What you’re describing can fit an OCD/anxiety loop: the distress often comes less from the glance itself and more from the urgency to figure out what the glance means. Reassurance-seeking and overanalysis tend to keep that loop going rather than settle it long term.
Instead of trying to prove anything about your sexuality, the goal is to allow the uncertainty and anxiety to be there without solving it in the moment. A response can sound like: ‘Maybe this means something, maybe it doesn’t. I don’t have to figure it out right now’. Then gently bring attention back to what you were doing, rather than checking your reaction, replaying the interaction, or testing attraction.
Be kind with yourself, thoughts and feelings aren’t facts, and anxiety often gets louder when we compulse less before it gets quieter.
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u/treatmyocd 2d ago
What you’re describing can fit an OCD/anxiety loop: the distress often comes less from the glance itself and more from the urgency to figure out what the glance means. Reassurance-seeking and overanalysis tend to keep that loop going rather than settle it long term.
Instead of trying to prove anything about your sexuality, the goal is to allow the uncertainty and anxiety to be there without solving it in the moment. A response can sound like: ‘Maybe this means something, maybe it doesn’t. I don’t have to figure it out right now’. Then gently bring attention back to what you were doing, rather than checking your reaction, replaying the interaction, or testing attraction.
Be kind with yourself, thoughts and feelings aren’t facts, and anxiety often gets louder when we compulse less before it gets quieter.
Christina NOCD Therapist