Welcome to
the NOCD Community

I think I’m in the recovery stage as my thoughts have settled so much & I only get intrusive thoughts on occasion and get worse only when I’m anxious, but the quietness in my brain feels so weird & I feel awful saying that because all I wanted was the thoughts to stop. This is the most quiet it’s been it’s over 7 months, so to go from non stop thoughts for a long time to quietness I don’t know how to take it. Has anyone else felt like this in recovery

17f So basically I think you know this whole accept and sit with the uncertainty thing. It applies to pocd as well. Because you can ruminate, test yourself, seek reassurance as much as you want but it will never be enough for you brain to be sure you are not a P. So you need to sit with "Maybe I am a P maybe not" and just don't do anything about it. So sometimes I can do that. But here comes moral ocd. If I accept the chanse of me being a pedophile, isn't it morally wrong for me to be around children? Look at children? Watch movies with children in it? Cause now I can't even look at children even if it was an accident without freaking out and thinking that I'm a monster. Sometimes it feels morally wrong to leave the house because there is a chanse I can meet a child on the street I genuinely don't know what to do. It feels paralyzing at this point. Seems like I can't do anything. Like I even need to cover children on the screen with my hand when I watch a movie. It's exhausting.

I’m 19 and struggle with health anxiety, contamination, harm, and magical thinking OCD and would love to meet people with similar experiences and hardships because I have never had an opportunity for such a supportive community!

Hi all. It is my first week on here and I don’t think I was anticipating how broken I would feel when I started this process. I hope I can do this, but I have been at listening to these obsessions about my health for 30 of my 45 years on the planet. I thought I had things more together, but this year has been real bad for so many reasons and my cracks are really showing. I am not sure what my question is..maybe I just need to know people have come back from where I am.

17f My ocd is hell on earth so I'm thinking about going to a psychiatrist maybe they will prescribe me meds cause my POCD is a torture and other themes are bad also But I'm scared that if I start taking meds I will become less cautions about looking at kids and interacting with kids and will do something fucked up and wrong Cause now I can't even look at kids I feel like it's morally wrong like if there is a chanse I'm a P and I'm scared meds will get rid of me being so so cautious around kids making sure I'm not aroused I'm not looking at them I'm not touching them and I will do something fucked up and then I won't deserve any redemption

Like always, porn has been a problem and I spent the entire night watching it. I feel tons of shame for things I've seen without intending to see, and I feel shame about struggling with it altogether. I kind of feel like crying but not that much. I'm just trying my absolute best to practice acceptance and not judge myself. I'm just trying to see this as a problem that others struggle with as well and not put myself down for it over and over again. I know that doesn't help in the long run, but it's hard not to feel that way.

I feel like my whole life I’ve been overthinking everything. I remember having really bad intrusive thoughts as a kid but I thought I had gotten over it. I feel like I’m starting to see that it’s just not manifested in different ways. I tried to bring it up with my therapist but she thinks it’s just anxiety. I feel like it’s something more. Does anyone have any advice on what personally showed you what was the difference

I believe I have ROCD — at least, that’s what many people here have told me based on what I’ve shared — and I really need help, because I feel like I’m falling apart. I don’t know what I feel anymore. I don’t know what’s real. My thoughts come as loud, cold statements — not questions. They say things like: “Nothing is the same.” “You don’t love him.” “You’re just staying because you’re used to him.” And even though I know I’m supposed to let the thoughts pass and not engage with them — I can’t. I get stuck in them. I try to find answers, I ruminate, I check, I cry, I panic. Everyone says “love isn’t just a feeling” — and I know that. But… I still want to feel something. I want to feel warmth, or connection, or even just peace. It’s been so long since I felt anything like that. Now everything just feels empty or terrifying or cold. My brain only gives me negative interpretations. No memory brings me comfort anymore. Nothing feels like it used to. And the worst part is — it all feels true. Sometimes I think: “What if I’m just denying the truth?” “What if I’ve finally realized that I don’t love him, and I just don’t want to admit it?” This feels like the worst version of myself. I’m so confused and scared and tired. Even therapy didn’t help — my therapist said things that made it worse, and now I don’t know who or what to believe anymore. I just want help. I want to know how to face ROCD — if that’s what this really is. I want to believe I can feel love again. I don’t want to lose myself in this forever. Has anyone else felt like this? How did you start to get better? i cant even remember past good memories with him, my head tells me that i didnt love him and i was just “excited “ to have someone. We have 2 years together and i have been dealing with this for a year and a half.

I am so tired of having intrusive thoughts everytime i try to eat anything cause my mind immediately goes to “what if this tastes like human meat” “what if the texture is like human meat” and i have to stop eating and i start crying it annoys me so bad and i lost some weight because of it i just want to be normal again and to stop these thoughts they happened out of nowhere and i talked to some people about it and they tell me what cannibals have said and it has made things so much worse tbh im just so exhausted and i wanna eat healthy again

(21+ ONLY: TRIGGER WARNING) I have therapy today and I’m nervous. I just started going to therapy and I really like my therapist. She talked to me about doing ERP and I’m really nervous about it. I’m scared to tell her the extent of my OCD, and my themes. I’m scared to tell her about my false memory OCD, because I’m scared that what I did was real and I’m just excusing it as false memory, although I have no memory of it. I’m scared that I am truly a monster and I’m using OCD as an excuse—and that she’ll find out and distance herself. I’m just scared that my whole world is gonna fall apart, all around me.

18+ TW! Involves sexual content I have learning disabilities which means im always going to be 3-5 years mentally behind from my actual age… when I was 14 I remember finding people saying they work with kids “attractive” and I remember mastu*** over a kid around 5+ but when I was 14 I was either mentally age 11 or 9. So I didn’t know it was wrong, and as soon as I realised I stopped. People say I was young and it’s okay but I remember finding people saying they even walked past a nursery “attractive” but I don’t know if this is even the right word. Maybe cute? Because I find different emotions hard to tell the difference between, so maybe it’s cute rather than attractive. I never ever had intentions to do anything to younger individuals, it was just me finding people saying they worked with them etc attractive… which my ocd now plays on, because my friend mentioned they were working with kids but idk if it was the real me or not but I genuinely felt like I found it attractive and it was giving my so many groinal responses which then made me feel genuinely aroused like I wanted to do things. This plays on my mind because my ocd will always say “but you did/do find stuff like this attractive” but this literally stops me from eating, sleeping or anything. I can’t break from my compultions because what if I do genuinely find it attractive. I don’t think it’s even attractive maybe it’s cute? Like I find it cute… but cuteness can give people feelings down there I guess. I think because if my learning disabilities I found it hard to know the difference between “attraction” and cute so I did stuff over it because it gave me that feeling down there but that could of been cuteness feeling. I just need some support on this.

Hey guys so I have been suffering with sexual ocd due to the fact that I don’t feel that romantic spark with him anymore, I love him and I know I do but I get to much in my thoughts thinking about why can’t I feel that anymore what has changed what if I don’t wanna be with anymore I’ve been with him for 4 years and at first I think it was ROCD but now I started thinking what if I’m into girls now I’ve always been the type to say oh a girl is so pretty or I like this about her but now I feel like every time I see a girl I’m like do I see myself in a relationship with her oh she’s pretty oh I like her voice do I find it attractive and sometimes I do !!! Which is killing me I feel disgust thinking about because what if I secretly am no shame to people who are my sister herself is but I just feel wierd because I wanna be with my husband and feel happy there not with a girl and feel like a man because I see myself in the mirrior and I’m like do I myself being a man do I look lesbian? Do I act lesbian or bi? What if secretly I wanna be a man or I imagine myself being a man in a relationship with a pretty girl and idk what to think

Does anyone else read other peoples post and think it’s for them or about them and their situation and start to think that’s what they are going through themselves ? Or like I’m blaming ocd but it’s my brain actually telling that’s how I actually feel?

im so scared that this is just denial and that im actuall gay. idk what to do anymore i need help. its just constant anxiety in my chest and i hate it. is there anything i can do to help?

Yesterday I kept thinking about something sad about God like yk when you feel disappointed in God sometimes :( so I had just gotten a really bad thought of God turning into a demon …. And it felt like like I was thinking it for a sec like intentionally… and I quickly started to panic and feel really bad bc I Love God a lot but I’m afraid I committed the Unforgivable sin aka blasphemy my brain gets to addicted to think about certain things I can’t think about

I know I shouldn’t and I’m trying not to ask for reassurance but how do I deal with this when I made real event mistakes in childhood? I’ve opened up to my cousin about this who’s an adult and believes that kids can be influenced at a young age and mimic things that they see and friends and my therapist. They all see the good in me and my stupid childhood mistakes but the guilt is very strong and even though I’ve opened up It’s telling me to open up more and more and I don’t know what else it wants from me.

Youtubers are constantly getting accused of doing p*dophilic activity and its making me think my real events are as bad or as worse as them... Ive vented a lot to a lot of people in the PM's about my OCD... some of them younger (minors)... because I wanted reassurance from everyone and anyone... but this situation triggers me the most because I was venting about my 18+ HOCD situations... In an HOCD support group I was in, I vented to 2 minors in the PM's about my 18+ HOCD situations... The leader of the support group (that i vented to) was 17... I was 19 at the time... the other minor i vented to was younger (14-15)... the younger one told me she was uncomfortable when i vented to her in the PM's twice... i stopped and blocked her after she told me the second time... i kept asking the leader of the support group for reassurance for my 18+ HOCD situations for months because she kept giving me reassurance... i thought she was cute but didnt pursue her because of my age... i dont ever want to ever be a P or a MAP or a groomer in any way... I keep getting this gut feeling in my stomach that i "flirted" with the younger one that I vented to, who i blocked after she told me twice she was uncomfortable about me venting about my 18+ hocd situations... i didnt ever vent to them for malicious intent... I was trying to get reassurance for my hocd... Plus my pocd keeps saying I cant have any opinions online because of my pocd and real events ocd situations and that Im not a good person so I cant say anything online... Also i keep getting intrusive thoughts of people labelling me as a P and a MAP in the future because of these pocd real events... And i keep getting intrusive thoughts of being outcasted and "cancelled" online when someone "exposes" me for my POCD and real events OCD...

Right now I feel like I’ve realized something awful. Like maybe… I never truly loved my boyfriend. Maybe in the beginning I was just excited to be in a relationship. Maybe I confused that excitement with real love. And when the intrusive thoughts started, maybe it wasn’t ROCD — maybe it was the truth hitting me. I write this and it feels real. That’s the scariest part. It feels calm and clear and like maybe I’ve just been lying to myself all along, holding on because I “should,” not because I truly want to. I can’t remember how it felt to love him — and that makes it worse. I feel so disconnected, so numb, like nothing makes sense anymore. Every time I try to feel something for him, it feels like I’m faking it. Like I’m playing a role, not being myself. But the thing is… I’m not at peace. If this was really the truth, why does it hurt so much? Why does this “realization” come with panic, guilt, emptiness, and so much fear? I don’t want to hurt him. I don’t want to lose him. But I also don’t want to keep living like this — doubting myself, my feelings, and my past. I feel like I’m stuck in a cycle I can’t break, and I’m scared I’ll always feel this way. Has anyone ever felt like this before?

Lately I’ve seen way too many comments under posts about OCD, especially the harm, POCD, and relationship themes that are incredibly misinformed and honestly harmful. People saying things like “these thoughts are unnatural,”or “you need to go get real help” and encouraging confession ***compulsions*** when they clearly have no understanding of how OCD actually works. Let me be clear: OCD involves distressing and unwanted thoughts, images, or urges. That doesn’t make someone dangerous. It makes them someone with a mental illness who is terrified of their own brain. Saying these people are “unnatural” or implying they’re broken only reinforces shame, and shame is the opposite of what helps anyone heal. If you’re commenting under OCD-related posts on an OCD ***app*** without understanding what intrusive thoughts are, or what compulsions can look like, or **how OCD can attach itself to the things we fear most** then please, stop. You are not helping. You’re reinforcing stigma and pushing people further into silence. OCD is already isolating. We don’t need more people moralizing or projecting trauma theory onto something they haven’t experienced or don’t understand. If you really care, go learn. Read about intrusive thoughts. Learn about ERP therapy. Or maybe just listen. Because some of us are barely hanging on, and comments like those don’t just miss the point, they can do real damage. I’m sorry if I come off too angry, it just really upsets me to see people speak on something they clearly don’t understand. End of rant. Thank you for reading 🤍

I just wanted to apologize for my last post, it was very angry and fearful, and I don’t think it was a great reflection of myself. I’ll try to avoid posting anything nearly as frantic or emotional again! Seemed like a lot of people avoided commenting on it, so I’ll avoid doing that again. Keep fighting your OCD guys!