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I am really scared of staring at people‘s private parts and I get the urge to do so. It gets so awkward in Social situations.

I've always had trouble completing tasks without procrastinating or just feeling stuck and unable to do anything. My psychiatrist suspects ADHD, but I haven't been diagnosed. Still, I need to figure out how to manage this issue of mine better. I'm wondering if anyone has any advice? I don't know if this is an OCD issue or what... Part of it may be, since I create unnecessary requirements for myself in order to do things. For example, before I do any work, I need to eat. I watch something while I eat, and then I need to let the food settle before I start anything, and the list keeps going. It's been like this for YEARS, but it's become more of an issue as I've gotten older. I've always had high grades, but it's just sitting down, getting started, and staying seated that I struggle with. I'm guilty of checking my phone a lot and getting distracted with things that have NOTHING to do with the tasks at hand. I just have no idea what to do... I feel guilty about this. In the past, I've tried following schedules, but I can never keep on one 🥲 I'm going to continue to try things, but I thought I'd ask here to see if anyone had advice?

I feel like I more than anyone have committed horrible acts. Specifically, when I was a teen. I don’t want to talk about them because I feel ashamed of them. I think that is something I would rather converse with my therapist instead. Recently I learned of remorse. I thought I felt remorse for what I did but I learned I in fact felt guilt. There’s a difference. People who feel guilt feel ashamed because they think it means they’re a bad person. People who feel remorse feel ashamed because they think of how the other person felt. I am still trying to understand it to be honest. I find it hard sometimes to understand how others feel. I do worry if that makes me a psychopath but I’m not going to go into that because I have a message to tell and reassurance will only pursue the cycle. I haven’t been diagnosed. I feel like many of us feel guilt not remorse. Or maybe it’s just me. I think, for me, my guilt is causing me to push someone away and further ruin my relationship with them. But when I learned of remorse yesterday I had the impulse to go hug them and talk to them. At first I wondered if this made me a predator for wanting to do that but as I tried to understand the emotions a little more I felt not a sexual drive like a big brick in my pants but rather like a warm embrace. One that my mom gave me when I was a baby. The emotion was not sexual, it was a nurturing love. I also heard a wonderful example where a woman said she was afraid of being something she wasn’t. Another woman told her she was that thing. Immediately the woman felt fear and anxiety and then the other woman said, “You are also a spider.” The other woman was confused. You think you are that thing because you focus on it so much. You are not that thing. You are not a spider even though you may have acted like one. This leads me to another wise saying that I learned of a man who was worried about his past actions and another man told him, “Your past does not define you and your acts of redemption do not redeem you.” That was as much as I can remember but I’m going to add a bit more to it. “Your past does not define you and your acts of redemption do not redeem you. Your guilt will stay with you, and it will also remind you. The car has a fuel tank. It has to have that to keep moving. But if the whole car was a fuel tank there would be no room for the engine or the passenger seat and the drive would likely die from the intense sleep of fuel. So, feel guilt, but leave it a fuel tank.” I feel too much guilt but forgot to feel remorse. I personally am going to try to change it. If you were harmed, would you rather that person apologized but then never see you again and not try to regain your trust out of guilt? Or would you prefer for them to come over and treat you better after they apologized? Some have done irredeemable mistakes and I feel like the those people who felt guilt over those mistakes now know that the world isn’t black and white. I don’t mean to exalt myself but I am planning this scene in a book I want to write about where the protagonist is about to kill a man who he trusted and who personifies the devil. “The devil is worshipped by all, boy. The devil always wins. You think killing me will redeem you. It just means I win. Those who love God pursue righteousness. But those who hate God follow me. And those who hate me follow me as well. And those who love me follow me as well. Because those who hate me do what I do in order to accomplish their hate. And those who love me forget I exist and follow in my footsteps. You let me live and I live on. You kill me. I live on through you.” Then I’m thinking the boys says, “Then I’ll cripple you.” But he does end up killing him, unfortunately. I’m still workshopping it. Anyways, I think what I’m trying to take from this is, your guilt happened. Stop trying to redeem yourself because you never will. Learn from it and move forward.

Recently i got stuck in a loop with a terrible intrusive thought about my boyfriend. it’s been rattling in my mind and i feel disgusted and scared and like an evil horrible person. i keep saying things like “intrusive thoughts attack who/what you care about the most” but i think my compulsion (researching; looking up ocd intrusive thoughts and watching others experiencing the same thing) had made it hard to believe that. Im not super concerned about the harm portion because im beating it but now its turned me numb towards my boyfriend after feeling so guilty and scared and everything. i just don’t know what to do its like my body and brain is trying to push me away. we also spend every single day together so im wondering if maybe thats why its so bad? like i feel AWFUL. and i cant stop crying and i havent told him any of this because i don’t want to scare him or make him think im crazy. any tips or words would be appreciated.

Im making this post not because Im currently anxious (even though i am currently triggered) but because i want to make this message for those who currently struggle as much as i do... What I will tell you is that you are loved... you don't have to agree with it... you even can label it as something you disagree with or hate... but you are loved regardless. And you are cared for... and you have people who will show you endless compassion... this is not something I will expect you to get yet, mostly because just like me, you are stuck in the spiral too... I know how you feel because I hate myself too... I hate myself so much that anyone who tells me that they love me, I refuse to believe and brush off because the thought of loving myself has become inconceivable to me. I have POCD and real events OCD for christs sake... I have done genuine horrible things as a 13-14 year old... things I will probably never forgive myself for as long as I live... but this does not have to be you... You might think "ive done horrible things, therefore I cannot be forgiven for the things ive done" and I know because Im just like you... the main difference between us is that I have actually done genuinely horrible things as a 13-14 year old that would make people despise, vilify, and even hate me. Thats not you. You are someone who either A. was a kid when it happened, so you cannot blame yourself for a childs mind and actions, or B. Realize that you are someone here because you understand that what you are going through is something that other people have gone through... you arent alone... no one ever is... but I might disagree because I'm probably the most alone out of everyone. Recognize that this community will fight tooth and nail to help and defend you and recognize that you are in a community full of the 1 percent of people on this planet, that give a shit about you... these people (whether they've blocked me or not) can recognize that your suffering is not the fault of your own, but through the fault of a chemical imbalance in their heads that torments them endlessly with intrusive thoughts, feelings, and even your own past... you arent alone... you never really are in this place... Im the exception however... One last sentence before I go. As the 11th doctor once said... "You are forgiven... always and completely forgiven..." P.S. please don't ask me what my real events were... they were genuinely extremely horrible and I refuse to discuss it with anyone unless its my mom (who knows what happened) or a therapist in the distant future... this isnt about me... this is about all of you.

Does it actually work for you? And do you not feel like a zombie? Maybe it’s just my ocd but I’m scared I made a mistake by not going back to my old med but my psych claims no one gets side effects from it but I kind of feel like a zombie on it even tho it’s early in and I’m hoping it goes away cuz I read it never did fir some ppl :( anyone not get this from lexapro?

18+ When I was in high school (16 or 17), I hung out with the popular kids of school... they send me this popular girl (who was in our school) explicit photo on snap because I was curious to see it... after I turned 19, I suddenly remembered my friends sent the photo and asked them to delete it off of the chat, as I didn't want to be in possession of any form of illegal material... Fast forward to later... my friend had broken up with his ex and wanted to send us explicit pics of her... curious at the time, I asked to see it and he sent the group (including me) some pictures... Now that Im 24, I remember him sending these pics and asked him to take down the pics in our snapchat convo... I didnt want any pics of their ex because this was harmful content... my friend, (the one who sent our friend group explicit vids and pics of his ex) told me that there was a one month period between him and her when they were in a relationship where he was 18 and she was 17 )... they were together for 1-2 years... and they were explicit throughout their whole relationship ... including the one month period... so i was getting extremely anxious and triggered about him sending me potentially illegal stuff... I asked him several times over the course of three days after he casually admitted he had a 1 month age period with her, (he was 18 and she was 17 during that one month) if she was over 18 when he made those videos, and he kept giving me answers like "Yes" And "It was a month after she turned 18..." He even got frustrated on the second day of me asking and said "Dude, this is the 10th time you've asked me and yes she was." On the third day I asked him, he said "yeah" when i said his previous comments of "a month after she turned 18, right?" back to him, and he even added that "we started getting more explicitly active around this time." He also told me "Even if she was under the age of 18, you wouldn't be in trouble because you were sent it." So now I keep getting anxious because I dont know if he's lying or not and its triggering me really bad, not to mention feeling guilty about the harm I had caused... I genuinely feel so guilty and awful about this... I hurt people... and I cant sleep at night knowing I did... People say you make mistakes when you were a teen... these were some of my mistakes... I genuinely feel horrible and I cant sleep at night knowing the guilt of my actions are still there... I genuinely feel awful... I hope people dont hate me after reading this... i hope you dont block me... you've all been so genuinely kind and encouraging to me... and I dont want to lose someone who cares about me on here... (edited)

I don't know what to do .I don't know if my therapist knows about intrusive thoughts..I want to tell them and see what she says.I told her some of my worries..but not all.At this point it feels like I am in denial.I had a staring compulsion and made a parent upset and I want to apologise but Idk how And I pray I didn't upset the kid.And I think about a terrible thing when I fantasize..like the thoughts appear and I am so so scared.I hate them.

Ok is this OCD or not? When my boyfriend and me first started dating I didn’t know it but for the first month he was still talking to and seeing his ex girlfriend. He says they weren’t physical but I’m not dumb. It was early on so I let it go. We are going on a year now and a few months ago she sent him a message saying “I miss coming to your house and you fucking me” He told me about it and didn’t respond to her. He blocked her. Now we are very serious and about a month ago I asked him if he still has her number in his phone. He said yes. I asked him to get rid of it but he got defensive and said he wouldn’t. It ate me up. He is talking marriage with me. I can’t quit thinking about it. Is this a huge red flag or is it my OCD?

has anyone ever been cancelled or struggles w cancel culture ocd? can you share your thoughts on it? i was cancelled a long time ago online and its sort of shaken my confidence and seriously triggered my real events ocd and given me lapses in my memory as a result. i don’t trust people anymore bc of how much i lost and was accused of for things that were either out of my control, or misinterpreted against my intentions. would love to hear some thoughts from yall whether similar experiences or even similar fears. thanks :)

Upset because a girl I met probably thinks I’m a p because she told me about this job and it involves with kids and I told her that “I can’t work with kids because I get triggered” and she said “ohh 😥” I said “OCD” she said “it’s OK I understand” and now I feel like she thinks that I’m a terrible person or she thinks I’m a p because I cannot fake it even if I need a job I don’t think it’s worth my mental health me going every day at home thinking if I did something to a kid, I would literally lose my mind.

With all the unintentional and intentional harm ive done, I keep thinking about the girl I like... she told me recently she felt scared for me because of my mental health decline, and I cant even tell her anything about my real events or my intrusive thoughts, because she would likely call me a disgusting freak, a perverted weirdo, or both... I genuinely hate living right now... I can't stand myself... When I was in high school (16 or 17), I hung out with the popular kids of school... they send me this popular girl at our school's explicit photo on snap because I was curious to see it... after I turned 18, I suddenly remembered my friends sent the photo and asked them to delete it off of the chat, as I didn't want to be in possession of any form of illegal material... Fast forward to when I was 19... my friend had broken up with his ex and wanted to send us explicit pics of her... curious at the time, I asked to see it and he sent the group (including me) some pictures... Now that Im 24, I remember him sending these pics and asked him to take down the pics in our snapchat convo... I didnt want any pics of their ex because this was harmful content... I genuinely feel so guilty and awful about this... I unintentionally hurt people... and I cant sleep at night knowing I did... You said you made mistakes when you were a teen... these were my mistakes... I genuinely feel horrible and I cant sleep at night knowing the guilt of my actions are still there... I genuinely feel awful... I hope all you dont hate me after reading this... i hope you dont block me... you've been so genuinely kind and encouraging to me... and I dont want to lose someone who cares about me on here...

I know confession is a compulsion, and it ultimately feeds into the cycle, but I'm tearing myself apart over this and I want help. I just want to confess everything to my partner, and then we can figure out how to deal with my thoughts together. Should I confess?

I was driving through a intersection and a guy on bike came into my lane when I had the right of way. I got a bit frustrated at him not follwoing the rules so I tried to break check him (without wishing him any harm, nor did I intended for him to get into an accident because of me). Beacuse he had made a u-turn and was now on my right side while break chehcking I turned a bit to the right too (not intending any harm to him, just wanted to tease him cause of the situation) he slightly touched my car. I felt bad so I checked all my mirrors. I remember at that time he moved to the left. How I know that? The guy was wearing a black helmet with another guy sitting behind him. So my mind tracked these 2 factors at that time assuring me that the black helmet bike guy was not harmed due to my due diligence. Becuase I felt bad about the sitiation I instead of speeding away kept my speed slow at first hoping if he was angry he'd pull up besides me. But the black helmet guy was also not too fast. He seemed he had shrugged it off, niether any other passengers on car or bike called me out or followed me (if any harm/accident had happened). So after this conclusion that he was not harmed (checking the mirrors/keeping a slow speed) I gradually increased my speed and got home. The ride back home I made prayers for forgiveness and and vowed not to do break checking and stuff like that again beacuse I was lucky nothing bad had happened this time around. Till this point (driving back home till I Slept) I had no OCD or false memory.I got home did my work but this incident kept coming back with guilt and it was all good (meaning no False memory till now). Then when I was about to go to sleep my brain started making worse scenerios that what if he had gotten hurt or worse.I have played the memory a thousand times and no one fell. Even my brother who was in the passenger seat, said I guess he just touched our car and did not fell. Even I didn't find any major scratch on the car confirming it was not a big deal cause we weren't that fast either casue its a major intersection. But still the false memroy keeps haunting me that what if I had harmed him/ hurt him. I wish for this to go away as evey other second this false thought of me causing the bike guy harm keeps haunting me.The fact that I initiated it as a simple break check to just get back at him (not intending any harm) makes it even worse for me. Cause now OCD is making me acountable for a false memory in my head (well I do say I was wrong and I could have brushed it off by not break checking. But all happened in a split second).

I’m in the beginning stages of a relationship and I’m honestly sick. My partner has completely laid out what he wants and explicitly said he wanted a relationship but I cannot for the life of me stop thinking of the worst. Even the slightest off behavior is making me think he hates me and I did something awful or I’m making it all up in my head. We have known each other for a long time and I have no reason not to trust him or myself but the only thing going through my head is awful things even though we talked about plans soon. How can I stop this without being reassured, if being reassured won’t help??

I had experienced a few instances where I am about to fall asleep or waking up and I will hear something from a previous conversation no matter how long the time. For example, on time I heard in my head my daughter say mom or another time internally the laugh of my husband's friend, etc. It led me to research which was my biggest mistake because although I read that it could be hypnagogic hallucinations and could stem from anxiety or stress and disrupted sleeping patterns which I currently have all of those, As I continued reading I saw that it can be seen with patients that have schizophrenia as well and my mind went into full panic mode, now I am in crippling fear that I have it or psychosis and am worried I will start to hear things and hallucinate, etc. to the point where I now hear ringing in my ears and it has caused my anxiety to fully spike again. Anyone else experience something similar?

Has anyone taken sertaline/Zoloft and experienced chest tightness? wanting to throw up a bit, muscle twitches or just a weird feeling in muscles. sleeping issues, loss of appetite, sweating, headaches. I've been to my psychiatrist yesterday but I felt I didn't provide enough details about how the meds actually went and it's really bothering me that I didn't so I'm not sure what to do now and I'm nervous about some of these side effects. I have a feeling I don't want to continue on the meds but he told me to continue and prescribed me something else to increase my focus as well (I have adhd) any help? Are these side effects normal like should I wait and it'll be fine or not?

Guys I've had this two week spiral and I tell you it just keeps getting worse everyday and even though I'm trying to sit with them and I've done a session I'm tired guys I don't know what I should do and being in a conservative African family even makes it harder for me to tell anyone...I tried to tell my mother in kind of like fun facts about ocd and she was like so that's how crazy people start and was laughing at some of the examples and compulsions I gave and now I'm even more scared to tell anyone even my friends..I told them I have ocd but I didn't tell them my theme , I feel alone guys😭

I'm feeling fearful and a large amount of anxiety. My intrusive thoughts are getting the better than and making me feel like a bad person and afraid of the future. But I just started down the road of recovery, I just recently started on Prozac and haven't met with a therapist yet so I'm trying to be hopeful for recovery.

Hello! Brand new here after being diagnosed with ocd and realizing I have probably been struggling with it for 30+ years. :( I had my first therapy sessions last week. Has anyone else felt things didn’t go well with your therapist? I have been in therapy before for anxiety, but never felt judged before or so ashamed after therapy sessions ended. I can’t quite explain it, but I feel like I have more insight on ocd from Instagram or just things I have read on here than my therapist. I actually felt I spoke too much and annoyed her and it has me questioning everything I think, do or say. I decided to try another therapist this week and meet them tomorrow. Praying obsessively it goes better and I get some clarity because right now I feel as confused as ever about what ocd is and isn’t and praying its not just me and I am a lot and annoying. 😖