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One minute I’m like omg I like him so much I care so much about him this has to work out and the next minute I feel so detached and numb and I’m like do I even really want him

Hi guys, I have ROCD and just figured it out about 2 weeks ago. For 2 weeks I have been having horrible anxiety over the thought I had that said “do you even like him” the thought came out of absolutely nowhere and basically hit me like a bus. Before that thought everything was perfect and now I find myself questioning everything. Today I was doing well with little to no anxiety over these thoughts but now my brain has gone to “if your not having anxiety about these thoughts you must actually not like him” im trying not to spiral but my god this is exhausting. Let me know what you guys think, I start therapy for ROCD in one week. And remember you are so loved.

We have been together for three months, I have seen him maybe ten times due to where he lives, he drives 5 hours both ways to see me when he can -regularly and we speak on the phone for hours. Issue is he won't use condoms because it turns him off. I am scared to take the pill (I ordered it but im sitting here reading the side effects), I don't want to lose him and i defo want to have sex but I genuinely don't know what to do, pull out is risky, morning after pill is birth control on steroids, i don't want IUD or anything in me. I feel so stuck. i spoke to him about it and he said he tried condoms and they just Don't work for him, and he doesn't wanna go around trying a bunch of different ones. He's refusing to do other sexual things with me because it turns him on and said "he doesn't wanna put himself in that position to get turned on cos i won't let him in without protection" he's adamant that condoms are a no, but he doesn't want a baby right now lol drives 5 hours to get turned on but won't put a condom on, so would rather leave with nothing, i wouldn't mind if he would do other sexual things but he's refusing to even do that now, so i guess there's nowhere for us to go from here.

I have been dealing with rocd (i think i have it i dont know, it feels like it, i cant go to a therapist bc im a minor and my parent wont let me) i have this amazing relationship with an amazing boy, we are together since april 2023, in september 2023 i saw a tik tok( it was an influencer form my coutry and in that video she was showing how she cried a lot in her past relationship that she thought it was the love of her life and she was with another man now) a though poped in my head saying “what if i will not be with my boyfriend forever “ that evolved into “what if i dont like/love him” and stayed with me until now, multiple things happend and i talked to my faling amd friends but at first it was a rielef now its not, im getting worse and worse and i keep questening if i love him or not, and what if im in dinal what of in lying to myself and so on, i have constant anxiety and i just want it to stop, i know i love him but why does my head say i dont, i dont know what to do, i have compulsions of reading things on reddit and even talking with CHAT GBT, i heard of ERP but im scared and dont know how to do it, even if i read so much about it, what if everything is real and i actually dont love him, it dosend make sens. Before these thoughts everything was percect, why am i like this.

i don't know what to do. i had a dream where i think i felt attraction. i remember being anxious the whole time, I remember that i wanted to try to figure it out and i think i discovered that like i was actually attracted. i dont know what to do. i felt conscious enough to determine that. I was also compulsively staring to check for attraction and then it stopped feeling that way at a certain point in the dream i just aelf sabotaged myself and stared at something inappropriate and told myself i was attracted, that felt ocd like. but the girl in the dream i felt like i was actually attracted to her. i cannot tolerate that.

slight tw! my ocd has been the worst it’s ever been for about a week now. and, to me, it all started for no reason. i truly don’t understand where these thoughts came from, or why. last monday my great aunt passed away, the days before that, i got into an argument with my dad and he was really mean, and later that weekend i saw him texting horrible things to my mom about me and her both (i wasn’t supposed to see) then, later that day, i say my ex boyfriend (who lives in another state!!!) at a thrift store. i left very quickly with hopes he didn’t see me but i found out that he saw me and then called my ex best friend to make fun of me. im also sort of homeless in a way (me and mom been staying with friends and family) the house we are trying to buy is in escrow and the fulfillment date was pushed back by a month (to oct 31st), and was recently (yesterday) pushed back again. i also stress over money. i feel like with all of these things going on, im just not affected by them? although i sometimes get anxious over these things, im so used to the family fights, and i wasnt close to my aunt who passed. although i stress about money and also wanting a home to live in again, i just feel like i truly don’t care enough to have such life changing anxiety. i started feeling so nervous out of NOWHERE and my mind was trying to find any reason it could, so of course it went to my gf. now im having rocd (it’s getting slightly better) and my magical thinking ocd is also pretty bad atm. i keep taking almost every song i hear on the radio as a sign (ill never feel love again, im a horrible person, etc) , unless its something good, which i try to acknowledge is ridiculous. is it possible that the things going on in my life made me spiral like this, even though i genuinely, truly and wholeheartedly feel like they didn’t? or could this truly have been brought on for no reason? i just turned 18 + graduated this year idk if that’s relevant. this is what ive been experiencing with the anxiety brought on by my ocd, i haven’t been able to eat at all. once a day at best, and it’s something like cereal or crackers. every morning i wake up early (8 AM) no matter how late i slept, and can’t fall back asleep because of how anxious i feel upon waking up. i almost immediately have to go to the bathroom out of anxiety (tmi sorry) i sometimes throw up and im just overall pretty anxious, it’s sort affecting my relationships and definitely my mental health. i’ve lost 6 pounds this week because of not eating and throwing up. my body feels weak half the time. i’m trying to do what i can to feel better but it’s just hard. also because of the rocd i developed, i feel so anxious and sick, on the verge of throwing up, whenever i talk to my girlfriend on the phone. i’m getting better about not being anxious when she texts me, but it’s still hard. i make myself text her though because i know i wont get over this by avoiding her. yesterday we called for the first time in a few days (long distance relationship, we’ve both been busy) and i was overwhelmed with anxiety and fear. i was trying to take deep breaths and not throw up. after a little bit the anxiety went down, along with the need to puke, but was very well still there. i’m trying my best but everything is so hard. does anybody have any advice for any part of this? anything would be appreciated. ):

i am really struggling with cheating ocd atm. i have struggled with it for a very long time. my relationship with my boyfriend isn’t the most stable. he’s done some things in the past that have really hurt me and i’ve not seen much of a effort to make me feel better tbh. i think that’s why my ocd is so high sometimes because of the stress of that. so over the weekend my friend and her family came over for the day and on the day my anxiety was sky high to the point i had knots in my belly and heart racing because her older brother was coming too. i avoid men because of my cheating ocd i don’t like talking to them or even looking their way. so you can imagine how anxious i felt lol. when they walked in, he didn’t walk in straight away and i felt so relieved that he wasn’t there but it was short lived as he walked in after. and when we hugged to say hello (which everyone did) i was focused on not making inappropriate contact and the whole time after i was ruminating on whether i hugged him inappropriately or not. then i had to give him a glass of water and i put it on the table because i didn’t want my hand to touch his and my hand was shaking so much when i did this. and to add, i wore no makeup on the day as i didn’t wanna come across as making an effort and i overthought so much about my outfit too as i didn’t want to seem like i was making an effort to impress. this is what’s bothering me. my mum needed help handing the food out and i didn’t want to hand the plates as i knew there was a chance our hands would touch. but what’s confusing me is that when i handed it to my friends bother, i got these overwhelming thoughts and feelings that i want our hands to touch, and i even feel like i let my hand stay on the plate for longer. in fact im certain i did because of those thoughts and feelings and after i said “you got it” about the plate and idk why it felt like at the time it was flirting maybe because in my mind the thoughts were “this is flirting” and straight away i felt SO much guilt like i had cheated and did something disloyal and i didn’t even eat. i was so anxious prior, why did this happen i feel so sad and i feel so much guilt it’s unreal. i literally don’t ever want to be disloyal, im so careful about what i do because of this. my friend said that it felt real because of my ocd but nothing i did was wrong but it feels so hard to believe that. i haven’t confessed as i don’t feel emotionally safe to at all tbh which i think is bothering me a lot too. my boyfriend has made comments in the past about retaliation and some of the stuff he’s done has really broken my trust even though it hasn’t been direct “cheating”. any advice will be appreciated, please be kind, im not doing well at all. thank you

I’ve been struggling with relationship OCD and differentiating between what is an intrusive thought and what is a real doubt. I was really happy with my partner then I got one aggressive thought that I didn’t love him and this spiralled into noticing all his flaws. I struggle being around him because I feel a huge sense of guilt that these thoughts even come into my head and I cannot figure out if this is my brain lying to me or this is how I feel. It’s really impacting a relationship that is so important to me.

So sometimes when I know that someone could be watching me an act a certain way. Like when you know someone’s watching you But I end up doing things that are like who care you do you Examples - I was driving and listening to an audio book, and just because there was a car next to me I didn’t want to sip back to the part I missed because I didn’t want the car next to me to think I was stupid. Then I didn’t even know what was going on. - giving my girlfriend a massage and I was so focused I stoped breathing then was out of breath - sitting next to someone and feel like I have to match there breathing - if I break too hard, if I drive I little to differ t the car behind me will think something. It’s exhausting this way I think most times. Because then in social moments I read too deep into things, makes me feel awkward, uncomfortable or also I just look to try hard.. idk what this is…

**long post, sorry, need advice so if anyone could help, I’d really appreciate it, thank you** So I’ve been a little anxious and mad at my boyfriend lately since I found out he’s voting for trump in the upcoming election. I’m voting for kamala for a lot of reasons but I also simply don’t like trump one bit. (I’m not considered a democrat or liberal either, I’m neutral with stuff, but not with anything trump stands for). We’ve been together for almost 2 years so I already knew my bf aligned more with the Republican Party rather than democratic, but that wasn’t really a problem for me since I think that both parties have their issues, and he’s mainly neutral with a lot of topics, and so am I. And we’re not really political people either, but this is our first time voting in a presidential election so ofc we talked about it and he said he was voting trump bc he wants the economy fixed. And I agree with the economy but I don’t like a lot of the things that trump says and the fact that he 🍇’d a woman, and everything with abortion, so it threw me off. And then I started to research more and found out that trump wouldn’t fix the economy, he’d make it worse, and when he was president before, we were under obama’s tax plan so that’s why the economy was so good. But anyway, after learning more and more, I started to grow angry at my bf cuz I just don’t see why he’d vote someone who would actively take away my rights if given the chance. I’ve tried talking to him about this and he understands where I’m coming from, and agrees with me that a lot of stuff that trump says and does is ridiculous, he’s not even a trumpie at all, and my bf isn’t against abortion either, he’s told me himself that if people should be allowed to carry guns, we should be allowed to do what we want with our own bodies. And all that makes me feel better, but he’s so focused on the economy and the fact that he just doesn’t believe that my rights would be stripped away, he just thinks that the government wouldn’t allow that to happen. And I tell him that they definitely would, but idk he just doesn’t believe it. He told me that he’s mainly voting for the Republican Party rather than trump, and that statement made me feel better at one point but regardless, the vote is still going to trump so it just rubs me the wrong way. It also doesn’t help at all that I keep seeing TikTok’s and tweets of people saying “if your partner loves you so much, why are they voting for someone that would take your rights away?”, saying to break up, etc., and that really freaks me out because of my rocd. I know my bf loves me and he wouldn’t want anything to happen with my rights, but I think he’s so oblivious to that the fact that there’s a possibility that bad things can happen. He doesn’t think anything will happen and everyone’s being dramatic, but I guess he’s not so skeptical about the government. I’m just hoping that kamala wins so I can move on from this, but if trump wins and he takes away womens’ rights, just like I thought he would do, I don’t see how I could ever forgive my bf. I would just hope that he’d admit he was wrong and actually understand, but it’s also sucks that something would have to happen in order for him to believe that any bad thing can happen. And I know that if trump loses, he won’t be able to run again after this, and that gives me some peace of mind, but now it’s freaking me out that if someone comes along in the Republican Party, that’s similar to trump, I feel like my bf would vote for them and it’d be the same thing every election. Idk I’m thinking too far ahead. I guess I just needed to vent about this, it’s all confusing, idk if anyone can relate, or has any advice (that isn’t to break up with him).

I’m afraid of falling in love with anyone now. Especially since I have pocd. I fucking hate it. I’m afraid of liking someone that’s even 1 year younger than me (I’m only 18 btw). I’m so scared this has been the most terrifying thought for me. I sound and feel like a creep writing this. How can I stop these thoughts I do NOT want them turning into feelings which I’m very afraid of. I want to not wake up again but I still keep waking up. Might eat a whole jar of melatonin just to not wake up again. And I’m afraid if I don’t have ocd then I’m actually a creep which I do NOT want to be!!! I’M SO AFRAID THAT I HAVE FEELINGS AND THOUGHTS WHEN I SEE A CHARACTER THATS MY FAVORITE BUT IT’S A KID IM TERRIFIED. I’M SO SCARED OF MYSELF AND I JUST NEED TO GET IT OFF MY CHEST. I am petrified. It’s like I’m in a never ending nightmare but I’m not in a dream… it’s like there’s another side to me that is not me…

I'm really struggling atm w what I think is rocd. I know for an absolute fact that I love my boyfriend 100% with all my heart. I'm only 15 but I know that he's the person for me. We've been together for a year and a few months and I've been in love with him since I was 11. I'm almost 16. We've never had an argument, he's so incredibly supportive and he's very aware of the whole situation. I've been having horrible thoughts for about 6 months now that I'm not in love with him anymore. Obviously this upset me so so much but at the beginning I knew it wasn't real and I miss when my biggest issue was how to tell him and not upset him. Luckily I have the kindest most loving boy and he completely understood me and he is the only person who can fully comfort me. At the beginning I knew the thoughts weren't real but 6 months later and they're all i can think about I'm believing them and it's horrible. At one point about 3 months ago I came to the realisation that love is a choice, I loved being around him qnd kissing him and being his friend, and qt 15 that's basically all a relationship is. Since coming to that conclusion, and also telling myself that even if the thoughts were real and I really didn't love him anymore, then I would again because of who he is, and the sheer fact that I want to love him, the thoughts have changed into what if I dint like him and now I've convinced myself that I don't even like him and I don't want to love him again, and that's the worst part of it all because I believe it. He knows I believe them, and he's only 16 but he's handling it all so so we'll. He says that he knows that the thoughts aren't real, even if I don't know because he's got an outside perspective, but it's okay if I don't realise it because he'll wait for mw as long as I need. Some days I overthink so much I refuse to kiss him, and he's handled that so well, he'll always ask me if I want a kiss or a hug beforehand if I'm having q bad day, and he's gotten into the habit of watching Disney films with me ro help calm me. I don't understand why I don't think I want him in my life anymore. I miss feeling like i love him. I do have therapy, and she says that the thoughts aren't real qnd she knows this because of just the way I speak about him. My mum said she knows that they're not real, ans his mum says the same. For about 5 days last week the thoughts were gone. I felt like I loved my baby again. I was so so so happy because I loved him again and he was so proud of me. Then the thouhjts came back. I dint want this to be too long, im so sorry of you're still reading. Just any tips on how to love my baby again? I'll do anything except break up with him. I love being a part of his family qnd I miss how it was, but I'd much rather be so so sad ans scared all the timw with the thoughts then not have him at all. I've had very intrusive thoughts before but nowhere as bad as this. Maybe the intensity of the thoughts is mimicking the intensity of the love I have for him? I just want to love my jude again, my lovely boy :(

Hi, sort of a vent, idk. This year i had a really bad time with my ocd and autism. I had a sudden and unexpected change that happened and it sent me into a spiral. I felt so out of control and that made my triggered certain things with my ocd so everything just started going downhill. A relationship i had that didn't last long cause i couldn't get my brain to calm down and then i lost 2 friends that I'd known for years. Even though i acknowledged that the friendships weren't great and they weren't the right people for me, i still found it really hard to come to terms with and i keot overthinking and going over every single detail of what happened. It's just hard enough for me to make friends as it is and even though those people weren't really great for me it's still like, great now in back to being alone. Im waiting for my counselling to start (I've been on the waiting list for ages now) and i still have 3 friends i talk to but they have their own things going on, i don't feel comfortable bringing up what im going through because i know it is likely to trigger them or might bring them down in some way and honestly they've been through so much, i just want them to be happy and i don't want to put anything else on them. But then that leaves me feeling like i wanna cry as soon as I stop talking to them/hanging out, cause im carrying so much and I'm surrounded by family that just diminish what im going through and don't respect me. They help me with some things i can't lie and i still have a connection with them but im just over here wondering what exactly am i supposed to do? Theres always something going on and i know thats just life but this year, the way things have been getting on top of me i just constantly feel so tired and done with it all. Ive considered going in-patient but being a black person who is so often misunderstood, i don't know if i would feel safe in those places. Also i know I'd feel so uncomfortable because my need for things to be so clean and perfect and orderly is overwhelming enough when im in my own space or at my family's home let alone some random place I've never been. Idk im just tired of my brain and life right now. To think my day was going well as i was watching one of my favourite shows before i got a call telling me i needed to leave the house to do xyz last minute and I've just been feeling miserable and irritated since then. I can't go back to my show either cause i would start associating everything with something negative and overthinking again. It would be amazing to just be a vegetable rn.

It's funny but my soocd subtype seems to pop up during fall and winter, and leaves during spring and summer. Currently it has me overanalyzing my friendship with my friend who happens to be gay. It's really frustrating. What makes this even worse is this friend and I are fairly close, (I see them as a parental type figure) and it makes it really awkward especially when they use words like honey or sweetie. They're biologically female, but identify as he/they, which again doesn't help my OCD. They're like 6 years older than me. Idk I'm just freaking out a bit lol.

Does anyone else when things are going okay in their life fixate on things. I’ve suffered with intrusive thoughts for years now and a common theme I suffer with is a “what if” - which is directed to my relationship with my girlfriend. I recently befriended someone at work (doesn’t work with me anymore) who is male and it’s the first time I had a male friend as Ive always worried my institute thoughts would get worse. What if I kissed this friend. What if this friend likes me. What if etc. I’ve had nights out where the next day I’ve imagined all kinds of things I’ve done and have horrible what if moments. Now I can’t stop thinking what if I’ve kissed this person. The thought makes me feel sick and panicky and I can’t stop crying at the thought of it. I love my girlfriend and have been with her for 9 years. I’m genuinely an insecure person and can also be bantery and flirting with my friends. I feel due to my insecurity I flirted more than I would normally with this person I used to work with for attention. Now it’s catching up with me. When I say flirting, I mean the tone and flirty jokes. Harmless as I would act this way in front of work colleges & family (I work with my dad and brother) Now all I can do is say what if I done this and what if I done that. I’d go for walks with this person at work as I was genuinely friends with him. I wanted attention, but not because my girlfriend makes me feel less than, but because I feel rubbish about myself. Am I normal? Do others do this. My insecurities and OCD mixed together makes me feel so anxious and panicky.

I'm having a huge panic attack right now and I can't calm myself down barley at all but I am trying. I came to the full realization I watched lesbian porn with masculine lesbians and strap ons before and I am officially convinced that makes me a lesbian. Because I found it arousing. I don't know how to calm down. I love my husband. Someone please help me. Please

I’m so tired of my OCD changing “themes.” And no matter what it changes to, it’s always directed towards a specific person - my mom. My mom and I are very close. I consider her my best friend and we live together. I can share anything with her and she’s very supportive. I’m 32 now, but harm ocd started when I was 15 and she was the main target back then as well. I had a bad flare up this year and the harm thoughts came back, but about a week ago they turned into sexual thoughts. Graphic thoughts and images about incest. These thoughts typically make me feel panic and dread, and just an overall depressed feeling. It has made me uncomfortable to be around my mom, since I can’t even look at her without a sexual thought or image popping up. Even watching a romantic scene in a show, listening a romantic song, etc. My brain wants to put an image of her in my head. Even me fantasizing about a man that I’m attracted to will replace the man with my mom. They just keep popping up. So this of course makes me think I actually want these things, and are actually fantasies. I have started to wonder if I’m in actual denial or that these are my true feelings. I have never been a relationship before due to not having much interest in it plus my mental health issues started as a teen, but someday I would like to get married. But now I’m thinking maybe I’ve never pursued a relationship with someone else because I’m actually in love with my mom and want to be with her, but I can’t so I’m just suppressing my feelings. And I do love my mom, but I question myself is this just platonic or familial love? Also questioning our relationship in general now - is it unhealthy or too dependent? It makes me feel doubt, since I have never really been in love before with someone else so I have nothing to compare it to. Always just crushes or finding a man attractive, and I identify as straight. But I also have not thought of my mom in a sexual way before, so I’m hoping this is just my OCD acting up. Even thinking about a future relationship with a man is making me feel nervous, since I think if I have feelings for my mom, will I ever be able to be in a serious relationship someday? If I’m with someone will I actually just picture her? It makes me feel hopeless, like I can’t help how I feel and what if these things are true? Would I act on them? My brain even made me think, “you want to ask your mom to be in a sexual relationship with you and/or want her to ask you.” I feel like such a pervert for writing that, like a truly disgusting person. I know I don’t want these things to be true, but what if they are and I can’t help how I feel? Again just feel doubt and uncertainty, that I’m in denial, and not to mention just feeling like a very sick individual.

I was in this game with this person and I noticed his voice was deep, and his avatar looked attractive to me?? and my brain was like “his voice is so??? And his avatar kinda fine too” like omg, shut up, I’m not taken yet but I still want to be in this relationship with this other guy, I feel like there’s nothing I can do and I’ll always be a cheater, I don’t even know how I feel, like do I actually want to cheat??? And it freaks me out because I don’t even know how I feel? Because sometimes I’ll get a feeling that agrees with it, like I’ll have that feeling that wants me to date them and then I’ll hear something like “yeah I would” / “yeah I agree with that” ,, now I feel like I’ll be a cheater and I’m really scared, I would NEVER cheat, nor would I trade this boy for anything, but I can’t do it. I just need to know what to do.

Hey guys, I hope you’re well! My names Matt, and OCD has struck me again 😂 When I was 10 years old I had to attend therapy as I was having excessive intrusive thoughts. P.s. I didn’t even know this was possible at the age of 10! I then completely forgot about it, until 2.5 years ago when I started experiencing ROCD. I really couldn’t understand why I was feeling/thinking this way however, I soon after remembered my struggles as a child and then realised my OCD had returned. Also, my mum has serious OCD so I guess that could be why too. I had a a really hard battle with my emotions and mood due to this however, the last 1.5 years had been really good and I managed it well. I got married and had the best day of my life. 3 months ago, a thought about having an affair in my head appeared, and BOOM, it’s back again. I’m struggling a lot right now however, I’ve accepted that this could be a re occurring theme throughout my life, and it’s time to learn to deal with it again. I’m back on medication and have started ERP therapy, so hopefully it’s on the up from here. I’m not here to list off my triggers and thoughts as this would be me seeking reassurance however, I’m here to show that recovery is certainly possible!

After months of not obsessing about my ex, last night I had a very heavy dream that lasted for hours about him. In my dream he was lovely, I was obsessed with him and most of all… I was happy. So fkin happy. I woke up feeling like I loved him. My heart was full. When I realised it wasn’t true, it felt like my heart was shattered all over again. It’s been 3 years since he left me. It shouldn’t hurt anymore. It sounds so silly, but it feels like a huge setback.