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How do you tell the difference between real guilt/shame verses something ocd. And what if it’s both? What if your real event ocd is something that really is very bad. And not just ocd.

It feels like I used to get so many intrusive thoughts in the beginning but now it’s less it’s only thoughts like what if I’m a p what if I’m a p what if I’m lying to myself what if I’m in dentist truly in all this and it was all fake like I’m an imposter, now it’s just feelings and noticing :/ and I hate he feelings that come with it I’m really scared I am one I feel so alone :( I’m taking therapy but my therapist is not specialized in ocd and I don’t think she understands and I don’t want to bring it up bc I brought up a fear that what if I turn into my stepdad and she said “are you attracted to children?” And I said no but it was just an irrational thought that came after I started realizing the trauma that happened to me as a kid, and idk I’m scared to Start with a therapists here bc what if all this just makes it worse and it turns out I am what I fear all along.? :(

I’m in an absolutely crippling episode dealing with real event/ false memory. I literally cannot get out of it and it is beyond hell. Can someone please help me with advice? If you have been through this how did you get through?! I’m out of work, the only relief is when I’m sleeping no exaggeration. My husband is being super supportive and Is also taking time off to be with me. Was there a specific medication or any tricks that helped? I’m beyond desperate. Thank you

there was a post on here and they were talking abt that they’ve done creepy things and it’s really worried me. i’m scared that i could’ve done something similar and completely forgotten about it. i don’t think i have though because i know me and i know i would never ever in a million years expose children to such stuff or even pose a risk of danger to them but it’s really worried me now. i’m worried that im one of those people who doesn’t want to be labelled as one of those people. im so worried please reply. i blocked them now but its still scared me because now i dont know anymore

So, I'm currently in panic mode. I commented underneath a post on here, just trying to be helpful if I could, but I ended up getting triggered by the messages exchanged with the person? I've blocked them now. I just got scared, and I feel really, really bad about it, but they said they'd interacted with a real offender and said they had behaved inappropriately in front of minors. I still don't really understand what they did, but I felt like since I'd started the conversation, I couldn't just leave them hanging... Ugh. I told them to seek professional help because I didn't feel comfortable trying to give advice if they really did do something horrible, and they said they felt like the only reason they felt guilt is because they didn't want people to label them as... one of those people. I can't even get myself to type the word. I don't want to offer advice to someone who... you know. But, I also wouldn't want to isolate someone who might really be struggling with OCD. I'm just at a loss right now. I feel really scared.

my real ocd will not leave me alone at the lowest point ever in my life. its making everything so much worse and I can't even confess or talk to anyone about it because it's so awful and disgusting. my fear is that I don't deserve to have the people who love me in my life, or if they knew what I did when I was younger (kid/early teen) they would see me differently and be disgusted. Its terrifying. Even if i was just "curious", didn't know hiw bad it actually was just that you dont do that type of thing, or was just hyper sexual, I don't know. I keep doing a compulsion thinking "if my partner or someone I know tells me they did this at that age, would I be abke to be okay with it or not judge them?" and it's can't give myself a clear answer??? which is terrifying because then obviously i don't deserve to be happy or have these people in my life. im disgusted, im dealing with so much other stuff right now that is more urgent, but this decided to sneak up again. I can't take it.

*****TW***** I keep remembering an interaction I had with a person who reached out to give advice on OCD. *****TW***** They ended up dumping the fact that they searched for illegal content to the point where they got arrested months later. This person claimed OCD but I really think there was more to it. I felt horrified when I learned what they did. I really doubt they simply typed into google. They most likely made a lot of effort to find this illegal stuff. I can rationalize that much, but I still feel so scared that this is possibility for me. Sure, I’m impulsive and my compulsions are super hard to resist but I think I have strong morals. I don’t ever want to become that person. Ever. I’m so scared. I’m panicking and maybe it’s the new medicine I’m on but I would really appreciate some support. I think it’s my OCD convincing me I’ll become that person eventually and I’m so petrified. I feel contaminated from ever interacting with such a person. I feel so scared.

This might contain triggering content, just a fair warning. The real event I'm struggling with revolves around the fear that I assaulted my sister when we were younger. It all happened around the time I'd started being groomed online, so I'm afraid that it led to me believing these behaviors were "normal" in a way. But, anyways... I've opened up to my parents and my psychiatrist about these "games" we used to play, and they reassured me I didn't assault her and that it sounded like innocent exploration, but my memories are so warped at this point, I feel evil. Then, I went to my sister and brought up the memories to her, and she laughed at me for being in so much distress over it. She said I didn't harm her and that we didn't even do anything bad. I know this, but I can't stop comparing my story to other people's stories that are worse... I still apologized profusely, and she said there wasn't anything to apologize for, but that she'd forgive me anyway, and she hugged me for a while. I told her that I'd never want to hurt her, that she was my best friend, and that's why these memories bothered me so much because she meant the world to me. She said she loved me and felt the same, and that the only people's opinions that mattered were hers and my parents, along with my psychiatrists. Which is true, but it's like these memories just have their claws in me. For a month or so, I'd been doing great. I could actually enjoy life, which was... amazing. The theme switched for me, and I wasn't really worrying about these memories anymore. In fact, when I'd look back on them, that's all they felt like... memories. But now they're all coming back, and I feel horrible. I'm always triggered by other peoples stories about similar things happening to them, which is strange, because a year ago, I didn't struggle with this at all, and these memories didn't bother me for years of my life. Everyone tells me I need to forgive that little girl and move on, but how? I feel like I deserve this... Ugh, I'd been doing so well. If I told my sister I was worrying about this again, she'd slap me😭 I'm sorry for the long post. I don't know if anyone has any advice, but I'd appreciate anything at this point. I don't even know if I deserve advice... It's weird to say that because I'd never say it to someone else, and I'd been doing so well... This post is such a mess, I'm sorry to anyone who reads it. I just feel really hopeless right now.

I’m really struggling right now. My mind is racing and I’m panicking about the content that I watched in the past because I don’t have a way to ‘prove’ that it was safe and consensual. I stupidly caved in and googled “what happens if an accidentally saw illegal porn” and I ended up making my anxiety so much worse. What if the images I saw in the past had underage people in them? Am I going to jail? Will my ip address be tracked? My brain is making all sorts of scenarios up and they feel so real. At this point I don’t know if I’m a bad person or not, I just feel like something terrible is about to happen. Although I know I’d never intentionally look for that kind of stuff there’s still a chance that I could have seen things without realising, and I actually don’t know what to do. I’m in total panic mode

I'm afraid to speak to a therapist and tell them something I did as a teenager because I don't know if it's a crime or not and what if they report me? I feel like I can't even get help I can't get rid of this guilt unless I get help but if I get help I feel like I might ruin my life. I'm so stuck!

**PLEASE READ** so one of my compulsions is frequent pornography consumption as my hypersexuality and ocd compulsions enable one another. as i was looking for something to watch, a website just popped up on my computer while i was in another tab and i looked up and it said dark web and then what I believed showed up were thumbnails for cp. i immediately clicked out and got really scared and started panicking and exited out of all my tabs. i almost screamed too bc i my computer is pretty good with blocking pop ups and random websites and idk how that came out of nowhere. i then went on google to search what would happen if the dark web was accidentally accessed and people were saying you cannot accidentally end up on it. so now i am panicking and do not know what to do bc I would never ever in a million years willingly even attempt to access to dark web and all of its atrocities. someone please help i feel like i am losing my mind and as if i am now going to get into legal trouble and have my life derailed. i am crying in the bathroom and trying to call my friends but no one is available. help

A few years ago I was watching porn and stumbled across a very grotesque video. I do not wish to say many contents of the video but included an underage person and a person over the age of 18, it was very inappropriate and boarderline sickening. Just a few days ago my mind jumps back to the time I stumbled across the video and my mind immediately starts jumping to conclusions that I’m pedophile. As well as my mind making up different scenarios that could’ve happened when I saw the video because I don’t remember in full detail of my thoughts looking back at it now. Such as my mind saying i’m a pedophile. Even though i’m not. I know i’m not. I haven’t ever reached out to those kinds of videos voluntarily and I have deleted the browser that I would normally go on for pornography. I’m very lost since and I’m having an internal battle with the myself and my own mind. It has made me feel sick to the stomache just thinking about when I stumbled across that video involuntarily. It has made me feel as though I don’t deserve the love, happiness, and support i’m getting today. Please if anyone has any tips on how to help letting go of past mistakes or moments like such reach out to me. This app has brought me some ease because it doesn’t make the other moments I face struggling with OCD a problem I face by myself. My OCD has ruined my past relationships to the point where I am agreeing to never get into a relationship again. I’m only 17 and I feel completely trapped. Since yesterday marks the second year I was diagnosed with OCD.

Hi, I’m struggling so much right now, and I feel like I’m falling apart. My OCD has latched onto intrusive thoughts about pedophilia and other horrible topics, and I can’t escape them. They feel so real sometimes—like my brain is trying to convince me that this is who I am. It’s not just ‘what if’ questions anymore; it feels like affirmations, like my mind is telling me I’m a monster. I keep getting these false memories that I did something horrible in the past, and it makes everything worse. I can’t even trust my own mind anymore. I’m terrified that these thoughts will never stop, and that I’ll somehow end up acting on them, even though deep down, I know that’s not who I am. I’ve also had an enormous addiction to pornography, and I deeply regret everything I’ve watched. The shame and guilt I feel because of that addiction are overwhelming. I can’t help but feel that it’s all connected to the mess in my mind right now, and it makes everything harder to bear. I can’t eat, I can’t sleep, and I spend most of my time hiding under the covers, wishing I could be the person I used to be. I love my family, but I can’t even be around them because I’m so consumed by shame and fear. Sometimes, I have mental scenarios where I imagine admitting to being something horrible, and it completely breaks me. I don’t know who I am anymore. I’ve even stopped going to work because there are children there, and I’m terrified of what my mind might do. On top of this, I have borderline personality disorder, which makes everything even harder to manage. I’m on Effexor (started 75 mg on December 23, now 150 mg), but I feel like I’m losing the strength to wait for it to help. This has been going on non-stop for a month now, and I don’t know how much more I can take. I feel so alone in this, like I’m trapped in my own head. I don’t know how to live with this constant doubt and terror. I just want to feel normal again. Please, if anyone has advice or support, I need help so badly.

I’ve been dealing with intrusive thoughts as long as I can remember. I’ve had several different themes that always come up at the worst times. Example In 2009 I married my high school sweetheart. Before that time my theme always revolved around health concerns. After we got home from our honeymoon someone at work said “nice ring, looks gay on you”. That statement alone sent me into a spiral of questioning my sexuality which I’ve never done before. That theme lasted a while and I can now burst out laughing about how ridiculous it was. Fast forward several years. I’m dealing with harm and any thought that my mind labels as intrusive. It’s very difficult because I have two kids that my OCD loves to attack. My family is my whole world but my intrusive automatic thoughts make me doubt everything. Do you sometimes check your feelings and notice that you are numb? I’ve even started being stuck on the idea that maybe I’m bipolar which terrifies me. Does anyone fall in the trap of reading symptoms and now you think you have them? OCD is a terrible thing. Just looking for someone who can relate. Knowing someone can relate is a big help. Stay Strong out there my OCD friends.

For as long as I can remember I've struggled with ocd, diagnosed when I was 6 or 7. And my family and friends have always helped me. So I want to share some things they have said to me that maybe could help some of you too. "Do you think bad people worry about being people? No. Bad people don't feel remorse, and they don't learn from mistakes. They don't care, that's the thing. So if your sick with guilt and worry about being a bad person, and your here worrying and thinking of any bad thing ya ever did. Your not a bad person." "Your ocd isn't very nice but it kinda means well, it think it's keeping you safe. Your intrussive thoughts get stuck and your brain mail room machines get clogged, so your brain thinks those messages are actual threats and real things ro worry about. It trys to come up with solutions. Don't hate your mind, tell it you hear it but it's not real, it's okay" "What would you say if it wasn't you? What if I told this worry to you? Would it still make sense? Would you be telling me that fear is real? Would it be just as convincing?" "Even the sun has to set. And sometimes the sun's out but it's raining, or even when it's cloudy, the sun is still there you just can't see it. You don't need to be happy all the time to be our sunshine, even the sun needs breaks and needs rest" "People don't care. Everyone is busy worrying about them selves, nobody has time to be paying that much attention to you. Don't worry about people making assumptions, most of em are worried about that or not even, they are probably more worried about what they are having for dinner tonight!" "You don't have to feel guilty for that. You didn't do it nor could you have known or stopped it. Not your barrel not your monkeys. You can't control other people and your not expected to puck up the pieces. You don't have to feel guilty because a friend does something bad, that's them not your." " Your one of the best people I know. Ofc I would care if anything happens to you. Nobody wants you to feel bad, nobody wants you to die. We all need you and are proud of you for doing everything you can" "I'll tell you what I think, but I wanna know what you think first. Okay? Do you think this is a reasonable worry? Do you really think this is true? Does this really seem likely?" " Some people just think more then others, doesn't mean your crazy. I find the people who think the most tend to care the most" "-although your ocd did give you a mind wise enough to look deeper into people's situations and think more about why they do what they do. That's why you see good and feel empathy towards most." "It will all be okay. It's not real, it's just ocd. I promise. I got you it's okay. That won't happen, you know I wouldn't let that happen anyways" "You can do it. Common you got this. By doing it you'd be proving ocd wrong!" "I want to make you feel better. So bad. But I know if I want to help you in the long run I should try to not give you as much reassurance"

I've found myself writhing on the ground from intrusive thoughts of my past. I have bruises all over from me hitting myself. Every waking moment is a nightmare, I can't do anything. Can't let people be mean. But standing up for myself turns into cruelty. Cruelty turns into a loathing, and then I fear that everyone hates me. I wish I could die, and live again. I don't want to lose my life, but I can't live like this.

17+ only or you’ll be blocked. I saw someone get canceled for drawing cheese pizza and zoophi// when they were 13-14 and at this point I want to be confess what I did. It eats at me and seeing all the comments about “maybe just don’t do bad things, this is the consequences you have to deal with.” Or “no, anything from 13-15 is unforgivable” I’m so done, I feel doomed and I feel like I ruined my life because I did something unforgivingly wrong and I will never deserve happiness. When I was 15, I viewed a inappropriate disgusting video on a website, no it wasn’t a weird video, it was actually bad, like get in trouble bad. then I regretted it once i realized what had happened, it was like my brain turned on after it happened and I realized what I was doing was wrong, I cried every night, and I didn’t eat or anything because of how much I regretted what I had did. It took me a year to recover because I would punish myself every single day and even now when I see these videos I go back to punishing myself like I did for a year, almost two years ago.

Sorry if this is a bit of an odd post, but I’m wondering if there are any girls out there that have specifically struggled with shame around watching porn? A lot of my real-event ocd stems from watching that kind of content in the past, and for some reason it feels particularly taboo as a woman. As a young teen, I saw some genuinely disturbing things, and I think a lot of that was to do with having unrestricted access to the internet. However, despite lots of people telling me “that’s normal teen curiosity” it just never feels like it applies to me, and that I’m genuinely just a sexual deviant. I think because that kind of content is so graphic and overstimulating it’s really stuck in my brain, and I just wish I could turn back the clock and switch off the computer. I’ve recently been struggling with doing typical ‘girly’ stuff because I feel tainted and gross, and I just want to get back to feeling myself again.

*TRIGGER WARNING: Mentions of adult content and suicidal thoughts* I am in pieces right now and I’m struggling to see a way through this nightmare. I’ve never posted on forums before but I see a lot of people sharing similar experiences on here and I feel like I need some advice. So around 4 months ago I was in a bit of a depressive state and I ended up looking at some NSFW content on Reddit, which I now regret more than anything I’ve ever done in my life. I was on a specific page that I’d used a few times in the past, but I found myself spending a much longer session on there than usual- I think because of the stress I was going through at the time, and I wasn’t looking for ANYTHING illegal whatsoever. I can remember scrolling past a few things that I found unpleasant, and I WISH this was the sign that I took to leave the site immediately. However, like an idiot, I continued scrolling through because I hadn’t found anything I liked. As soon as I left the page, I had an awful, awful feeling build up inside of me. The next morning I woke up with the realisation that one of the posts that flashed up had a very ambiguous sounding title and I got that horrible gut-drop feeling. Whilst there wasn’t anything visually alarming, the title that I remembered spoke about “waiting for their mum to get home” and I felt absolutely sick. Even just writing this is making me want to throw up. I started panicking and I even called my mum because I was in shock. Ever since that happened, I have had numerous visits to hospital because of it and I’ve been put on medication. I made a little bit of progress until I was hit with another dreadful realisation that I had seen something else with a worrying title on there in the past, and this time it felt like there were no excuses. I started spiralling into a pit of self-hatred and despair which is where I am currently at now. Even though I knew I just forgot about it, it doesn’t make me feel any different the situation, and I cannot forgive myself no matter how hard I try. I’ve had dozens of health professionals tell me that I haven’t done anything wrong, yet it just feels so catastrophic. I have since reported the subreddit and I haven’t looked at any kind of adult content since, because I personally find it the single most terrifying thing now. I just wish there was a way to settle my uncertainty and make sure that the people in the images were safe, but there is no way to prove that. Things have just got worse and worse and by brain is bringing up all kinds of gross/disturbing things I’ve seen on the internet from years back, and it’s taken over my life at this point. I don’t want to sound narcissistic but I’ve always considered myself to a person with strong morals, and this feels like it’s violated every single one of them. It’s made me feel like I don’t deserve to heal or grow from this and the only thing that is keeping me going is not wanting to upset my family and friends. I’m sorry for the long post, I’m just terrified with what’s happened and I’m starting to lose faith in ever recovering. If anyone has struggled with anything similar and has come out on the other side I’d love to hear how you overcame it because I genuinely cannot see the wood for the trees. Thank you for reading.

On my tumblr I keep getting messaged by a lot of people from Gaza who made accounts to get donations to evacuate (they have been verified and such) i donate what i can and share their posts,but don't typically reply to their messages. A few people started messaging again thinking i was ignoring. So I felt bad and told that I donated and shared. There was some confronted bc one of them I sent a donation several days ago but didn't reply.to their message until later and they got confused and thought I didn't donate. I feel really bad and anxious abt it even if I know I did do it and am trying to do the right thing,the fear i might convince a family stuck in a war zone i am lying to them about such a thing terrifies me