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Does anyone else's Harm OCD make you question if you are a psychopath or a sociopath?? I keep thinking it and I'm worrying a lot. This is all so tiring. I just wish it would leave me alone..😔

I’m not too sure how long ago but sometime in the past year i was on snapchat looking through profiles that had p**n videos and images on them. the profiles would have links to other ones so i would keep clicking on them to find more and more. eventually i clicked on one profile in particular that had bite sized photos of animal p**n and child p**n. i realized what it was but didn’t really stop looking immediately( i’m not sure why) but once i did, i was sick to my stomach and couldn’t even think straight. i told my then gf(fiancé now) and she comforted me and told me i probably kept looking at it because i was just curious. i have never once thought of a child as attractive in anyway so this really disturbed me. i had seen something like that once in the last but didn’t give it much thought before but this time was different. and just a few months before this happen my son was born so i don’t know if this could have an affect or not… presently i am still struggling and have intrusive thoughts every now and then about hurting my son and they make me feel like my whole stomach was ripped out of me. i look at younger girls now and question if i think they are attractive and ask myself if i would do anything to them. i have tried thinking of a child in a sexual manner(i get groinal responses but nothing more), watched adult p**n to make myself feel better, try and get reassurance from my fiancé, etc. i have good and bad days, but most are bad. i’ll get thoughts that tell me to watch cp to see if i would enjoy it or i’ll just tell myself i am a P and that i have to deal with it. i don’t want to hurt anyone and i feel like im just an accident waiting to happen. sometimes my brain even tells me that pedophilia isn’t a bad thing even though i know it is. i could just be looking for reassurance but my life has been on a downward slope for some time now and i’m getting miserable.. i have been thinking of leaving the earth more and more. i don’t want to die but i don’t want to keep living like this..

I had never really had OCD symptoms like this a few months ago. I had struggled a little bit with anxiety and had always had a fear of uncertainty but I’ve never felt a 24/7 pain anxiety, guilt and fear like this. I was pretty happy😭 Have others had this experience as well? Did it just show up randomly from one intrusive thought that you couldn’t brush off? Is it possible to get back to how you were before or will I have to “manage” for the rest of my life?

Hi, I have been struggling with OCD for 7 months now. First there were incestuous thoughts related to the mother. I was very bad for two months, I couldn't sleep and I had severe depression. I went to a psychiatrist and started therapy. After two weeks it was as if I woke up from a nightmare. All the obsessive thoughts stopped, the anxiety stopped and I was back to my new life again. I found a girlfriend and it was great. After about 3 months, the thoughts came back again, this time about my girlfriend. I started to wonder if I loved her, if I would be better off with someone else. And that stopped over time. A few days ago I went to the kitchen and saw a knife. I suddenly got scared and thought what if I hurt my girlfriend. I constantly analyzed that thought and asked myself if I could do it, if I wanted to. And it got to the point that I convinced myself that I wanted to hurt her and that I was just lying that I didn't want to. I became very anxious and scared again. My girlfriend has known about my problem from the beginning and is a great support. She even gave me a knife and told me to sit next to her. Of course I didn't do anything, I just threw the knife away and started crying and hugging her. But in my mind I still want to do something bad. Can OCD convince you that you want something, even though deep down I don't want to hurt anyone. I just want everything to be like before and to have a normal life without obsessive thoughts. I really love my girlfriend and I want to have a family with her. Can OCD cause false desire and will it ever stop. I heard that ERP is the best way to fight OCD. How can I do ERP alone without a therapist. I am really afraid that I will hurt someone and become a murderer. Thank you for reading this and I send many greetings and I hope you are well.

I can’t get diagnosed because I’m 16. I feel left in the dark. Not asking anyone to diagnose me. Just If they see a hocd cycle that could indicate I possibly suffer from it. Please When I was 14 nearly 15 I had a random thought ‘am I gay’ and I immediately had discomfort. The next day I asked myself again and this time (I believe I had real event ocd) the event came through as almost ‘proof’ and that’s the beginning. I started taking quizzes to see whether I was gay. I asked friends and family to tell me if they thought I was gay. The idea of being gay worried me and I searched up how I felt and that’s how I found Hocd. I related to some of the symptoms but I didn’t have many compulsions. At the age of 15 it was really bad and I still hated the idea of being gay. A few months later I tried a relationship with someone of the opposite gender and I fell in love. My thoughts of being gay were pretty much gone. I was obsessed with this boy. However I became obsessed with needing reassurance that this boy loved me. Every. Single. Day. When I was 16 It became too much for him and we split up. 4 months after obsessing over the breakup and questioning if I was abusive, if I ever SA him, if I was toxic or a bad girlfriend…I had the ‘am I gay’ thought and that’s how it came Back. The thoughts are constant. I get these: ‘Am I gay’ ‘do you like her’ ‘remember when … that must mean your gay’ *gets groinals* (even after seeing just a girl in a skirt) *head tries to convince me I like my friends* *lost all attraction to the opposite gender. I don’t feel anything whatsoever* ‘is this really hocd because you’re not diagnosed. You just found it’ ‘You don’t do physical compulsions like others. So it’s all real’ I don’t have many compulsions but here’s what I do: * when I have a thought I ask other hocd suffers if they have the same and if they tell me yes I feel happy and completely normal for at least an hour. Then it’s back * If I get a thought sometimes I’ll try and distract myself or possibly even pinch myself to make sure I’m focused on the pinch not the thought. * If I get a groinal I’ll sometimes check to see if it’s a real response * Checking porn to see if I react to lesbian stuff (I have done and I had a meltdown) All of this happens every day. And everyday I manage to find something that gives me that temporary relief. But then it comes back after.

My chest is really heavy. Basically my mind gave me the intrusive memory of when I got a weird feeling in my chest about a female friend when I was like 9. My heads telling me it’s because I liked her. I liked spending time with her and we practiced kissing as experimentation (part of kids games) and my head keeps reminding me of it. It was very intrusive because it came randomly while watching a program. It just popped into my head. I’m so scared And I have a lot of anxiety right now I told myself maybe, maybe not. But it’s made my anxiety worse. I can’t stay uncertain with this atm. I’m so scared. Please help if you can

My OCD and intrusive thoughts always seem to be worse when I have nothing to do all day. When I graduated college I didn’t have an easy time finding work (mainly because I didn’t know what I even wanted to do or how to even find a job). I ended up taking a job in a career I wasn’t even interested in but I enjoyed it because it made me feel so much better just to have SOMETHING and contribute to society. For 2 years at this job I was so happy with my life. Never experienced an OCD episode and lost 50 pounds and felt so good. I ended up leaving that job to chase the money and it was the worst decision I ever made. I switched to a job that basically told me from the beginning they didn’t want me and spent a year being miserable. I gained all my weight back and HATED the work I was doing. I almost switched jobs to another company but it would have been the same work I was doing so I didn’t take it and in turn experienced another OCD episode where I was obsessing over the fact that I may have made the wrong decision. Eventually I got fired and am now once again home doing nothing all day with no idea where my life is going to take me. My Obsessions have now turned towards not being able to raise a family because I can’t figure my mental health/life out. Does anyone have any experience where their OCD tends to be worse when they have extended free time and will the things I worry about now seem insignificant once I have my professional confidence back and feel like I am valuable?

I’m 16 and this thing started at 14/ nearly 15. I feel like I’m ‘too young’ to have this. People tell me I’m the age age of questioning and to just accept who I am. I believe I had another theme of ocd at 11-14 (real event ocd) but I feel like it’s impossible for me to have hocd. That scares me because if I don’t have hocd then it means my worst fears are true.

I am in the process of leaving a toxic work environment. I believe this is adding to the stress levels from the ocd I deal with on the daily. I’m currently sitting at my desk patiently waiting for a call back from any one of the multiple places I applied to. I am doing my best not to engage with the ROCD and the pure ocd. But today I just feel so outside of myself. I hate this feeling of constant nagging anxiety. It just makes me feel so lost. All I want is to be with my boyfriend but then at the same time that I find comfort in him I feel massive guilt from the ROCD intrusive thoughts and all of the excessive doubts and questioning that comes with it. Some days I’m perfectly fine and then there are days like this where I can’t focus on anything but the anxiety. I love him. I want to be fully committed to one person. I wish I knew why ocd attacks everything I care about the most and makes me question everything in my life. Then the added stress of what work life has been bringing has been making matters worse. It just makes me want to curl up in a ball. I want to finally feel like I belong somewhere at work and not struggle. I feel like I don’t belong anywhere. I just want to be with him. I wish my ocd would leave me alone.

I thought I was finally over my sleep OCD but it was triggered all over again and it’s come back even worse than before. I even had to go to the ER so they could knock me out for while because I hadn’t slept in 4 days. I got out of the hospital two days ago and I’m terrified I’ll never be able to fall asleep on my own again. I’m crying typing this because I was doing so much better with my NOCD therapist. I just want to be normal again

I had 3 people ask me today if I’m a lesbian. Started the day feeling no anxiety to my thoughts. When I got told that I looked like a lesbian I panicked. I then got a groinal to a girl vaping. I then got shown a nude of a girl and had a groinal. Then spoke to my college counsellor and she recognised an ocd cycle in my life. How can this not be real. I don’t want it to be. But it seems to be no?

I literally hate living with OCD….I was so happy before with not having these thoughts…😢 I have so many intrusive thoughts about stabbing (specifically my husband) and it makes me hate myself and makes me want to cry. I never dealt with this until almost 2 1/2 months ago, and I don’t want to anymore…I’m so tired of living like this:( Now it feels like I don’t even care if I act on it or not…like it wouldn’t be that bad of a thing, which I 100% know it is an awful thing, the most awful thing you could ever do to a person. But I’m worried that I’m eventually not gonna care and that I’m gonna give into the thoughts…😢 I feel like I was a good person before this. I love people and being around them. I love my husband so much, but having this makes me question if I even love my husband because I feel like harm ocd is not letting me feel those feelings for him…when I know I love him tho:( Someone pls help:(

Hey guys, I am new to this whole OCD thing. And I'm honestly questioning if it is OCD. I am thinking that I am going insane. Or that I'm going crazy. My thoughts are getting so bad to the point that I just want to scream and punch something. My thoughts are getting bad to the point to where I question if I am going to become a serial killer or a murderer. I keep getting thoughts and images of hurting my boyfriend. It's tearing me up and I get these thoughts quite often. It's very distressing. It gives me so much anxiety and makes me feel like I cannot trust myself. I'm to the point where I'm scared of sleeping face to face with him because I don't want anything to happen. I take walks whenever I get these thoughts but even on the walks the thoughts continue. I just want them to go away. It feels like they are ruining me. And I am so afraid of snapping😭

Its usually when I'm alone with it gets worse lmao. Well now it is since I got an anxiety spike from last nights false memory. But ugh The combination of a false memory within a real event reaaaaallllyyy sucks cause you don't know. I have many real events, all are a bit different but with in them creates false memories. Its like "If I did this, then I could have easily done this." Which really I have and its nothing bad with what I know I did but my false memory is changing one little thing, and if that one little thing changes, it changes the wwhhhoolleee thing. I know I regret my bigger real event that correlates to my false memory. But ugh god its like I could have easily done something like that. So thinking thag I could and even having the feeling that "I really did" is just sickening to me :( Idk why I had to live a life like that. But whatever. Its one thing have false memories, its another having a real event and having false memories within it that could be so real because its something that could have been easily done. Whatever just wanted to vent again. Its just so weird how I LITERALLY DEALT WITH THIS. I dealt with the what ifs of this specific false memory. I literally freaking forgot about this or it would be brought up in my mind and soon forgotten. But now because I created a backdoor spike for ruminating on my past, it feels just like how I felt with my actual real event :/ Maybe I'm repressing the memory as well which scared me more. What if the actual memory comes out soon. Its such a scary thing.... ugh whatever again I don't think so :/ I know I shouldn't find proof but even if I tried I know damn well its impossible lmao but seeing one of my real events its a big possibility... ah whatever I gotta get better in life What are you guys doing for the weekend ? I'd love to know !!! 🫂💕

Finally I'm almost done with my costume. Honestly it kinda looks ugly :/ but theres not much I can do now. Just gotta keep going. Of course OCD has to change. I have real events with false memories and today I questioned if I had done more things in my past that I feel horrible about. I decided to check/ruminate or I guess me and my mind decided to and I believe my mind created a false memory. I know I shouldn't have but its too late now. I freaked myself out because I don't know if its real or fake. It seems like a remembrance and it would feel even more believable because its something so easily to do :/ The me before seems like the person who could've done it in a sense. Trust me I want to forget the false memory and honestly move on, but idk theres something inside me thats like saying no don't move on, you did this, and I honestly feel sickened by it. Now its just a game of did I do it ? Or didn't I ? Did I do something similar to it ? Why did I "remember" and suddenly get a spike feeling like that memory was real and I was remembering. I got a spike feeling towards my real event, this spike feeling could be the same thing. (Even though the real event I did remember before but it never gave me extreme guilt but eh) Ugh... I know ruminating and checking can make memories even more real and vivid but then thats even scarier cause that gets you questioning more 😵‍💫😵‍💫. I hate also that I could have potentially had the same feelings and reactions before to my false memories, but like always whenever things change and you get a spike its like a different feeling. Its like nope this is it, this is the "real" memory. Do any of you guys get like that with false memories ? Maybe I'm not describing it well, but its like you know youve dealt with a false memory before and the feelings you had with it, your mind creates a new scenario I guess days after, you keep ruminating and you get a spike, or an immediate spike and its like oh god this is real. It feels real. The other thing was for sure false but this ? Yeah this might be the real memory now... UUGHH. Its just so annoying. I just wanted to vent mainly about false memories. One of the worst things also with False Memory is because of how awful they are, they are something that will always be in the back of our heads. Its a thought that has already been produced and it will "stay" with you in a sense of its a thought you will always remember. God I wish I can go back in time. Whatever I needed to let my frustrations out. I was dumb to check again, I should have known I'm not ok and I never will be "ok" in a sense of OCD will always be with me. I need to learn to live with it and that will hopefully help me. The what ifs are something that always gets us and trust me again when I say I'm trying not to think of the what ifs but its like my mind deep down inside is saying it. I guess its just scared and I'm trying not to be scared. Whatever again. Hopefully tomorrow is a new day :) Sucks whenever I have these days I just don't want to continue anything. I was supposed to shower but I can't. I really can't get up and do it. I just wanna lay down and idk honestly. How was your guys day ? List the good things that happened ! 🫂💕

I feel like I’m not “struggling” as bad as others might be and that’s making me so scared. Like don’t get me wrong the intrusive thoughts and images have been soooo horrible and gruesome and caused me so much stress and anxiety. But never once have i isolated myself from my family. Like I’ve always been part of family events and have enjoyed them. And on here i always here stories about how people have to isolate because they fear they will hurt their family. Like don’t get me wrong i too fear that i will do something wrong but I’m isolating myself. And it makes me scared that I’m not, like should i be? Does that mean that i want my thoughts because I’m okay with my family? Also others Struggle for years in end and i have only been struggling for about 3 months and i feel like I’m already potentially getting “better”. Like I’m not struggling with intrusive thoughts as much and if they do come i feel like i can shut them down quickly. I just feel so guilty and so terrible because others struggle so bad. And it makes me feel like there may be truly something wrong with me because I’m recovering quicker if you will. Can this be normal? I’m actually kind scared.

i have many forms of ocd, i was diagnosed recently,, and well the more i learn about it the more i’ve realized how much it floods my mind. my mind is so flooded with intrusive thoughts, my family doesn’t know that i have it ive been too nervous to really tell anyone but my boyfriend which i love so much but since i have ; contamination ocd Pure ocd religion/ spiritual ocd relationship ocd somatic ocd it’s hard for him to understand my thoughts and feelings around each of them.. The cycle of getting relief and assurance is always me running to him to help me and it’s not fair to him and he doesn’t understand mental health problems so he just doesn’t know how to help? i have a support worker helping me through it however,, I am also in the support field so my work and schooling with contamination is very difficult and i don’t share that with them since they assume i’m just very precautions. i’ve tried therapists but they always made me take my thoughts lock-in a box and throw them away, my sister died oct/9/21 and since her death i went into a pit of impulsive dumb choices that now with moral ocd everything ive done drugs,smoking,drinking,etc is all catching up to me,, it’s created this hole of guilt that i can’t get out of. it’s like i’m drowning in guilt from things i have no capability of fixing. i worked at a church for a bit and it felt like god was there for me and then the workers there shunned me ignored me, bullied me and they hurt children,, after i quit the job they didn’t pay me and since it’s made me resent churches but feel like i’m the eyes of god that he seen me and he wants me to do more for myself and for others to fix and amend my actions. i’m not religious but i know one day i’ll die and i don’t want to live my life feeling guilty for everything things i can’t change now. ive tried talking to people to sort through it first hand but i’m only 18 i’m poor i can’t receive any help further then free therapy trial sessions, i had a truama therapist whom would make me draw out my life and feeling but when it came to my sisters death she made me draw the body and from there i starting avoiding sessions, avoiding her and from there i started thinking i was better but i wasn’t and now when i want the help i deserve it’s like i’m stuck of not knowing where to start or anything. i know this is just a vent type thing but i just want to be able to feel like i’m not alone because i feel so alone for so long and i don’t want to keep feeling like i have no support aswell.. but this is a little start? someone may relate understand or something?

Anything would help.

I love my boyfriend so much! Sometimes though I get irritated with everything and anything he does. He won’t do anything bad, just make a joke, or laugh, and I get anxious, which I think is because I’m internally checking how I feel about him (completely unaware I’m even doing it), and then I get irritated. And it’s like I’m always irritated by anything he does. I feel it’s because my mind is rescreening how I feel and checking my emotions and whether “I love him enough” and that anxiety makes me anxious. Is this normal? Anyone else know what I’m talking about or have tips to help me?

I know others will be able to relate to this: How do you deal with wanting to come to this app or another OCD resource when your OCD is out of control? I’ll give a little backstory on how this is affecting me specifically, but you can skip to the question at the bottom if it’s too much. My worst OCD episodes are during big transitions or after big events like Christmas, weddings, etc. though I have a “normal” amount of OCD tendencies outside of these episodes as well. I moved into a new place a little less than a week ago so the transition is making my OCD really bad. It’s my first home and my first time living alone and I’m completely overjoyed and thrilled, but OCD takes away from it. Right now my OCD is themed around fear of real events, internet privacy, radiation from technology, and feeling like the world may end because of any combination of these things. Add on fear of microplastic, man made viruses, etc, and my mind is a nightmare. My mom said something about wishing she could pay only cash for things and go off the grid, but that the Bible says we’ll have a cashless society in the end and that it’s too late. She said it RIGHT when we were pulling up to my brand new house for the first time, and I am super triggered by what she said when I am at home now. My family (especially my mom and her parents) regularly talk about the end of times in relation to global news, but in a very negative, gloomy way that makes my fear and OCD go absolutely nuts, I’ve had to leave the room before just to calm down. I am a Christian so I am overestimating the threat of these “signs of the times” fears which brings me a wave of dread. Christians are instructed to not fear signs of the times, so fearing these arbitrary things that I am *perceiving* as signs of the times brings religious OCD angst. The stupid thing is I have no way to know whether the end will come soon or beyond my lifetime, so there’s no way to reassure myself 100% if these are actually signs of the end or just life. Time is irrelevant to God and I can’t find a balance between listening to what the Bible says will happen, and fearing everything and living as if this is the end. A ritual of mine is to look back over the globe’s history at all the scary things that have happened and I tell myself that those weren’t end times, so this isn’t necessarily either. My entire obsession is unhealthy, obviously. Right now it’s taunting me that I feel so much fear and I “shouldn’t”. The QUESTION at hand though is that I feel like I want to seek support on this app, on Reddit, or by listening to Mark DeJesus’s OCD podcast to help my OCD fears calm down. Last night I was so anxious that I listened to the podcast to help me calm down so I could sleep. I know I have made progress because I recognize my obsessive thoughts, but starving the compulsion is the challenging part, especially when a compulsion is theoretically something that should “help”. How to I continue to get support and learn about my illness without making it worse by reassuring myself?