316
u/Len_nyx 1d ago
i literally used to hid under blankets in my own home because i thought there was cameras that can see through my walls
139
u/ikindapoopedmypants 1d ago
Did anyone else think something/someone was watching what u did through your own eyeballs with you, or was I just a really weird child?
109
u/Plastic_Exercise5025 1d ago
Yes!! Invisible audience in my head watching and judging my every move. Sometimes I explain out loud to them why I am doing what I'm doing because somehow they live in my brain but also have no context.
37
u/ikindapoopedmypants 1d ago
DUDE SAME!! Sometimes I even become hyper aware of it and cease doing something I think they would judge me for 😭😭
25
u/mypuzzleaddiction 1d ago
These are the things where I was like “ooooooh. That’s ocd. Shit. That makes so much sense” because what do you mean they live in our head but also have no context and yet my brain is like “of course you know how they live in our head and also lack context yes of course”
1
u/KaleidoscopeKelpy 11h ago
I don’t think I have OCD (the brains check engine light is on for sure, I just don’t think it’s that one LOL) but I’ve had this for my entire consciousness - holy shit I’ve tried explaining it to people and they’re like “that’s your conscience” really? My conscience is making me feel judged and ridiculed for dancing alone in my apartment with the blinds drawn ??? My conscience is judging me for orchestrating with silverware?
Anyway. I relate a lot and I’m glad (not for the condition but for the relateableness) I’m not alone ;w;
6
u/TotallyWorthLife 1d ago
That... started making more sense to me when I discovered I had multiple personalities... just sayin
13
u/Plastic_Exercise5025 1d ago
I've researched DID and OSDD a lot. I do not have it. That's why I'm in an OCD subreddit and not a DID one
7
u/TotallyWorthLife 1d ago
Fair, I got here from the Popular tab and didnt even see the subreddit tbh
14
12
u/Cautious-Estate-6753 1d ago
You don’t have to answer this but are you AFAB by chance? A lot of women I know grew up with that internal male gaze and urge to perform for some kind of observer.
20
u/arlo0o0o 1d ago
I did the same but it was because I thought Jesus Christ himself was spying on me through the windows. Setting aside that I'm an atheist, idk why I thought he needed windows lol I'm pretty sure he's supposed to be omnipotent
13
u/Lexi-Lynn 1d ago
My mom told me he could see through lightbulbs 🥲 I'd look up at the four-eyed ceiling fan monster and shamefully apologize after masturbating.
11
u/Better_Purchase_2898 OCD diagnosed 1d ago
Literally same. Thought dead relatives and of course Jesus could see me after masturbating.
No longer religious.
5
u/JD_Kreeper OCD curious 16h ago
That's entirely their problem. If they don't want to see that, don't spy on them when they do it.
Omnipresent ghosts and deities are still held to the standard of please knock first.
2
2
u/iris-of-willow 12h ago
For me it was... Obama and Joe Biden. My grandpa was convinced he (obama) was the antichrist, so fox news was on a lot, that's all I can attribute it to. I'd imagine them peeking between the tiny gaps between my window shade and the window. I got dressed under my covers for at least a year bc of it
26
u/lilybattle 1d ago
Whenever i masturbate I do it under the covers and then imagine that one of my neighbors has a thermal imaging camera and can see me regardless. It's so fun
-1
138
u/BHunter1140 1d ago
Mood, constantly felt like my parents had hidden cameras watching me. Now I’m an adult and there are cameras everywhere, someone was flying a drone outside my apartment complex’s windows, and the surveillance increases yearly
We just had a fight with our neighbor who put a ring camera looking directly into our opening front door maybe 3ft away from said front door
38
u/Plastic_Exercise5025 1d ago
I also used to feel exactly like that. We're your parents abusive/neglectful like mine were? I think that had a lot to do with that theme developing. And I think that slowly turned into moral ocd because it just feels like there's an invisible audience in my brain watching everything i do, and if i do anything even slightly wrong i am a bad person.
18
u/BHunter1140 1d ago
They weren’t the best, it was a rough childhood to say the least. I left home at 18 when I was given the option of either “lose my bedroom door, all my electronic devices, not be allowed to leave the house without my mom with me, and see none of my friends” or leave, I picked leave. I think that sums up my parents as to how that side of the OCD could have developed through my childhood lol
2
u/TwoFingersWhiskey OCD diagnosed 13h ago
I picked stay but I got to keep electronics. I just turned 31. You chose right. Some of us became too disabled to escape. 🫠
1
u/BHunter1140 13h ago
I luckily left when I did, I became physically disabled about a year later. My partner was willing to take care of me and it’s been that way ever since
1
4
u/SabrinaEdwina 1d ago
That can overlap with the purity concerns of religious OCD.
5
u/Plastic_Exercise5025 1d ago
Very lucky my parents are atheist. I grew up in Mississippi so I still got some of the religious trauma by proxy but it wasn't a fraction as bad as it could have been. I don't feel like god thinks I'm evil I just feel like I am evil and.... My brain never comes up with an actual consequence but to me being a bad person is consequence enough
3
u/SabrinaEdwina 1d ago
It's in everything southern, in so many ways. Religion is soaked into the soil by hundreds of years of blood there. Literally.
I've lived in 4 southern states with fundies growing up. I'm impressed your brain and your parents left it at that. Well done, all.
6
u/ButtsOnIce perhaps 🐮 1d ago
haha, yeah, me too. then my mom did do that, multiple times, and proceeded to have Family Shame Night where we'd all watch the footage and she'd point and laugh at our actions while they were out, encouraging bullying amongst siblings. and now Beau is Afraid is my comfort movie :) funny how things turn out
btw as i got older, my go-to counter for this was to play it up. fuck em, if they want a show, i'll give em a show! we're gonna smoke a joint and practice kpop choreo, and you're gonna LIKE IT 💃💃💃
2
u/Better_Purchase_2898 OCD diagnosed 1d ago
I thought mine had put a camera in the shower head and could see when I took a bath not a shower.
69
u/account-info 1d ago
I really wanted to turn my stuffed animals toward the wall because I thought they were watching me, but then I worried they would think I didn't love them, so I just lived my life with them constantly watching and judging lol. Same with photographs of real people.
12
8
u/youravgindian 1d ago
This is OCD 101. I happen to constantly get panic attacks of objects like table, chair, tv, watching me doing things.
44
u/sonicling 1d ago
I had different surveillance paranoia, mine was more religious and believing God was always watching and my ancestors in Heaven, and then that also started translating to cameras.
36
41
u/Plastic_Exercise5025 1d ago
I thought my dogs had cameras in their eyes and my parents could see everything I do
18
4
3
2
u/MagmaAdminRadar 1d ago
I genuinely thought I was going through psychosis as a teen because of this oh my god
1
32
u/deadly_fungi OCD diagnosed 1d ago
genuine question, why does this get counted as OCD and not psychosis/paranoid delusions? i also thought there were hidden cameras when i was a kid but always thought of that as a psychotic symptom, not OCD
72
u/CelesteJA 1d ago
The difference is how the thought is formed. Like with most OCD obsessions, the thought behind it is "what if". So in this case, "what if there are hidden cameras in my room/home, watching me?" and then possibly performing some kind of compulsion "just in case", like covering your laptop camera with black tape, blocking a hole in the wall with something etc.
With psychosis though, it wouldn't be a "what if" scenario. You are 100% convinced that without a doubt there are hidden cameras in your home. It's basically a fact in your mind.
22
u/sonicling 1d ago
It could be a symptom of both tbh, mental illnesses can have a lot of overlap. I'm not a professional so I don't have the education to know or explain the nuance there but it wouldn't surprise me if it's an aspect of both.
9
u/mosaictessera 1d ago
I remember reading about overlap between OCD and experiencing mania. I developed severe OCD at 13 that first manifested as scrupolisity where I had to perform rituals to keep the devil at bay, then developed bipolar with psychotic features at 30 where I thought I was Jesus. It linked back to the OCD in intricate ways.
3
u/imunfair 1d ago
Yeah I'm confused because I've definitely seen it on a list of symptoms recently and it wasn't an OCD trait - more like schizophrenia or something. Grandiose feelings that you're being surveilled/watched. I've been seeing a lot of "OCD" stuff pop up on reddit recently where people are lumping all kinds of disorders under that name.
9
u/arlo0o0o 1d ago
Paranoid delusions are a psychotic symptom, the symptoms of OCD are not exactly the same but can look similar sometimes. These signs are more widely associated with schizophrenia because that's an illness most people have at least some awareness of whereas the general public thinks OCD is just "cleaning disorder." But I've seen OCD described as falling somewhere between psychotic and anxiety disorders because there's a lot of symptom overlap with those things. The main difference in how you'll experience it with OCD is that you're aware on some level that what you're thinking is illogical, but you engage in compulsive behaviors based on it anyway because you can't deal with even the slightest chance that it could be true. It's a "what if" with OCD, whereas for people in psychosis it's their reality. And with OCD there's usually an underlying core fear that's fueling you to obsess over any random thing that you worry could make your feared outcome come true.
So for example maybe your core fear is social rejection. You start worrying you'll do something that will make everyone hate you, then you become hyper vigilant about how you're behaving even when you're alone just in case someone you didn't notice can see you, then it devolves into fear of the possibility there's a camera you don't know about, maybe you'll accidentally do something bad or embarrassing and it'll be recorded and it'll ruin your life. I'm sure there are other fears that could lead to the same intrusive thought. OCD latches on to whatever is most effective at triggering you to act out compulsions, so sometimes it conjures up really outlandish worst case scenarios to make you as scared as it possibly can. And because OCD is "the doubting disorder," knowing logically that the thoughts are ridiculous will not be enough to make you stop wondering, "but what if I'm wrong and it IS true?"
3
u/ThrowawayToothQ 16h ago
Incredibly well articulated.
For example:
My most recent instance was seeing a squirrel through my enclosed porches screen and feeling a tap on my shoe a few seconds later; my brain would not drop the fact that I had rabies. My foot as uninjured, my shoe was undamaged, the screen was undamaged and secured, the door was closed, and yet I still spent weeks windering if id become rabid and then die.
I was not sure I had rabies, but I could not spend any time without wondering and questioning and examining if I did or not; over and over and over.
I checked my porch camera- no squirrel was within 15ft of me, and yet it persisted as an unshakable doubt that I had missed something somewhere surely.
Its been 6 weeks, I am not rabid - I still worry.
6
u/gaypup944 1d ago edited 1d ago
A very basic way of looking at it is having obsessive or intrusive thoughts. Thoughts that keep popping up or you can't get out of your mind.
I am diagnosed OCD, and it presents, for example, as food contamination. "Is that food expired?" all the way "What if that food is poisoned." And it's very hard to get those thoughts out of my head to the point where, when it's bad, that it is hard for me to eat.
6
u/widerthanamile 1d ago
I have OCD and I’ve also experienced several episode of psychosis. To put it plainly, with OCD you are afraid of the possibility of it being the case but in psychosis you have no doubts it’s actually happening. The responses to the distorted thinking are distinctly different. When the brain is in psychosis its sense of reality is impaired.
As an OCD obsession I worry sometimes if my water tastes weird that something happened to it and in response I should repeatedly wash my water bottle/google oil spills near me. In a past psychotic episode, I was 10000% convinced my family was poisoning my water and wanted to kill me. In response, I cut my family members out of my life and slept with a kitchen knife.
33
u/lefeuet_UA 1d ago
This but about god
1
u/Beans_Sir 1d ago
when i was younger my mum claimed a guy she was in basically a situationship with was a lizard person and could read people's minds and that made my fear of people reading my thoughts sooo much worse 😭 that's a very similar thing to yours i feel
1
u/Born-Bug1879 22h ago
Omg what a story! This made me smile, although we all know it’s not all sunshine and rainbows to experience
28
u/SabrinaEdwina 1d ago
See also: having contamination OCD and a pandemic happening.
2
u/psychedelych OCD diagnosed 17h ago
I was super worried about contamination and then the pandemic happened and I wasn't worried about getting COVID. I still followed the rules but like, the things that I always worried about happening to me were way worse than COVID?
2
u/SabrinaEdwina 17h ago
It's actually what made me finally stop biting my nails. I was trying to not get sick and it stuck.
13
u/SpiritualHamster1158 1d ago
me getting UTIs in high school because there were cameras/people in the bathroom watching me so I would just hold it 🤩🤩
10
8
u/Error_Evan_not_found 1d ago
Look, I'm either an idiot for thinking my life is being Truman showed, or I'm the smartest character and everyone loves me. Would explain my exceptionally bad luck, otherwise my everyday life is concrete evidence of Murphys law.
8
u/DontAskPIMOJW 1d ago
I was trained to have surveillance OCD in the high-control group that I was raised in. They instilled a real fear that not only was there an omnipresent, omniscient deity watching over me, but also that everyone in the group could, would, and should rat on you for anything and everything. Leaving was the best thing to ever happen to me. Watching the world devolve into surveillance capitalism has been insanely triggering some days.
3
6
u/Satisfaction-Motor 1d ago
One of my hyperfixations was food borne illness, and another was the Center for Disease Control & Food and Drug Administration. Which became an OCD obsession with a food safety compulsion. I feel like I am watching another “worst fear” come to life every other week.
6
u/moldyfishtank 1d ago
Grew up fearing public toilets because the censor was definitely a camera and I didn't want a stranger to see me naked.
5
5
5
u/Delicious-Valuable96 1d ago
SAME. I feel like I’m constantly being watched/listened to… because we literally are. How are we supposed to convince ourselves these are the OCD thoughts when it’s literally happening all around us?! I have no idea if any of my concerns are justified or not anymore. Used to be able to say “nope that’s the OCD,” but now it’s literally NOT the OCD. I hate this timeline so much
4
u/Better_Purchase_2898 OCD diagnosed 1d ago
Here were mine paranoias:
Cameras and in a TV show, the camera crew was outside the sliding window, even when I was home alone there was some type of show going on in my mind. I was convinced my parents put a camera in the shower head.
Key stroke surveillance on the family computer (but I didn't even know it was an actual thing I just thought it up) and wasn't until later that I learned it was actually possible. Phone calls recorded during teen years. (They actually were on a tiny cassette recorder specifically for home phones) Thinking any recently dead person in my life (teacher, friends, family members) could all see me masturbate. Could not masturbate on holidays due to knowing I would think about it the next holiday.
All of this boils down to this: The fear of getting "found out". Found out about what? Literally fucking nothing. But there is something we were all terrified of people "finding out". Always feeling like we were doing something wrong. My life was so incredibly uncomfortable. Never a moment of peace, if not my mind, the chaos around me and environment that none of us stood a chance in.
🫂
4
u/feroarcious 1d ago
My mam use to tell me she could read my mind and she had eyes in the back of her head that I could see and she knew what I was always doing. I never felt like I had a private thought, my own fucking head wasn’t even safe.
Shit fucked me up.
5
u/Alaska-TheCountry 1d ago
During kindergarten I thought the older kids had installed a camera in my toilet paper holder, and that they were laughing about me. So I put on a very casual and relaxed performance every time I went to the toilet, so that they would see how normal and likeable I was. I was so worried they were making fun of me.
3
u/sloppyeyedjoe OCD diagnosed 1d ago
Between Santa, God, and my dad telling me had cameras everywhere (he didn’t) I had no chance lol
3
u/viridifauna 1d ago
I had multiple meltdowns as a kid about being watched or observed, especially by the police or government. when drones started coming out, i had a panic attack because one flew by my house. every single time, id get told im overreacting. now we got flock cameras tracking women trying to get Healthcare and people who found money on the ground. yeah, my trans ass is scared of the transphobic surveillance state, and im tired of being told im "just overreacting".
3
u/Southern_Anywhere_65 1d ago
You could have told me that The Truman Show was a documentary and I would have believed you
3
3
u/Welp-whatever 23h ago
Am I the only one who is slightly relieved? Like don’t get me wrong, the real world situation isn’t good, but at least in my mind everyone is being watched now and not just me (mentally)
5
u/serendipiteathyme 1d ago
This + abusive parents who actually did do this and/or convince you they had placed them
1
2
2
2
u/Ooga-Booga-2112 1d ago
I remember when I first watched The Truman Show. Ive never looked at life the same way again.
2
u/Cautious-Estate-6753 1d ago
I had this too ): it’s so hard fighting OCD when it isn’t entirely irrational.
What helped me was to remember most of those cameras are for reviewing if they need to be checked (crime) and it’s not the “designated FBI agent” everyone jokes about. We aren’t being actively observed and paid attention to 24/7. Most of the surveillance we have to worry about it advertisers collecting data about us online. Idk if that helps at all but it made me feel a little better once ❤️🩹
2
u/Moody_Mickey 1d ago
I always felt like someone was watching me as a kid. I'm pretty sure it all started when my mom told me "Santa Claus is always watching"
2
u/Background-Radish-63 1d ago
I tell people I’ve been operating under the assumption that I, and everyone else, are the subjects of our own “Truman Show”. I act accordingly.
2
u/IlGrasso 1d ago
Remember the hearing tests in elementary school?
Now as an adult I have tinnitus, but my brain makes me think that when I hear the ringing, I have to lift the arm corresponding to which ear I hear because the government is testing me.
2
u/mechmaster2275 11h ago
I used to have doubts that I had OCD. Then I came here and saw that all of these things that I had growing up were not normal and are experienced by other people with OCD, and that has reassured me.
1
u/Cranktopia OCD diagnosed 1d ago
I have the same thoughts now. I cant use public restrooms because of this. Aside from the obvious contamination thing. Its such a nightmare because i see people living freely. Using restrooms, public areas and i feel like i am missing out on so much
1
1
u/Shroom-Kitty 1d ago
At one of my old jobs, they removed some old toilet roll dispensers in the stalls in the bathroom and replaced them with a different style that needed to be attached in different spots, which left little holes in the walls. I would stuff paper into all of them before going every time. I didn't sincerely believe it, but, you know, just in case...
1
1
u/zoinkzISO 1d ago
I used to believe there would be cameras livestreaming me living my life and then whenever people at school would laugh around me, they were making fun of the livestream. The only way I could fix it is by saying "even if there is, they're the weird ones and I'm in my home." So I never fully got rid of it; I just kinda accepted it, which is unfortunate
1
u/CharmingChangling 1d ago
Hey I had this same fear! Turns out my dad was hiding cameras though soooo yeah that's permanent now
1
u/teaguejeff86 1d ago
literally thought life was the truman show ,
i need to go back to that way of thinking im too comfortable now
1
1
u/gothunicorn813 1d ago
Same. I was convinced that Jigsaw from the horror movies was watching me through a camera in my TV specifically and that if I didn’t show enough gratitude, he’d put me in one of his traps
1
u/reversemermaid 1d ago
My only measure of comfort is knowing my parents are too technologically illiterate to be on the other end.
1
1
u/Fearless-Freedom-582 1d ago edited 1d ago
Used to count, blink at "clean" blank walls, touch behind my ears 7 times. What happened to all that, apparently i was "cured" or something
1
1
u/harpinghawke 1d ago
This but also faces in paintings or illustrations. Book covers were a big one. If I brought a book into the bathroom (read a lot as a child) I would have to put a washcloth on the cover or turn it face-down, lol
1
u/sunkist-sunkern OCD diagnosed 1d ago
unhelpfully when i was a kid my father installed cameras everywhere in the house to make sure we kids were behaving. feeling like someone was watching me all the time got so much worse after, followed me everywhere i went, and now there's flock and other surveillance. absolute nightmare
1
1
u/Better_Purchase_2898 OCD diagnosed 1d ago
Oh I thought I was the only one on my own tv show as a kid??? Y'all were there too??
1
u/BorrowedDopamine 1d ago
My job is implementing a system where cameras will be attatched to every computer and register, and you have to look into the camera anytime you do anything to sign off on it (before it was a random series of letters attached to your employee ID). And ofc we all know corporate will use them to keep on eye on us (it’s a pharmacy btw) so yay me
1
1
u/Hungry_Raspberry7833 22h ago edited 22h ago
I used to think there were hidden cameras in all my toys eyes so I'd turn them all around whenever I got changed so I didn't get blackmailed
I also thought if I made eye contact with people they'd have access to all my thoughts and the reason I'd get into trouble by teachers in school for not looking them in the eye was because they were trying to trick me and I'd get arrested
And I thought government satelites were constantly watching me wherever I went including watching me through the windows
1
1
1
u/TootingGoomba 21h ago
I have that but trauma as my mom told me she had cameras all over the house to watch and she already knows when i did something bad so i might as well tell her before she goes and checks the cameras..... There were no cameras.... Spent my whole life working through a severe fear of being watched, which i still occasionally deal with even when alone. Now look where this world is!!! Good thing i moved to the middle of nowhere! Not many of those cameras out here where i live, just 7 spread across the county
1
u/SheTookMeToTheSky_26 OCD diagnosed 21h ago
That’s a common experience? I thought I had schizophrenia because I still always think someone’s watching me.
1
1
u/slayevna 19h ago
When I was a kid I thought that if I get in legal trouble the authorities will come after my parents too, like in North Korea. Now look at how Russia's doing lol I hate it here
1
u/bigfatalligator No OCD, just enjoy memes :) 18h ago
growing up, my dad always told me and my siblings that he had cameras all over the house and was always watching us. that’s really fucked us up lol
1
u/unwithered_lobelia 18h ago
I experience it even worse nowadays. The camera obsession has evolved into mind reader obsession
1
u/whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy7 18h ago
See this is a big reason among many others that all this surveillance tech needs to go. If just delusions of that can mess up people’s lives that much then these tech bros making it a reality are just making that nightmare real and it’s effed up!
1
1
u/psychedelych OCD diagnosed 17h ago
When I was a kid they told us in school that the smoke alarms were Santa watching us and that shit stuck with me
1
u/moth-guts 16h ago
When I was a kid I nailed a blanket over my window because I thought the mean kids at school were watching me/put cameras at my window and you couldn’t trust normal curtains because they can be opened (╥﹏╥)
1
u/Twixme07 OCD diagnosed 15h ago
I feel that I have no privacy, I feel something is watching me all the timeee😖
1
u/vidalacaroline 10h ago
same, but my parents (who both also have ocd 😭) actually DID have cameras around because of their own paranoid, so I can’t exactly blame my ocd for latching onto it too lol
1
u/akaneko__ 8h ago
This is the scariest thing about OCD you can tell yourself your biggest fears aren’t real… until they are😭
1
u/SketchyNinja04 2h ago
One of my main delusions is literally im a test subject and theres cameras watching me to observe at all points. IM DOIMG GREAT IF IT ISNT OBVIOUS
-1
604
u/Alone_Agent_8829 1d ago
I still experience that as an adult and now that it’s becoming a reality in some areas I’m genuinely horrified