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I am not sure if OCD is what I have, I struggle to open up completely, even to a therapist in fear they will not understand me. But basically, I catastrophise the past constantly. With 'what if's'. A friend i confided in suggests it might be becuase of a traumatic event I experienced 8 years ago, I still think back to what happened to me. basically my body's reaction was to freeze rather than fight back. I've always had a hard time dealing with this because I thought I would fight back. When I think back to it I think 'what if I did fight back, would I be a different (happier) person' or ' what if I fought back and could have stopped it'. Now, my mind is always in the past. I have been trying to make sense to why that happened to me, so I do a lot of 'what if I did....' and think of extreme scenarios and convince my self that maybe i did do that to explain the traumatic event. I can add so much depth into my what if scenarios that I can convince myself its true. I once believed I did something one time when I had alochol and the next day when I mentioned it to my friend she said that never happened. But I have it in my thoughts like its a true memory. How do you know if a thought is just a thought? Or if all the 'what if's' are true? On my good days I realise how irrational I am being and know I have a clear conscious and am a good person. I dont even think about the what if scenarios I usually have in my mind . But on the bad days I'm so convinced and feel so guilty that I've done something so bad that I deserve all of this. Can anyone relate? Does anyone know if this is a form of OCD?

Does anyone else fear that their morals will change or are changing due to their ocd??

i used to relate to ppl who were bi i think. i’m so scared. i saw some girl who said she thought she was bi curious and i think i agreed. i saw tiktoks abt bi girls and i think i related. i didn’t think twice about it, i still identified as straight. i wanted to be straight and i didn’t think about it seriously. i don’t want to be bi. i don’t. i really really really don’t. it doesn’t feel right and it doesn’t make me happy. is it possible to be straight even if i find proof? all i want is to be straight. i never really thought about what it would mean to be bi. i’m scared that what if it felt natural so i never had to think about it, and i knew but didn’t give it much thought? that makes no sense. i’m sorry. i’m so scared. i think i was too young to understand before. i am straight. that's what makes me happy so idc if i find more proof. i’m straight. period. end of conversation. i’m done w this. it’s my life and if being straight makes me happy then i’m straight. i’m done being confused. i’m done. i’m still terrified, but whatever. idk. sorry about this post, it’s very all over the place. i need to get everything out.

Traveling and OCD : I need advice! When my OCD first started I went on vacation with my family to Ecuador back in September 2019. While I enjoyed the trip and seeing family I hadn’t seen in a long time, I was also experiencing hell because this was completely new to me, didn’t know it was OCD, and constantly kept feeding it mental compulsions because I had no idea what else to do. So now my family wants to travel back there at the end of the year for the holidays. I really want to see my other family again and I’ve never in my life been there during the holidays/my birthday, we’ve always previously gone in the summer. But i honestly think that other trip traumatized me or something due to the extreme distress and pain I was going through. So now just thinking of going back has my OCD acting up fierce and I’m terrified it’s gonna get worse from now just being September to the trip in December. I know things are completely different now: I’ve been diagnosed with OCD, I’ve been in therapy doing ERP with an OCD specialist for the last 6-7 months, and I’ve seen progress from then on. But now this is coming up and it’s knocking me around. I know I have to go on this trip because of I said I didn’t want to that would hurt me more because I know it would come from a place of avoidance. Plus I absolutely LOVE traveling via plane, going to airports and being on a plane and everything about it is one of my greatest joys and OCD is trying hard to hurt that for me. I just wanna go and not be in that same state of pain and distress as before, and to get myself out of a state of panic and into self-care so I can just CHILL. I’ve been working lately to find a psychiatrist to potentially start medication so that I can be less on edge and deal with my OCD accordingly without having the anxiety portion fly off the rails. Is there anything else I should do? Advice? Thanks

has anyone here lost their faith and believe in god? like mine is border line religion ocd bc i keep thinking if god is real then why do i keep praying and praying and nothing happens?? i’m still stuck in this whole where i question the most basic thing about myself like my sexuality it feels like my whole world has come down, everything i ever dreamed of is down to crumbles

im pretty sure its not normal to cry everyday right like idk i hate my brain and i hate my life rn im too scared to take ocd medication and i noticed that my brain is using methods like being numb to cope again and i used to do that a lot

anyone else have adhd and ocd and find actually sitting down to do erps verrrrry challenging i am the procrastination pro i just will find anything to do but what im supposed to but i dont like taking vyvanse or adderal just so i will actually do my erps ... i also feel like when my ocd is in over drive from a real life trigger not a forced trigger i cant help but focus on the intrusive thoughts and let them overwhelm me but when im doing an erp thing it feels like homework it feels like an assignment that i dont want to do and while i do get anxiety from the exposures if my brain finds a distraction (not on purpose) then my adhd excellerates the process and my anxiety goes from a 7 to a 4 and i feel like i havr to start over, does any of that make sense or sound relatable? like and because of this when i do the erp exercises sometimes i cant tell if im forcing myself to concentrate on the intrusive thoughts (because i know my brain wants to go elsewhere to random thoughts) or if my intrusive thoughts are occuring naturally and then my thought spiral goes well look this is proof you dont have ocd doing an erp shouldnt be this challenging in my mind i imagine someone with ocd sits down say they blink a lot or do a physical compulsion they expose themself to something that makes them panic and they have to sit there and not do a physical compulsion for 10 minutes and watch their anxiety go up and down until it steadies out ... for me though my compulsions are reassurance but sometimes my adhd distracted brain can mess up the process and i have to remind myself of the task at hand and i say to myself "someone with real ocd doesnt have to remind themselves of their anxiety they are crippled by it" but i will say in early august my panic attacks and crying spells were out of control and i was feeling crippled by it but now that i feel more regulated after getting a diagnosis and feeling a sense that i can take control of my life i almost find these exercises tedious and annoying and also sometimes ruining my day so i avoid them especially because they make me feel like i dont have ocd sometimes because im not having the amount of anxiety i should have... to be clear ive only done 7s on my hierarchy so far im sure thats why i doubt it because im not experiencing panic attacks that i have in the past and instead just light anxiety ... anyway hope someone reads this and gets what im saying 🤷‍♀️ is this just me feeling like a fraud because of ocd or is my adhd really making it hard to do erps? i have no clue and i know i cant be give reassurance

My OCD has been all over the place today and now it’s hitting my existential OCD. I keep getting thoughts focused on reality and feeling if I feel real and if my environment is real and it’s freaking me out. It makes me feel like a crazy person. How can I just stop and be present and not feel unreal or in a simulation somehow?

Struggling with the idea that ocd is chronic or not some say it is some say it is not . What does your therapists say

i really need to know if God is real. It’s the root of my existential ocd if god isn’t real nothing makes sense.

The more you realize how fake OCD is The easier and faster recovery becomes.

I have a question. Is excessive note taking an OCD thing? Like if I have to outline a chapter I leave nothing out. Sometimes my outline is more pages than the chapter. Also I heard that constantly using new materials is an OCD thing. Like always starting new notebooks, getting new pens, restarting imperfect flash cards, etc. I never really struggle with perfectionism but maybe I do on a mild or moderate level. It does affect my functioning a little bit in terms of things taking forever to do but it’s not severe mental distress.

How to stop ruminating when your thoughts make you unsure of what you believe and you feel like you have to figure it out or you will never know or you will start doing things that are bad and will get you in jail because you stop believing what you've always believed and what you've been taught bc other people your age do and what if you do too but like worse and don't do normal rebellious things like drugs but awful things (harm ocd thoughts or even pocd thoughts) I am so scared and anytime I hear of someone rebelling I get anxious or think that I will or might want to 😫😫

Anyone have any tips for dealing with uncertainty form suicidal thoughts with harm ocd?

This is very troubling to me and seems to be something that’s going to crush me does anybody have an experience where they’re talking to somebody maybe while trying to fix an OCD compulsion and then hang up the phone with them and a little while later they have this thought Of the person saying something to them so it’s a thought it’s not audible but the thought is kind of in the other persons voice if that makes sense and then it’s very troubling

So I messed up the other day and read a statistic online regarding a percentage of people with harm ocd and mental/anxiety disorders as a whole harming and/or killing themselves... While the percentage wasn't huge, it was still a percentage/larger than I wish that I hadnt accidentally seen... I'm sorry for the huge trigger, but that currently has me still stuck in a panic mode right now.

anyone else’s OCD surround a weird thought they had as a child?

i need some help. i have hocd as well as a porn addiction. from a young age i stumbled upon porn, specifically lesbian porn and watersports. let me just tell you now i am straight but because of stumbling upon the porn it has turned my whole life upside down. its made me think that im gay, and that i have a pee kink. im 10000000% straight. im in a relationship with a boy who i adore. i see women as sisters and im not attracted to them, but for some reason my hocd has come back stronger than ever after! i was doing so well and now after months of battling it i’ve relapsed in watching lesbian porn, and done the thing that im most ashamed of, i was masturbating to daddy kink videos and my ocd told me to look up peeing instead and then i got aroused and peed. i feel ashamed and so disgusted i feel like dying :( i feel like i have to confess it to someone or i will explode and have. a panic attack. is this ocd doing this? I can’t go back to feeling like this again. it was so hard to beat this the first time. my ocd is a mess. i have a spending addiction, porn addiction, and now this godawful gross pee thing :( is anyone else going through this or have been through similar with porn addiction and ocd thinking you like pee kinks? :( i just need some advice because i don’t know what to do and contrary to what my ocd thinks i don’t like the addictions it just makes me think that i do and I can’t live without them. but i can :( i need help :( i don’t wanna feel like this disgusting person. i was doing so well :(

One of the hardest things about OCD is that people who don’t have it NEVER understand it. It can be so frustrating. I’m so upset right now because I was talking to my friend, who is aware that I’m in therapy for OCD. One of my themes is a fear of illnesses. My friend started to tell me a story that began with “OMG, I know someone in the hospital who died because of —“ I cut him off and told him I can’t listen to the end of that story because it will freak me out. What did he do? Finished it anyway. “No, let me finish, I was just going to tell you that...” as if his desire to tell me was somehow more pressing than my anxiety? Now I’m freaking out about the story, of course. This was completely preventable. I’m both angry AND anxious. Great.

Recovery story :) I had untreated and undiagnosed ocd that ran my life from 5 years old to 20 years old. I had every theme, so intensely. Sexuality ocd, harm ocd, cleanliness ocd, health ocd, organization ocd and body dysmorphia. I had multiple panic attacks daily for many of those years. I truly truly stopped doing all of my compulsions about 4 weeks into nocd therapy. Until that point during those first 4 weeks I was stopping physical compulsions, but i was still reasuring myself i wasnt going to do or be my fear etc. However, once I stopped all compulsions, reassurance seeking, self-reassurance, avoidance, EVERYTHING, I experienced terrible anxiety. Possibly the worst in my life for about a week. I was doubting everything. Then came the relief. I faced my fears. I accepted the real possibility that my worst fear could come true. I welcomed it even. This sounds terrifying but bear with me... If we give ourselves true permission to be or do what we fear, our ocd has no power over us. It attacks what we love and makes us think the opposite, but the only. The ONLY way out is to accept it might be true. To accept my worst fear might come true. I welcomed it even. And in a moment all that terrible anxiety went away, all the terrible intrusive feelings ceased, and i was brought back to my normal feelings, my normal wants and needs, my normal self. I was me. I was safe. I have been in recovery for weeks now, and things pop up every now and then but I feel so much more normal. And it is thanks to 3 things.... .Accepting my worst fear may or may not come true. My ocd thoughts may be real thoughts, and they may be ocd thoughts. .Resisting all compulsions (I did this in phases but its better to do quicker than slower) .Exposing myself to my fears .Feeling that intense INTENSE distress that comes with resisting compulsions and accepting uncertainty, and letting it fall naturally (it takes a bit) but it will fall. And now, I have hope, I have peace, I accept all that is and might be, but my ocd has been rooted out through feeling anxiety without compulsions, and so my brain is re-wiring itself. It is healing. That pain you feel when you resist your compulsions? That is your brain trying to heal from ocd. We can re-wire our brains from ocd. We can, and i did. I had severe ocd for 15 years. If I can, you can too. It takes alot of strength to resist compulsions during INTENSE anxiety during exposures, but this is in your hands. You have the power to heal your own brain. So, try to identify any and all compulsions, (mental and physical), and resist them, feel that terrible pain and anxiety, ride the wave and feel true, beautiful relief from ocd when the wave falls. Recovery works 100% if we agree to stop 100% of our compulsions. It will be the hardest thing you will ever do, but it will be worth it. Don't give up, the peace in recovery is worth this agony. Sending love to all of you beautiful people. You. Can. Do. This. 😇