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the NOCD Community

From this app, I got reported for asking for reassurance. Sorry guys. That wasn’t great. I will try to do better for self care

As a disclaimer, I'm still very new to understanding everything here. Also, please be nice, I've seen some rude comments on other posts. I guess my question is, has anyone here had a problem with cats before? My OCD started (or started to show strongly) around the time my BF and I moved in together, about 2yrs ago. I know there are likely a LOT of other contributing factors to the onset, but the one I've found most prevalent in my... flare ups?... is his cat. I'm allergic and haven't spent much time around cats which plays a part in it I'm sure, the cat also isn't the most socialized and has a high prey drive (I can't wear my hair down or he'll try to attack it). My biggest issue nowadays however is that he will jump on countertops and tables, will try to drink out of our cups, and the fur is EVERYWHERE. It triggers me SO much I've cried about it, and will even shut myself in the bedroom for days just to avoid thinking about it (our bedroom is a cat-free zone). The thing is, everywhere I look online it seems like cats are these amazing and clean creatures. Even some of the helpline sites I've browsed through will villainize anyone who has an issue with cats cleanliness, saying that dogs are the ones to worry about. I've had dogs my whole life and even have a career working with them, and they've never been as triggering as this cat is? I feel like some evil person for hating this cat and being disgusted by the cleanliness aspect of it, but every time he jumps on the counter I feel sick. Any cup I see him try to drink out of, I don't use ever again (even if it's been washed). I feel like it's tainted so much of my household, and I'm becoming a shut-in because of it. (And yes- we've tried spray bottles and offering other outlets for him etc). Does anyone else have an issue with cats and their cleanliness? Or any pets in general? Do you have tips on how I can work through this? It's driving me to a point of wanting to give my BF an ultimatum (me or the cat) because I just can't keep living like this... which btw, I would NEVER do because thats his baby and I wouldn't take my issues out on the cat.

After many years of thinking I might have ocd, it’s official. It is nice to feel seen and to have an answer finally but it’s also really scary, mostly because I’m about to start Prozac and I’ve never taken any mental health medications. Anyone have experiences to share? I’m so scared of the side effects but I know I need to start something. My provider suggested finding a support group as I have no family and friends to support me during this time, right now I’m feeling very scared and alone 😔

Does anyone else obsess about having another panic attack or scan their body constantly for how they feel and if a thought or feeling about a panic attacks comes on, you’re more likely to start to feel panicky?

How do people recognize the difference between relationship ocd intrusive thoughts and real thoughts about your relationship? I have been in a relationship for about a year, it’s my first long-term relationship and the healthiest, I am almost 20 years old, and I believe I have rocd (I haven’t been diagnosed but it’s pretty clear to me). The main thoughts I get are “what if I’ll lose feelings for my bf?, what if I don’t love him?, what if I’m gonna break his heart?” (it’s never about if he’s cheating on me or anything like that. He is a really great boyfriend and the best person to ever walk into my life, he isn’t toxic or bad in any way towards me or the relationship). Usually these thoughts occur before my period (luteal phase/pms) but I’m on day 6 of my period and I got these thoughts, which usually isn’t the case as I’ve said before. So I went into a spiral cus I believed that since I got these thoughts at a different time in my cycle, they must be true. Deep down I know I love my boyfriend so much, it’s just so hard to navigate whether or not these thoughts are just fake rocd thoughts or what I’m really thinking. Can anyone else relate?

I got diagnosed with ocd recently from my therapist after having years of symptoms since I was a toddler and recently I have had a terrible dream with beastiality in it about 3 months ago and I woke up and cried. I went through the day as usual and then I told one of my friends and I sobbed because that is the last thing I have ever thought about in my life. Luckily my friend was there for me, but then the OCD kicked in. I’ve been having horrible thoughts and I’m scared, I don’t want to do anything to animals never have I ever had thoughts of such. I have two pit bulls that are my sweet babies and I have never had thoughts of anything to do with beastiality in my whole life and now I’m 20 just now being scared of this. It has been the worst ocd obsession I have had in a long time the last one I had lasted 3 years. I’ve been wanting to lock myself in my room and not look at my dogs because I’m afraid to even let them sleep in my room anymore. I stay up all night sometimes because I’m scared I’ll see another dream. My mind is starting to make think I want those thoughts and I’m so scared I’m tearing up whole typing this. I’ve been contemplating suicide because of this fear of doing sexual acts to an animal I would rather not live. I hate living like this and it has been hard to sleep with my partner because now I’m afraid to have intercourse which I have always been able to do with my partner no problem. But now the beastiality OCD has ruined my life and I don’t know what to do.

Hi everyone this is going to be a long introduction. When I was much younger I struggled with debilitating anxiety I worked on myself and took medication and got so much better. Since then I have been living a normal life up until about 6 months ago. I became pregnant with my second child. At 16 weeks pregnant I lost the baby I ended up hemorrhaging being rushed to the hospital having emergency surgery and the entire experience was absolutely horrifying. I thought I was doing so much better until recently when I started experiencing neck issues. I know this sounds extremely weird but I feel like I constantly have to crack or stretch my neck it drove me crazy to the point where I went to a chiropractor and had X-rays done and adjustments. Which made me feel better for a little bit and then it came back. I find myself thinking about how my neck feels and having to be cracked constantly and then I’m on the internet researching how cracking my neck can affect me and a million other things. I have also been experiencing anxiety over it to the point where I took some prescribed Valium to help me get through the day. I am a hypochondriac I have always since I was a little kid been absolutely consumed about dying or having something horrible wrong with my health. I dwell on how scary the thought of having a heart attack or stroke or anything is to the point where I have gone to the hospital for random weird feelings and things I have experienced that were nothing but self inflicted anxiety. I did not think I ever had OCD until very recently since I started researching it. I have noticed a pattern now throughout my life of worrying about everyone I love dying and worrying about me dying and how it will happen and what will happen. I used to tighten my chest repeatedly until it would hurt and I couldn’t get myself to stop until I finally got a hold of myself and stopped. Then I went to every doctor imaginable to make sure I was ok and had a million tests done. Now I’m doing the neck cracking and constantly thinking about my neck. I have talked to my primary doctor and chiropractor who both say it’s a anxiety/ocd manifestation and nothing is wrong with me. I was doing so well until I lost the baby and it stirred this all up for me. I’m desperately reaching out for help at this point. I want to travel and be happy and enjoy the one life I have to live. Instead I’m a prisoner in my own mind and body and I can’t enjoy anything because I can’t get out of my own mind and fears long enough to enjoy the moments I’m in. I also have a beautiful amazing 3 year old daughter that keeps me going and I want to be the best version of myself for her. Thank you for listening to my rant I look forward to hearing experiences and meeting other people out there like me. Sometimes it just helps to know your not alone. I find myself watching the people around me and saying see look at them they are so happy nothing is wrong with them. Nobody else experiences what I am going through.

I’m not sure if anyone else goes through this or if it’s normal for PPOCD. But when my ocd flares up , it makes me feel less attached to my baby and gives me a ton of anxiety. I also feel like my ocd jumps to a lot of different themes. Will PPOCD last forever ?

I’m always waiting for the next horrible event to happen, and it’s sapping the joy out of my good days. I’m just waiting for the next time the house needs a major repair, or I’m waiting for the next family member to die horribly (even though no one is sick right now). I’m waiting for the next time my relationship takes a dive due to miscommunication. I’m preventing myself from making art my career because I’m convinced I’ll just mess it up, or I’m convinced no one would pay actual money for something I’ve made. I won’t go back to school because I’m convinced I’ll fail again, or worse, I’ll be too focused on myself to take care of my family. I’m so sure that everyone I’m close with in my life secretly hates me, and I know it’s the OCD but some days I’m just waiting for them to tell me I’m right, or I’m waiting for them to all leave me. I know I’ve felt joy, love, and acceptance at one point in my life, but those warm feelings don’t reach my heart when I’m stuck waiting for the next moment life kicks the chair out from under me.

I struggle with information and memory hoarding if that’s a thing. I very excessively buy books, I save interesting bits of information I come across online, I take an excessive amount of photos and screenshots and have tons of articles and info saved in a huge Google drive. I have many journals and logs. I back up things to multiple places, I save multiple versions of files I am working on, I record long notes after meetings, Doctors appointments and phone calls. I keep photos of all sorts of keepsake and nostalgia types items. I feel like I need to constantly archive all sorts of info. It takes up so much time and I have no sense of what’s actually important to keep, so I keep most things. Has anyone experienced this as an OCD theme? I don’t see much written about this anywhere. Other than books and journals, I don’t seem to hoard any other physical objects, but I have endless collections of digital content and files of all kinds. I have a lot of anxiety around losing valuable bits of info. For example,I just got diagnosed with OCD and I have already bought around 15 books on the topic (that I really can’t afford), have watched several documentaries and took notes, saved tons of articles and made playlists of tons of videos all of that I have read or watched over and over but I never feel like I have learned enough. I am not even sure what drives this. I would love to hear any similar experiences as I feel pretty alone in dealing with this.

I have ROCD and I doing ERP with my NOCD therapist, her approach is to do imaginary ERP (writing stuff down and read it etc.) But I won't get triggered by stuff like that. PLEASE, does anyone else have any other examples or Ideas of kinds of exposures I could do? Here are some details: So my core fears are: "What if it's not OCD but really no love" What if you hurt her What if you never get rid of the stuff What if you just try convincing yourself you love her. So it always works like this: Trigger builds up "naturally" (due to stress, or life changes or if I spend a lot of time with my girlfriend) OCD comes crashing down on me with a massive doubt like "what if you really don't love her and it's no OCD" I try to stand the affliction and stick with my point of view and don't question it (That I love her and it's just OCD) I give in (I am not really doing much, it's more like a light switch in my head that OCD switches from standing my point to be unsure and in question about if I love her) So the thing is, I tried to analyze the shit out of this stuff and recreate situations but I have a really hard time triggering myself, it just won't work. Furthermore I think I might have ADHD cause I am literally ALWAYS distracted, so it's really hard for me to focus. On the other hand, when I WAIT for OCD to come fucking naturaly, it's so overwhelming and I fail. PLEASE HELP ME. My therapist seems to doesn't have a real solution for it.

How did others do after first getting diagnosed? Did the diagnosis cause you to spiral initially? It feels like all the symptoms have become so much worse since, maybe because I am noticing them and focusing on them. I have been stuck on looking back through my whole life but now through an OCD lens and it’s been incredibly overwhelming realizing how much OCD has impacted me my whole life. I had previously assumed all the symptoms were part of my having ADHD and Autism, but I am now realizing a lot of my struggling was actually OCD. I’m 45 and I was diagnosed with severe OCD a week ago. Tomorrow I start ERP and I’m quite anxious about it. I feel pretty unfixable at this point, but I’m trying to be hopeful. I have my doubts that I will be strong enough to do this.

So I want to work in my OCD with ERP and I already have a therapist here on NOCD and stuff. The problem is, that: 1. When I want to trigger myself (in an exposure) it does nearly nothing, I don't feel it and I won't get triggered, also I have a hard time focusing on my ERP 2. When I am triggered in the wild, so by OCD in my daily life it's either so hard that I can't resist it and give in OR it's so overwhelming and chaotic that I can't see it clear and it's all messy, like I am walking in fog or try holding on to smoke I want to fix that with writing down the Situation and trigger Everytime I get triggered and then try to recreate that and trigger me, but I fear that it won't work. Plus the last days where so overwhelming. I want to focus on my ROCD right now, because that's most important to me but then I started and internship as a Smith yesterday and liked it and BOOM OCD came and lets me question my future plans. After that settles down I go to depressed desperate, where I feel unheard and hate and argue with my past therapist and friends in my mind which treated me wrong, or did something bad or whatever, I carry so much hate inside me. I litteraly can't fucking Stop imagining arguments and fights with them in my head. When I notice I am doing it and stop, I will start over again a few moments later. This is all so fucking much! PLEASE HELP ME. What can I do to still do ERP successfully while my mind is so polluted. It feels like I want to reach my car down the road. But the road is a fucking mountain range, it's foggy, with creatures keeping me from moving on and planes bombarding the area. What can I do please

I feel like i want to scream and run with im on the phone with someone. I even got scared of the jake from statefarm commercial, like every thing has made me paranoid and scared. Making me feel like im schizophrenic or something.

Hello all! I have harm ocd, anxiety, and depression. I feel I know exactly how to get through most thoughts because I’ve probably had exactly what you are thinking myself. So, if you have any questions or any problems that needs solved please comment and if I don’t have an answer maybe someone else who is reading this does!

My drinking is out of control and I’m not sure what to do about it. I’m going to try to stop. It seems simple but it isn’t. The day after I feel so depressed and anxious. Any advice would be much appreciated

I’ve been struggling with mental health for a while. I’ve seen a few therapists and psychiatrists over the last three years hoping for some diagnosis to give me direction on how to improve my mental state. I’ve also tried several medications, most just making my anxiety worse. At this point I don’t even know what I’ve been diagnosed with, if anything. My last talk therapist blamed all my symptoms on PMDD and dismissed me every time I would bring up another perspective of my symptoms and thoughts that I may have something other than childhood trauma and PMDD. I continued to see her questioning myself and slowly realizing that I was becoming so focused on finding a diagnosis that I needed to just focus on feeling better and being able to function day to day. Then I realized that some of the advice she gave me was not helpful and it actually made my family situation worse. Then there were scheduling conflicts repeatedly and when I needed therapy the most I couldn’t go for one reason or another. So I got burnt out on therapy too and I’m not currently seeing anyone. During a session with my last psychiatrist a few months ago she casually asked me how my OCD was, even though we had never discussed OCD before and it had never even been mentioned. This was the first time I had ever heard anyone bring this up to me. After I did some research I do feel as if I can fit in an OCD box but when I start breaking down all of my symptoms and behaviors I fell like I can fit into a lot of different boxes. Man is it exhausting.

Hi, does anyone have any tips or advice over how to not allow the intrusive images or themes consume to the point of freezing up in petrified fear. I feel that I ruminate over my OCD theme to the point where I’m super anxious or I’m depressed and find no point in my day to day activities because I feel that I need to think over my theme. But I go no where with it than into a freak out mode. Any help or advice is welcomed. Thank you.

I gotta share this because I think we can all get through this OCD! But you gotta put the work in! The homework therapist gives is to help us, and for me, i think i had a breakthrough. So I am a month into my ERP therapy through here and let me tell you… it sucks most days. What i like about my therapist I got on here is she told me she’s been working in hospital and prison wards, so she’s probably heard and seen some stuff and what I got probably ain’t that bad. I started with CBT but my OCD was getting rough after about a year so now I’m giving ERP a try. I was asked to write a letter to someone that I believed was triggering my OCD and so I did. I went through a whole spiral with my POCD, honestly I feel like a monster. But! I’m also recalling some stuff I have kept suppressed and never wanted to mention in therapy, and I think it’s probably time I process that stuff, no matter how ashamed or guilty I feel. Ultimately, it’s probably what is causing the doubt disorder to overtake me. So for those of you struggling, keep going! And be completely open! I promise you your therapist has heard some stuff and you are probably far from what they have heard.

does anyone remember what their first experience with OCD felt like? im pretty sure i know the exact minute it happened. I was nine and my cousin was over for a sleep over, i remember she was on my bed watching a youtube video, and i was on the floor watching a youtube video. Then all of a sudden i got this horrible feeling it felt almost like deja vu? but i was terrified and i was so anxious i went and threw up. After that my mind was never the same, at the time i was so scared that i had been possessed because thats what i imagined it would feel/ look like, i became obsessed with the thought that i had become possessed. i kept asking my mom for reassurance that I hadn’t gotten possessed or had “made god angry.” im just wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience or if maybe that wasn’t OCD? Part of me still wonders if maybe i actually am possessed and i don’t have OCD even after 10 years. I obviously know thats not true but it’s always the “what if” ya know?