Does anyone else ever have bad thoughts?

@Generiname lol

@Generiname How do you get past the thoughts that you’re gonna act on your intrusive thoughts?

@Stacey353 Quite simply, they are just thoughts. Awful, horrid thoughts. But thoughts all the same. I have terrible harm related intrusive thoughts, but I know they go against my values. If they didn't, I wouldn't feel so disgusted by them and would ENJOY these thoughts. They would thrill me! Which they don't.

@Stacey353 I wish I had more options other than "put on a fun show you enjoy and try to experience the fun sides of life a little" WHILST you're suffering. Because god knows that's still a very difficult thing to do. I'm still learning myself here, but that's what I do. I try to find something I love doing and... well, DO it! Bad feelings or not!

@Generiname Do you worry about ever just snapping or losing control?

@Stacey353 I think we all do, if we suffer from this disorder. But... we dont! We keep ourselves prisoner to a hypothetical situation that goes completely against our values. And doesn't that sound like a terrible way to live? Give yourself some grace. Take some time to comfort yourself and say "you know, this is a really awful way to feel, and I am so sorry you're going through this."

@Generiname Thank you so much.

@Loranqadri Thank you so much for responding to me!

@Loranqadri Mine too started after trauma due to PTSD

@Love1another<3 What kind of erp did you do for the harm thoughts bc I don’t have insurance and I can’t afford it

@Love1another<3 I did rep for a little while but we were addressing my fear of driving and not these awful thoughts so I don’t know what to do. :(

@Love1another<3 What kind of thoughts did you have and what kind of erp do you do? I need therapy but I don’t have insurance and can’t afford it :(

@Stacey353 - Hi :) I'm very sorry to hear that ERP isn't affordable. On the bright side, a lot of ppl have done ERP on their own and they still were successful. You just have to be aware of hidden compulsions you do (mental and/or physical) and try your best to eliminate them. BTW there's an affordable option for you here at NOCD. At this company, you are allowed to meet a therapist for a minimum of 30 minutes every 90 days (that's 2 hours a year), and that still counts as you being in therapy. And you might be able to pay out of pocket for that since those meetings will be rare. If you do those meetings, it grants you access to all of the support groups (which occur daily). So even though you meet with your therapist every 90 days- you can still have access to support groups with licensed therapists- any day of the week that you want and you can ask them any questions you want or just listen to other people describe their symptoms and ERP journeys. And those support groups are completely free. So I think that's a great deal :)

@Stacey353 - I am very similar to you in that I used to have a lot of anxiety around my harm intrusive thoughts and I had a fear of acting on them. In ERP I learned that OCD isn't only intrusive thoughts, it comes with intrusive urges, intrusive images, intrusive feelings, groinals, etc. OCD plagues you with anxiety about these thoughts because they are the opposite of who you are. For example, its common for teachers to have harm intrusive thoughts about kids. And it's common for mothers to have intrusive thoughts about their own babies. Intrusive thoughts happen to everyone- even people without OCD. It's just that with Ocd they get stuck in our heads. We need to learn to let our intrusions float by like clouds. My core fear is being a bad person (since being a good person is who I always strive to be). Ocd is the opposite of who you are. Once I found out that core fear, my therapist assigned me exposures to trigger my intrusive thoughts about "what if I'm a bad person?" We made a hierarchy of how distressing my exposures were and I started from easiest to hardest. Some examples (in no particular order) were thinking harm thoughts on purpose, watching short serial killer youtube documentaries, watching videos of police "baker acting" people, watching videos inside psych hospitals, keeping a knife by my bedside table, answering my therapist's risk assessment several times over, etc.