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the NOCD Community

How does one move on from having intrusive thoughts and feelings?

Sometimes I find it crazy how I used to be so unbothered before ROCD. I wonder since it was triggered so quickly if one day I’ll be able to feel how I did before all of this. Now everything that I think or do has to relate back to my relationship. Every Instagram post or thing I say or tiktok I see I wonder, what would he think if I liked this? Do I like this? Does he like this? Is it morally right for us to like this? What if he likes this and it’s not right, what will people think? I’m honestly tired of caring so much and my brain numbs out. It feels so weird to me since I lived most of my life happy and with free. I really want to try and get back to those calm times where I could love him freely. I get scared that I’m stuck this way forever.

How do you practice overcoming these thoughts? I read that accepting, allowing it to exist without interaction can help, but I don’t know how to apply it or how long it can last

Ok so for a little but of background before my ROCD started I had bad health anxiety/ocd, I was super worried I was going to die, but as well, thought my partner was going to die, and was insistent on them getting checked by the doctor, I was so scared to lose them. Once I got answers for my health concerns, it flipped pretty much over night to feelings of him being a stranger to me, our memories didn't feel real and I was very numbed out. 6 months later I'm still dealing with this, and I'm honestly still in shock about it. My question is, now, the relationship doubts are there, but also I'm starting to notice the "worried about him dying thoughts" pop in, which confuses me, because I never ever want to lose him so I understand being worried about his health but then it immediately flips back to, "why do you even care anyway" Is this normal? Maybe the ROCD started because I was scared to lose him in the first place? Has anyone else experienced this weird flip flop in between being scared to lose them one moment, and then back to numbness the next?

I just recently got diagnosed with OCD. Things are making more sense, but I’m so scared. I don’t know what to do. I have always had horrific intrusive thoughts and compulsions, but I kind of just assumed it was normal and that everyone experienced them. Now that I know for sure that’s not true, I feel so isolated and gross. I feel like I can’t tell anyone. Does it even get better?

I don't understand how to calm down long enough to explain my OCD to those around me, and I don't even feel comfortable enough to open up to those around me. But, I miss my parents/nieces so much but my parents won't let me around my nieces because my bf (I live with) and I have had arguments recently and my mom told me my niece (9) told her therapist about my argument with my ex bf 5 years ago, and my mom said it was traumatic for my niece (I kicked my bf out of my house because he was a compulsive liar and I caught him in another lie). I feel like my parents truly believe I am a terrible person and they aren't willing to make time for me to actually get to know me. I feel uncomfortable like I can't be myself around them and it leads me to feeling like I have no family. My nieces are my favorite people in the world and I love them a lot but it feels like my mom is using my own trauma against me by saying she doesn't want me to traumatize my nieces with my mental illness. My nieces are the only people that treat me like a human being and love me unconditionally. I just feel like somewhere between 18 and leaving for college, and now 23 still in college and living on my own, my parents and I have drifted so much and it feels like they are relieved to see less of me. I don't have anyone that I feel like I can open up to, except for my bf but my ROCD loves to ruin that too (and my bf's parents keep calling him and telling him to leave me because I am a sociopath). I was supposed to go to my nieces' dance recital today but I have been so anxious the past few days because I'm worried everyone will be able to tell I have POCD intrusive thoughts and it feels so wrong to sit in a theatre and watch little girls dance. My brain keeps making it out to be so creepy. On top of that, I started new medication for my PTSD nightmares, and it made me drowsy and oversleep today and I feel horrible. I told my mom I couldn't make it today and I am left sitting with this guilt because she always tells me I let my nieces down and I am so scared I will legitimately have nobody. They almost moved to another state last year and they didn't even consider me when making that decision because they said I never come around anyway but I don't come around because they don't understand my condition and they don't take the time to understand my condition so they just treat me like I'm not worth the energy or empathy and being in their company makes me feel worse but I would do anything in this world to have them love me again. I just feel so consumed by the anxiety and I know if I open up to my parents they are just going to tell me to pray about it and I am no where near ready to even think about religion again and it just feels like when it comes to my family, it triggers every single theme and I end up feeling hopeless and depressed and I don't know how to get better. I keep going back to being a kid and my parents both loving me before I started getting more depressed/anxious because of my brain. I also feel like my family doesn't know how to act around each other unless we are bonding over our trauma together. We don't know how to converse about anything other than that. I feel like I don't have parents anymore and I feel like I am begging strangers to love me and let me into their lives/hearts but they make it seem like they can't be around me too much because I've caused them too much pain and I don't know how to deal with that guilt of hurting them. And I know both of my parents probably have some OCD too and I worry if I open up to them then I will ruin both of their lives even more. I just don't know what to do I just want to feel like I have a mom or dad. Or anyone.

I just need help understanding that not every difference or disagreement needs to end in a horrible relationship with constant arguments or dissatisfaction. My boyfriend is very words of affirmation and enjoys acknowledging that he spoils me. Growing up my household, was very anti-words of affirmation, seeing it as gloating. So I interpret his self appreciation as throwing it in my face that he buys me things or treat me well. These things don’t mix very well but we know this and work on it. Unfortunately my mind thinks that since we’re not perfect with this it’s going to just cause building resentment and cause huge fights and ultimately end our relationship. Obviously this doesn’t have to be the case but how can I internalize this? When I’m triggered I get so fixated and think this will be the end of us (amongst other themes and triggers) it’s just tiring thinking everything ends in failure, or that I’m the only person in a relationship that is trying to work though something like this and that everyone else just finds someone that is able to 100% meet every need all the time. Any advice or support?

It’s been only a day since I received an OCD diagnosis. Several days since the episode that caused me to seek help began. Already I’m so fucking exhausted. This isn’t my first episode—they come and go and I used to think it was just anxiety—but it just feels like my brain isn’t mine. I’ve been super dissociated for several days. I’m so in my head, I have tunnel vision. I’m over-analyzing every single thought. I’m scared I’ll never feel like myself again and I’m scared no one has obsessions as weirdly specific and as shameful as mine. I just want my brain back!!

I have been in therapy since the end of January and I have made so much improvement since then. I would have never thought that in four months I have made as much improvement as I have. Recently I took a medication for a skin condition that messed with my hormones and set me back a bit but with all of the tools and knowledge I have gained I’m so proud that I was able to come back from that. My main themes are about being in the perfect relationship, questioning love, and over all black and white thinking. It’s still hard because the thoughts are still there and I have an anxious gut feeling a lot throughout the day but I know it will only get better from here. Please don’t give up on trying to heal yourself, it is so worth it. ROCD is not about your partner, it’s about you.

My ocd was about loyalty towards my gf every bad thought I had towards her had to tell her or felt guilty for thinking somsones better looking and have to tell her now I’m over that and in my next stage of ocd after help I feel overwhelming attraction towards girls I used to not be able to look at them for a year and now I feel bad and like I should be single if that’s how I feel

I have been obsessed with my relationships since my first boyfriend. I always have spent hours at a time with friends or myself doubting the relationship, combing over every interaction as undeniable proof they are unsafe or cheaters or liars or like they are actually abusive and it’s a matter of time before I am trapped with them. Breaking up always brings me significant relief. I always thought that I am just scared of relationships because my parents have a horrible marriage and were emotionally neglectful, so I figured I was just messed up, and maybe traumatized by one person who did cheat. I’m married to someone who loves me very much, who I trust more than anyone but I will oscillate between loving him and fearing him so much that I begin planning how I can divorce and move out and get away from him. If we don’t interact enough because we are working and tired, it’s a matter of time before I feel like I don’t know who he is and all the little things in our relationship that are not perfect, or legitimate but common relationship issues, just build in my head as evidence and it’ll go beyond facts into obsessive fear. I become paranoid he is cheating on me and is neglecting me while using me for money or whatever other benefit. Just in general, a terrible person that has yet to fully reveal himself. We honestly have issues every few days or week or so and I just become consumed. I’ll call friends or journal or just cry and panic for hours. We just moved to another state together where he is working a new job and I have been losing my mind. A few google searches led me to ROCD and I just cried reading the NOCD article about it. We both saw me in it exactly. I was diagnosed with severe OCD last year but it’s still unveiling itself to me because I had no idea how prevalent it was in my life. One thing I have been struggling with is staring at other women in public. It’s almost like I am constantly scanning for someone prettier or better than me for my husband to wish he was with instead. I’m constantly comparing myself but the worst is I accidentally look at people too much, and then I become intensely fearful that they know and I am being weird. Even when I am alone, probably because I am consumed with fears he will leave me, I am still scanning and obsessively looking at other people. It’s become semi uncontrollable and I’m trying to work on it now. Especially living in a new place, where I wanted this to be a fresh start, I want to be “perfect” and everyone I meet think I am normal and sociable, staring at people is making me terrified that everyone will know something is wrong with me and reject me instead. Sorry I wrote a book. I haven’t explored OCD in a meaningful way since my diagnosis (or any of the years I had a suspicion of OCD), and I am becoming genuinely shocked at how much it might be impacting my life in ways I was never aware of. I feel relief and hope because not knowing these behaviors may be OCD has been devastating and scary.

Have anyone tried erp for soocd? How does it look like? I heard that it's about not caring or exposing yourself to the trigger or many other things. I'm a little confursed now how it all works

It always happens to me where I have 2 really good weeks of anxiety free days where I don’t miss any days of work.. then I feel proud of myself for not missing work and having good weeks. Then this week I’ve missed 2 days of work and can’t get myself to get dressed and do anything. It feels so hopeless. Just when I think I’m doing better I have a really rough week

hi okay so i don't even know if i have ocd i mean i have been told i do by multiple of my friends who do and really relate to like. everything but i feel bad even considering it bc i don't think mine (if it is) is nearly as bad as other peoples so i feel like ??? i don't deserve to say that i have it since it's not too bad??? i don't know if that makes sense. anyway that wasn't what i was going to go into detail abt here but im currently having an issue that my friend said sounds like ocd and it's really bothering me so here i am this is going to sound really ridiculous probably but. so i'm a kpop stan right. and i ult this one group (i'll call them #1) and i have for years. one time i did ult another group over them (i'll say #2) and my ult bias was someone else. and then they disbanded on my birthday bc of unfair circumstances. So then after #1 became my ult group again. now i just saw another group (let's say #3) in concert and when i was there i was like wow i kinda love my bias in this group more than anyone in the world. and i had to consider like ulting him above anyone else and having #3 as my ult group. but after what happened when i put #2 above #1 im terrified something bad is going to happen to #3. and i know that it will like. I don't know how to explain it but im sure if you're reading this you understand the feeling of being so sure you're going to cause harm to people you care about. and i know i can't ask for reassurance that it won't happen bc 1. i know that doesn't help in the long run 2. it's not like i would believe it if people tell me bc i think about how it's not physically possible to prove 100% that something won't happen 3. i think that saying it won't happen will make it happen and then a few days ago i saw that my #3 bias was sick (like a cold) and i had a really bad breakdown and couldn't breathe and felt like i was gonna be sick and almost had to call off work (i should have i was shaking for half my shift). and i feel like because i even considered it that it's my fault. and that something even worse will happen to him if i actually do it. and that scares me so much i don't want to hurt him i don't. i don't i don't i don't im so worried. and then i learned that he got sick after the concert i went to. where i thought abt how i love him more than anyone else. so now i really think it's my fault and that i'm hurting him by loving him. anyway im scared and stressed out and i don't even want to talk to my friends rn bc all i can think about is this and i'm sure they're tired of me hearing this but i just. i don't know what to do. i have this bracelet i made that has his name on it and now i can't take it off bc i think something bad will happen if i do. i was driving the other day and said if i saw a yellow car by the time the song i was listening to ended then something bad would happen. and then next song i said green. and i never saw either color but i saw blue and yellow and green make blue??? and i had thought blue for a second so something bad might happen then??? and then i said something bad would happen if i was behind a car with y in its license plate but i wasn't paying attention sometimes so what if one had a y but i missed it and now something bad will happen. i don't even know if anyone can help me but. Idk if this needed a trigger warning but i put one just incase

I can’t tell if I have anxiety or OCD. I tend to think I’m anxious loops aboht a very specific topic and it gets worse and worse until it’s unbearable. There are a lot of things I need to do “just right”, like the timing of my music when I’m on walks, or the color mixing and fit of my outfit. I am never satisfied in my relationships (romantic and platonic) because I always question whether I’m in it with the right person. I’ve developed a set of rules someone must meet for me to like them, except these rules are all just manifestations of my own personality traits, no one ever meets them, and I am always dissatisfied with all my friends. I had to break up with my last (almost) boyfriend because I couldn’t decide if I liked him or not because he didn’t have the “right” traits. I have never known if I liked any of my friends and this even extends to my mother who may be difficult but who loves and cares for me very much. It makes me feel like a bad person and relationship partner, but I get over this by telling myself it’s okay to treat these people poorly because they are not my “true” friends, partners, etc. I always need people to think I’m “good” - there are parts of my life I HAVE to portray properly to different people so they like me and I HAVE to share it with them so I can control the image of me they have in their heads and so they can like this manifestation of myself I’ve created. I have trouble making decisions because I always consider every possible outcome, and if I do it for too long, I just lose the ability to make the decision because I can’t choose the right option and I freeze. This has happened to me while driving and I’ve almost crashed my car because of it. I often get flashbacks to times I have humiliated myself, and I sometimes tense up my body and close my eyes to get rid of them, sometimes ruminate. I go in and out of phases of lining up all my things in certain ways and I have very rigid moral principles that when I stray from them, I get immense guilt. I have also developed a recent problem where I worry I have a certain mental illnesses (I’ve had a BPD phase, and NPD, OCPD, and autism). I NEED to know immediately if I have the mental illness so I can use it as a scapegoat for all my problems, so I google everything about the illness and obsessively read multiple studies to prove if I have the illness or not. This usually makes my mental illness speculation cycles worse. I also go in and out of phases of having a rigid daily routine, but this is usually only if I have something to “accomplish” (often weight loss, social activity, or homework related). I also have a problem where I HAVE to do things in the most time-efficient, cost efficient, or resource-efficient way possible or I will feel guilty or bothered by the waste. Whag complicates this is a couple things. I have had specific rumination cycles for quite a while, but I don’t always do compulsions to get rid of them. Sometimes I just sit with them till they drive me crazy. This makes me worry I don’t have OCD and I actually have anxiety - in fact I have a GAD diagnosis from an ex therapist (I dumped her because I kept worrying she was “wrong” for me and wouldn’t understand my problems and give me an improper diagnosis. This to me is reminiscent of ROCD but maybe I am also just picky). I also have ADHD - pure ocd is often comorbid with ADHD as I have read, but I fear my problems may just be a manifestation of people pleasing + RSD (adhd symptom) + other ADHD tendencies. I have also read about overfocused ADHD (a newly researched ADHD subtype that is not yet in any diagnostic manual) and worry this may be my issue. I also think I may “forget” whag compuslions help me due to ADHD working memory issues - but this is just a personal theory backed in no research. I also worry that all these issues could be a manifestation of autism (rigidness and social difficulties) but maybe the problem is my worry about this and not an actual presence of ASD, who knows. And maybe my worries are just a result of my upbringing - I did have an extremely strict, rigid, and rules and image-oriented mother, who also claims she has OCD but takes it lightly because she doesn’t like mental health diagnoses. She definitely seems like she is always in distress but it doesn’t seem to bother her. So is my problem genetic from her (OCD or some sort of anxiety) or is it just an imprint from the rules and things she put on me as i grew up? I have also been anorexic for a few years now. These symptoms i describes have always been there, but never were intolerable really until the onset of my anorexia. That made them pretty bad, and then I gained a bunch of weight when I went to college which made these thought processes I described go completely out of control. I don’t know if this is a problem of having an eating disorder that would go away if I recovered, or if I just worsened a prexisting problem by developing an eating disorder. That is another concern. By the third month of being in college, my thought cycles would get so bad that I would sometimes lose the ability to properly communicate and make a fool out of myself in front of everyone. To combat this, when I felt my thought cycles coming along, I would lock myself in the nearest family bathroom or lactation room for a few hours of guaranteed and unadulterated privacy. I have genuinely spent multiple hours sitting on the same bathroom floor, it makes me hate myself and it is horrendously disgusting. I am genuinely an extroverted, fun-loving, and funny person, but whatever is going on with me has robbed me of my personality and made it near-impossible to make any friends in college. I often worry that I will end up alone forever because of whatever has started happening in my head. Out of all these differential hypotheses I have provided to OCD, my strongest doubt about myself is that a therapist diagnosed me with GAD and told me I didn’t have any other issues - I just had anxiety about having other issues. I’m not sure if that’s true, but I’m also not sure I can have confidence in my opinion over a trained professional. If anyone had the energy to read all of this… thank you, you’re an angel, I appreciate you so very deeply, and PLEASE give me an opinion on what you think is wrong with me. There’s got to be something diagnosable and I think it goes a little deeper than simple GAD.

How can you tell if you feel the urge to confess because it's a compulsion or because the person you want to confess to genuinely needs to know that information? I deal with real event OCD based on an event that no one will be affected by unless I confess it to them, but I've been having a flare up that's telling me that I don't have OCD and that I am just feeling normal guilt because I haven't disclosed the event when I should have. How do I know if I feel like not confessing is morally wrong because it actually is morally wrong and I need to seek forgiveness, or because my OCD is trying to convince me to give into a compulsion? Would it be better to just confess regardless so that I can stop worrying about whether or not I'm doing something wrong by keeping it to myself?

Hi there, I just downloaded the app yesterday in hopes of guidance. For me, I believe I may have recently learned I have OCD several weeks ago. In looking through what has occured, I believe I might be struggling with Hit and Run OCD. Roughly two weeks ago, I was driving to meet my friends with the window down and radio on. I looked to adjust the radio briefly in combination with hearing a child outside. While the thought occured if I may have hit a child, I continued to drive thinking nothing of it. Closer to my destination, I became more and more panicked, and involved looking at my car for any new damage or blood on the tires. Even though nothing was noticeable, since then it has been dehabilitating with checking news and police reports, mental reassurance, etc. Then two days ago, when driving through a parking garage, I ran over what logically would be a speed bump (checking that the garage has speed bumps in multiple areas) and did my best not to check and continue to my destination. However, I can't remember exactly when I hit that speed bump, so I'm panicked over another possible hit and run scenario I was unsure of. Even now, I have doubts about my dented license plate from years ago was new and from a pedestrian, or even if I have OCD at all and am using this as an excuse of some sort. My apologies for the long winded response, as I am researching and trying to put ERP into practice, but any guidance would be extremely grateful.

growing up I was fully convinced that I was straight. even when people would tease me and my girl best friends about “being gay for each other,” I took no offense because I was entirely secure in being straight. however after my first kiss with a guy I THOUGHT I liked my senior year of high school, I suddenly spiraled with SOOCD. I spent a ton of time reflecting on why I didn’t enjoy the kiss, how I possibly could’ve convinced myself that I liked a guy that I didn’t, and completely lost trust in my feelings and attraction. I spent hours doing groinal checks, analyzing how I’ve felt in previous friendships and about “crushes,” gathered “evidence” about my personality that might somehow “indicate I’m gay,” and couldn’t even leave the house for two weeks because I couldn’t stop checking people around me. I finally went on lexapro for a bit to settle down my brain, and after about a year, I felt pretty secure in the idea of me being bisexual. fast forward to now—I was doing pretty great off meds, and now I’ve suddenly spiraled the same thing this week. I’ve progressed a lot with a guy recently and now I’m having attacks again, convinced that I’m lesbian and deceiving myself and him, even though we’ve agreed to not being in a relationship for now and just see where things go. so I guess I want to ask, does anyone experiencing SOOCD genuinely think they’re lgbtq+, but they can’t stop obsessing over it? at this point, I feel like there is genuine evidence that I’m bisexual and maybe even lesbian, but I am having an insanely hard time accepting it, even with the support of family and friends. I also don’t know if my SOOCD has just gotten so bad that I’ve fully convinced myself of this, but regardless of whether or not I’m actually lesbian or bisexual, I just want to be ok with it.

Does anyone else experience OCD revolving around other people mainly? Like people’s intentions or if people are real? I get intrusive thoughts about my family having been replaced by imposters, and then I worry that I’m experiencing psychosis or something because of these thoughts. Both the fear that I’m having psychosis and the fear of the fact that whether or not my family has been replaced by imposters is “unverifiable”, as ridiculous as it is, gives me bad panic attacks. What’s the difference between this and actual psychosis? Does the fact that it feels real make it real? I’ve never been evaluated by a professional which makes me even more anxious…I don’t know, just looking for answers.

So this morning, I was having quite a bit of anxiety and I was having the usual intrusive thoughts and all that comes with them. And at work I was listening to a podcast about my particular “theme” of OCD which initially was a total compulsion on my part, because I listened to it in an effort to bring down my anxiety. But at the end of the episode, the host, who is a licensed therapist and OCD specialist, went through a imaginative exposure type thingy, and I was at work so I didn’t really get to sit down and truly follow along, but nonetheless it made me anxious and got the anxiety going again. But something that this guy kept saying was “notice how you’re feeling right now. It doesn’t matter if it’s good or bad, don’t label it. Just allow yourself to have that thought and to feel however you feel about it.” And honestly, I was at a point where I was willing to do anything to get these thoughts to go away. 😂 So I sat with those thoughts and it was super uncomfortable but I didn’t fight them, I just said “okay”, and then didn’t do a compulsion after that. I think I did ERP correctly for the first time! It didn’t feel good in the moment, but now, some hours later, I feel really good! Now for the original reason for my post. After work, I decided I was gonna go mountain biking. It’s something I’ve loved doing for over 10 years and it’s probably my favorite hobby. And I just went, and chose not to be afraid of my intrusive thoughts and just let what ever thoughts were to come to just be there. And I found myself having the thoughts, but focusing way more on how much fun I was having hitting these jumps on my mountain bike. I feel more like myself tonight than I’ve felt in months. I feel genuinely me! Not the obsessive compulsive me. And it’s a dang good feeling. It took me so long to build up the courage to allow the thoughts to be there and to lean into them. But leaning into them and allowing them to be there without attaching any meaning to them will help you so much. Try it!