Welcome to
the NOCD Community

Let’s make a list of workbooks, books, articles, podcasts that helped you or made you feel seen!

Has anyone else experienced moments where they find themselves on “auto-pilot,” checking or testing themselves without consciously intending to? I just had an experience where I almost acted in a way I wouldn’t, but during the moment, I didn’t feel any anxiety. It wasn’t until after I pulled away that I began to panic and felt really confused. It felt like I was testing myself, but it also made me question if I was close to actually doing it or if it was a compulsion I did subconsciously. It was a very strange and unsettling experience. I’m confused, scared, and in tears. Curious if others have encountered similar situations?

Let’s start with today. I went back to work today to the company I have been with for 22 years. I thought for the past couple of years that my job was sucking the life out of me…it was another three letter word…OCD. Today I drove to the office, interacted with coworkers, handled sharp knives, etc - all things I had completely stopped doing 5.5 months ago. In June, I started having repetitive thoughts and urges of suicide and was hospitalized. I had previously been diagnosed with GAD, panic disorder and PTSD and then had MDD added on to that for suicidal ideation. After 5 days and some horrifying meds, I discharged, feeling worse than when I had arrived at the hospital. I took a medical leave of absence from work and started seeing two therapists a week and enrolled in a substance abuse program for alcohol. And I declined and continued declining for 3 months. During that time, I started having thoughts of hitting pedestrians with my car so I stopped driving. I had thoughts of slitting my wrists with our kitchen knives, so we locked those away. I couldn’t sleep and could barely eat. I could drag myself to my Zoom therapy sessions - that was about it. I had to switch to virtual sessions because I had thoughts of jumping off a 4 story building and no longer felt safe going into buildings with more than one floor. I couldn’t be left home alone so I would go wherever my husband was going and wait in the car. I had thoughts of throwing myself out of the car, smashing my toes in the car door, and throwing myself in front of cars. I had thoughts of jumping out of trees, drinking bleach and drowning myself. I would often lay on the bed in my husband’s office while he worked, just so I wouldn’t be alone with all of those terrifying thoughts. I even hid in my closet at times. Just when I thought it couldn’t get worse, I had my first thoughts of killing my husband and son. That was too much and in a fit of rage and resignation, I attempted to take my own life to stop the thoughts and spare those around me. I was not successful and ended up hospitalized again. I finally admitted that I had been having thoughts of harming others and a social worker in the ER recognized it for what it was - ego dystonic OCD. After a not awesome second hospitalization, I went into a 4 week OCD specific IOP and therapy twice a week after that through NOCD. Proper diagnosis, treatment and medication turned my life completely around in 2.5 months. ERP every thought, all day, every day. Power of choice.

My ocd is ruining my relationship with my kids. Because of the intrusive thoughts I avoid being close to them, hugging or cuddling up to watch tv. My ocd is either telling me I wouldn’t care if harm came to them or it turns everything into something sexual or inappropriate. For example, my daughter wanted to show me how long her nails are so she started scratching my arm gently. It felt so nice and relaxing and I immediately panicked because I was scared the ocd would cause a groinal and I don’t ever, ever want a feeling like that connected with my child even though I know it’s the ocd causing it and not me i’d still feel horrible. I just want to be a normal loving affectionate mom and I can never be that for my kids because of ocd😪 I don’t see any other parents posting about going through this or commenting that they do and how they cope. I feel so alone and defeated.

It’s turning into this sort of real event OCD where I’ll remember something I thought of months or years ago and shrugged off except now I’m consumed by guilt and panic for not caring back then. Like the whole what if thinking that and not reacting or just being like whatever means I was really a terrible person and I just now grew a conscience? It’s not even past actions, it’s all about what has come to my mind before. I used to just be like “okay anyway” sometimes I’d let the thought play out and then just move on. But now I think I recognize them as intrusive and I feel shame and guilt for not caring to question them in the past. I think in developing some new theme or something if that’s what real event ocd is? Help?

My therapist isn’t specialized in OCD. I’m her first OCD client. She told me she’s taking courses in ERP and specifically sexual OCD since a lot of my themes are sexual in nature. I want help, I need help. It feels like every time I meet with her I get set back. I make progress a lot on my own. Sitting with discomfort, trying to accept the thoughts and uncertainty. But every single time I meet with her, it feels like I’m explaining OCD to her. She even went as far as to suggest that some of my thoughts that bring me distress are mine. I am not a cheater. They are not mine. Why on earth would they not be intrusive if I was in tears about having this thought? I feel bad. I really do because I can see that even though I can very much see her mistakes, I can also see that she’s trying to help me. I’m just so scared of getting worse. I’ve been in therapy for 5 weeks now. I feel like had it been with a specialist, I would be doing so much better. Instead it takes me days to come backs to whatever progress I’ve made alone after meeting with her. She’s a great person, she tells me she experiences intrusive thoughts too and she doesn’t have OCD which helps me feel less alone but I don’t think that’s enough for me. She’s always available for a call whenever I’m in extreme panic. I just don’t think this is working. I trust her and I tell her everything, but it feels like she’s just listening to me talk the whole time. We’re doing a workbook but she gives me absolutely 0 input. I just read my replies and she just sits there. I don’t understand the point in that. I feel so anxious right now. She wants me to get properly evaluated for anything that may be going on because on top of the severe OCD, I was also diagnosed with PMDD, GAD, and MDD by my primary care doctor but I guess she doesn’t trust those diagnoses? My psychiatrist also told me I have ADHD, which I’ve suspected my whole life but it sounds like my therapist doesn’t know how to handle OCD much less OCD, MDD, GAD, PMDD, and ADHD. She’s questioning the validity of my diagnoses instead of helping me figure out how to deal with all of it. This is so suffocatingly difficult. I’m also a huge people pleaser so how on earth do I end this thing?

Has anyone with medicine sensitivities, found a med that works for them? I’ve been on like 4 in the last two months and all of them had unbearable side effects on me. - Lexapro (urges felt real, almost called 911, I thought I was going to harm myself and my dogs, ended up calling a hotline and sobbing for hours every single day) - Buspar (constant panic and crying, literally could not function) - Amitriptyline (worked the best but made me moody and impulsive) - Prozac (felt petrified and frozen half the day) Has anyone found one that works for them?

Feel guilty for not giving into compulsions like rumination and confessing? I feel guilt for having an intrusive thought, trying to shrug it off or just giving it a few seconds of thought and moving along. This sounds like improvement but I still struggle with the anxiety and the guilt. The shame. I’ll be okay and then I’ll remember I have OCD and my stomach will drop and I just want to curl up and cry.

my therapist suggested that some of my less bad rocd intrusive thoughts are actually mine, and not intrusive. She ended up taking it back when she saw the alarm on my face and saw how panicked I got. I feel really freaking anxious. We were only talking about it because I mentioned a lot of doubt surrounding those less bad ones, but it only filled me with more doubt. I don’t want those thoughts to be mine. I really don’t. I feel scared and so discouraged after this session. I feel scared about the worst thoughts, what if those aren’t intrusive. I feel so much doubt.

Before I was diagnosed with OCD, I would constantly figure out why something triggered me. I don’t know if this is like bad for OCD but it usually calmed me down enough to where it would practically go away fully. I’ve been in the worst spiral of my life for about two months now. There’s certain thoughts I cannot sit down and think of triggers because it simply makes them worse. However, there are thoughts where I notice that they pop up around the same repetitive trigger. For example: inappropriately grabbing my mom would flash before my eyes when I would playfully reach for her. This happened so many times over the last several weeks and I kinda had an “aha” moment a few minutes ago. It’s basically like an extra barrier, an extra warning. The last thing I want to do is make my mom uncomfortable and whenever I grab for her, the worst case scenario appears. As a form of *remember this could happen, stay away.* Maybe this all sounds obvious and if it does, I’m sorry. Essentially, I would also feel like I almost did it, ofc it did, all I saw in that moment was the worst case scenario. The urge I feel to do it was a compulsion to test if I would even get close to considering it. I don’t actively think of it, it feels like my ADHD brain kinda solves the puzzle and throws out the answer at a random moment. I don’t know, maybe this all harms me more but in my experience understanding why certain things trigger me (not why the thought is there, figuring that out makes me worse, I keep a generic broad idea: it’s probably the opposite of me *shrug*) have helped me a ton. I’m still hypervigilant and I’m working on just refocusing my attention to the present but I wanted to share for any opinions or advice. I’m still very new at handling this and learning since I was only recently diagnosed so please take all of this with a grain of salt. The last thing I would want to do is make anyone worse. So any thoughts?

Today was one of those days where OCD decided to throw a curveball—completely unplanned and uninvited. It wasn’t one of those moments where I’d geared up for exposure practice or had a strategy ready. Instead, it hit out of nowhere. This morning, I noticed a massive 4-foot scratch on my car when I got to work. It was glaring, impossible to miss, and my mind immediately spiraled into overdrive. This was after intentionally avoiding any distractions during my commute (no videos, no crutches). For about two hours, I had no idea how or when the scratch happened, and it felt awful. My brain latched onto the uncertainty, feeding me all the “what ifs” and “should haves” it could muster. And as if the scratch itself wasn’t enough, there was the bigger, familiar fear lurking in the background: the fear of being a disappointment. The thought that I might have harmed someone or caused damage—or that I would be a disappointment to those I valued the most—loomed large. It wasn’t just about the car. It was about the story my OCD loves to tell me: What if this makes me bad? What if I’m careless? What if I’ve let everyone down? In that moment, I had to make a choice. I couldn’t undo the scratch or magically find an answer to what caused it, but I could decide how I responded. I kept telling myself: This is uncomfortable, but I can handle it. Something happened, or maybe it didn’t, but either way, I have to sit with this feeling. Later, my husband figured it out. The scratch happened when he was squeezing by my car to bring the trash bins in. Even after learning the cause, though, the anxiety didn’t disappear. If anything, it hung around, whispering that I still needed to fix something or do something to make it “right.” What’s wild is that I’d been having a great couple of days before this. I felt like I was making progress—fewer compulsions, less spiraling—and then this situation hit, and I felt like I’d been thrown a million miles backwards. That’s the thing about OCD: progress isn’t linear. And then there’s the added layer of fear: this nagging worry that I’ll never stop letting people down, that even little mistakes or accidents somehow make me a failure in someone else’s eyes. That weight can feel unbearable sometimes. As the day went on, though, I noticed a shift. It wasn’t dramatic, but the anxiety started to lose its edge. I’m proud of myself for not falling back into old habits—no reassurance-seeking, no obsessing over the car, no chasing answers to make the anxiety disappear. But I won’t sugarcoat it. It’s still hard. I’m nervous about getting back in the car later. Will I feel paralyzed, stuck in the moment when I first saw the scratch? Or will I be able to move on like it’s just another part of the day? Right now, I don’t know, but here’s what I do know: I didn’t give up today. I faced a 9/10 anxiety moment, and even though it wasn’t graceful or ideal, I kept going. It didn’t feel good, and it wasn’t perfect, but I’m still here, still trying, still moving forward.

A few days ago I posted about the urge to type up cp spelt out into Google. As stated in that post I know it’s essential harmless. It would generate articles and statistics. I’ve never given into this urge. My therapist theorizes that my OCD has its own morbid curiosity. I think that’s possibly true. But this urge has me feeling almost restricted? I can’t get on my phone or computer without feeling like I can’t breathe. I think it’s maybe anxiety but it’s driving me crazy. My therapist is newer at treating OCD. She told me I was her first client with in an active OCD episode. She’s mentioned ERP and workbooks, I’ve met with her twice. We normally go in what I wrote in workbooks and my journal about OCD. She suggested I type it into Google (since it’s technically not harmful) once to see if that urge goes away and if it doesn’t, to use it against my OCD by saying, “this urge that seems to be promising relief from anxiety is a lie, we’ve done this before and I gave in. You’re lying and we’re not doing this again.” I mentioned that this might just give my OCD more power over me. Or use the guilt against me. I’m scared to do it. I know it’s harmless again. But I’ve been thinking about it for a while and I don’t know if I should take that advice. Can anyone give me their input or perspective? Or maybe even what they think their therapist would say? I trust my therapist but we’re both very new at this and I’m terrified of this getting worse but I also hate this restriction feeling/anxiety. Input please, I really appreciate it

Hello, at the risk of seeking reassurance, I wanted to see if anyone else here had experienced what I consider a strange thought process in my ocd. I have suffered from harm and existential themes for around 4 months now, with the existential themes having stemmed from the initial fear that I could become a violent person (triggered by something I read online). Before I knew better I would argue and engage excessively with the thoughts to try and disprove them. This led me to tread into very dark and strange philosophical territory. For example: I would tell myself that there’s no way that I could hurt someone because I am repulsed by the thought and I know that if I ever were to cause harm, I would feel awful. But logic doesn’t work on this, so my brain would then suggest that I could still hurt someone despite not wanting to because I could actually somehow want to feel awful. This led to a lot of bizarre thoughts about whether I actually want good things for myself and what essentially amounts to an identity crisis and fears that I am in denial and actually have some sort of evil shadow self that I’ve been unaware of my whole life. As if the more I tried to reason my way out of it, the more I lost touch with reason. I don’t want any reassurance, just looking for some commonality and maybe encouragement to keep working on getting better.

Guys, I discussed this with a therapist, and it’s something I want to share with you. If you’re considering whether or not to take medication—both of which are completely valid choices—let me just say this when making your decision: Medications are not a long-term solution. Period. True healing only begins when you can completely and fully do without medication. In the beginning, they help with stability during exposures, and I totally understand that. But they won’t help you, if you decide to stop taking them at some point and that stability is no longer there. As hard as it may sound, and as tough as it is, real healing starts when we no longer need medication for our exposures. I know it’s hard, and I don’t want to discourage you or anything like that, I just want to tell you the truth. It’s absolutely OKAY (i did too for a time) if you decide to take medication, and in the beginning, they should help you, but please think long-term and consider it carefully. Wish u all the best ❤️

There’s a stupid urge that’s been bugging me for a month. It’s stupid it’s to type out “cp” (spelled out) into Google. I know this is essentially harmless all I would get is articles and whatnot. But it still is bugging the hell out of me. I feel like if I just do it once it’ll go away. I don’t know if that’s the OCD talking but it’s driving me insane because I get filled with dread every other hour when the thought to do it shows up. It had calmed down but now it’s back times 10. I know it’s quite literally harmless to type that, I know the results because of a Reddit post on morbid curiosity. I just don’t understand why my brain is so hyper focused on this. I almost gave into it the other day bc it feels ridiculous. I don’t know what to do. What do I do???

Hey Everyone. I'm new to this and I figured I would reach out to groups of people in similar situations. I have had OCD and intrusive thoughts in my life since a young age. When I was a Kid, I constantly checked my blood sugar out of fear I had diabetes. I did it so often you could see where the skin was lanced at, a bunch of little dots on every single finger tip. I have always had that fear of "what if, what if, what if" and I'm tired of it. I want to rise above it and work on making my life somewhat normal. I'm currently going through therapy and where it does help, our sessions are far and few in between. I have so much anxiety about certain weird aspects of my life. I have to sing my abcs to feel like my hands are clean. I constantly have intrusive thoughts bringing up things about my past and my trauma. Do I have a disease? Am I going to contaminate something I touch? Do I love my partner? Do I find my partner attractive? I was molested as a kid, would I do that to a kid? Even though I know how I really feel it creeps up and takes over my mind. It gets loud. So loud, but silent at the same time. It becomes pressure. The back of my neck tenses and I feel something looming over me. Like it's the puppet master pulling the strings. I read a few posts on here and it feels reassuring that I'm not going through this type of stuff alone. I'm constantly feeling alone and broken because of it, despite my therapist telling me I'm not. For instance, last night my gf of five years and I had intimate time and when I wanted to enjoy myself, my brain triggered by the smell of her breath and it shot me back to a memory of my first partner. My first partner and I, we had a good relationship in the beginning but it became writhing with toxicity and hurt towards the middle and the end. I don't want to think of that. It's unwanted. The more I don't want to think it, the more it's forced on me. I'm tired. Not suicidal tired but I'm wearing thin. It feels like the thoughts I don't want to think about, win. If anybody has a similar experience to me and you found something that tried and it works. Please link the tools! I am open to everything. I want to be normal.

Hi everyone, I’m 21 and I was diagnosed with OCD at 16. I had a great therapist who was trained to treat OCD and we made a lot of progress, but I moved out of state for college and had to find someone new. I’ve been seeing someone else who is trained to treat OCD too for about a year now and they’ve been super helpful, but I feel like I’m caught in a cycle. I did some ERP and it has helped, but I think I need to focus on it more than I ever have. I’ve only ever gone to therapy once a week at most, and I considered that a lot. But I have been struggling a LOT the past few months, and have only really been addressing new stressors that have triggered my OCD, rather than doing actual exposure work. I’ve also been in the process of finding an effective medication, and the past few months have felt like a vicious cycle of weaning off of a med and trying a new one, the weaning period making my OCD horrible, my OCD cooling down, a few weeks of being as anxious as usual (upsetting things usually being a 6 or 7 and obsessing in small chunks for up to an hour a day), then chatting with my psychiatrist about a new med, rinse and repeat. I feel like I’ve kind of boomeranged in progress, and I wonder if I’d benefit from more intensive (2+ sessions a week) treatment with ERP to address the obsessions that have been making me miserable. For anyone who’s recovered from severe OCD or has gotten a good grip on it, what resources did you use? Did you do intensive therapy (lots of erp multiple times a week) or was once a week enough for you? Did you see an expert from NOCD or something else? How did medication come into play? I feel like I’ve plateaued, and I want to put the hard work in to get to a place where I have power over my ocd and can live a more care free life!

I have ADHD and I’m struggling with impulsivity related to intrusive thoughts. Sometimes, I get these strong urges to act on a thought, and I start taking action. But then, right as I’m about to make contact or do it, I freeze in confusion and terror, realizing what I’m about to do. It’s like I’m caught between the urge and the awareness that I don’t want to follow through. Has anyone experienced something similar, where the impulsivity leads you to take action before you realize what’s happening? How do you manage that confusion and prevent following through with the urge?

Does anyone else experience this lingering fear and anxiety because they think they’re capable of hurting someone? It’s killing me. I feel like I’m such a danger. I feel like I’m a predator. I feel like this awful person and I can’t shake it. I want to carry on with my day but I can’t. I don’t feel like I deserve it. I feel like I’ve done awful things. I can’t stop crying.

Hey, i would appreciate any small little advice on this post… so idk if this is rocd or not but i feel like i am not showing interest in my boyfriends things and life anymore its like i dont care only and i am okay if he cuts the call soon or actually am even like okay if i dont call him? And will pickup if he calls cause thats like habit or whatever and i feel like i am feeling that so strongly and it cant be ocd cause on video call i feel it like i am not interested in his stuff but i want him to be in mine like just some selfish person and feel like not even want to talk or make excuses to stop talking or whatever and feel relieved when we do and like dont know what to talk about and thats all i can think and it actually true cause i feel it and sometimes my actions of cutting the call are proof of it and i am not anxious but i feel it and do it normally so it cant be ocd right has to be real and that means i am delaying something or not accepting the truth regarding it? He talks about the future sometimes and idk if i even feel like that and yes i dont means its not so, i avoid sometimes even lovey dovey talks and specifically if i am okay with not talking and he is not my priority and i am feeling it and cant deny that and feeling doesn’t budge and am okay with watching my show rather than talking and actually doing it means its true and its coming cause not enough feeling for him or priorities means thats not ocd and this is my habit of writing so i write it or express cause thats my first reaction feel normal and not anxious without doing it as well meaning even writing this is not imp and thinking that and that i am lying to him so its not ocd right? Pls help me…