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How do you guys manage compulsive self-talk?

I have been getting better and better but I've been experiencing this one theme, i'll refrain from mentioning it so I don't trigger anyone accidentally. It is something I know is against my values, beliefs, what I know to be true, and it is something i'd never do but the moment the OCD happens the urge i'd of course never act upon that is there is so profound it is honestly so distressing and then I do not know what to do other than wanting to lock myself in my bedroom and hope for this to pass. What do you guys do when a comand-like/urge intrusive thought pops into your mind? I know it is not my thought, and I would never act upon it of course. But how can I calm myself and be rational in such a moment?

I've battled OCD since I was a little kid. Until a couple of years ago, I sort of learnt to live with it. The last 2 years, intrusive thoughts have ruined my life. Let's just say, everything I dont want to think about, pops into my mind. This leads to immense guilt, shame and fear I will feel like this forever. Ive done ERP, seen roughly 8 psychologists, did a 3 weeks stay as an impatient OCD program and am taking Fluoxetine daily. I know all there is to know about OCD therapy, minimising compulsions, ACT, mindfulness etc. Why cant I seem to get on top of this? I know it takes time and practice and eventually I will change the way my brain is wired. It's days like today I feel that I will never be able to forgive myself for the content of the thoughts that have resided in my mind. Sometimes I wish I could use the memory wiping device used in Men in Black, so I can forget everything Ive ever thought. I will keep fighting and hopefully one day I can use what I have learnt to help others OCD sufferers. You are all so frickin brave for getting out of bed every day knowing what awaits you. I wish nothing but happiness, peace and a clear mind to you all xxx

I am honestly feeling terrified and here’s why… My partner is currently in New York with his family and while that is more than okay, I feel anxious. It has nothing to do with him being there but instead it has everything to do with me. I play this game online and came across someone. I started playing with them, we played for about six hours. I am not sure if it’s because this person is a guy but I have this fear that I will cheat or leave my partner even when that is the last thing I want. I thought about never playing with this person again but I enjoy playing with them. I just can’t stand the intrusive thoughts my mind creates about this person. I have no clue how this person even looks, I don’t know why my mind is playing these tricks on me and causing me these intense feelings of anxiety. Help?

This is a very specific and unique situation that I don’t think many (if any) will be able to relate….and I am not sharing this to get validation. Its more of a lack of connection and lack of understanding situation. I feel really alone. I have had OCD since I was a child. I truthfully think it happened because of some not okay sexual things happening at home. To add fuel to the fire God decided to give me type 1 diabetes as a child…which only intensified the OCD. Especially because the mother he assigned to me is extremely controlling and emotionally abusive. I am 33 years old living at home- I would have never dreamed my life would have ended up as terrible as it did and I have no words to express that. It isn’t for lack of trying, ive been working since I was 14 years old. But With the economy and the cost of my disease (that is out of control) and disability only offering me $800 a month, i am stuck at home. Pity party starting now: Imagine for a moment your OCD is cleanliness. And you have a disease that not only causes you severe pain; but causes other issues such as but not limited to, issues with going to the bathroom. ie: if my sugar is 400 like it is currently the piss Will spray out of me like a broken faucet and get on my inner thigh like it has just done. Not only this but anyone who has experienced blood sugar this high would know it causes scary cognitive function issues and dark thoughts, spiraling thoughts. So I can’t just work through the thought of being dirty..ive tried..i spiral. Then my sugar gets worse, i faint and have to call the ambulance. Imagine having a mother who after 20 years of you being sick can’t understand it. And doesn’t care how sick you are or how you feel in regards to your diabetes. And who laughs and makes fun of you in regards to your OCD. And now imagine you live in America where everything is so expensive that you can’t leave.

So my SO OCD has been crazy today. I’m in a very committed relationship with a boy I love but now I think that I may have a crush on a girl I see in rehearsals for this play I’m in. Funny, but I didn’t think of her that way before I started ruminating. I feel like I sort of willed this “crush” into happening as a sort of way to figure out my sexuality. She is very pretty and there are aspects I like about her, but there are also things about her personality I don’t like. Granted, I’ve never felt romantic or sexual attraction to women. All my crushes have been men and I’m 27. Has anyone ever felt this way? I feel a tremendous amount of fear and guilt. “What if I like this person?” “What if I’m Bi or Bi-curious?” “Should I leave my partner?” I don’t feel like I align with dating women and I don’t feel comfortable having romantic feelings for a woman, but I feel like I do. I certainly don’t want to have a crush on someone while in a committed relationship. Any advice or well wishes would be nice….

i remember feeling more hopeless in the past, having lower moments, mentally, you know, in 2022 i completely lost it. and i remember being 14 in 2020 and for the first time really considering ending my life. but still every day i wake up and go to sleep in the ocd prison, i am so tired, no one understands the patterns are the same, have been the same for years and yet i don’t know how to cope. it’s so exhausting.

I have really bad intrusive thoughts and I feel like I can never get rid of them they’re always there and I can never get them of my mind can someone help me ?

After that triggering dream where the worst thing could have happened, I don't feel legimitated anymore to feel genuinely distressed by triggers, to call compulsions as such. It all feels disingenuous. They don't feel valid anymore. Like crocodile tears. Because the one thing I didn't want to happen probably happened, that undoes everything else. I feel like a hypocrite, to feel distress and worry about those things, being anxious of that particular fear because in that dream it happened. I felt arousal and probably genuine attraction, I'm afraid that I could have agreed with it. Maybe it isn't true, maybe it didn't happen, maybe I'm misinterpreting, but then why I was left with that impression? All because of a damn dream, because ocd, all my triggers intrude even in my sleep, because I can't even be safe in my dreams. This is the worst mental illness.

I think I have suffered from some forms of pure ‘o’ OCD for a while now, but I am not sure as they come and go and change with time. At the moment I cannot stop obsessing over the thought that I must be a pedophile, despite having no desire to harm children and no attraction to children. Now even the thought of the word ‘children’ or the sight of them makes me feel anxious and on edge that I will for some reason harm them or everyone will know that I am a molester even though I am not and would never want to be. I also cannot stop trying to look into the past to see if I ever behaved inappropriately around children and testing/bargaining with myself when there are children around to prove to myself that I am in fact normal. It is very hard to focus on anything, so sometimes performing weird rituals like counting to 8 and not stepping on the cracks helps to soothe me, but I have resorted to harming myself at worse moments. Also, when I was growing up, I thought I had sexuality based OCD or anxiety because I was terrified of being a lesbian. I would try and bargain and explain myself out of the idea that I could be gay, and try to find evidence that would prove to myself that I was straight. However, I have since accepted that part of myself and dismissed it as denial, but now I am experiencing similar anxiety levels with this suspected POCD. Now I am afraid that this means I am not truly queer, or even worse, that it is not POCD and I am in danger of becoming a pedophile in the future. However, when I was anxious over my sexuality I think I did on some level know that I was attracted to women, whereas I don’t have a clue where these thoughts that I would harm children have come from. However it was a while ago and I can’t stop obsessing that they are the same thing; these thoughts are extremely distressing so I don’t know what to do.

Last night my friend and I did edibles for the first time. We accidentally did too much and we both became incredibly anxious. For me it made my ocd bad I started constantly checking to see if I was aroused and I got paranoid that I was and then kept checking and it really just triggered my ocd. I was wondering if anyone else has gone through similar things? I got really bad sexual and violent intrusive thoughts.

Hello, so I had some pretty bad OCD. I had intrusive thoughts and I would do very disturbing rituals/ compulsions to try to suppress the thoughts. It was extremely unhealthy. It pretty much took over my life. It was non stop. I got the help I needed. I saw a physiatrist and she put me on medicine. We found a good combination of medicine that worked great. Over time I felt the best I had in so long! It was great! But then we lowered the dose of the medicine and eventually I stopped taking it. It turned out I didn't do it right. The first mistake was at this point I had not taken any therapy, only medicine. And also I believe I didn't take enough time lowering the dosage before I just completely stopped taking the medicine. So basically at this point I unfortunately relapsed and started doing all those terrible compulsions again. It was horrible! It was a nightmare. So I obviously saw my physiatrist again and we went back on the medicine. And she then strongly recommended I see a therapist. So I did. I signed up to NOCD and started taking sessions. They taught me a lot! It was extremely helpful. So after the therapy and continuing taking my medicine I got back to where I was before the relapse. I was in a great spot again. At this point my physiatrist recommended we start to reduce my medicine again.. but this time we did it way more slower. I would take lower dosages monthly. I would cut my pills in halves, then quarters, then I would take a pill every other day etc. We got to a point ( about 3 months ago) Where we decide I stop taking the medicine. Now here I am now. So I haven't relapsed. What I mean is I haven't done any of my terrible rituals/ compulsions that really spiral me out of control. So I'm proud of that. But unfortunately I just feel like some of the symptoms are returning. I find myself doing very small ticks to try to suppress some of these thoughts. I guess you can call them compulsions. There not anything bad but I know I'm doing them. I know I probably should stop because I fear that could lead to worse compulsions. So basically after I stopped taking my pills I've noticed a difference. It's no where near as bad as it was!! I'm able to live with this. Thanks to everything I know from therapy etc... but to be honest I kinda feel a little depressed because I know there are symptoms returning. I can feel them. So it kind of sucks. I'm trying my best to not do any compulsions. But it's been like every day where I'm dealing with these symptoms. And it's got me down. I'm seeing my physiatrist in a week. And I'm going to ask her if she thinks I should get back on some medicine. The best I ever felt was when I was on my pills. There were some side effects but nothing to bad. They weren't an issue. I felt amazing when I was on them. I just don't feel the best right now. It's it OK to be on medicine (at least a small dosage) for long periods of time? Potentially life? I really appreciate anyone who reads this! Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I'm 31 years old. Thank you

Hi everyone. This isn't as much a cry for help as it is a confession. I was out to brunch, and had a drink, felt a little tipsy and then went grocery shopping. All was fine and well until I started having intrusive thoughts about POCD. At first I was mentally saying no and disagreeing, but then I kind of started to ignore it. Well I went to the bathroom, and when I was washing my hands, I had more intrusive thoughts (or I was acknowledging the OCD I was having, I don't know for sure) but then I had a groinal response. It felt like pleasure but I knew I was also having OCD AND I convinced myself I had pleasure to the intrusive thoughts about POCD. I was numb and drunk and honestly I didn't even have a reaction besides I just let it happen like I didn't say no mentally I kind of just stood there with dead eyes at the floor. I feel absolutely disgusting and I feel the need to confess to my boyfriend everything. I feel disgusting. It feels like I was having pleasure to those intrusive thoughts and I'm disgusted with myself that my brain and body would do that. The problem is- I can't remember if I was just numb and not reacting, or if I keep doing it? It happened like 2-3 times that my body had that groinal response. I don't really remember thinking about a particular intrusive thought or I know I didn't like imagine anything TO have pleasure to, but I can't ignore the what-ifs. Someone please help

Im turning 21 this year and part of me wants to drink alcohol and enjoy myself (in moderation obviously), but I cant help being afraid of accidentally getting too inebriated and losing control of myself or possibly talking about my ocd. Im not ashamed of having ocd itself, but some of my ocd themes can be classified as disturbing if not explained correctly. Not to mention my experiences are relatively personal and I want to keep between my therapist and I. Im afraid of an instance like this where I start to talk too much and people around me get the wrong idea of my values, which, in turn, might push people away from me. I know the answer is to just drink responsibly, but can anyone share any experiences they have with having a drink while being diagnosed with ocd? How have you coped? Has everything been okay?

ERP has been tremendously helpful for me, but I find it difficult to plan exposures to my obsessions, given that most of my intrusive thoughts are mostly about moral or conceptual issues, so it's hard to put them into smth "actionable". Do you guys have any advice?

Ive been having such a bad episode i keep ruminating abt my relationship and how when we were abt to break up i thought my whole world was ending like i actually wanted to just stop everythjng which i know is bad so once i felt thst ive been working on spending more time w friends and becoming more independent and me and my bf r working together to fulfill our personal goals so we can have a healthier relationshipnand make things work and stopnbeing toxic. but my ocd keeps telling me if im this attached and dependent then its not real love and its all toxic snd it wont work out which i dont want at all and then i had this thought that i have to break up with him bcs its valid to if im this attached but i don't want to at all and i don't want to think that either cuz we r actually doing well. but it got in my head and now i'm so stressed out and i have this other fear that once i become independent its just an obsession with him that will turn to disgust but i don'g want that rither. can someone pls pls give me advice that will help this is stressing me out so bad

Do you guys also have unwanted thoughts as affirmations/statements/invitations about horrible things? I had a voice saying "cmon we know you like that stuff" "cmon you can like it" "it's okay to like it" "why is that so wrong?" a combination of those things (but I don't remember the specific intrusive statement that bothered me and made me need to write this so I'm currently trying to recollect my memories to find it, but I think I should stop); and I don't know if it was ocd using implicitly my voice to automatically self sabotage and mess me up. Anyway it bothers me. But did it before? They appeared almost automatically that I couldn't even react or anticipate them coming to block them. I didn't see my will to block them so to know that they were unwanted, they just happened so quickly and they went away quickly. I was high on weed yesterday with my friends and they started saying very triggering stuff and I had horrible intrusive images to which my mind responded with uncomfortable intrusive thoughts that felt like invitations, but I was high so they felt a lot harder to distinguish from my own thoughts, it was all hazy and I didn't give it much attention. I was more concerned about my groin area. I don't remember that much. I'm bothered now but was I that bothered before? I don't remember being "no, stop, don't go there", only with intrusive images and triggering associations as my friend were describing triggering stuff not ill-intentioned. Since I woke up with others intrusive images that I tried to solve, I also have one triggering intrusive image stuck in my mind that I'm costantly trying to suppress.

So I’m in a relationship with an amazing guy, like he’s literally so great, and yet there have been a lot of moments of doubt and worry over many different things, some of them I know are small and insignificant, and yet they feel so big. But right now, I’ve been experiencing thoughts and feelings that don’t necessarily worry me, but I still try to understand them and analyze them to no end. For example, I’ve realized that I become a little irritated and weirded out by my bf’s overly hyper and cringy behaviour around his friends. I sometimes think he’s just a little socially awkward and he doesn’t realize it. I can’t quite explain it or put my finger on it, but it’s irritating, and a lot of it has to do with his voice. I don’t want to be irritated by this stuff tho, I don’t want to feel irritated by his voice or his hyper and cringy behaviour, but it can be a bit much sometimes, and I worry that it’s bad for me to feel that way. I just wish I could make that feeling go away. But even with this, I’m not feeling worried as much because I know I really like him and I want to make this relationship work, and yet I still feel the need to analyze his behaviours, trying to make sense of why he acts and sounds the way he does when he’s with friends, trying to understand how I feel about it, and how I would feel if it was done/said differently or by a different person. It’s all just a mess, it’s so confusing, and it’s even more confusing when I’m not feeling anxious or worried, but I’m still finding these quirks bothersome. I really just want this to work out, you have no idea how badly. It’s all just so confusing and I don’t want to let those flaws become dealbreakers. I’ve always been worried, even since the very beginning, that his minor flaws would become dealbreakers, it was like I was fighting a part of myself that felt it should be a dealbreaker, but I don’t want it to be. I just want to stop feeling this way about every little inconvenience, annoyance, or flaw. I feel like I’m constantly fighting myself.

im not on this app such a long time because i was doing really well. i felt like my ocd has gone and i thought maybe if i go to therapy once a month is okay like im doing really well. but then the day after i felt incredible anxiety just beacuse i put on a parfum like on the bad days too. and i got so scared like what if its gonna be like old times again. what am i gonna do. i cant resist for a second time something like that am i gonna live like this forever? i cant live like this. please if you triggered like similarity with your ocd flared up times please write to me.

I have a lot I need to do for work and feel like I’m slacking but I’m just so overcome with my obsessions. I can hardly focus either due to the obsessions or lack of mental energy leftover after the episodes subside. I’m frustrated because I know what I need to do a lot and I have to get focused asap. Please encourage me to get a lot done at work this week. I need to tell myself I can do it and stick to it.