- Date posted
- 1y
Drunk false memories?
Anyone have a real event / false memory but because you were drunk it feels even more scary? Mine has real details , false details and I don’t know what’s real.
Anyone have a real event / false memory but because you were drunk it feels even more scary? Mine has real details , false details and I don’t know what’s real.
Honestly, I used to be a heavy drinker. I would even haved classed myself as a low-level alcoholic! Drinking used to make my OCD so much worse the next day. I used to struggle with false memory OCD and drinking only exacerbated this for me. To be completely honest, there is no way of knowing what part of the details are real or false. This is what OCD thrives on. The fact is, we can never have 100% uncertainty about anything in life. OCD wants to be 100% certain about everything and anything in life, and this is why those of us with OCD get so caught out trying to remember every single tiny detail. We have to just accept the fact that we will never have 100% certainty surrounding this doubt/question in our mind, and we will be okay with this! You can handle not knowing for sure what happened! Even I sometimes, on a rare occasion nowadays, have an OCD flare-up. Yesterday I had an intrusive thought whilst doing a normally daily chore, and suddenly I started to question if I acted on the thought. It made me feel so terrible, guilty, and completely OPPOSITE of my character and values. The way I dealt with it was by telling myself this: “I know exactly what this is. It is another one of OCDs tricks. I know that I will never have 100% certainty about this question, and I have to accept that, and I am okay with that🫶🏾✨” This is a non-engagement response to OCD. Don’t get me wrong, the doubt and anxiety surrounding the obsession can still pop up, but whenever it does, I just tell myself the above statement in my mind, and I just sit with the uncertainty and uncomfortableness.
Just to add as well (sorry, I know it’s a long response 😂). It may be difficult at first to sit with these feelings and uncertainty. God knows how scary it was for me at first. But as the saying goes, “if you do what you have always done, you will get what you have always got”. This means if you don’t change the way you view OCD or respond to it, the outcome will be the same. However, if you start to look at OCD for what it is (a bully), and you start to realise that you don’t have to interact with these thoughts/doubts/feelings, the outcome you receive will be different! It’s hard at first, honestly, at some points I felt so so scared. But facing your fears is what gets you out of this horrible cycle.
@AaronB1111 Thank you for your response it honestly means a lot. I think I stuffed myself over from the start by engaging, it literally just started as an ‘what if’ thought , then became an intrusive thought , then started to become really real when I started guessing details getting them correct , adding in feelings etc , I think I’ve just done this to myself. Your so right, I need to learn to not engage when I get these thoughts, I just worry it’s too late now
It’s never too late Lilly! Honestly, the fact that you have now realised that you have been engaging in unhelpful compulsive behaviours is a huge achievement! You just gotta tell yourself now: “Look, compulsions haven’t helped me and they will never help me. I know this is OCD trying to trick me, but I will not let OCD win anymore!” I am perfectly fine with accepting the fact that I will never be 100% certain about this!” Another helpful thing to add I might say, is that if it feels like it is even a 0.01% that this is OCD, treat it as such! OCD is the opposite of who you are! It will target the things that you value, that you love, and that you care about! Always remember that OCD can try and make you believe anything! It is up to you to disengage from anything that doesn’t align with who you are!
Does anyone else’s false memory intrusive thoughts of what could have happened feel very, very real?
So. I was in a traumatic relationship. for a long time. it was filled with gaslighting, manipulation, abuse, cheating ect. I would OBSESS over finding out where they were, what they were doing, who they were talking too. but I couldn’t leave. I tried so hard but I never could. they would call me names, physically hurt me, throw things, break things. because I would question them all the time. but I just couldn’t leave. no matter what I knew. they would manipulate me. I fell for their childhood trauma. it’s like I lost all logic. but I also feel like I have a pretty good memory with memories. not all the way, but remembering a lot of the traumatic things. especially now that I’m no longer with them. I keep remembering things that’s happened. even from my childhood. one time way before I even started dating this person, I had an intrusive thought about a friend of mine. that was with me. and I freaked out. I thought I had acted on the intrusive thought the next day. I asked my friend for confirmation but they said nothing happened. but the memories about it feel SO REAL. so VIVID. but they swore that nothing happened and they had no idea what I was talking about. I’ve struggled with intrusive thoughts for my whole life. so fast forward to now, that ‘false memory’ from my friend randomly popped up and I started obsessing about it, and my childhood ‘memories’ that have popped up. and then I was reading an article of someone doing something horrible, and then it sounded ‘familiar’ and so then I’ve created this whole memory of me doing something similar to the article involving my partner doing it also. the memory keeps adding new things and conversations around it. when it involves an actual real memory. but it’s like it’s been twisted from what I remembered before. I also suffer from bad anxiety. I’ve stalked pictures. my search history to figure out what I was doing that say when the real event happened. and I’ve found some things but I can’t look through my texts because I got a new phone. it has been hounding me for months. MONTHS. trying to figure out if this new ‘memory’ is real or not. if it’s been fabricated by an intrusive thought from reading the article and thinking ‘what if’ or if it actually happened and because I’m no longer in this relationship it’s a ‘repressed memory’ but the thing is I have horrible horrible anxiety and I don’t think I could have gone this long knowingly that that happened without remembering it until now. because I remember a lot of the horrible things that they did. this ‘memory’ is fuzzy, but it brings me horrible anxiety when I think of it, like I feel like it happened. but I also feel like it didn’t happen. because I know I would never do anything like that. but WHAT IF I DID, because I was manipulated. idk. is this a false memory. I really need help. because it’s been debilitating. that relationship was really traumatic. and I got manipulated into a lot of things. but I wouldn’t have just went forward knowing that that happened??? there’s no way I could have just forgotten it. because before when I would think about that night it was different, until now. but what if I just made myself forget what truly happened?? I’m a pretty self aware individual, but somehow that relationship really REALLY put me into a trance somehow where I allowed things that I have no idea how I would even allow because before I met that person I would have never allowed someone to cheat on my constantly or talk to me the way they did. or allow abuse. like I don’t understand it.
When false memories have popped up for you guys, did they feel real straight away like pop up like a memory but you’re still doubting whether they’re real?
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