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Can anyone share any success stories from doing ERP therapy and anything else that may have helped you? I understand now that I've probably had OCD most of my life, but getting started and seeing the light at the end of the tunnel are two completely different things. I really want to recover from this. Mine stems mostly from real events, but I have other themes as well.

I'm terrified that my biggest fear happened on a night I drank too much and blacked out. I now keep finding/looking for evidence to try and prove/disprove and it's terrifyingwhen I find something that supports the belief. Does anyone else experience this. So angry with myself for letting myself drink to this point. Have been so depressed

I struggle most with harm OCD+real event+false memories. The mental rumination gets exhausting. I constantly beat myself up over past mistakes and will fill in the pieces I don’t remember with the worst case scenario. I self soothe by reminding myself I am not a bad person and my worries are disproportionate to the actual situation due to the fact I struggle with OCD. But I quickly get interrupted with an intrusive thought telling me “it is that bad and you’re pinning it as OCD to down play it and avoid accountability”. Anyone else struggle with this?

I could use some advice or encouragement. I made it 33 days without a genuinely bad ocd day. Every day was hard and almost a constant battle, but I was winning those battles and refraining from going into my ocd stories for the most part. Then yesterday, after a great morning, I got triggered and decided I needed to engage an ocd story I have about the possibility that I harmed someone through negligence two years ago. I had dealt with this fear before and decided it was ocd, but it tricked me into considering it yesterday, and I spent about seven hours off and on going over the same details, trying to reassure myself I was okay. When my wife came home and I told her how bad I had done she just gave me a blank expression. I think after sixteen years of dealing with my ocd, she’s out of sympathy. But she was disappointed, I could tell. So was I. I feel so ashamed of having given in to rumination. But I still feel anxious that I need to “figure it out.” I’m just so tired of this disorder. I want to be well. I want to be my old funny self. I want to talk to people and laugh. I’m scared I’ll never get better and that I’ve ruined my kids’ lives by neglecting them to obsess. I feel so tired, alone, depressed, and hopeless.

I read multiple articles on false memory ocd an now I’m confused. I actually thought that false memory ocd is marked by things that are actually completely fabricated by the brain. But I keep seeing things like „an event that may or may not have happened“, does this mean that it could actually be true? Are there any ways how to find out if what you’re going through is real if it’s an actual bad act? Because for me I have been completely focused on false memory ocd lately and while I was ruminating on another one, I suddenly got an image of sth even worse that could maybe be like 7 or 8 months ago. I never remembered this happening and for months I’ve been convinced I had never hurt anybody but then I got this image. I instantly also thought that this didn’t happen and that I would definitely remember if it had happened because it’s actually horrible and it’s not just something you would quickly do and then completely forget, it’s an actual entire act. And I never was close to that person. But I keep being like „but what if I listened to my intrusive thoughts? But I can’t remember doing that and I even have posts on here from around that time saying I was too afraid of that person and that I would never ever listen to my intrusive thoughts… but what if I tried to get rid of my ocd theme by doing this? Nah that’s not what I would do and I know that… I’ve never done any harmful things just to get rid of this theme this is stupid“ etc etc. Like I keep fearing I might’ve done this and done it for various reasons. But I can’t actually remember doing it. All those scenarios feel like they’re just imaginations. But I can’t let go of it. And usually for memories it’s that with time you start to be able to puzzle it all together trough evidence and u don’t forget bad things you’ve done. For example, I know that like a year ago I pushed my sister while I was having an argument with her. I remember everything from then because in my entire life I’ve barely ever done anything to others and so I usually remember those events almost 100% perfectly. I also remember sth from almost 10 years ago in which I called one of my friends (and ik this is bad, that’s why I remember it) fat. I lost a few details but I still remember what exactly I did and that the exact same day I called the parents and apologised bc I felt bad. But for this scenario, I’ve been ruminating on it for TWENTY days and I’m still in the doubting stage. I have spent hours ruminating by now and I still don’t have any actual memories back, just things like „but what if I was mad and then just did this and instantly forgot about it?“ and all this. But not an actual full scenario of me doing this even though it could only be a few months away. Idk what To do, I can’t continue living with the uncertainty. If it’s real, then I won’t even continue living. People like these are terrible and disgusting and don’t deserve living and everybody can agree on that.

I have a really awful event. One that required a lot of non-OCD related confessions to my gf. It happened 4 years ago. I don’t really consider any of my thoughts around this event to be OCD related, because it was actually THAT BAD, and I actually should feel the things I’m feeling. The problem that keeps coming up is my urge to confess more details. The thing I did wasn’t one event, but a series of awful events. My girlfriend doesn’t want to know anymore details. She says no matter how bad it is, she doesn’t want to know anymore. I keep getting memories of details that I’m worried would end our relationship if she knew. I’ve confessed so many awful details and she hasn’t left me yet, but there are so many genuinely terrible things that I thought, felt, intended, and acted on. With the thought that revealing a detail could end my relationship, how am I not supposed to confess? I feel like I am tricking her and she doesn’t understand the full extent of my depravity. When she looks at me with love I feel sick and unworthy. She doesn’t want me to confess anymore, my therapist doesn’t want me to confess anymore, and these memories are just sitting in my head, eating away at my soul. I feel so alone. I feel like most of you can probably guess the nature of what I did and might not appreciate me posting about it here. I’m sorry, I just need someone to talk to…

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've been doing with real event ocd for some time now. I get "I don't deserve" thoughts about literally everything and I've had enough. They're still freaking there after so much time, and I've been practicing mindfulness, acceptance and exposure therapy. I'm tired of going through my life every 10 seconds "you don't deserve this" or "you don't deserve that", what's actually going to stop these thoughts. I know whatever you resist persists but common give me a break, there's got to be a better way.

My ocd is in a spiral. My passed away on December 30th and it’s been taking a tole on me. She was sick for a year and half. Couple months before she was diagnosed with cancer I basically told my teachers a lie saying she was I’ll in order to take my exams early so I can go home early. She had diabetes at the time and she’s a single parent but my mind wasn’t solely set on her being sick from on it while I was sending out the emails. Even she was on board with me telling them that she’s basically sick because she gave me a document that shows she’s scheduled for a colonoscopy. But still it isn’t right.!I feel so bad because as soon as I said that a couple months later she gets diagnosed with colon cancer stage 3. There’s this spiritual saying that you’re tongue is powerful, and it truly is. Now I’m having a hard time sleeping. I can’t even grieve without my ocd having multiple episodes. Everyday it’s something new. My ocd is now saying I basically killed my mother and I wished sickness on her. Please help me I cannot go to this funeral nor live with this hanging on my shoulders.

when i was younger i had symptoms of pshyopaths and now im scared that im one does anyone know if i had those symptoms does that mean im one im scared?

I recently found out that I have OCD and it’s becoming harder and harder to enjoy every day that passes. I spend hours a day, reflecting on all of the bad decisions I made out of ignorance or out of intention. I don’t know if I can ever forgive myself for what I did but I also don’t know if it’s the OCD making it worse. I was wondering if you guys have any tips on how to distinguish between guilt over what you’ve done in the past versus the OCD. I just want to be able to enjoy every day, but I’m plagued with guilt!

I just want to obsess and attach a whole story. What if I’m stuck this way. What if I go crazy and can’t remember what I’ve done. What if I stop loving God and turn to new age and I become evil and start hurting people. I just can’t. I have never thought I was evil. My entire life until I had my daughter and my mind told me she was of the devil. I was so mad at myself. How could I think about my precious gift this way? And now I’m so clueless as to why I even exist and how could this happen. It’s like nothing is real an tangible anymore. I feel like everything is such a blur in this life. I want God to be real. He has always been my whole life. It even makes 100% sense to me at the same it doesn’t 😭 I didn’t waver on my beliefs at all before this kid and it’s like me thinking about her like that has caused me so many problems along with horrible side effects from meds that made me see things in slow motion. I’m in therapy but it’s take so long to heal and for me to love my life and me again. I feel like I look at my self and think. You can’t trust you anymore. This world too has turned upside down to me. I am just so heartbroken. I want to be a good person an it seems like I’m going to turn evil any second and I’ve never been purposely evil or mean to anyone. I got bullied as a kid. 😢. I feel like I’m losing my identity an understand who I am.

So I've unintentionally started to confront some of my triggers. I have real event OCD with "I don't deserve" thoughts that have latched onto pretty much every aspect of my life. I'm leaving overseas tomorrow with my partner to go and see her family, we've had this trip planned for awhile, and for a long time I was good with it. Two days ago my head goes "but wait, you don't deserve to enjoy going overseas" forcing me to confront this trigger. So long story short, I'm unintentionally doing erp. The problem is I find it so overwhelming, all my old OCD triggers have come up at the same time due to me being stressed. I've also stopped sleeping well, is this normal for starting erp?.

I was spending time with my family and I wanted to give one of my family members a beer but when I handed it to my family member an intrusive thoughts came across my mind and it scared me because of the urge the thought generated which got me scared in the moment and I can’t stop thinking about it keeps ruminating in my mind. Any tips

I’m in a really bad panic at the moment re my ocd. I’m trying so hard to accept the thoughts/feelings and accept how real and true it all feels, despite the panic and anxiety. I read somewhere that you can clearly tell the difference between a thought about your sexuality being true vs an ocd thought. It said if the thoughts/feelings/narrative makes you feel panic, anxiety and dread, like you don’t want the thoughts, then it’s ocd. If they make you feel warm, content and normal, then they’re likely not ocd. Is that how people and psychologists differentiate? My situation is that I’m a 36 year old male that never questioned or had to question my sexuality until one day at 26, I had the question pop up “are you gay”. Since then, it’s like I don’t know who I am anymore. Questioning, checking, anxious 24/7, wanting to escape myself. Help :(

Does anyone have any advice for dealing with rumination? I’ve been ruminating on every possible thing I have done and have potentially done wrong but don’t have clear evidence or memory of for so long now and it’s so difficult to deal with. I’m hoping to get a therapist this year, it’s so hard feeling like a horrible person but not being able to do anything about it until I can seek help.

I feel like giving up. Idk what to do anymore. All of these intrusive thoughts idk if they are real or not. I wouldn’t ever hurt my daughter but I feel like I can’t be a father or am capable of it anymore. I’m so down and out of it.

My psychiatrist said to stop smoking weed because not only is it a compulsion but getting high can make the thoughts worse. It definitely helps with anxiety but then i get into this weird state of not knowing what’s real and fake. Idk why

My problem with OCD/ERP is that it’s very situational and hard to trigger. So it’s hard to create exposures. My trigger is job offers. I obsess obsess obsess about them if they don’t feel just right, ask for lore time, call everyone I know, do obsessive Research, lose all perspective, and then either accept or reject the at the last minute without much confidence. Then my brain tells me I made the wrong choice, and my compulsion is to prolong the decision-making process by undoing and redoing the decision (“I accept! [2 hours later] Actually, I don’t want the job. Oh just kidding, I do! Oh wait, I don’t.”) How the fuck do I do ERP for this?! It’s not like germ phobia where exposure to the trigger is easy (there are germs everywhere). Job offers, real ones, don’t come around often (thank goodness) but when they do it is hell. This used to happen with smaller decisions but thank god that seems to be less so now

Can anyone give me tips on how when I have an intrusive thought that doesn’t mean I did it. Like I’ll have a thought of something then my head will tell me that I did this .. anybody else deal with this