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the NOCD Community

Has anyone ever taken Zoloft and a week into taking it just started to feel totally spaced out? I have no personality and idk if it’s normal and temporary or if this will stay and I’ll Need to switch back to Lexapro

Im sure i dont have social anxiety,i used to have it so horrible but now i dont. Though i hate going out,seeing people, talking with people or even them being near me, i can just go shopping all day and i wouldn't feel any anxiety so i know its not social anxiety,but the moment i step into the class and have to talk with one of my classmates i just get so angry,its almost like people disgust me,i want to be just by myself every day but i know its bad for my mental health. What do i do?

Does anyone have any tips for just letting a though exist or thinking you are something exist by just letting it be there cause when I do just let it be there it feels like I’m actively trying to pretend it’s not there like how am I supposed to just let it exist when it feels like I’m trying to ignore it even though that isn’t the goal

Hi! I’ve been in therapy for 3 years now and this is my first time with ERP. I’m both terrified and excited. I’ve suffered from OCD since childhood and nothing was done about it. Now at age 32, OCD is running my life. I know I’ll make it through somehow - just not sure how or what it will be like. Creating a life worth living is the goal. If anyone wants to share their experience with me, I’d love to hear it. 💚

Hello! I’m a baby OCD (just diagnosed last week lol) and I’m still trying to figure out what O and C mean. I learn best through anecdotes and learning what stuff means to other people. Your explanations/definitions of OCD obsession and compulsion greatly appreciated! I thiiiiiink I’m pure-o or something but I do stim and shake my head to try to clear bad thoughts. Thanks so much!!!

I just got broken up with because I am depressed and it was over text. My anxiety and ocd have been awful and he said that can only be an excuse for so long so now I’m going insane. I am so sick.

Does God even care about my little prayers. They feel rushed and idk how to just sit with him I feel awkward. Like I can’t spend like an hour in prayer then just pray they scroll cuz idk what to do. And I ask God so many questions too and feel like I never hear cuz I’m not listening or being obedient cuz he will always knock at our hearts but what if my heart is hardened

Can anyone relate with having mental OCD? For me it's not so physical, but just ruminating and fixating on certain upcoming events over and over. Also researching, reaching out to providers, etc. I also want things done immediately and have NO patience. Guess immediate gratification. Just didn't know if anyone could relate because my OCD doesn't feel as much physical.

I am a true Christian and I am struggling with my faith,I fear that I have blasphemed God,I keep having thoughts that are completely opposite of what I believe and they are torturing me and also doubts,If anyone here is a true Christian struggling will you please tell me how you were able to get through exposure response prevention without the fear and confusion getting to you.,It literally feels impossible to get out of my head or even fully trust God.

I imagine every surface has a "direction," and if someone touches it differently, I feel like I'm going crazy. Sometimes I can't put on my clothes because it messes up my skin, and other times I struggle to breathe because the air is blowing in the opposite direction to my nose. I can't let my friends or my boyfriend touch me. But I don't have any particular intrusive thoughts or anything like that, so I'm not sure.

I have struggled with ocd my entire life until I realized what it was and why I was the way I was. My psychiatrist is trying one more medicine because we have “exhausted” all other options which is making me lose hope. I’ve been on many medicines since 8th grade and now I just feel hopeless, she said after if this medicine doesn’t work I should do TMS therapy which freaks me out. The medicine she is prescribing me is Anafranil? Guys I’m so just lost right now

I will very soon have an appointment with a psychiatrist! Recently though, my sister mentioned to me that when she took medication for her OCD, she took prozac and did not like it as she felt very tired and sleepy for an entire year, and also gained weight. She decided to stop taking prozac as the only thing it helped with for her was having no thoughts, but overall she hated the tiredness she felt for the entire year. My question is, do any of yall know if the medication side effects can be the same for me as well because of genetics? Would family history be something a psychiatrist asks you about? This is my first time ever taking medication for mental health, so I may sound dumb lol. And if you have any other comments, feel free to share as I am quite nervous about starting medication.

I literally wasted more than half of the day procrastinating on my work/ classes/ assignments. And for the past 3 days I have been procrastinating the entire way. I played video games, I hung out with friends, and the time that I was supposed to work. I didn’t. Could it be because I don’t know or I fear the work. I know it’s the discomfort of knowing, and simple discomfort of doing things in general. There is so much activation energy needed, to do things for me. It’s a perfectionism thing, but I don’t know what the hell it is. Like I don’t know why I am so undisciplined. Like I don’t get It. There are few conclusions as to why these past three days have been like this Fear of unknown Fear of FOMO Fear of not finishing things Fear of not doing it “right” or “correctly” not being able to do it messy and unfinished or not knowing if I made progress Fear and discomfort of the task or the thing not making any meaningful progress in my life. Part of it is that I don't know what to do anymore. It's confusion and when clarity comes to me, clarity is the biggest anxiety reliever ever. I know action is the only way to gain more clarity but when I take any action I doubt whether that action is correct. This really hurts me, not just before, but during and after. Before, I want to avoid all the discomfort of doing things wrong or working on the wrong things in the wrong way. I want to do everything that is very meaningful and I don't want to be bad at it. I think a huge part of it is also time investment because I know I'm bad. For the first time I try something, whatever that might be, if it's trying to learn something, you're supposed to not know and figure it out out. I know that figuring it out, knowing that if I were to do it in the right way, in order to really have a good handle, as in figuring it out takes time. Okay. Figuring out takes time and I am scared that when I start something, it is going to take longer than I wanted because I want to do a lot of things. If I spend a lot of my time on one thing for an extended period of time, I am scared that I am not going to be able to stick to that one thing for a long amount of time. There is this fear of not being able to be productive while doing the task, which is really weird. A big part of it is first having the entire thing set up; that's the first thing, the environment, right? If the environment isn't correct, okay if the environment isn't correct, I mean that it's not good enough. For example when I say "environment isn't correct," I mean it's like it's not good enough, like my ability. I fear this is literally a little weird. For example I wake up in the morning and I know I have to do stuff now. One big thing is activation energy. One thing is the fear of uncertainty and the unknown (FOMO), and the scary factor is that now I have to plan. I have to plan for the day ahead, knowing that it will bring me a lot of distress and anxiety. To plan things out and to prioritize is the biggest first thing because I am constantly scared of prioritizing the wrong things. There are so many things I want to do: • Learn AI • Work on my business • Work on another skill at the same time • Work on my classes and get good grades • Apply to internships and jobs and stuff like that and network I want to do all of it because if I don't do all of it, I am officially behind. I feel behind and I know I am behind. Me, before even waking up, for example, and knowing that, all this comes at me at once in my head. This is what I'm going to have to go through, and it's this overwhelming pressure to do anything right to start. I also know that if I were to break all of the things that I wanted to do down into tiny tiny steps, I literally have anxiety doing that as well. I know that breaking down things itself takes up so much of my energy and so much because of the staying with that anxiousness and having to sort of fight it and then having to figure out how to break things down for all the tasks that I need to do. On top of that I know I need to sort of, like, not only that. Now I know that when I first, let's say, break things down, right, even though I will break down the task, the task will still be difficult. Breaking down that task into smaller chunks, yes, it does help but it doesn't help enough because I know I'm going to be bad and I know it's going to take a lot of time. There is also the scare and the fear that I'm not prioritizing the right thing, I'm not doing the right thing, or I'm doing too slow. That's the big thing too, or that my pace of progress is too slow. The world is moving extremely fast and I can't keep up. I have to learn everything and anything, and I have to just, like, learn the latest AI news to be on top of it. I have to learn the latest tech skill, and now there's the other layer: how do I do that? How do I do it in a way that is actually with good progress? I am in a program called I Can Study, and there is an aspect of learning skills and all these things. I have to work on those techniques and everything, and I know how long it takes to work on those techniques. I can't, and I know I need to create a system where I am using the techniques together once everything is habit. Because of that it really really hurts because it's like I don't know what to do. I just don't know how to move along without having all these layers of pressure over me. It's like what I know that I have, in terms of ERP, is that I'm supposed to stick with it and just go with it and stick with it, as in be with the feeling and see my anxiety where it needs me and all that stuff. The thing is I know how difficult it is and how hard it is to do that, because while I'm doing it I feel like I'm wasting time. I am not doing things correctly. I'm not doing enough, and this really really hurts me and my progress. Another part is that you are telling me to do this, to progress and stuff, but the idea of progression itself makes me anxious because optimizing. A lot of times, if I don't make progress, I feel like there is no purpose behind what I do, and it's inefficient and a waste of time because I don't know how to make progress. When do I know that, after doing it for 2 minutes, I should do it for 5 minutes now for this week? I overanalyze these types of things.

Hey does anyone play basketball. Also how do you manage to playing when having Severe Anxiety and OCD? I just played this past weekend and I haven’t played in a while and I played like 5 games but it was truly hard cause I was still in my head and after each game I have to walk and catch my breath do to panic and breathing heavy. A couple months ago I was able to play normal. I even joined a league that starts in June and I have to start running but I’m scared. I did it to not let my OCD take over but how am I suppose to push forward when I’m scared ?

Am I naïve to want to feel back to normal before this episode started two months ago and thinking that it might?

Last month, I celebrated 4 years of ERP therapy/being in recovery for OCD. Who I was 4 years ago is wildly different than who I am now, in all the best ways. In the course of those 4 years, I: -got the courage to leave an abusive relationship -got the courage to make a career change, and leave a job I hated but was comfortable at because it was familiar -worked through emotional contamination around my grandma, before she passed away -got over my driving fears, I drive all over the place now, in rain or good weather -learned to accept the sexual intrusive thoughts around a family member And many other things. Things aren’t perfect, I have rough days and great days, I’ve backslid and worked my way forward again. But recovery got me my life back. I’m happy to answer any questions or hear your stories of recovery.

I am feeling really scared lately, as my ocd has twisted triggers a bit for me. I keep having intrusive thoughts while feeling happy or I feel happy afterward, which TERRIFIES me. I have had SO-OCD/HOCD for about 2 and half months now. I just really want to know if anyone else has experienced intrusive thoughts in this way. I also can get really anxious at some specific people in general (namely people I find attractive (not in a weird way) or gay people/lesbians). Is this normal for people with SO-OCD/HOCD? I haven't had ocd for very long and only recently started ocd based therapy, so I dont know much yet.

So I have staring ocd and it started a couple of years ago it’s so intense I always worry someone is going to think I’m a pervert and that anxiety never stops. I always worry I’ll be fired about it. I think by now they understand it’s a medical issue I have addressed it but it doesn’t stop the anxiety. It makes it worse. Any tips ? How do I break up the compulsion? And the mental ones as well? It’s like a never ending cycle of anxiety. And as you guessed it staring is one of my biggest pet peeves.

So I have been treated poorly in relationships for a long time. My first one was 2 years of emotional, mental, financial, and sexual abuse back in high school, my second was amazing with tons of physical attraction but he was later emotionally unavailable so we broke up, and I was also groomed in a friendship and I have an emotionally abusive stepmother all in the span of about 4 years. So I have not been in a great spot with relationships and have told myself that I would not get into a new one unless I was sure about everything to a degree. I recently started going out with this new guy this week. Absolute precious sweetheart and he hasn’t done anything wrong at all. We love all the exact same things, love being goofy and weird, and I had an amazing time with him in the first date (yesterday) and had nothing bad to say whatsoever and had no fears or anything. And I was pretty attracted to him physically too and many times I wanted to cuddle with him or hold his hand but we haven’t done any of that yet because we are still in the stage of getting to know each other. Then the second date tonight was different. I started to notice certain super small things he did (like if he made a cringe joke or something) and it gave me a slight “ick” and it was so overwhelming and I couldn’t enjoy it nearly as much as the other night. I started to wonder if I was really attracted to him or if I was just pretending to like him. I also was thinking of the second guy I dated where I was always super physically attracted to him but we just weren’t emotionally compatible. I compare this new guy to my previous boyfriend physically and I just get so in distress in the differences. And I felt bad and sobbed to my roommates tonight in fear because he is so sweet and kind and there are times where I AM attracted to him but I can’t stop fixating on the way he looks when he laughs or some of the random jokes he says and my brain is telling me those are dealbreakers and that I’m jus leading him on 😭 PLEASE HELP!!

can someone inform me of what mental compulsions can be or feel like? i feel like i do many compulsions but im not sure if they actually are compulsions or not ☹️