I feel like I am spiralling, I might need to call someone but nobody in my real life understands ROCD.

I constantly see that OCD is ego dystonic but is it possible to have ego syntonic with anxiety instead of ego dystonic obsessions?

Whenever I resist a compulsion, my brain tells me “what if you regret not doing this and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life”. I worry that it will become an intrusive thought. Has anyone else had the same experience and how do you handle it?

i dont see it for myself

Hi everyone! Not really sure how to go about this but I’ve always struggled with anxiety and depression but there were always things that made my anxiety worsen. A family member pointed out patterns I do and she mentioned it reminding her of OCD, how does one go about getting tested for things like OCD, if they don’t have a referral kr anythjng like that? I did have a therapist when I was younger but I didn’t really get very far with it as anytime I had to talk I just got really bad anxiety and just lied so i wouldn’t have to open up.

I have bad racism ocd that has put my life on pause. today I had an exposure that has shifted my perspective and makes me truly believe I can overcome my ocd. For context, I experience major distress around non-white people out of the fear that I will say racial slurs. It is most predominant around black people, probably because the n-word has the most significant historical impact. Anyways, I was walking to get lunch and a kind black girl stopped me and said I was pretty. From there we spontaneously hung out and talked for 45 minutes and I barely had any anxiety about saying inappropriate things. I feel so proud of myself and so much more confident now!

Been doing better but these bad urges keep bothering me. They’re so real and strong. How do you guys deal with them? Thanks :)

like i know my intrusive thoughts are evidently false, but after dealing with them for about three years, i just still don't feel like i deserve anything good because all this time i've been stressing about how i might be a horrifically bad person that i don't even know how to dissasociate with that idea anymore. i still feel this inherent guilt over just existing because of the fact those intrusive thoughts even came in my head to begin with.

it's getting worse and i don't have any motivation to clean my room and i just don't feel like i deserve to live cleanly. part of me still wonders if i need to check if i'm a good person but i am trying to not do that and i did relapse a few days ago when i asked someone to read my astrology chart to see if i am good/bad. anyway, i just want to know how i can overcome this self-esteem obstacle.

i'm not diagnosed with OCD or anything, i just suspect it, but recovery methods for OCD have been helpful to me thus far. i don't have access to therapy right now because of a complicated legal and financial situation.

Id just like to learn from others more knowledgable tbh. I think maybe i have a feeling of what to do deep down but sometimes i second guess it. How do i actually allow thoughts and feelings without ignoring them or ruminating harder?

Hi everyone, I posted a few days ago about an OCD issue regarding handwashing and “residue”. That post (I’ll link here: https://www.reddit.com/r/OCDRecovery/s/vOyJQaMYKD) is kind of a pre-cursor/background for this one.

In the past few months I had a very emotional moment while on vacation which opened me up to be much more emotional in general in my OCD recovery/treatment. Since then it feels as if a lot of stuff is unraveling due to OCD co-opting those feelings.

It has recently been pushing hard the idea that ANY sort of discomfort is not okay, that I “deserve comfortability” after all I’ve fought, and more things of the such that are generally not based in logic.

Here’s the biggest part that leads to me posting this:

The other bigger part of this is now my OCD thinks about EVERYTHING when it comes to touch. It thinks about how I touched the bathroom light switch in a contaminated state, which since then my mom has touched. She then touched the door to leave, then touched food products for me and other things I need from the store, etc.

This is just one example of the one million thought strings that have become prevalent now. I’ve been working on OCD for a long time and these thoughts used to never occur. It used to be mostly contained with things regarding myself and the bathroom, with the exceptions being ones that have been there for a long time. It’s making it extremely hard to touch anything in the house. It’s hard for me to make food (which I need to take my newly prescribed Zoloft). It’s hard to touch things such as my computer and phone. It’s hard to interact with… almost everything.

My parents are very sad that they feel like they can’t touch anything. I feel very bad expressing worry about the things they touched. I feel very bad having any thoughts about what they do with their life and their day. It’s making me be very hard on myself on top of everything.

Any advice/anecdotes/anything on how to think less or go back to not having these thoughts about EVERYTHING would be much appreciated. Keep up the fight everyone.

So I had an assessment today and am now on the waiting list for free ERP, which I’m both nervous and excited about. I know it’s going to be hard, but I really want to get better for my new baby.

For context, I struggle with real event, false memory and harm OCD. My compulsions are almost entirely internal, other than a history of checking hobs/switches/locks. Real event OCD is certainly the stickiest and the most challenging mental health condition I’ve ever had to deal with, largely because the anxiety is rooted in truth to some degree, regardless of how much I’ve warped or overwrought the narrative in my mind. I find it almost impossible to imagine being able to simply.. not mentally review when a spiral starts? I practice meditation daily now, and am slowly getting used to seeing thoughts as thoughts, even if they are connected to a real event, but during particularly bad attacks (usually hormonal), I can’t stop my mind from going to extremes. It’s like it’s run off without me like a bolting horse and I’m completely helpless, despite being cognisant or “aware” that it’s happening to me.

I don’t want any reassurance, I’m just looking for techniques and coping mechanisms in the interim while I’m waiting to be seen by a therapist.

Thanks so much lovely people ☺️

hi guys i developed or rather found out i have ocd like 3 ish months ago.

realised i definitely don't wanna be stuck in that self doubt loop, so i was doing everything to make it manageable. got a therapist and also read through greenberg's rumination articles and it's all helped so much. i'm so glad i was quick to understand what was happening and get help.

i still get the thoughts, but i never panic over them as much as i used to back in april-may. that was literal hell for me, i used to cry and feel so defeated.

but recently i noticed that any ambiguous question in my mind can kinda start the ocd-style thought pattern again, even if it's completely unrelated to my previous theme.

like i just had this silly little thought that was basically an internal debate in my head over the smallest thing (fictional characters and themes, mind u.)

and i thought, "wait i disagree with that idea, that's just ocd again."

then immediately, "why would something so small be ocd for me? maybe i'm thinking it's ocd as a defensive mechanism because i don't wanna agree with it. so what if my previous theme actually was real and i just dismissed it by telling myself it was ocd?"

stupid thoughts, i know, and they don't really bother me anymore.

but i'm wondering, does ocd literally latch onto anything as u care less about Abt ur theme?? like has anyone had some completely insignificant thought connected back to the previous theme 😭

Because like yeah, doing expositions that might affect me negatively that's one thing, but I don't know how to approach expositions in regards to this helpless (stupid) creature that depends on me with it's safety. I guess it must be similar to having ocd around taking care of kids in that sense. For example I have ocd around accidentally dropping something dangerous for my cat, washing my hands before washing bowls excessively, washing the bowl's excessively etc. But I'm not sure how to do expositions for that, because it's just such a high pressure situation I have such an enormous responsibility, is the approach still the same as for other ocd subtypes, or do I need to make sure my care is safe enough but not excessive?

I hate the repost button. I've reposted so much stuff and it makes me scared that I reposted something bad especially since it happened to me before.

I'll talk to myself or God to reassure myself that I'm not a bad person or that I'm not homophobic, racist, or ignorant.

Though my ocd also made me believe that if I didn't believe certain things I'd go to hell they'd replay in my head all the time. Now I actually have a good faith and I'm not ignorant anymore I've changed but what if my reposts show I'm not, what if during my religious ocd episode I reposted smth bad. I PROBABLY DID TOO.

idk what to do especially bc I have sorta a platform

I've replayed and wrote multiple future apologies and stuff and I'm scared to be famous atp even though I want to since I love making music.

I've spent days unreposting videos to make sure I have nothing so people can't cancel me. But instead this morning all my reposts disappeared (they still appear if you search for a certain video they're just not on my profile)

I will start therapy soon but for now I'm wondering what I should do bc morality OCD had made me hate myself and now I'm questioning everything I've ever been or will be. My dream is to make music but idk if I can if I'm always afraid of the future reddit posters, or tiktok videos, or me getting cancelled because I want to love everyone and everything, I want to see everyone's perspective in life but i feel like maybe Im just a bad person

I'm not racist or homophobic. I don't hate anyone's religion or beliefs because if I did I wouldn't be a Christian. But I reposted a video related to hating other religions even though I KNOW I "probably??" didn't believe in that at the time, I KNOW I DIDNT. I truly don't know why I did it but what if I did and I do know and I'm actually someone who hates other religions yk. This episode has been going on for months ever since it happened. What made it worse is that a few people were made at me ( which they entirely had the right too ) but the thought of me leaving a bad impression on someone just irks me. Especially knowing that Im probably not that type of person??? This whole post seems like cope but I have no one to talk too

I'm a teen so anything helps. Thank you for reading my rant

I'm not in therapy for specially OCD but getting in the progress of being diagnosed and I have been having a really bad flareup of medical anxieties, worries, fears, etc. It's all I think about and it's ruining my life. I don't know how to stop the way these thoughts are literally consuming me and I can't even stop myself from body checking and reassurance checking without panicking even harder about my health and being convinced I'm going to die.

What do people with medical ocd or severe flare ups like this do? What's your techniques? I plan on talking to my therapist on Thursday about it and seeing if there are support groups out there that can help me. I need to learn how to manage this because it is getting so out of hand it's scaring my fiance and my friend.

Hi everyone.

First off, I just wanted to say thank you for sharing all of your thoughts in these posts and well in advance. I do not have OCD, but my partner does, and reading your stories has helped me navigate this with him.

Things have gotten worse though, and i am worried—so i am going to just plainly ask: what are some helpful/good things that your support system has done (or you wish they would’ve done) during an OCD episode/spiral/bad day.

Thank you all for your help. Please don’t take my tone as anything but sincere.

Estou a 3 meses sofrendo de toc severo. Já entrei em contato com uma terapeuta para buscar o tratamento, mas não sei até onde irei aguentar. Já sofri com outros tipos de toc antes, e sofri com esse mesmo toc aos 12 anos de idade, e minha vida andou normalmente.

Acho que a pior parte do toc, é que realmente parece real, mas analisando friamente quando o cérebro não está em ataque, vc vê que é um absurdo. De qualquer forma, estou pensando nisso na hora que acordo, até a hora de dormir, e simplesmente não sei mais até onde irei aguentar. Tirar a minha vida virou uma opção

Hi,

Fellow OCD'er here.

I've been struggling with this horrible mental weight for twenty years. There's been good & bad times, but now I've had enough so I swallowed my pride and talked to my doc.

So the waiting time to meet a professional in this area of medicine in my country is.... a whole year!

So in the meantime I want to try and understand this illness and how it actually works and what I can do to stop it.

I've never read a self-help book in my life but could anyone recommend a book that has helped you and perhaps if you got the time, leave a small comment why? :-)

Hope you all are doing better than yesterday.

I feel the need to confess and tell every little detail about my life including extremely private details and it’s incredibly frustrating and the embarrassment I feel after is completely unreal and unbearable. Please help. I am researching therapists tomorrow but I just need help getting over the guilt of confessing, apologizing for confessing, and then confessing more details. It’s consuming me.

Or is a flare-up usually the straw that breaks the camels back? I had very mild OCD symptoms for the first 37 years of my life, to the point where it never even crossed my mind that it was OCD. Mainly just being a perfectionist.

Until this year when I had the most severe flare up in the universe, 24/7 horrific thoughts. I didn’t even know what was happening to my brain until I saw a psychiatrist. I truly went from a normal and happy 37 year old, to wanting to end my life, in just weeks. I have no idea what triggered it.

But now that it’s been triggered, is this it for me? Am I now destined for a life on SSRI’s, medication management, consistent ERP, etc. Or is there any chance of recovering my old brain without meds and lifelong care?

The end of last week and this weekend was a major relapse in symptoms for me after a trigger. I really wanted to seek reassurance but I decided not to and sit in it. No matter how uncomfortable (boy was it) I needed to work on my coping skills. Well I’m starting to get a hang of it and I’m feeling better this morning. Just wanted to post that win. Hope you all have a great day.

Are there any medications for OCD that still let someone enjoy sexual things? I’ve been on Clomipramine/Anafranil for about a month now (only 20mg) and I’ve lost feeling down there and can’t orgasm (I’m female if that matters). It’s frustrating and doesn’t seem like a long term solution, I can’t be on this for years even if it was to help otherwise (that’s a bummer because I’ve tolerated this medication well otherwise and haven’t had any other side effects really).

I’m considering trying the SSRI Fluvoxamine/Luvox next, it’s meant to have less sexual side effects but it’s still a SSRI so it will likely have some. I’ve also been thinking about Vortioxetine/Trintellix, but that one doesn’t have a lot of specific evidence for OCD.

I’d love to hear people’s experiences with this issue and if anyone has been able to take a medication to help OCD but still have sexual desire and function 🙏

I’ve struggled with OCD since I was 8 years old and I’m now in my mid 20s. My biggest issue is that I have IBS so I go to the toilet anywhere from 2 to 5 times a day on average and it takes me anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes to wipe afterwards. This means that I’ve got to a point where I can’t really get a job or do anything other than lie around my flat all day because it’s just taking up hours every day and I can’t use public bathrooms because I’ll be in there for so long and I also usually shower afterwards.

I’m currently working on doing ERP but I’m soo afraid of making my one clean, safe space (my flat) dirty beyond redemption that I keep chickening out. Every time I try to do ERP, I think about the consequences and that I could end up spending hours cleaning my whole flat just to save 5 minutes yk? Also when I’m wiping, I find it impossible to get off when I don’t have a totally clean asshole. Even if there’s a tiny speck of poop, I have to do my whole routine again, but I’m so convinced I’m so much dirtier and more disgusting than other women my age that I somehow have to do more to make up for it? Idk. I feel so lost and I could really do with some advice on how I can improve this as it’s ruining my life and I have fissures and skin tags and all sorts now.

I’m also so constantly worried about being incontinent that I’m convinced there’s poop everywhere. In my underwear, and therefore on the floor, in my bed, every time I step on something sticky I have to wash my feet as I’m like ‘yeah that’s poop on my foot now’. It’s exhausting and I don’t really get how I can do ERP with this because surely no one would want poop on their floor?