't want to be the person my head thinks I am but in my head it's just constant fear anxiety and uncertainty.

How does one take the step to except uncertainty especially when the thoughts are so disturbing and ones you know do not reflect your values and true feelings, how do you do this but remind yourself it’s not truly who you are, how do you not feel guilty?

I was just sat downstairs watching a movie and I had a “what if u watch cp” and “what if you like thinking about kids in sexual ways” when I don’t at all want to think about that or watch that. And I thought what it would be like to think of a kid like that which made me incredibly anxious and feel repulsed. But my ocd will say “you were thinking what it would be like to think of kids like that because u were considering it” when I wasn’t at all Nothing would ever make me want to think about kids in a sexual way it’s completely repulsive. My ocd will try and say I like the images too and I like the thoughts! It’s really stressful. Does this sound familiar to anyone? I just need some support at the moment as I’m worrying it’s not OCD

Hey everyone! It’s a long post (sorry😂). I just wanted to share something I experienced today, hopefully it will encourage many of you to see that there is a life that you can enjoy whilst battling OCD! I have been pretty much compulsion free for 5 months! I have been really proud of myself and I have genuinely been loving life! However, today, was not a good day. It was a complete nightmare in fact. I had this intense feeling of anxiety, fear, panic, doubt, and guilt running through me all day. I kept avoiding things because I knew it was going to trigger me, and I was expecting my unwanted intrusive thoughts to pop up (which obviously they did 🙄). I found myself engaging in compulsions all day. I struggled to watch a TV series as I kept thinking that I wasn’t paying attention, and then OCD would tell me “what if I wasn’t actually paying attention to the TV series, and what if I did something bad and don’t remember it?!”. I found myself constantly rewinding the programme in order to relieve my anxiety and distress, and to gain certainty that I saw every single scene perfectly to reassure myself. Obviously as you can expect, this did not do me any favours. It only did one thing, it made my anxiety worse and increased the amount I was doing compulsions. This has easily been one of the hardest days I have had in a very long time, and I kept thinking to myself, “why is this happening to me?”. I sat down in the evening and started to think about my day. I realised that OCD will do whatever it can to keep us in this cycle. It can pop up at anytime, and it will try the same old tricks it always has. But the most important thing I realised today, is that progress isn’t linear. One bad day DOES NOT mean I am back to square one. I just had a bad day, that’s all! It doesn’t mean all the hard work and everything I have accomplished has gone down the drain, in fact it is actually an opportunity! An opportunity for me to use all the skills and tools I have learnt to be able to deal with setbacks! After this, I told OCD to bog off, and I watched the TV series without engaging in any compulsions! Did I feel scared? Hell yes 😂 Did I have doubts pop into my mind? Of course I did, it’s what OCD is, it’s the DOUBT DISORDER! But most importantly, I chose to do the hard thing and not give into OCD, I chose to lean into the uncertainty and discomfort and just let it be! I just wanted to share this as a message of encouragement for anyone on their recovery journey! It’s okay to feel overwhelmed. It’s okay to still have doubts and “what-ifs” pop into your mind. It’s okay to be uncertain! This is how OCD works! It targets the things we love the most, and it will target our values and intentions! Remember, you are so much more than your OCD! You all got this! Keep going!🙏🏽🫶🏾

Five years ago I met my fiancé and fell in love. At the time, I was a complete degenerate dating multiple women, but was looking for an opportunity to throw away that old way of living. After some months she said "I feel weird not calling you my boyfriend". This, In my mind was her saying she wants to be exclusive. I can't remember if this was the weekend after or if it was a weekend before but I think it was the weekend after: Someone who I never met, barely knew, found on Tinder from years ago, and whom I very rarely texted, texted me late at night and kept trying to steer the conversation in a sexual direction. I initially replied with short, generic responses. This worked for a little while until there was one one moment I remember where she said, "I wish you were here right now" and I said "Me too". I know you won't believe me, but in the moment I completely forgot I was then very recently supposed to be in a committed relationship. I messaged her afterwards and told her that I loved (Fiancé's name) and told her not to talk to me ever again. It was after that where I couldn't live with myself and reached out to my OCD therapist. This was almost 5 years ago. He related it to pornography and those old classified ads in the newspapers where you would call them up and pay by the minute. He said I did the right thing and told me to just never talk to her again and to move forward. I never did anything like that ever again, and I am marrying her in less than two months. Part of me doesn't want to hurt her feelings for no reason so close to our date, the other OCD part of me wants to confess. Any advice?

I feel like I'm constantly thinking about the same sex. Feeling in my backside is driving me nuts 😒. And I've met this girl I like and I feel guilty as hell because I feel like I'm hiding something. I really like her but how can carry this on if I'm having these thoughts. I had these thoughts before a met her. Please help someone 😢

What are your wins/win recently? Also what is something you are grateful for in your ocd journey? My win is starting trauma therapy finally. Im very nervous but I know it will be beneficial. As for what Im grateful for with my ocd journey, its the love and support of my husband who has stuck by me for almost 20 years so far through all my diificult battles with ocd. I hope this post inspires people and gives them hope! It does get better! I also suffer from bipolar, anxiety and ptsd, too and it is possible to live a good life with multiple mental issues.

Something came up on my fyp on tiktok. The possibility of asteroid Apophis hitting the earth in 2029 and 2036. NASA assured it wouldn’t hit instead coming between the moon and earth. The comments are all fear mongering. They say you can’t trust NASA and they’d have a reason to lie to the common folk. If it was about anything else i’d wave it away because I don’t give sceptics the time of day but this is bothering me severely. I’ve been staring at a wall for the past hour absolutely terrified and trying my best not to reassure myself. This is horrible for me, because images of my own death and that of the world keep relentlessly attacking my psyche. I wish i could just wave this off but it’s sticking to me terribly.

My problem is wrong coding, and perception. My subconscious mind get into wrong perception. I cannot calm my amygdala. Before this I can easily calm my mind. But I can not do it anymore. I do not know what to do. I am thinking of how to die everyday please help me

Im 18 and Ive had POCD since i was 16. I think ive become very good about dealing with it. Recently ive been able to accept the uncertainty and ive felt almost normal. Me and my friends were playing gartic phone which is a game where someone writes a sentence and you draw an image based off the sentence. It can be really funny because you draw something really dumb. Obviously sometimes the thing is sexual and thats why its funny. But they started going way too far with it and getting references from rule 34 and sending them. I got really uncomfortable and was about to leave then one of them sent some really weird looking drawing i didnt really see properly but it was some weird young looking cartoon drawing. I just left all their group chats and i genuinely dont think i can be friends with them anymore. It goes way back and ive had talking threapy about my ocd before and gotten better. My reaction to this is way less bad than it wouldve been a few years ago, but still now i feel really stressed again. I almost feel like just blocking all them and never speaking to them again irl. What should i do. I dont know who i can talk to about this other than another one of my friends who wasnt playing.

I am really struggling. I feel like I have a constant harm related intrusive thought in my head, causing a horrible intrusive feeling in my head. Even if I’m just simply scrolling and see someone sometimes this feeling of an intrusive thought becomes present, leading it to become horrid intrusive thoughts and feelings. I would never want to hurt anyone. Let alone do it and I’m struggling so much. I feel like I have a constant harm related intrusive thought in my head and feeling. Which is reinforced when I look at people. It goes when im distracted and then i remember the horrid feeling. I feel like bursting into tears, ive had enough. Can anyone relate? I feel like a constant intrusive thought and feeling IN my head im so sad :( I feel horrid. Scared ill go crazy.

So for the past month I have been dealing with the theme of going into a psychosis/or becoming schizophrenic. Having thoughts like is this really my reality? I am really here? I’m I just hallucinating what I want to see and did something horrible? Very scary thoughts. I’ve also been dealing with harm intrusive towards myself and towards my family. Recently this week I’ve developed a new theme of fearing not being able to sleep and going crazy from not being able to sleep. I lay there at night waiting to fall asleep and no matter how tired I was all day sleep doesn’t come. And then when I actually get some hours of sleep I question if I really slept and didn’t just hallucinate sleep. Which is very ridiculous I know. I’m just really scared and feel so helpless right now. I haven’t been diagnosed for OCD but I’m positive it’s what I have. I’m just so tired and feel like crying all the time. Sleep was the one thing I had to escape from all this crap and now that has gotten taken away from me as well. I just want my life back. Yesterday my family came over and for once I was able to forget about the thoughts for the time they were here and it felt so nice. I’m trying so hard to be okay for my family but I’m not. Im drowning on the inside and I just want to breathe. I can’t afford therapy right now and I have been prescribed sertraline 25mg for my anxiety but I’m to scared to take it. If anyone can relate or give me advice it would be greatly appreciated. I know reassurance is not what I should be getting but I’m just so scared.

My OCD, cognitive distortions and overthinking make it harder to be around people. Any tips?