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Has anyone been able to look back at their false memory and say oh yeah that was a false memory after recovery? Seems so difficult to me. Or you just move on and accept and never know?

I feel like the whole acceptance thing it means to endure the pain. I keep falling back into huge anxiety circles and i start to get tired of it. Everytime i learned a way to not fall into ocd and emotions, it turned into fighting. I feel tired that everyone thinks that I just want to feel happy all the time and dont have negative emotions, or that I want to control them perfectly... Im afraid the answer is that we need to endure the pain and try to do what you choose to do while you feel horrible, and you will feel horrible and at the end of the day you might feel numb or crying but hey accept it, cause we are humans... I went to many therapists, now I try to learn from chatgpt which gave me really good answers and helped alot before, now idk what happened to it but it gives me this answer to everything that seems like i need to endure pain, if i want to focus on something else to not focus on pain thats not possible, its like telling to me you need to be like a robot, do things jist for the sake of doing it, but you will feel horrible and you cant do anything about it and if you want to do something about it then you are controlling and thats why ocd gets stronger...I feel like i wont recover or become better at handling emotions ever cause I cant do this. It seems like the only thing you can do is deciding what you do but still the focus will be on the pain, still you will feel horrible, still you are suffering, and when the emotions decides that it will go away cause it didnt got fuel, then you might be yourself again... this is enduring the pain and a really sad thing in my opinion... I might have control problems then...

in 2022 I met a guy who quickly became a dear friend. After a short time getting to know each other, I started feeling confused about what I felt for him, I couldn't tell if I liked him romantically or not. I talked about it with my girlfriend and she said that if I wanted we could break up, but I told her no, I wanted to stay together. It was something that troubled me a lot and I genuinely couldn't figure out if I liked him or not. Sometimes I'd tell myself with more certainty that I didn't, but then the doubt would come back. Our friendship was something I cared about deeply, we were also very affectionate with each other, though sometimes specifying that the affection was platonic and nothing more. We also often made very sexual jokes at each other's expense, often very silly ones, but not always. His attention made me feel good, he'd often compliment me and I felt appreciated. I liked the idea of him seeing me as an attractive and interesting person, and I actively wanted that. Over time the doubt faded and I stopped wondering if I liked him, it was very clear he was just my friend. Years later, in mid-2024, I started wondering if during that period I had cheated on my girlfriend, if I had said something with wrong intentions or stuff like that. Nothing physical ever happened, and when we would hang out I have no memory of wanting to kiss him or anything like that. Initially I told myself it probably wasn't like that, nothing came to mind and those sexual jokes didn't seem like anything strange because I couldn't remember any wrong intentions. Over time the doubt grew, until at the end of 2025 I became convinced I had acted with wrong intentions. There are many conversations between me and my friend that I now consider ambiguous or proof of cheating The problem is that I told my girlfriend everything, and she doesn't believe me, she thinks it's just OCD. This has caused a real rift in our relationship because we're on completely different wavelengths. It's hard to be together. I've become more absent at a time when she's not doing well and needs me, which makes her upset But I'm convinced I did something wrong and I don't know what to do anymore. It feels like our relationship is built on a lie that she's ignoring. I want to cut off contact with this friend( who also thinks it's just OCD) even though my girlfriend told me I shouldn't. I feel totally convinced now, and it makes me deeply depressed because she's the person I care about most in the world and I can't bear the thought of having done something so terrible

Hello all! I hope everyone is having a great weekend! I have had OCD for the entirety of my life, but just because I have OCD doesn’t mean I have to suffer from it! First off, I wanted to say, that it does get better. The extent of how much I’ve done was, I was originally misdiagnosed with simply generalized anxiety disorder. I’m not to say that I don’t have it, but I always knew that it felt like it was something more than that. I started taking medicine, even though I was unsure of it. This did help tremendously, but it led to weight gain and sort of a numb feeling towards the end of it. I went off and on it for several years, I usually would get back on when I had symptoms of sadness and anxiety. Although I never was diagnosed with depression, I often times would feel sad in the winter seasons, and sometimes just anxious and couldn’t calm myself down. Following a really bad breakup where I dealt with a lot of gaslighting and being cheated on, I later developed real event and false memory OCD with POCD in the mix. My obsessions were usually over any content that I had seen online and I would obsessively check images and memory review. I remember the scariest feeling with constant memory review and going to a therapist to use CBT to address this. We would talk through all the thoughts and images and memories, and I would feel a lot better after telling him this. But I realize there was always a “sticky” feeling about some of these thoughts that I wasn’t able to shake. I would compulsively go to therapy just because it was such a relief to talk to these things with my therapist about. Eventually, after several years, it went away naturally on its own, he was equipped with knowledge of OCD, but the CBT portion of it didn’t seem to help as we constantly would problem solve and try to figure things out. Later on after a really rough season and being completely medication free, I indulged in mental review, rumination, and constantly putting myself on the stand and a mental trial. I was always worried about things in my past, and I would think about them over and over and over again, for some reason all the thoughts would be with childhood or teenage memories of research and exploration online. I was always terrified that maybe this said something about me and because of how traumatic my breakup was, I blamed myself for the downfall and also my ex-girlfriend’s drinking problem. This led me to question myself as a person and develop a bit of a different theme of POCD. I never really had images and urges, but I had constant worry that anime I was watching, harmless things I had seen online, and fuzzy memories kept me in a constant state of wondering about my character. I would constantly read stories about criminals and how people would act. I isolated myself for a long time (despite still working a full-time job and having a social life) and constantly tried to reassure myself that I wasn’t a dangerous person. I would take several precautions to make sure that I was never seen as a creep to women and would always make sure to look out for other others. It was such a horrible thing to endure, as I’m very passionate about protecting people and making sure that people aren’t in abusive situations. It took a long time for me to accept that I was abused emotionally in my relationship. I love my ex-girlfriend so much and I still do. I wish her only but the best and sometimes I think about what life would’ve been like if I had stayed with her. I have achieved the OCD conquerer status over the years, but after a run with Zepbound, a lot of my anxiety came back as I went through a bad bout of depression. I want to ask people here to share their stories and their thoughts and their journeys. My biggest struggles right now is I feel like I’m hiding a dark secret or I’m constantly on a mental trial. Although I have things that I think sometimes may provide evidence for this, I’m always back at square one once I’m able to “disprove it” and go back to compulsions that provide the temporarily relief. I do want to say that it does get better, you can live a beautiful life with OCD but you don’t have to suffer from OCD. What have you done to stay in remission? What keeps you stuck? What do you value most in life? If you were reading this and struggling, I want you to know that it is never too late to get help. You deserve compassion and you deserve a beautiful life just like I do even though sometimes I don’t think I do. I have a wonderful therapist from NOCD and the support groups have been really life-changing. I just want you all to know that I genuinely love you all and I am rooting for each and every one of you! We’ve got this and I am so thankful for the no CD community and for the bravery all of you have displayed in your journeys! As we learn and grow together, I truly believe it will get better and I’m so happy that there are so many resources to help address this.

Hi, I’m wondering if anyone relates to this because my OCD doesn’t focus on one clear event or thought. It started with me obsessing over remembering things perfectly (like trying to recall exactly what I did, in what order). When I couldn’t remember, I would mentally go back and try to reconstruct it until it felt “right.” At some point that original obsession faded, but instead of relief, my brain got stuck on how it faded and whether I missed something in between. Now the obsession isn’t about a specific memory. It’s more like a constant feeling that there’s “something in the past” I can’t figure out. There’s no clear image or event — just a sense of uncertainty that my brain keeps trying to solve. Whenever I feel anxious or triggered, my mind automatically links the feeling back to that idea, like the anxiety is proof that I need to figure something out. I end up ruminating, trying to understand how my mind got here or what I’m missing, but I never get clarity — it just makes it worse. Even when I feel calm, the thought can still sit in the background like an unsolved problem. I’ve started seeking help and looking into CBT/ERP, but I wanted to see if anyone else has dealt with this kind of vague, “figure it out” OCD rather than a specific fear or memory.

in 2022 I met a guy who quickly became a dear friend. After a short time getting to know each other, I started feeling confused about what I felt for him, I couldn't tell if I liked him romantically or not. I talked about it with my girlfriend and she said that if I wanted we could break up, but I told her no, I wanted to stay together. It was something that troubled me a lot and I genuinely couldn't figure out if I liked him or not. Sometimes I'd tell myself with more certainty that I didn't, but then the doubt would come back. Our friendship was something I cared about deeply, we were also very affectionate with each other, though sometimes specifying that the affection was platonic and nothing more. We also often made very sexual jokes at each other's expense, often very silly ones, but not always. His attention made me feel good, he'd often compliment me and I felt appreciated. I liked the idea of him seeing me as an attractive and interesting person, and I actively wanted that. Over time the doubt faded and I stopped wondering if I liked him, it was very clear he was just my friend. Years later, in mid-2024, I started wondering if during that period I had cheated on my girlfriend, if I had said something with wrong intentions or stuff like that. Nothing physical ever happened, and when we would hang out I have no memory of wanting to kiss him or anything like that. Initially I told myself it probably wasn't like that, nothing came to mind and those sexual jokes didn't seem like anything strange because I couldn't remember any wrong intentions. Over time the doubt grew, until at the end of 2025 I became convinced I had acted with wrong intentions. There are many conversations between me and my friend that I now consider ambiguous or proof of cheating The problem is that I told my girlfriend everything, and she doesn't believe me, she thinks it's just OCD. This has caused a real rift in our relationship because we're on completely different wavelengths. It's hard to be together. I've become more absent at a time when she's not doing well and needs me, which makes her upset But I'm convinced I did something wrong and I don't know what to do anymore. It feels like our relationship is built on a lie that she's ignoring. I want to cut off contact with this friend( who also thinks it's just OCD) even though my girlfriend told me I shouldn't. I feel totally convinced now, and it makes me deeply depressed because she's the person I care about most in the world and I can't bear the thought of having done something so terrible

18+ only I was already struggling from every possible OCD symptom and having a groinal just from pure stress but then I saw an ad, I didn't realise what it was at first, just skipped past a random ad before doing a double take and reporting it but it definitely made it all worse and I'm ruminating about it and all these intrusive thoughts and images are running through my head and I'm really resisting the urge to do a checking compulsion to something safe to disprove the groinals and intrusive thoughts but I know it'll just make it worse and OCD will say I did the compulsion for a made up reason. I'm still doing other compulsions like scratching my head or picking my lip so I'm not doing a very good job of not doing every compulsion. My intrusive thoughts are so much more frequent, and I think this may be related to ADHD but I keep having intrusive memories of disgusting "jokes" or things like dogwhistles and stuff. Just yesterday I saw someone post about Batman with a picture of that monkey with a cuddly toy as his mum and then found out they follow a bunch of people who wrote about him and his adoptive sons in terrible ways. Then after that, someone posted a gif of Catwoman and was being weird so I blocked them, but I got concerned about whether I should report them so I checked their following and there wasn't anything bad from what I could see based on their names and bios but their pinned post was kinda weird and I thought crossed the line so I had to report them as well just in case.

I wanted to share some positivity because I know as we’re all healing we need to look at success stories to see what’s happening in other people’s brains after they have successfully been “set free” You can see the subtypes of OCD I struggled with in the tags, it was a lot at once. And it all came at me in the span of 7 weeks. But prior to the actual crisis, I had always had ocd tendencies. Intense ruminations about other people’s problems, my own identity, how others saw me. I didn’t realize how debilitating it was until I got on antipsychotic medication and saw what it’s like to have a clear mind. And not ruminate compulsively. I am in many aspects 95% ocd free. The 5% is the fact that OCD is chronic and genetic. Technically you’ll always “have it” but if it’s under control it’s as if you don’t even have it. That’s my interpretation. Today was an interesting day. I had a depressive episode where I genuinely felt helpless and hopeless and said many things that I regret. Today I tried out some of my old habits and compulsions to see what they would feel like. And they felt repulsive. Boring. And completely opposite of who I’ve been working on becoming the past month I’ve been in IOP and medicated. IOP alone has helped me to surround myself with positivity and realize that I am the furthest thing from solo in my struggles with mental health. Writing down affirmations, creating tool kits to challenge my thoughts, journaling and getting busy with focusing on my faith has been transformative in a way I didn’t think was possible. Yes, you will have lows. You will have depressed and anxious days. You will have times you feel like the thoughts are coming back or the mental compulsions will try to creep up on you. But once you’re on the right medication; start working with the right people and build those tool kits and hobbies that work for you, it will progressively get better. But you have to stay the course. I thought about giving up on my medication. I thought about giving up on IOP. I thought about throwing away my progress for my old life. But today I looked back and I realized: oh my gosh that was horrific, I like the “new me” much better. My medication is so interesting because you feel it working in your brain. Anytime a mental compulsion or old habit tries to creep up on me, I feel that forehead pressure and the thought being blunted and almost dissipating. The chemical brakes are working as they should in my frontal lobe lol. You will find old compulsions feel boring and unnecessary and your mind will naturally drift towards things that are actually tangible. Like for me, a tangible is was checking in with the community that has been helpful for me to stay on track with my recovery. I do feel “bad” that I even attempted to entertain old habits today. But I also feel happy that my sheer reaction and feeling towards these old things is proof that my anti virus softwares are working as intended. And I wish you healing too.

Hi. It’s been about a month where I’ve barely done anything in my free time again. Things I used to like just don’t feel interesting anymore. My hobbies feel “worn out” — like I’ve done them so many times that they don’t feel fresh anymore. When I finally have a moment of free time, instead of feeling excited or relaxed, I feel pressure. It’s like the moment I try to choose something enjoyable, my brain shuts down and says it’s not worth it because it’s always the same. And then I end up doing nothing at all. People without OCD repeat the same activities too, and they still enjoy them, so I don’t understand why it feels different for me. It feels like I overthink my free time so much that everything loses its spark before I even start. It’s frustrating not knowing why this happens, and sometimes it feels like it takes away a part of who I am because free time is one of the main things that gives life meaning. Has anyone else experienced this? And is this OCD, combination, or what it is actually?

Hello I’ve been dealing with what I believe to be harm ocd since 2023 and I was on meds and they helped a little but haven’t been on them in months and just about 2 weeks ago my thoughts of hurting someone has come back, especially my girlfriend and that really scares me, because the thoughts make it seem like I have to do it or I want to do it and then I get freaked out but also at the same time I don’t want anything bad to happen to anyone I don’t even like fighting I don’t like anything like that. my thoughts are vivid in my head, a plan, or a thought, and I notice whenever I think about how grateful or lucky I am to have her or remember fond things it kinda pops up with the thoughts, and it’s been driving me crazy recently, and I’m at the point where I don’t know if it’s OCD anymore, but I know that all I want in life is to be with her and live on our own and be happy and do so many things, I’ve debated calling my local mental help area, but idk what’s going on

I need help managing it. I am in my mid teens: almost entering late teens. I feel doomed. Eternal doom and severe panic when having an intrusive thought. I believe my parents are my biggest source of anxiety and trauma. I canNOT make any social mistakes in front of my parents because they are just not the people who will ever understand me. Since childhood I was scared of not being perfect because of my parents; This ended in me just freezing and being the "beyond-introvert" . Every time I disappointed my parents it ended with silent treatment, ultimatums, calling me names, and making harsh global statements about me. I once had a catastrophic social disaster revolving around being creepy sometime ago. It was unintentional but was in front of my parents and extended family. Since then my life has been derailed and I have no one that understands me. I feel I walk on eggshells everytime I have a conversation /in-front-of my parents/someone who knows my parents before me/ . I used to be scared of all social scenarios before but now I can handle professional conversations (doctors, eg.) or personal ones where my parents (or someone who knows them) aren't involved. Although I still deeply fear about any /conversation/social interaction/ in my mind. Now it's at this point where I think I can't go any longer and just want to completely shut down and not try and accept that my life is destroyed. I have thoughts mostly about future scenarios: that can be 1 minute into the future or decades. Every thought scares me. Even as I am writing this I am having the thought where I am talking to you (reader) even though you do not want to engage and I am being delusional and creepy and it's extremely unbearably cringe and I can't end anything -- not suffering, not being cringe, not that conversation in my head, or even this sentence. I hate it. I have been trying grounding and not fighting the thought. 'maybe, maybe not' . They do work to some extent and have given me relief but I can't go any further. I am so scared of everything and it all feels so scary and painful and I do not want to lose control and become a perverted cringey person so I avoid everything. Now I am spiralling again... It is all so bad please help me because I feel like I am literally dying and therapy is not an option right now.

Can any of you guys give me tips on how to stop thinking about ocd itself? Cuz i catch myself thinking all the time about how to get better and what to do and what is the perfect way to get better. Looks like i am stuck in a loop. Any tips on what to do? Am i even allowed to think about anything ocd related?

Can you differentiate between obsessive thoughts and normal thoughts?For those suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) related to things you need to search for: Does a new piece of information pop into your head every time you close a door? I'm sorry I didn't know how to express it, but OCD feels like a never-ending cycle. You close one door, and the obsession comes from another. Maybe this time is different. What if you forget something important that could change everything? Therefore, I tried to find out how to differentiate between normal thoughts that come to all humans and obsessive thoughts. Like seeing the same thing, but in a million different ways, and questions And to conclude, I wanted to say: Since you are here to seek treatment, you should know that you are taking the most important steps 🌼 We can do it🌷.

Does anyone with rabies ocd overthinking every little pinching feeling or even stepping outside

Hey y'all, i hope everyone's doing okay. I remember posting here about thoughts that felt gut wrenching and so urgent but lately i feel like ive learnt to live with ocd and have it under control. Of course there are some bad moments but not that often anymore. And i don't know but this has been on my mind lately. I feel like... Because i dont feel the presence of OCD on the surface as it used to be, it feels... as if I'm not that different anymore? Is that normal? I don't even know how this thought makes me feel. I just feel like im in a void right now. It feels very different from back then, but i also don't feel like a different person. Just as if the disability gave me a differentness as if i was more special back then. But I know myself how bad things used to be to the point that i wanted to off myself. It was so scary. Some thoughts still make me wanna just... Get out of my body. But when i remember my past obsessions, i think like, yeah it was nonsense that i was going crazy over that. But it's almost as if this feeling of "not feeling special enough" is a bit upsetting? Well i know ocd is very much present in my life. Even when im writing this theres a disturbing thought in my head telling me that what im writing here right now is exaggerated. I know its present in my daily life, my conversations and most of the stuff. I also remember that I used to not want to get medicated because i was scared of getting better. I don't know anymore. Id like some of you guys's opinions. Thank you

I have been suffering from intense intrusive thoughts for quite some time now. The usual theme is me being socially unacceptable somehow. People will exclude me, hate me, be annoyed of me, disgusted by me, etc... My mind shows me very vivid pictures and stories where on each step and scene I am doing the most cringe, awfully disgusting, hateful, horrible, creepy thing that will guarantee people will hate and avoid me either consciously or subconsciously at best. This can be a one time sudden blow -- a thought that appears as a "woosh" out of no where and is absolutely terrifying. Or it can be a long ride where I do unacceptable things subtle-ly and it all compounds and climaxes. This causes me immense stress, panic and fear -- and that is an understatement: I am dying. I also have thought contamination -- Everything I /do/say/think/ is contaminated by a thought that somehow translates my actions in the present into some social scenario where it is one of the worst things to do at the moment. This all makes me avoid basically any social setting that is not purely professional -- which is most of the color in life. Though I understand how any theme of OCD can be really difficult to deal with, I sometimes believe that mine is harder to deal with because it involves future and social scenarios: future is uncertain and as a human I will have to socialize. I know that is probably not true and at the end of the day it is OCD and we are all feeling that dying feeling by either one theme or another. I wanted to know what "flavor" of OCD is this? Are you experiencing the same theme? What helped you deal with it?: If you have some niche knowledge or insight please share... Thank you for your time. That was it. Have a wonderful day though I can't have mine :(...

Some years ago, I picked up a theme. It’s about peeing before bed time The most natural thing we do without thinking about it. Unfortunately, for me, I now stress about peeing and making sure I empty my bladder before I go to bed. But I know it’s my brain tricking my body that I have to pee at the moment I lay down. It’s absolutely horrible and what makes it worse is that I keep pushing every time I have to pee even though I’m done I keep push pushing and push pushing until I feel like I am completely done Now I feel like I’ve weakened my you know what. Maybe it’s my age I’m 39. I noticed that when I drink carbonated water, it irritates my bladder so I try to not drink it so much but I just hate how frustrating this is that I avoid bedtime and I procrastinate and it’s 5 AM and I didn’t want to deal with it earlier so now I’m dealing with it and I have to learn to just have a stable bedtime so I can take care of this earlier. I’m laying in bed and I really want to go pee again. Does anybody else struggle with this?

I’ve had no side effects, positive or negative, to any medication I’ve taken. This includes 80mg of Prozac, 200mg of Zoloft, 60 mg of buspirone, and 10 mg of abilify. My ocd symptoms are bad (my Y-BOCS score was 39), so I’m not sure if the severity is the issue, or if there is another issue. My therapists supervisor thinks something else may be going on because I have had no side effects from 10 mg of abilify. Does anyone have ideas? I read that some people metabolize medications more quickly than others, and I don’t gain weight easily, so maybe that is the problem. It could also be ADHD in addition or the severity of the symptoms, or something else

I am currently on a EMT class. I have tremendous doubts about my abilities. I fear failure and constantly see video like thoughts of my peers and Instructors being disappointed and frustrated with me. I actually ended up going to class, parking car at school and not being able to walk on because I was so afraid of not passing and losing my composure in class. Today I talked to my therapist about how one of my obsessions is being afraid of not knowing which means I might fail. This leads to avoidance. This feels to powerful and it really does feel like I will fail and leave a bad impression on my instructors. Can anybody relate? Please reach out for further details and clarity. I want to hear about others and those with similar experiences.

I’m the only person I’ve met with ocd, but i know a lot of ADHD people. i met back w my therapist again today and we didn’t focus much on ocd. We touched on it a tad but he seems to think a lot of my problems i experience through my day is adhd. At first it made me feel that i was lying about ocd and i was scared. But i do agree it weighs on me heavily. Has anyone treated their adhd at all and it helps w their ocd? We talked about self regulation and it seems to me i need a lot of help with that.