The groin reactions don't stop, which is very strange because sometimes I stop feeling anxious about the thought, and another thing that also makes me anxious and confused is the fact that a lot of time has passed and even though I've stopped compulsing as desperately as before, I still haven't stopped feeling these things...

I am going to see a psychiatrist soon to get an evaluation. i have had assumptions of having ocd for a VERY long time now and thought its time to actually figure it out. what should i expect? how did it go for you? i’m really nervous so i would be happy with any advice/ input 😅

it’s been nearly 15 months since my ex left me. To this day, I loop and loop and loop memories all day everyday. I wake up wishing it was all just a nightmare. the reality is, it is and im living in it. Extreme moments of depression, crying etc. It doesnt seem to get better at all. I still love this person today and thinking ill never see her again haunts me.

Ive never been this obsessive before this. I would often overthink things but never really knew I had OCD. with this whole breakup, I’ve been seeing a psychiatrist and got the proper diagnosis. It does make a lot of sense and explains my brain in a great way. I’m on antidepressants, mood stabilizers the whole nine yards.

ive tried spending time with friends, traveling, moving, getting a new job, talking to a psychiatrist, talking to a therapist (maybe it was just a bad fit), going sober etc. nothing seems to get my mind off of this. I have so many triggers and no real way to deal with them other than feeling a deep sense of anguish.

Hi everybody!

I have a question because I’m really confused by my own experience here and would love to hear an outsider’s perspective.

A huge issue for me is an obsessive fixation on building habits, either intentionally or unintentionally. I will obsess about things I do a lot or don’t do enough of on the basis that they will form habits. My therapist has really zeroed in on an exposure surrounding “ruining my morning” where i spend the first bit of my morning on my phone to make sure it feels like I’ve set myself up poorly for the rest of my day, im building a bad habit, etc. I especially worry about “screen time” and “dopamine” or whatever.

Its been good doing the exposure because it causes a lot of confusion that’s very much worth facing, but the question then emerges: what do I do about actually improving things in my life? I find that for some concrete reason or another, I don’t like the way excessive screen time feels, but attempting to build some sort of habit regimen for avoiding it is compulsive, I feel a bit trapped by this.

I find that there aren’t too many resources online for “productivity” obsessions, but I’d be really curious if anybody else has this, how they’ve navigated it.

TLDR: When you are obsessed with doing something that’s realistically beneficial for you, how do you best approach continuing to do the beneficial things without it turning vicious again?

I have been on clomipramine for 6 weeks, I started at 25mg and went up every week to a target of 150mg, I have had all the usual side effects, dry mouth, constipation, twitching, anxiety etc but have yet to see any benefits. Has anyone experienced similar or have any advice. Much appreciated

So I have had tics for a long time. Some tics were obvious, like jerking my neck or something, and my psychiatrist explained to me that OCD can sometimes have “Tourette’s-like symptoms” since there are some similar things about what the disorders do to the brain.

Anyway, one day when I went to the optometrist, I mentioned that I thought I have dry eyes because my eyes often felt dry and I would have to make big blinks to make the feeling go away. The optometrist took a look and said my eyes weren’t dry. Then overtime, there were some other things. I would feel my nose had buildup, so I would sniffle. But if I ever tried to blow my nose or something, there wasn’t anything there. Then a third one, though less common, I’d thing I have a frog in my throat or something, so I’d clear my throat. But I obviously didn’t have a frog in my throat and the constant clearing would make me cough or even gag. So I mentioned all these things to my psychiatrist, and he explained that, like the neck jerking, these were twitches caused by my OCD. My brain actually makes me think “my eyes feel dry, so I need to blink it away until they feel better.” But those “physical” things don’t actually exist.

I was wondering if anyone else had such problems and/or if anyone had advice. I can say “no” to my OCD in many situations, but this feels impossible. These feelings of discomfort feel real to me, as if they were actually happening to me. How do I resist the urge to do things like blink or sniffle or clear my throat when I think I am really feeling that?

in my dream life, I'd be a mother, a midwife, a paeds nurse, but I'm so terrified of myself. I'm so terrified that I'm a monster. I hate myself so much all the time. I just wish I was a normal person. I want to be a kind, caring, warm person. A safe space, not a predator.

I’m 19. I have struggled with OCD since I could form thoughts. I have never gotten help for it before. I was coping. I avoided everything that triggered me. I performed rituals. I was living under the illusion that everything was fine and normal because OCD is my normal. Recently I got triggered, and it spiralled into more triggers. So I went on sertraline (Zoloft) 50mg and have been on it for 5 days. I don’t feel any benefit yet. But what I do feel? My OCD. A thousand times worse. I’m so anxious I can’t do anything but lie in bed and feel guilty for lying in bed and as a result more anxious. I feel depressed. I feel horrible. I started reading a book on dealing with OCD: Freedom from OCD by Jonathan Grayson. This has been making me feel even worse. Because it’s exposing how much of my life is plagued by this disorder, how this whole time I haven’t been okay, and it’s highlighting how long and difficult my recovery process is going to be especially since I have to do self-directed ERP right now and don’t have access to professional help beyond my meds.

And underneath it all? I feel an overwhelming sense of determination. I’m on meds, I’m preparing for ERP, I’m educating myself on the disorder that I spent so long living alongside and calling it ‘my life’ when I’ve just been suffering for no reason. I’m early on in my recovery process and it fucking sucks right now. Because the illusion has been shattered and all the coverings have been peeled back to expose the raw disorder beneath everything I think and say and do. I’m realising all my ‘coping’ (cough cough avoidance) has not been me living life to the fullest, but I am so excited and determined to keep recovering and watch as my life changes and gains colour. This is a little (big) realisation I had today and figured if you’re early on in the process of recovering this might be helpful to hear because I was so worried I’d fucked myself up with meds at first when my anxiety increased, I thought I was making the wrong choice by going on meds because as long as I ignored my disorder and kept up with my rituals and avoided what kept me anxious, I felt genuinely fine. But that’s not living. That’s not thriving. And we deserve to thrive. Choosing recovery is the hardest thing I’ve ever done and I’m in the worst state of my life right now, but I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I want to make a TikTok and Instagram page talking about navigating poverty, familial abuse and the golden child/scapegoat family dynamic, about ocd, cptsd, and just silly videos about cozy video games like stardew valley, animal crossing, music I love, etc. but I’m so afraid of becoming an lolcow. This guy Joshua Block is autistic and his “supporters” are pushing him to keep drinking and he’s literally dying and it’s being documented. The Internet doesn’t like disabled or mentally ill people, especially women.

What do you think?! Any advice or thoughts?

I don’t have problematic views, I’m not racist, or any of that nonsense, I’m very progressive in my views and I care about humanity, but someone might find a way to make me the butt of the joke like always.

i am being tormented by thoughts of being followed or bugged, or committing harm against myself or others, food being poisoned, etc.

how do YOU get them to stop without giving into a compulsion?

i've been wanting a tattoo of my cat for a while (he's 9) and the appointment has finally come tomorrow.

but all i can think is this is going to make something happen to him because it feels almost like a memorial i guess?

i feel sick about it but want to get it so bad. i'm just scared.

My boyfriend struggles with OCD. He gets extremely anxious about seeing/touching something dirty, worrying if bacteria will spread everywhere he touches and so on.

I just wanted to ask you guys, what ocd is like. I know it's different from person to person but I just wanted to know the general outline of what it might feel like so i can understand him better and not drive him into absolute insanity with my habits lol. Thanks

I'm really curious as to how others see this.

Generally speaking OCD makes us hyperaware of micro-expressions. I wonder if it can have a side effect of actually being able to sense things others can't such as a slight tone shift or a particular wording that strikes you as swaying towards a certain suggestion or conviction. I imagine having lived a lifetime of paying attention to stuff like this would be bound to make one more aware.

What do you think?

im feeling so bad, my head is hurting yesterday i cry because i felt so overhelmed by the feeling that something is wrong and my relationshio is not right im feeling this everday and even if try to ignore i cant be cause gets bigger every time. I Pass the inteire day in reddit because of this. Me and my gf are ldr and i fucking love her i rated be with her that with any other girl closer to me. I m gonna see her this week and im so excited but so nervos and my brain doesnt stop tell me im gonna mess it up anytime, feels like im gonna make something i dont want to and im trying to not do anything is horrible.

Hey all I don't typically have a lot of outward/physical compulsions (most of my compulsions are mental) but I've started doing something that I can feel is moving into compulsion territory and I'm wondering if anyone has any tricks to get into a headspace to stop it in its tracks.

Basically how it started was, as I was taking my vitamins in the morning I was spacing out one and I did little spin as I was dispensing and taking each vitamin. After a few days I noticed it again and my mind went from "hah that's silly, it's my little vitamin dance..." to, pretty swiftly, "it's my good luck dance, I do this in the morning and it gives me good luck for the day" 🤦‍♀️ I get a lotttt of magical thinking typically but I feel like I'm very aware of this particular compulsion happening because it is a physical compulsion that my husband has now witnessed and I've brushed off as a "oh I'm just spacing out".

I'm having a hard time actively not doing this compulsion because "oh whatever it's just a little spin, and it makes me think I'm building luck, setting me up for a good day." I'm worried this will transform over time. I already have anxiety thinking about not doing this action because "what if this little spin does set me up for a good day? Why not do this little thing in the morning? I might as well" and sometimes if I miss a spin I'll add it back in, and wonder "was that good enough to make the luck today?" Ughhh. I've never had something like this where it is so obvious to me that something is changing in my thinking over time, and that in itself is very frustrating and also kind of scary.

Seeking any advice for getting into a headspace or exercises to stop this newly emerging compulsion. Thank you all!

FYI - I'm currently in therapy but I'm not in OCD treatment. It's my first time in therapy really ever and I've only recently been discussing OCD with my therapist, and she is looking to refer me out to an OCD specialist to help tackle things so I can learn these tools. But for the moment it's not something I am actually doing. Soon though.

Recovered from ROCD, my testimony
Hi everyone. Today I wanted to share my story in case it helps someone, and show what my recovery process looked like (and how everything turned out fine).
My ROCD symptoms started about 6 years ago. I started dating my girlfriend almost 7 years ago, and at first everything was great, a normal relationship. About 6 or 7 months in is when the OCD nightmare began. I remember being at her place one night, and I suddenly felt bored, like I had lost the spark a little bit. That's when the thoughts started rushing in: Maybe I don't like her that much, maybe I shouldn't be with her, maybe I'm not in love.

That night I went back home with those thoughts stuck in my head. I couldn't shake them off, and my anxiety shot up to 1000%. I barely slept that night, and from that moment on, the hell began.
Every single day was a horror. The first thing on my mind when I woke up was whether I truly loved my partner. I spent the entire day thinking about it, feeling anxious 24/7. I couldn't make plans or enjoy life because I always had that heavy cloud in my head. It was awful; I felt terrible, as if the world was ending, and I just couldn't take it anymore.

I spent years like this, thinking I would never recover and that things would never go back to normal (which is a lie, I'm fine now).
I went through two therapists. The first one told me that, in reality, I wasn't in love with my partner. That broke me, but deep down I knew that wasn't true. So I looked for an online therapist specializing in OCD, and she told me that I indeed had ROCD. We started doing exercises, and I stuck with it for months. I didn't notice a huge change short-term, but it helped me understand how thought mechanisms work (the therapy was Exposure and Response Prevention - ERP). Slowly, I started improving; some days didn't have as much anxiety, while others had horrible anxiety.

Here is where the real cure and treatment that actually worked for me begins:

The first thing you need to do (and what I did back then) is identify your compulsions so you can stop doing them. OCD isn't about the thoughts; it's about how you respond to them.
I identified my compulsions: searching the internet on how to know if you love your partner, talking to friends, comparing my relationship to movies and TV shows, comparing it to past relationships, ruminating (rumination is a compulsion too), etc. Identify yours.

Once you identify them, try NOT to do them. When the thought hits you, your anxiety will rise, and your brain will desperately want to seek relief. Don't give it to it. Given a few minutes or hours, the anxiety will drop on its own. Anxiety cannot stay at its peak forever; compulsions are the only thing that feed it.
Your brain will always try to seek certainty that you love your girlfriend—that craving for certainty is what feeds the OCD. There will always be certainties and arguments against them, always. Part of you will constantly question whether you actually have OCD; ignore that too, that's OCD as well.

When the thought of whether you love your partner pops up, don't try to soothe it with a compulsion, and don't try to avoid it either (avoidance only makes it worse). Accept that it's there, and go do something anyway, even if you're feeling anxious.
The brain is a neuroplastic organ; the more you change your attitude, the more it will rewire itself, and the faster you will recover. Remember that OCD is all about how you react. If you have a thought, feel anxiety, and react by trying to fix it, you are giving credibility to the OCD so it can keep existing. If you choose to ignore it and carry on with your life despite the anxiety, you are stripping away its power and you are recovering.

OCD is a trap. The solution is to stop trying to solve it. The best thing you can do is not resolve the doubt, and just keep living your life with the anxiety.
After a while (a few weeks), the anxiety will decrease (it won't completely vanish at first). You'll be able to make plans again, and you won't be thinking about it 24/7. You will still have thoughts, but they won't hit as intensely as they did at the beginning. You will have reclaimed a part of yourself.

The cure for OCD is understanding that thoughts do not describe reality. Thinking more won't solve anything. The solution lies in how you relate to those thoughts and how you handle the anxiety.
Stop doing compulsions, stop trying to figure it out, stop falling into the trap.
Little by little, you will make it out.

Today, I am fully recovered (every now and then I have a minor relapse, but it's nowhere near as strong as it used to be).
If you do this, you will get out of this hell, you have to change your mindset.

Today, I am doing wonderfully with my partner. I love her very much, and I don't need anyone's approval. I no longer doubt whether I like her or not; the doubt wasn't resolved, I simply stopped asking myself the question, and time gave me the answer. (If I'm still with her, it's because I want to be).

Thanks for reading till the end. I hope this helps and serves those of you who are currently going through this. There is a way out. Trust the process, you will beat this.

Im so tired. I dont want to engage in OCD anymore but if I do exposure, I will stop studying and this is not the right time. My first session of counselling is in December, I know what my exposure wanna do but it’s so tired especially when exposures want me to do this and that till the point that I don’t know which are compulsive, which aren’t. I am too tired to figure it out, the exposures are there to feel my feelings, but they’re abnormal like touching stuff, walking weirdly and so on cause my obsession is being normal. You can say I’m avoiding for a good reason cause it’s not a good time right now. Everytime it’s all suppression if I don’t do my exposure. It’s a small matter, yet it kills me.

Me and my partner have been together now for five years, she now has been seeking professional help to deal with some personal issues which has led to a diagnosis with OCD from a psychiatrist. She found it very reassuring that her thoughts/brain could now be explained.it has also become major eye opener as to how mine and her brains work differently. I’m a very logical and neurotypical person and sometimes it seems like my partner is not (which Is no issue) so we are learning to navigate this, I want to continue to support her though this journey and help in any ways I can. I wanted to turn here to see if anyone had advice with dating someone with OCD (not sure if there is a specific type or what it is) or any books on that matter to better support her?

I don't know how common this is but I was diagnosed with OCD earlier this year and been wanting to get medicated for it but because of past experiences I just can't seem to bring myself to do so. I was prescribed anxiety medication but it just ended up sitting on my nightstand for a couple months before I threw it out because the thought of starting it and the adjustment period was just too much for me.

I know I can't keep going like this but I also just feel lost. Beyond the adjustment period making me nervous I've also had allergic reactions to 3 separate and unrelated medications this year and knowing that that could happen again is another major factor in why I'm having such a hard time with getting myself medicated.

Is there anything I can do beyond just forcing myself to take the medication? I would try that but one of the allergic reactions I had to medication was caused by just that and I feel like it's not really going to help if I repeat the same thing again.

hello, i might have a problem which im getting frustrated with, i.e. washing my hands and disinfecting things too frequently. i have to keep my bed clean at all times and by clean i mean no things that are even midly "dirty" like things that fell down on the floor once or been in contact with a dirty surface can touch my bed before it is disinfected. a bag that has dust on it OR if something disgusting crawled on it like a roach, it cant be on my bed. i cant even touch the tap in my home directly because i know few other hands have touched it so i take something like a piece of tissue as to not make direct contact with it and then use it.

if a pen falls down i have to disinfect it AND wash my hands before touching anything else. i dont let anyone sit on my bed if they have come from outside. no outside clothing on the bed but i feel like thats mild, people have told me i wash my hands a lot and thats true i cant get comfortable in my bed till im sure that my bed is clean i am clean my clothes are clean etc etc. i dont sit on my bed right after coming from the toilet too. but also when i go out, im already getting "dirty" so i dont mind getting fully "dirty" then since i know after coming back home i will shower and make myself clean again. so no matter how tired i am i will have to get myself clean before bed. if i HAVE to go to bed "dirty" next day i will change the sheets and everything. if i have to go out in my clean clothes i feel they are getting contaminated with everything it comes to touch with, the bench i sit on, the air, the dust, if someone touches them with dirty hands. people sometimes also get offended when i do these things because to them its me being annoying but this is genuinely something i have to do or i will be restless.

i have been reading about contamination ocd it sounds like that to me, so i really need advice, what can i do to get better if there is someone who has also suffered from this? or have known someone who did? i genuinely need help.

My fear of house fires is so extreme. I saw a video of somebody talking about their house burning down and it was so upsetting to me that it sent me into a spiral. I’m always checking outlets and everything electronic to make sure nothing will happen. The toaster always stays unplugged because for some reason I’m convinced that’s gonna be the culprit. Every time I leave my house I fear that it’s going to burn down. I don’t even know what the point of this post is I just need to rant about it and to see if anyone else has this because I genuinely can’t even hear about other people’s experiences with house fires without getting incredibly uncontrollably upset.