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working to conquer OCD
I often want to be able to drink alcohol like a normal 21 year old with friends, but then I notice I question if I handled my intrusive thoughts normally while under the influence. I then convince myself that the alcohol made me less aware and more likely to engage with the thought. Even though I think I’m fighting against the thought even more than if i was sober. It’s annoying because I want to be able to relax when buzzed but when the ocd thoughts start, then it’s harder to ignore them than when sober. I wish I could just trust in myself and know that even if i am tipsy, that i am stronger than intrusive thoughts and can handle them as I usually do.
With a little backstory, I've been struggling with physical sleep issues that a medical hospital is trying to to help me with (sleep apnea, TMJ issues, etc.). Anyway, I guess my OCD knows that sleep is a problem, so it's created an obsession around it. I was laying on my two pillows, on my side, and had the thought "Hmm, my shoulder is horizontally up against the pillows, is this squishing the pillows in, bunching them up? Is the level of the pillows now unevenly distributed because of my shoulder against it? How soft/hard is my shoulder pushing against the pillow?" It's ridiculous, because I've slept this way my whole life. But now I'm hyper focused on how my body is laying against the pillows and having to have the pillows perfectly even, without any dents or flaws in them. This sucks because on top of the physical sleep issues, now I'm having OCD sleep issues. Im just so tired. I wish I could ignore it, but OCD gets so strong when I lay on my pillows now. Any advice? Anything to tell myself that could help? Thank you ahead of time.
Does anyone else have taboo thoughts during, and right before you’re about to _____? How do you work on this so it stops happening?
Can anyone give any advice please IS IT POSSIBLE TO CONVINCE YOURSELF THAT YOU HAVE DONE SOMETHING THAT YOU HAVEN’T DONE? HOW CAN A THOUGHT/FEELING SEEM SO REAL IF ITS NOT REAL? When you have thoughts/think that you have done something bad in the past to someone ,but you are sure you haven’t and never would. One minute you say to yourself no I would never do such a thing and then you say what if you did as the feelings/thoughts feel so real. The thoughts/feelings sometimes are so convincing you have done something to someone but you truly believe you haven’t , you even question what if there is proof of this happening like recordings and that’s where the constant checking starts. Is this false memory or is it something else?
I live in college dorm apartment and have three other roomates. The other two that share a room have made complaints toward my roomate and I about little things like leave 1 dish in the dish rack. So at the beginning of moving in I asked if blow drying my hair in the AM was too loud they said after 7 AM was ok, so I have abided by it. They also had commented that we were “slamming doors” mind you, our doors are less than half a foot away from each other including mine and my roomates bathroom door. So I try to be as quiet as possible. Well three days ago they put as passive aggressive sticky note on my door complaining about the “door slamming” I open and close the door twice before 8 AM and they basically said limit the door slamming until 8 AM which is the dorm time of making noise. However we have classes really early and also stated in our profil that we would be waking up prior to 7 am or earlier. And I’m so confused because my roomie just acts innocent and I do all the talking. And I feel like there’s jealously and hostility coming from the other two girls, and I haven’t even done anything. I don’t play music, I wash my dishes immediately after cooking. I vacuum and clean common areas. And it does make sense to me how I can blow dry my hair at 7 AM but they’re complaining my open a door before 8 AM wakes them up but not the sound of a loud blow dryer?? So anyways I told my RA bc I’m tired of them picking on me. And we have a mediation meeting this upcoming week, and I have been having a bad ocd episode questioning myself if I’ve done something wrong or if if I’m going to get in trouble even though the hostility is coming from them. My current roomie started acting cold bc we were already kind of having distance because of some unhealthy things I saw and didn’t want to be part of. So my roomie has kinda instigated making jokes like oh that’s your best friend abt my roomates and like used to bring them up everyday yet acts innocent in front of them, and allowing me to look like the bad person for standing up for myself. Anyways the ocd is out of hand and I feel intense sadness bc I haven’t done anything and I’m paranoid that they’re going to say bad things about me at the mediation meeting and make me look bad but I doubt the person hosting our meeting would allow that behavior. Any recommendations on how to cope?
Me again. I seem to be having more issues lately. Last night laying in bed watching a movie and I get anxiety bad out of nowhere. As if I didn’t already have anxiety it became worse. I made myself go to bed to feel better. Woke up this morning and am still obsessing on the why! What caused me to go from stable and okay to feeling terrible?
Guys, I am really stressed rn. My psychiatrist is telling me that OCD is just a spectrum or something like that. My therapist has diagnosed me with OCD. I am scared that I don’t have OCD. Did someone go through something like this?
I’m getting married in November to the love of my life. I’ve been with him for over 5 years and I’m so excited but I’ve struggle sexual identity over the past and now with the wedding coming up, my intrusive thoughts and the constant theme of identity keep showing up in my head. From what I wear to how I act, I can’t just enjoy being myself. I know who I am but anytime my SOOCD comes up, it just wipes my identity completely out. I’m trying to ignore it and tell myself I don’t need to label myself as anything but I’m having constant intrusive dreams lately and it’s messing with my daily life
Does anyone ever feel like they are “reaching” for the thoughts almost to check it shows up? It makes it feel like it’s intentional but if is very much not because I believe the content of the thought, rather it is almost a sick need to have the thought even though I don’t want the thought. Does that make any sense?
I’m feeling anxious right now my roommate and I were watching a disturbing show and now I want to punish myself for it. My heart is racing
Anyone struggling with intrusive thoughts that only seem to pass when faced with evidence? I had people knock at my front door to hand out leaflets. After looking back at my ring doorbell and the video cutting out after a while I realised the video didn’t pick up on them leaving. I now have intrusive thoughts of what if I did something and now I have no proof of it. Anyone else have this?😭
Ever since the pandemic I have had this fear of germs. However this fear then turned into being scared of sperm. Germs were not the problem anymore. For the past two years I have been battling with my mind trying to convince myself that it’s impossible to get pregnant from surfaces, from the toilet, from chairs in public. I have this irrational fear that I might somehow get sperm on me and then that will somehow get onto my underwear and then I get pregnant which Ofcourse will be a cryptic pregnancy, so I won’t know until I am actually giving birth. Unfortunately, I have these thoughts about every male I come into contact with, whether that is brushing up against them on the bus, or the train or them being the cashier at the supermarket. I can spend hours cleaning my phone and my glasses just in case. However when I’m actually having intercourse, the fear of getting pregnant doesn’t even cross my mind and doesn’t worry me even a little bit as I’m on contraception. But what worries me is if I touch a door handle which was dirty with sperm and then getting pregnant by a complete stranger. Does anyone else have this type of OCD?
Sorry in advance for the long post. I had a conversation with my mother a while ago, where she was trying to help me with something that could either be false memory or real event (at the time I thought it was completely real and didn’t want to even think about the possibility of it not being real because “that would be cheating and would make me a horrible person” but in hindsight there is a possibility it’s false) and anyways, that wasn’t the point. I was talking to my mom, and she made a comparison to a character I really loved, by saying “well this character probably does cuz’ and you still really like him” which made me spiral even further because that character would never ever do what she said and I didn’t want to think about that character doing that, and what she gave an example of was way worse than what might’ve happened with me. But I got over it. (My mother ended up telling me that, no, she doesn’t believe that character would actually do that, she was just trying to make me feel better/ find something to relate to or hold on to) but now I’m obsessing over the fact that her example was worse than my memory, and the fact that she thought that would make me feel better. The current thoughts are “does she really think I’m that level of scum?” And “if she thinks that you are equal to that character doing THAT, then what you might’ve done is just as bad”. And I really don’t know what to do because on some level I think I agree a tiny bit.
Guys please help. Did anyone of you find a way to break the sleep obsession cycle? For my whole life I was able to fall asleep in 10-20 minutes. Had one sleepless night few days ago due to being excited yet scared for a special day. Since then I have this fuck up in my head that even though I'm tired as hell I cannot fall asleep because I'm still checking it. It's like don't think of a pink elephant. I am naturally not the type that would have difficulties with sleep. It's because this obsession. I know my thoughts cannot just disappear so I have to find a way to work with it somehow. Any help appreciated. Thank you very much.
My partner was high and so was I and he just said “is this real like is this really real” and my theme right now is I’m convinced I’m in a dream or not real and this is a false reality or something, I had therapy early today and that helped so much and then I was feeling hopeful that i was gonna get better and the theme was going away and then he said that and I’m spiraling, please help
Ever since my terrible ocd started since march 2020 (i was 16, almost 17.), school was very hard to do. i was still at 9th and 10th grade level. i eventually dropped out in 2021 (i was 18.) My Life had been wasted for 4 years, i feel like a failure. im 20 now, and still unwell to do school. the ocd is so bad that i lose connection with reality, it makes my bipolar worse, and i just feel like im losing my mind with the constant anxiety and depression and manic and everything. I feel like a failure. I look at my friends who are successful and on the way to graduating or already in college in university, and im sitting here feeling like a horrible failure. im a failure. i didnt ask for this ocd to happen, i wish it never happened, i just wanted to be successful and graduate and start college, but i cant do that anymore. Why me? why is everyone else lucky to not suffer from such debilitating mental illness? why me? now im just a failure with no life and fully reliant on my parents for money, food, shelter, etc. i tried so hard to go back to school, to try to work, but it was too unbearable. if i never got this ocd, i know i would have graduated and been successful and head straight to college. 4 years of my life wasted. and more years to come.
I’m 54 yrs old and had my first episode at 17. Didn’t know what it was at the time. Intrusive thoughts that made me feel like I had lost my mind. It’s continued off and on since then. But just recently found out I have ocd. I was too stubborn or embarrassed to ever admit or ask for help. Anyway, when this is triggered and I get chronic severe anxiety that lasts months I get these symptoms and wanted to see if anyone else experiences these? Severe memory loss from recent events. Even feeling like I don’t know people. A numbness always on the left side of my face. Extreme ear ringing. Feeling like my head is in a vise, but not a real headache. I was just curious. The memory thing is a real issue for me and makes my anxiety worse. These physical symptoms always go away when my anxiety is gone but it’s concerning to me. Please share any similar experiences. Hope everyone has a great weekend. Jeff
I feel like I’m going crazy and second guessing everything rn. I keep wondering if I did or said anything racist and I just can’t remember or I did and i didn’t acknowledge it. I feel like people at my school hate me or are ignoring me. I don’t know how to get out of this endless loop of doubting myself. I know I would never do such a thing but I keep second guessing myself. Im starting to believe I’m a terrible person and I don’t know how to prove myself otherwise.
With a little backstory, I've been struggling with physical sleep issues that a medical hospital is trying to to help me with (sleep apnea, TMJ issues, etc.). Anyway, I guess my OCD knows that sleep is a problem, so it's created an obsession around it. I was laying on my two pillows, on my side, and had the thought "Hmm, my shoulder is up against the pillows, is this squishing the pillows in, bunching them up? Is the level of the pillows now unevenly distributed because of my shoulder against it? How soft/hard is my shoulder pushing against the pillow?" It's ridiculous, because I've slept this way my whole life. But now I'm hyper focused on how my body is laying against the pillows and having to have the pillows perfectly even, without any dents or flaws in them. This sucks because on top of the physical sleep issues, now I'm having OCD sleep issues. Im just so tired. I wish I could ignore it, but OCD gets so strong when I lay on my pillows now. Any advice? Anything to tell myself that could help? Thank you ahead of time.
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