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Is it possible for someone dealing with HOCD to experience loss of attraction to women and lower libido? And if anyone has also experienced this, what things have helped you deal with this?

Hi everyone. I hope you are all well. As for me, I've been 8 days clean without my addiction and while it's really hard to ignore the urges and stopping myself mid way in engaging with them completely, I've been trying my best. I've been doing great lately and I hope everyone else has been getting better. I've been in a very good mood. I just wanted to take some time to share some advice that has helped me when it comes to OCD. I hope this can be of use for anyone that stumbled upon this post. :) 1. Calming down and letting the anxiety pass: It's usually not a good idea to judge yourself under the feelings of anxiety when it comes to thoughts. Anxiety can be a response in the body that leaves the brain unable to think critically. On one hand you may feel very horrible in the moment but as it passes, you may feel better, and you may even be able to sit with the thoughts. In the same way you are not your thoughts, feelings do not mean facts. 2. Accepting the possibilities of the thoughts or whatever the thoughts throw at you: Always remember: Accepting is NOT agreeing with them. Big difference. If you agreed with the thoughts you wouldn't be so anxious over them. Think of it this way: if you are confident in being a straight person, would your OCD try to convince you that you are? No. Instead, it will try to convince you that you are the opposite. Your worry inducing response to the OCD can bring some positivity believe it or not. The fact that you feel so much shame/guilt/worry about the thought or past event alone shows you that you are met with OCD, a mental disorder. And that you've grown from your past self. HOWEVER, this should not be used as a compulsion in of itself. 3. Self compassion: Don't beat yourself up when it comes to OCD, no matter what theme. You're trying your best to get better and you have a community that is always here to help you one way or another. Your thoughts can get to bad places. It happens to everyone! You aren't alone. OCD's job is to convince you of the things you don't want to be true and it will try to distort everything it can think of. 4. Mindfulness. Staying in the moment always helps. Whenever your mind shifts to the past or the future, it helps to catch yourself doing it, and following these steps to bring yourself back. 5. DO NOT CHECK: Seriously, checking does nothing but make things worse. People check themselves with the use of very self destructive tendencies and after doing so, even if they feel they proved they aren't what they fear, they will then feel immense guilt for the simple fact that they gave into the compulsion alone. This can also be said about addictions. You are better off not engaging with them at all, even if your thoughts or urges tell you that it will take all the pain away. 6. It's never too late: I've learned that from what I've seen when it comes to people with OCD, whether it'd be something of the past, a thought that trembles them, a traumatic event that has happened, or low self-esteem, we can all get the help we very much deserve. I'm more than glad to have this community and to be with so many people that understand a struggle that is not exactly understood by society as a whole. Keep fighting, ladies and gentlemen. It won't last forever. :)

My bf and I are moving to another city next week and I find myself being more vulnerable to triggers this week. Suddenly stuff dealing with Sexuality scares me again even when it doesn't go against my own opinion/mindset. Also I tend to obsess over tiny things and questions every other day, like how to get a new passport or who needs to know my new address and how do I tell them. I feel easily overwhelmed by things that aren't that hard after all. I hope things will settle down once the move is done. Maybe I should do another media detox until then and try to only focus on the move and work.. do you guys have any tipps how to get through a stressful period without falling into a rumination trap?

This is just a rant :) I've realized I don't freaking know anything about attraction. Like how do I know if I have an attraction to someone? For me a big role comes in face value of the person. I am pretty picky with boys and I've always been comfortable with that idea because I promise you guys there are VERY FEW handsome men in my town (even my straight women/gay friends agree). Even my straight friends are more picky about men than me 😂. But, I'm also VERY insecure and I find a lot of women pretty/attractive (like even if you aren't that pretty, you would be "normal" for me because I don't care about women too much). Probably the biggest thing that contributed to my high standards with boys is the fact that I read and watch too many novels/series/kpop where there are tons of too good to be true boys in it (but also had crushes on boys who are not that particularly handsome, and i was fine with that). I've also only experienced the giddy feeling over boys, and I would fantasize about them every single night to help me sleep. I have always been at peace with my sexuality being heterosexual because I was happy with that. I didn't wanna rush into a relationship with a boy because I knew I can't find a nice man within my area so I was waiting until I go to college this year, but this stupid pandemic and HOCD happened. My friends and I always like to go outside and look for handsome men whenever there are functions and events, we never looked for "pretty" girls. Since this HOCD started, I kind of had a compulsion to look at other women and to test if I find them somehow pretty/attractive, and surprise surprise they were all "okay" or even pretty for me. Some even had nice clothes that I would like to wear (probably if it was 2 months ago, I would just be insecure about myself if I did find them attractive). Even when I was "straight", I didn't do that thing to boys because if I would find a boy attractive, then he is attractive. I don't have to test and compare them to other guys. I don't actually want to be with a girl because I am romantically and sexually attracted to men, but I keep having what-ifs. I did ERP pretty early on (this is my 2nd month of suffering) so I am not bothered by the thoughts anymore, making me think I'm just in denial. Everything that I do I would be so skeptical about my sexuality, if I find that man attractive then maybe I'm bi. If I don't find that man attractive, then maybe I'm bi. Like I don't even want to be bi, but I don't have the anxiety anymore. It feels like the anxiety was the only thing that was keeping me from becoming bisexual, and I don't want that. I don't even like boobs or vaginas 😭😭😭 It feels like I don't have a choice anymore because I'm not anxious 😭 It's also getting harder to fantasize about boys, it's very very upsetting. My attraction to boys somewhat came back, but it's not the same anymore. I'm super filled with doubts about my sexuality 😭

Does anyone else ruminate nearly 24/7 about their Harm/Pure OCD thought or thoughts? For example, stating to themselves that “I don’t want to harm, hurt or kill anyone, etc.” Do you have anxiety while doing so and also even more anxiety after trying to stop the reassurance/compulsions. Thanks in advance!

Intrusive thoughts are destroying my sex life. What can I do? Every time I’m having sex with my fiancé I get horrible thoughts. I feel so horrible

So much anxiety today smfh. I’m supposed to have an interview tomorrow and now I’m like htf am I supposed to do an interview when I feel like this and expect to get it smfh. I feel like taking a drive out to no where and to get away from my house and just leave the city to a far away city or something cuz I hate this feeling that I get when I’m in my room with no tv on and the door closed and being triggered smfh.

Hi everyone. I've struggled mostly with just order & symmetry OCD, but lately feel like I might be developing suicidal OCD. I find myself often worrying about becoming depressed and that it will cause me to commit suicide, even though when I think about it I really don't want to die. And I feel like worrying about getting depressed and committing suicide is making it more real, and making me depressed and have suicidal thoughts even more. Does anyone else struggle with this? How do you cope / do ERP for it?

i think erp and the “maybe maybe not method” really only works for certain themes so if you have harm OCD, POCD, and others i understand why erp could be a little harder for you; it just baffles me that a therapist would tell you “well maybe you want to kill people maybe you don’t” it just doesn’t make sense to me and i think there should be a better therapy option for you all that struggle with things like this.

TW Yesterday I was driving and saw some attractive guy driving and turned my head to look at them. I have a boyfriend who I love very much and I feel like I need to confess this to him so bad. Even tho I know I didn’t mean anything by it I just wanted to look. I feel so guilty though. I haven’t confessed yet and I’m trying not to given because I’ve been confessing like crazy. It’s so hard.

Are we really just supposed to suffer? I have irrational delusional thoughts all day like 20-30 times a minutes until I finally go to sleep. I’m doing my very best to abstain from compulsions. But holy shit it’s so hard. It’s been 19 days.

TW: Saw something shockingly disturbing in casual YouTube video recommended to me; Fighting my porn addiction; Ruminating; POCD, Real Event, VERY DETAILED CONTENT NSFW I suppose I'll just be journaling. I dunno where else to share this and I don't want to boil it up. So.. tonight I've been doing a lot of googling when it comes to my situation with real event OCD. It's about porn videos I've watched in the past. I know I'm not supposed to google to get reassurance but I just needed to see other people struggling with my situation and getting advice from it. I worry that I saw illegal content, I think I used checking on one search that was taboo and I felt really bad to the point where I cried after. After all the googling, I've gotten people say it's uncommon to have a taboo interest because you get a kick out of the feeling of it being unusual or shocking to you I guess. I've discovered that most people get to the taboo point when it comes to excessive porn viewing. For me it was exhibitionism, shemales, MILFs ladyboys, flatulence, family themes, and basically porn twisting my naturally developed fetish. On occasion I've made bizzare taboo search terms and seen taboo videos like "step mother and son" "therapist feet joi" "lil sister feet" "mature mom worship" "oily butts" and "ladyboys" After these incidents I can remember, I just end up feeling really guilty over this for months and days after days. I always question if I'm a good or bad person or not. I feel like these search terms could be illegal, or my POCD is twisting some of them along with my regular OCD. As I've watched porn much less, these porn induced fetishes have decreased significantly. I still get thoughts and fantasies about most of them but I don't act on them and I don't look up videos relating to the topics. I really hate that I got bored of normal natural porn and thought stepping it up was a good idea. I regret that. I'm totally done with porn and I don't want to go back to the addiction I used to have. I feel like as a society, porn destroys us. Honestly it shouldn't even be legal. It focuses so much on targeting younger audience in terms of both actors and viewers such as me and others who have been exposed to it at such a young age. It exploits people in ways that can change the perspective on reality when it comes to men and women. Even if videos have fully provided consent, it still adds onto the demand. I'm trying to practice not feeling bad for the past and being in the present. I'm trying to accept the thoughts because accepting the what ifs is how you beat OCD step by step. It's not about agreeing with the thoughts but more about accepting their presence. But at the end of the day, I quit with porn and masturbating. Most of the advice I've seen on there in a nutshell is to accept the thoughts, quit the viewing habits entirely, and don't beat yourself up about things of this nature in the past. Aside from all of that though, I was watching a video focusing on a video game showcasing a funny montage. Everything was going well and perfectly fine until I saw something really fucking terrifying and disturbing for like a frame of a second. It looked to be a picture of cartoon CP as a "meme" This isn't the first time this has happened and for some reason people in comments think it's now funny to witness CP in that sense. I never understood it. It makes me not know what to believe because I feel like I'm the only person worrying about it. At least I HOPE it wasn't a picture taken from a cartoon CP video but I wouldn't be surprised. This just adds onto my point of how fucked up porn can be. I had my hand over my mouth for a really long time for what I just saw. I guess people without OCD would see these things and just move on. Maybe that's my issue. Judging by how negatively I reacted from that, I feel like it's justified against my POCD proving it isn't true and I'm not what I think. I would never want to hurt a child, and I wouldn't want to hurt anybody for any sort of gratification. I'd much prefer helping people. I don't get off on hurting people and I guess at the time I was able to seperate fantasy from reality. But, I still just feel so wrong about these things. But as I google for support, many other people have gone through these things and felt the guilt and they're trying to get rid of porn entirely just like I am. I don't know if I was doing a checking compulsion searching "lil sis feet" or trying to engage in a taboo off my main fetish but I just hate ruminating over it and I feel awful about it. I'm also not testing myself anymore. I used to do that with softcore porn on instagram admiring adult women, milfs, muscular women, etc. But, it only got me more stuck in the loops of compulsions and eventually I cut it all off. What the positives of these events are something I ask myself a lot: I'm glad I'm disgusting by porn now. I'm glad I'm disgusting by the things I fear and the things I may have seen. I'm glad I'm disgusted and fearful and full panick of the word p*** and I'm glad to see that I can't even dare type the word child and p*** in the same sentence. Seeing anything along these lines is enough to make me very sick.

My poem for school... "When the OCD Monster Had Had Enough" It's about the moment my OCD hit it's worst and I knew I needed serious help 3:00 am The monster had had enough It was strong it was hungry and it thought it was tough Burdening misery had barged through my door The bang, bang, bang at my door was too hard to ignore And woke me with the sound of, “Come, come look, at the things to explore.” It was burying itself inside of me preparing to roar “Look, look, look!” it said. “Only a few minutes!” Grabbing the phone beside my bed, covered with fright, too shocked with fear to hear the crickets of the night At this point my body was done, so I just searched up the word “heaven” Without depth and without context, I just searched up “heaven” My emotions felt weak like an uncontrollable train slowly crashing and falling into a creek My my! 40 minutes?! The bang, bang, bang at my door was too hard to ignore I remembered my mom said no more researching after 20 minutes! I sat like a rock on my bed, constantly looking at the clock Blinking my eyes constantly, too tired to walk I waited and waited with no time to sleep, so I could tell my mom sorry for the monster’s critique The OCD monster was furious now, I waited and waited to hear the sound OCD had taken over each space in between my bones OCD had ferociously attacked my heart, my soul, my body’s home I listened and texted my mom, “I must say sorry for the things I’ve done wrong!” It was maybe 6 o’clock now Creak, creak, creak With my eyes darkened and my body weak I realized my mom had woken from her sleep I stepped outside at 7 am now The August morning was busy with children going to school, the air feeling cool My mom holding the dog leash, staring at me with a complexed tone, “Why are you up so early? Are you okay?” But the monster told me to be quiet so all that I could say, “I am just so sorry for the things I’ve done wrong! I researched for more than 20 minutes! Oh you must be so upset!” “Hannah, that was yesterday. I said you could research for 20 minutes yesterday. Not today.”

I often find it triggering to look at old photos of myself because instantly I think of how I look gay, how I was just struggling with my sexuality even then and “knew I was”, etc. This is mainly due to the fact I have never been super girly (don’t do my nails or wear makeup) or cared how I looked until later when I got my first boyfriend. Would it be a good exposure practice? To look at these photos? I had urges to delete them because I hated how I looked.. but decided that wouldn’t be a good idea.

Hey everybody. I'm struggling with my somatic ocd. I realize that when I don't have intrusive thoughts, this obssession of controling my breath dominates me. It's so exhausting. I'm always afraid of something bad happens because of this obessssion, but I can't stop it. Anyone can help me?

so i had a really bad panic attack ocd spiral this past august it was like three that month that eventually led me down the path of ocd diagnosis and doing ERPs with a therapist through this app I started doing 7s on my hierarchy and then moved up to my 8s and 9s ... once i got to my 9 which was recording myself saying maybe im a p*** and was able to finally do that a few times i was feeling really confident it took me months to get there but i finally got to my 9 however my amount of sessions with my therapist on here ended in terms of face to face sessions and once i didnt have to report back to her on how many i did in a week i just let it all slide and didnt do any for almost a whole month now i started doing my 9s again but im finding my anxiety at night and the morning are getting really bad again like it had been in august which had got a lot better when i was being consistant with my ERPs...i also am turning 29 this weekend and have some existential themes as well i havent worked on and they are spiking right now its not even as much that my pocd theme is worse but just in general i guess once you stop practicing sitting with your anxiety after triggering yourself on purpose when triggers happen on their own it is so much harder to sit with them than before because youre out of practice but i guess what worried me is it doesnt make sense because my intrusive thoughts have been of pocd more frequently since i went a month not doing erps but mostly at night my fears of death and dying alone and something being wrong with me and im broken and will i ever have a relationship will i ever have love and hocd stuff are the loudest or most overwhelming not my pocd but i guess i have worked on that theme the most and also my friend is setting me up on a date and thats a lot of change im turning 29 and i avoid dating and romance like the plague and like my hocd and existential stuff with dating and my birthday coming up im just used to staying in my comfort zone and having the same routine and being alone and its overwhelming anyway i just wanted to vent but i actually agreed to a date and im turning 29 and so i guess for eocd and hocd thats gonna trigger a lot plus i slipped up on my pocd erps so yeah i hate change and i hate getting older and i hate dating so many things could go wrong im wondering if i should get on zoloft just because i really am having a hard time imagining me on these dates without something to help me not freak out

I’m losing my fuckin mind smfh. It is so gross to have sexual thoughts of my mother smfh. I never had thoughts for her until she started purposely doing it to me smfh. I don’t get why she just doesn’t stop like do you not want time to be able to talk to you like normal? Do you want me to become even more crazier I really don’t know how to go about this smfh. I would be fine if she didn’t do it in purpose I wouldn’t feel anything or think I’m going to have sexual thoughts for her in purpose like leave me tf alone I just want to talk to my mom like normal and not be forced to have thoughts for her all cuz of her insecurities of whether or not I have soocd or am I actually gay like I swear I get no support at my house at all smfh.

it’s perfectly healthy to think about experimenting it’s perfectly healthy to think about experimenting it’s perfectly healthy to think about experimenting this doesn’t mean i’m bisexual

My mind is making me think I have a crush on this boy and I don't. I dont know how to sit with this anxiety. I keep.looking at pictures of him and because I thought he looked kind of nice in a couple pictures my OCD says I like him and I want to message him. No one seems to understand. This is making me cry and I feel like it must be real but I can't tell. I just want to cry. Can anyone please help me. My mind is confusing me to the point where I am thinking it is real

Why won't the thoughts and the anxiety ever fucking stop?! It seems to be worse when I'm tired. It's just NON-STOP with, "I'm gay, I'm gay, I'm gay" even when I'm trying to keep myself busy. It never. Fucking. Stops. I feel like I'm gonna break down and have a panic attack at some point. What exacerbates it even more is this dread feeling I get about sex now. Whenever I look at women I'm reminded of it, or when I try to talk to women. Because my libido is basically zero right now, it's feeding the OCD even more. And the worst thing is that I can't tell if it's just a low libido, or if I actually don't find women arousing anymore. I really can't fucking tell sometimes. I WANT to be able to have fun with women again but my brain is fucking it all up.