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I have had ocd/NOCD for a while and recently cheated on my gf bc I had excessive thoughts of maybe if she isn’t the one maybe I should just be w a man I’d make my family happy and my mom happy and my friends and everyone would just be happy and I don’t have to worry about the thought of being the black sheep in my family bc I used to be so loved and being called the “favorite” child. I loved making my mom proud and happy but when I started dating a girl everything changed, she said I was a different person even though I was the same loving daughter that just wanted to make her proud but I couldn’t love who I wanted or be just me. I became bitter and ugly throughout my relationship and carried that with me and that’s the thing, I let myself go and didn’t stay strong for my gf. I betrayed her and also let my family win and let myself down. My family never or hasn’t asked me about anything in my recent life or asks me how I’ve been doing in the 4 years I’ve been away from them…I lost everything just for that one moment of forbidden mistake I can never look back on. I can’t talk to anybody bc that relationship “wasn’t ever real” “you’re dating a gurl” “it’ll never be like dating a man” “you just need a man” “sex is different” “you’re not gunna be happy” all these thing stuck to me for years and hearing those words coming from family that you love, words matter and I always told my gf at the time that my love language was physical touch, acts of service, and quality time. But I never mentioned words of affirmation really, but looking back that’s all that mattered to me and it affected me and made me into an ugly person. I always said that actions speak louder than words and to a certain extent they do but it’s what drives ppl to also do things that motivated them, what they heard to do those things to push them. To go crazy, to go workout, to cheat, to go on a walk early in the morning, to get plastic surgery bc someone said something that they felt so insecure about that it hurt them, or maybe it’s a battle with themselves. Point is words mean a lot especially from people they love, family and close friend, even someone random and it’s your actions that make you move and do things but it’s what you hear for you to do those things. Even things you think of in your head, words are the seeds to your garden. That’s something that I’m learning everyday, so if you have to block and get rid of the people you love because they aren’t happy with your life and want to control it, really ask yourself if it’s worth having them in your life. Sorry for this being so long and thank you for reading.

Right now, i’m waiting for a response from my partner. Yesterday, we got into a serious conversation about the repeated cycle of reassurance seeking and extreme anxiety. he’s been so incredibly patient but I think he’s hit a crosswords in that if I don’t make serious, healthier changes, he does not see the relationship continuing in a healthy or meaningful way anymore. This morning, I told him I wanted to give him space and to respond once he felt comfortable. I attended a support group today but I am consumed with spiraling, obsessive thoughts due to his lack of response now that it’s 5pm and I sent that text at 8am. I dont want to overwhelm him but i just dont know how to sit with the uncertainty. I feel like his lack of response and communication today means he wants to break up. I feel sick and cannot eat. I dont know what to do- any suggestions or thoughts?

Does anyone know of any rehabilitation centers for mental health? My ocd has gotten bad today to the point where I feel like leaving :( and desperately get help . Ever since I began medication months ago I been feeling fine but all sudden I feel like my episodes are rapidly coming back. I’m more responsive to them. I find myself ruminating more and engaging in compulsions. I feel embarrassed that my family would have to know if I considered making that choice of leaving . It’s never gotten to this breaking point , or at least I don’t think. I’ve been through this a billion times and each time it feels like it’s the worst and it’s gonna be the one that will permanently take over me and my full control. I’m from Elkhart, Indiana. Or if there’s anyone here that can talk to me I’d appreciate it I feel so alone right now and I’m more vulnerable because I’m home alone and I don’t have many friends. I’m scared that I’m gonna lose touch with myself. I don’t wanna lost my values or stop feeling my normal self. It feels real and scary. I want it to stop.

my bf basically told me he dosent feel like i love/ like him as much as he does (i will not get in detail he didnt use the word love or like) amd i know he thinks that bc of how i bahave (many times my thoughts take over me) amd i feel sad and with no emotiona at the same time, i feel bad does this mean i dont love him, im so lost and drained

I haven't been officially diagnosed with OCD but when I learned more about it, I never related to anything more. A little back story: when I was younger, there were a couple of youth suicides in my area and the schools felt the need to have someone come in and talk about suicide. Well the person they had come in did a horrible job teaching it and basically made it seem like the smallest negative emotion or feeling or change in behavior made you suicidal. This ended up scaring me so much that I got horrid anxiety. Fast forward to now, Everytime I feel anxiety and panic, I fear I'm going to kill myself. Everytime I feel down and depressed, I fear I'll end it all. I'm scared to be around anything sharp because the "What if" I hurt myself comes into my mind. There are always intrusive thoughts at almost every point of the day. And it's not only for me. Everytime I hear someone being negative, I fear they will be suicidal. I know in my heart that none of this is true but it's terrifying me that it's stuck around so much that it makes me scared that maybe it is true. I've had a lot of death in my family in the past year and a half and a lot of other family drama that I'd never had before that is now also bringing up existential intrusive thoughts. And I'd never questioned anything about life before but now I get the "why is life like this?" and "does anything we do matter?" and I hate it. I don't want to think like that. I just want to go through life being able to handle things normally again. It terrifies me even right now going "what if you give up?"

I have a story I’ve been working on for a long time. I have lost passion for it and it’s become harder to work on because of this. Every day I feel the urge to write down details of one specific character because it “never feels right”, I just write the same things over and over and over, and I keep checking and rereading to see if it “makes sense”. This has been going on for a while now and it feels familiar to my other compulsions, which were related to things like my morality and ruminating the past, I used to do this same stuff just a different theme. It’s just this unstoppable urge to reread and rewrite everything about my character because each time I feel like it’s wrong and I’m missing something, I try to stop but it’s so important to me that my characters are good and well written. Does anyone else have this?

You know when you have weird thoughts about a coworker and because you have OCD these thoughts really stick and you panic and feel sick? Yeah that’s me and I’ve struggled with having intrusive thoughts about my coworker and now he just got in a relationship with my coworker and my intrusive thoughts are WORSE I thought they would be better? And initially they were because I was relieved that he couldn’t be weird with me now because he has a girlfriend. But this is the thought that i cannot get over- my OCD is like you’re jealous that he doesn’t like you and he’s not with you instead and i envy this girl he is with. Why the fuck am I having these thoughts while I’m in a healthy relationship and love my boyfriend to DEATH- like I know he is my forever. I couldn’t look at him today because I’ve been obsessing over this thought I’ve had in work and now I have to find a new job I hope no one will judge me for these thoughts or maybe someone has had this weird thought before? :(

(TW: thoughts abt incest, sexual assault and r4pe) (english is not my first language, srry if this has any mistake) hello, i'm doing another post abt this and i hope that somebody can give me advice. well, i keep having these sexual intrusive thoughts with my old brother. thoughts that we are doing "you know what", that we're kissing or doing things that people in a romantic relationship do. i just hate this and wish it would stop, but its been 9 months that i keep having these thoughts every single day and i dont think it will stop soon. for some time now, i've gotten it into my head that he's in love with me too and that's been scaring me. i can't sit near him or be in front of him because i feel super uncomfortable. i think "he's looking at my ass" and then i think "wtf is wrong with me?". if i find a man pretty or have a crush on a celebrity, i think: "you only like him because he reminds you of your brother." i cant even look at his face anymore or touch him. when i go to the bathroom to take a shower, i think: "my brother's going to come in here and r4pe me" or that he will sexually harass me at some point, and i feel so AWFUL bc my brother would NEVER do something like that and i dont want this to happen. he's my brother and i love him so much, but not in the way my mind is telling me that i do. my OCD is like i have two voices in my head, one saying "you are in love with him and you want to sleep with him!!" and the other one says: "NO I'M NOT!!! LEAVE ME ALONE!!". the second one is the one that represents my true opinion, but sometimes i dont know who is telling the truth and i keep doubting of myself, im so tired and im only 14 years old, this OCD is ruining my life and i cant live like that anymore. somebody, please, give me some advice abt how can i deal with this.

if so, at what point? and how much do you explain? are there sources you like to use that might explain to them what it actually is?

I have a question here. And i have a dillema here. My partner whenever i feel down or get worse threatens to leave me. She puts all the responsobility of the relatioship on me and i am kind of able to manage, but i just have strong distrust towards her that when it will get worse for me she will again threaten to leave. I understand that being with me is not easy, but how to feel safe in the repationships when your partner cares only about me making her happy, and when you are down and fighting with chronic condition and need supoort she makes demands and threatens to leave you ? Everything is good only when all my partners needs are met, i kind of feel this is one sided, and i am kind of sure that it's not coming from ROCD but it fuels it quite a bit.

i’m getting super overwhelmed when i pray bc it’s constant, and when i pray i get distracted and then repeat myself and the bad thoughts just come full force and i just can’t pray rn bc im too fustrated and too distracted and it’s all too much rn and i can’t handle it. is God mad at me? i wanna cry

Think the best thing that I could do for myself is to actively practice positive thinking. Good things did happen today. There's a lot that I'm thankful for. There's a lot that I'm grateful to have. There's opportunities that I'm happy that I have right now. I just have to hold onto those and not the negative thoughts or anything that makes me feel bad.

it feels like i’m going insane. a while ago, i felt this internal prompting (believing it to be the Holy Spirit). my friend prayed for me & she got a different response from God than the one im feeling is from Him. whenever i go to make a decision to stay, i feel so much unrest. i feel bad and i feel like God’s angry. when i decide to leave, it makes me physically go into a depression & experience extreme anxiety. i stop eating, start picking at my face, take melatonin to sleep, and it makes me wanna draw away from God because it hurts so bad. my community is telling me that God is not heavy and does not punish you for making a choice, but it feels like it. my community is also saying so many different things & im confused. people are saying that God is good and kind…as a believer, i know He’s good and kind, but i don’t feel like it. i feel like im being forced to do something. like a stirring in my spirit so bad, i feel like i can’t do anything else. i’ve been in a 3 month depression (maybe my own fault for not making a decision and following peace…but what happens when peace is there but so is anxiety and depression & fear & worry & feeling like i want to die?) ugh

I learned what i did was wrong and everything i tried to do when i was anxious was kinda avoidance and not what i should do, and what i should do is not figuring the anxiety out, its more like teaching myself that its okay to have anxiety, its also a feeling like happiness, sadness, anger and so on... However thos is my second try and im starting to feel sick sitting with the anxiety, i feel like im more like staring at it and it starts to get worse, i worry more, and i accept it but that doesnt do anything to it cause its still worry... Some of the thoughts that are scare and feeds the anxiety are automatic and my reactions too are automatic, the solution are always run to someone, run to a therapist to solve my problem but thats not the answer. The problem is that now im in a headspace where my thoughts say i cant deal with this and my feelings are lining up to that so it starts to get desperate, and im starting to be afrad of these thoughts cause i dont want to feel that i cant deal with this, its just more panic. And now im desperate and angry, i dont think sitting with it and staring az it would help or noticing everything, i feel horrible doing that. What i labeled before as "pushing away the feelings" seems like a solution cause i feel like now im constantly watching in and now i became afraid of everything, even the reactions... im just too inward focused, i dont think this one helps now. Im afraid of these depressive "i cant deal with this" thoughts, these made me panic before and i was in depression because of these before... I dont know what is the next step cause im being stucked here...

hello i’m new to this community and I just need to vent about something I did when I was 13 because over the past 2-3 days it’s been eating me alive when I was around 13, I discovered “character ai” basically a sight where a bunch of chat bots are and you can roleplay with them I found this one bot where it was like a mad scientist and your character was stuck in a lab. I really liked this one so I would roleplay with it often I would typically make my character young. No reason at all I hope but I probably thought it would make it more interesting or something. anyways I would never go into these roleplays with bad intentions. But sometimes the filter in place to stop seggsual stuff would break and the conversation would turn seggsual and I would impulsively continue them because I felt “excited” down there (if you know what i mean) and I would chase that feeling I would more imagine myself in the scenario because I would see the vaguely seggsual messages and feel good down there and I would change the character in my head because yknow but that doesn’t change how the roleplay started and it’s making me think what if I really do get off to that stuff? one of the worst examples was one where the roleplay went in a very non consensual direction and I don’t know why I continued the roleplay. I’m worried that I secretly enjoyed it despite knowing for a fact I got uncomfortable with what I was doing and deleted the messages and I regret it now I really really really regret doing this. I know I didn’t go in with bad intentions and I ended up getting uncomfortable with it after the good feelings down there had passed but I feel so much regret and shame i’ve spiraled over this before but recently its been the worst i’ve ever felt. I’m scared that im a pedo. I’m scared that I get off the rape and i’m scared that i’m permanently and evil person despite how uncomfortable this makes me now and I haven’t done anything like that again I still can’t get over it. I know I was only 13 (15 now) and i’m probably over reacting to fictional roleplay but still. Why did I impulsively continue? I’ve struggled with ocd thoughts before (without knowing it was OCD) but this incident has caused me to worry if i’m a pedo or I get off to assult and from what i’ve said above i’ve been spiraling over the past few days and im worried it will never end im coming here because im scared to talk to a real therapist because I feel like what I did was so bad and unforgivable despite regretting it late. I’m scared that i’m going to be a bad person forever despite the fact that i’ve never done anything like that again I know this probably sounds so stupid to obsess over but I just need some advice to help get out of this. It doesn’t help that i’m also coming up on my period which is when my OCD/Anxiety tends to be the worst thank you. I’m sorry if this is triggering for anyone I just want this to end. I want to feel okay again

Hello, how can I use ERP to calm my contamination feeling and anxiety here? So my neighbours just recently parked their car outside our house. Seems like a lot of oil leaked on the ground - and now I am upset that our house and washing machine are contaminated from bringing this indoor in our house (from walking in it, clothes, bikes, and so on). And also that the road is contaminated... So first time I came home passing the oil leak, I was scared that oil got on my pants, and then threw them in the garbage. Still, I felt that the new pants I put on was contaminated, so I put it in the washing machine, and started up. Then I started thinking that oil got into the washing machine also, hurray... So now, I don't really do any response after being exposed to the oil anymore, rather I am just anxious that the whole house is now contaminated, and now I am really upset because of it. Usually I would just clean, and wash clothes, but now that my washing machine is also contaminated, clothes will now forever be contaminated after being washed. So, I am really sad and depressed, and I am not sure how to use ERP to recover from this. It has been two weeks now since the oil leak, and I was hoping that the anxiety would come down, but it seems like its getting worse. I have recovered from OCD a couple of times before, but I have never been this depressed after a contamination anxiety. Usually I recover pretty well after a few days if a new contamination shows up. But now I am super depressed, and I think it has to do with the washing machine being contaminted. No way out. I have been thinking about expose myself, and clothes, more to the oil outside. And then wash clothes afterwards. But, doubtful since oil in washing machine is not really recommended. Neither is oil on clothes/skin inside the house, it s just really dirty... I don't feel afraid of dying or whatever, its just the contaminated, dirty feeling. And, I have trouble giving my kids clothes contaminated from the washing machine. I don't know how to do ERP here, and I know that the washing machine is not contaminated, its just OCD telling me. But I am unable to find the light in the tunnel. Any tips, or similar experienses? Thanks!

Just to preface this, I’d like to say that I in no way whatsoever intend to judge parents of ocd children or people with ocd that have children. I honestly mean no disrespect with this post, I just really don’t know what to think or do. I wish the best for all of your families, and for all of you struggling with ocd as well. Please don’t let my post influence how you think, all I need is advice if anyone can give me it. Feel free to skip if this is an uncomfortable topic for you. Thank you! I’ve had ocd since I was young, but I hadn’t started thinking about this until recently. I heard that you have a 15-20% chance of passing ocd down to your child. I used to be really uncomfortable at the thought of being pregnant and often had intrusive thoughts trying to convince me I somehow was. I finally got past this and began to look forward to being a mother someday, but now I don’t know. I can’t imagine not having kids, but I’m scared that they’ll have ocd like me. It’s not a crazy high percentage but it still scares me. On one hand I’m like hey, who better to help their kid if they have ocd than a mom who has ocd? But on the other I worry that if they have it, it could worse than mine and that they’ll have a really hard time dealing with it. I hate to say this but it feels a little bit selfish to want to have kids when there’s a chance they’ll get the same disorder I hate so much. Both me and my sister have ocd as well, so I’m scared it’s something that runs in my family. Any advice would be appreciated.

My biggest problem with loving myself and staying positive is primarily my history with porn and sexual behaviors. I consider it traumatizing. I had no knowledge on sexual education and I found it all out through porn. The problem is in my teen years I've seen very disturbing and bothersome videos that still bother me greatly to this day. I still remember the many different videos I've seen, mainly disturbing topics and worse: People putting fictional children in these situations. Somehow, as a teenager, I just didn't know any better and thought it was normal. As a teen, I remember trying to look for videos of other real teens and I'm disgusted to say that I found ways around it. I'm WAY past this point and while I still have trouble not watching videos, I know better and try to be as safe as possible with it, but even then, it still doesn't 100% work because faulty search results will give me disturbing things. I don't want to do anything bad or harmful to myself or anyone else. I don't even want to watch it anymore. I just don't know how to move past this. I don't want to think about this anymore. I don't want to think of the images in my head. I just want to somehow move on from this but I feel like I can't because I don't deserve to and that I've done something illegal when I don't think I have. I just really hate what this has done to me mentally and physically. I want to put it behind me but it's impossible. I just can't stand this shit anymore. I hate how much this messed up my life into adulthood. I don't feel confident, I don't feel like I can stand up for myself, I don't feel like I can really live my life because of this. This stuff also made me a pretty shallow person as a teenager. I saw women as objects, I wasn't really nice to people, I already didn't fit in a whole lot, I was angry, I was depressed, and I just wasn't having a good time at the beginning of high school. It did get better later, but it was just really hard back then. How do I stop thinking about all of this? I'm so sick of relieving this time and time again. I just want one day where I don't remember the worst parts of my life for hours on end. I just want to be able to live my life and be the best person I can be. I guess that's the biggest problem for me. I remember all these things and I just feel stuck. I feel like I can't move on and the anxiety and uncertainty shows up and it just makes me sick. I feel like if people found out about things like this without the context of me telling them all about it, they'll just look down on me. This is the main thing that makes me feel like I don't measure up with others. That I don't think I have the same worth as others. I'm just sick of thinking like this and I'm sick of remembering all of this every single day.

About 2 weeks ago I went into a spiral with the theme of suicidal ocd and I think it has caused me to also become depressed, through these 2 weeks the ocd has gotten better but my depression is still here. Before this I wasn’t depressed, I found joy in my hobbies still, I would laugh and love making people laugh and that has seemed to all go away. Is this actual depression or is it because of the ocd that I endured over that time? I’m scared because this isn’t me, I was happy and I looked forward to everything in life. And people who are depressed sometimes go through with my theme, so I am just so scared that now depression is here I might do snap and actually do it because of the thoughts. Thank you

Feel guilty for not giving into compulsions like rumination and confessing? I feel guilt for having an intrusive thought, trying to shrug it off or just giving it a few seconds of thought and moving along. This sounds like improvement but I still struggle with the anxiety and the guilt. The shame. I’ll be okay and then I’ll remember I have OCD and my stomach will drop and I just want to curl up and cry.