Welcome to
the NOCD Community

I find myself getting panic attacks over things that I was exposed to as a teen in my younger years and they still haunt me sometimes.

It’s been a really long time since I’ve been here. I’m about to go back to school for nursing. But right now I’m working as a nursing assistant in the hospital. Idk if it’s my body adjusting to seeing new INTENSE things every day or shoving so much information into me at once with long 12 hour shifts. And when I’m at work and conscious it’s completely fine. But when I come home and sleep I wake up from bad dreams. Yesterday at work there were maybe 10 rapids (when you call an emergency for your patient, don’t always have a good ending) and I woke up this morning remembering my dream that I was in the hospital and my heart stopped and they had to call a rapid on me. Maybe it’s not even OCD??? And it’s just heavy heavy stuff that I’ve never seen before and it’s just my brain and body adjusting to life and things that can be really scary. It just feels a bit like when my OCD was bad and I’m scared I’m really in my head right now I don’t want it to get worse. Can anyone relate???

i just got diagnosed with ptsd on top of my ocd but my ocd is trying to convince me that i am lying to myself & my psychiatrist & that i am an “attention-seeker”. i feel so embarrassed by these thoughts that its eating me up. my ocd makes me feel so invalidated from what i went thru that led to me being diagnosed with ptsd… does anyone else experience this?

bruh I was sleeping & I suddenly am woken up by one of my cats. idk what was happening but she was making a weird howling noise. her tail was puffed up and she was either looking out the window or looking at my other cat. I told her to be quiet bc idk why she was making such a weird noise. thing is, I never heard her do that. then when I threw something on the floor (my bed is a loft), they both kinda flinched. I didn’t hurt them but just needed my girl to relax. they were both looking at each other & my girl was growling/howling at my other cat. idk why. like ik sometimes they fight but she was being weird. anyway, I had to use the bathroom so I did. the door to my room was open which meant they could get out if they wanted. they didn’t. they were by the window. very odd. came back up the bed & now my mind is frightening me. thoughts are racing, ranging from: there’s something/someone at the window, likely some shadow figure to my cats secretly being possessed by some mysterious entity. my mind goes wild & when I’m suddenly woken up, I’m still in that dream state. idk how to put it but my mind starts to believe things and I feel very vulnerable. literally it’s night and everyone else in my household is asleep. these moments felt like nightmare fuel & any sudden noise triggered me. like I felt maybe my cats were going to stand on their legs and chant some shit idk. I wanna go back to sleep soon. I need my paranoid ass to calm down. at some point I started to get kinda freaked out just looking at my cats. ruhrjfjdsnnfnf I hate waking up suddenly at night T_T

Hi. I found this website through listening to a podcast. I am undiagnosed OCD, but I am absolutely sure I've got it, and I'm really struggling. I feel lonely and my head will literally not give me a moment's peace. It all started a year ago. I have always been the anxious type, but a really intrusive/alarming thought randomly entered my head - it wasn't intrusive/alarming in the sense of distressing explicit content (as I know this is common with OCD), it was intrusive & alarming in regards to the future and a worse case scenario happening. I spiralled from here and over a year later I'm really struggling in this same spiral. I have to check things constantly. If I can't check, I become quickly distressed. But, even if I can check, sometimes it's not enough and I still doubt and become distressed. I am CONSTANTLY scanning for danger - no matter how small, or insignificant. I am CONSTANTLY pre-occupied by worse case scenario and I try and plan repeatedly in my head 'just in case'. I replay the past in my head on a constant loop trying to desperately remember if I did/didn't do something. I then 'test' myself by trying to remember things that I can check in the here and now - if I get it wrong, I become pre-occupied and distressed. I'm very vigilant about 'covering any tracks' where I could have 'slipped up', e.g. did I send that text to the right person? Or fully believing that my phone has malfunctioned and has sent stuff to people who I wouldn't want to see it. I then check and recheck. I have urges to straighten things, touch things etc. when my brain tells me to so that I stay 'safe'. Every OCD incident, pattern etc. I have a real need to share and seek reassurance from friends and family, but not only do I realise that ultimately this reinforces my OCD, friends and family are fed up and have a 'what now?' attitude. It's so lonely and I want to beat OCD once and for all. It's an absolutely miserable way to live.

Adults only as pocd mentioned I'm still thinking abt all the friends online who have unfollowed me,some cases even i think softblocked or fully blocked me. My brain is convinced that I must have done something gross and predatory or I did something racist or in general bigoted and they came to terms with it and left me. I can't stop thinking abt it. I just remembered checking an old discord for a fandom I was in when I was 17,half the people there had unadded me when we were friended and possibly even blocked,I hadn't talked to a lot of them in a long time though,but I thought we were on good terms. I think we also used to follow eachother on tumblr but before I made a new tumblr I remember not seeing their posts after some point and I can't remember if it's just bc I wasn't on much or i unfolloed or I got blocked. I feel I must have done something awful. One of my worst fears is people i care abt or was friends w leaving me and not telling me why,I have so much stuff I did on the internet I feel regret abt and it could be any of those things,as i mentioned i cant stop goint thru old messages and there have been times ive seen me make like a nsfw joke as a teen in a group chat or me not react negatively when someone else in the chat does something weird . I'm constantly scared who the next old friend i have will suddenly disappear one day,letting me wonder if I did something hurtful or predatory or bigoted to them or someone they know. I have so much stuff I regret a lot when i was younger,I have so much stuff I wanna confess but I'd be here all day and I'm bound to forget something then remember it later and spiral.

Hi everyone I’m new here and well today was a very hard day for me… so a couple months ago out of no where my brain just went poof literally to not get so much into detail I experienced a lot of things but during that whole process I developed intrusive thoughts of hurting my self or others its been going on since December I knew someThing was off so I went for professional help Ive been working very hard in recovering now those intrusive thoughts aren’t the problem as much because I figured out what was the trigger (I think) but now it’s more obsessing over religion and spirituality and what’s real and what’s not and it makes me panic and creates panic attacks and just kind of makes my episodes a lot worst… so I would like to know if anyone has experienced this? How do get through it? How do you talk yourself out of it?

Was just remembering and ruminating on extremely traumatic and disturbing drawings I looked at as a teen. I'm trying to move past it because I cannot go back and unsee what I've seen, it's so difficult though. Feeling like people would look at me with disgust and I don't deserve the love that I crave desperately.

Last night I was closing the store just like every other night. It was really late and I take public transportation, and I’m not comfortable taking the train alone as a young female late at night, so I take the bus. This bus comes just after my shift ends and whenever I ask to leave a bit early for my safety all the other managers say it’s okay. Except last night apparently. The manager I had was picking apart everything I did that day and giving me so much disrespect and attitude. I take it every time because I can’t afford to stick up for myself. She gave me permission to leave early and when I was about to step out she told me I needed to do more shit because I didn’t do enough during the day(I did my best). I stared tearing up because I got really bad images of me getting assaulted on the train or like me getting stabbed or something like that.(I live in a big city and crime on trains is too often). I even stared thinking of what to say to doctors and nurses about what happened and why I got hurt. To top it off she took away the days I was supposed to work this week. I hate retail. One day I’ll be able to afford school and work for respect in a field I love.

i have done so many bad things bc of my OCD. and the thing is i have actually done them. whether or not they were compulsions doesn’t matter bc i still did those things with a fully conscious mind and I cannot erase those moments. and today I did something completely irredeemable. I don’t know how I can live with myself bc I know I am not worthy of life anymore. I am not worthy of being able to walk around free when I am a danger. and people will say “no it’s just your thoughts telling u this” NO IT ISNT. I HAVE ACTUALLY DONE BAD THINGS THAT ARE IMMORAL AND AT THIS POINT CALLING THEM COMPULSIONS JUST FEELS WRONG. I wish I had normal ocd. bc I know I deserve to suffer bc of all these things so im fine with it being normal OCD. there is nothing no one can do for me anymore. I doubt anyone will see this post anyway. and if u have read this far, ur better off just scrolling away bc im just a terrible person who is better off d3@d.

Im so fucking terrified by my own thoughts. Idk how much longer I can go on like this. Just every single thing my brain produces feels either distorted by OCD or like I've literally done the most deplorable thing any person could do. Can't reach out to a specialist because I don't have the money and too scared too share. So scared that it's real

Idk if this happened to anyone but I have a lot of self doubt and memory problems.idk if they are false memories or not. When someone ,a relative , or even going to church in a deliverance service ask questions like "have you don't something in the past that you feel guilty about in the past?" "do feel like you admitting to stuff would make you feel a certain way ? I feel like it triggers me does that means that the thoughts I have are real and I did do something if I feel triggered. I always feel guilty 😔

Getting eaten alive by thoughts right now, when I was a child me and other kids around my age would experiment and do things we shouldn’t have, I’m talking very young, like 3-5 as I got older I was for whatever reason always curious to a horrible extent and it lead me to do in appropriate things to kids around me, I was 7-8 at the time. I would say it happened 3 times in total in my childhood. And i eventually told my parents the last time it happened because even though I didn’t know it at the time. I had ocd. And I knew it was bad. That was when it all started. I feel absolutely disgusted with my 7 year old self and it comes up every once in a while especially when I hear anything about sexual abuse. I’m nearly 20 now and I enjoy my life for the most part and I’ve been down the ocd path before but I feel unforgivable. And I never want to tell anyone about it, but my ocd seems to want that. I have a beautiful girlfriend that had some traumatic things happen to her and I love her with my soul. I don’t ever want that to come up. Because that’s not who I am. When will I be able to forgive myself? If at all I hope I’m not alone.

i need some advice!! when i was 16, i was watching an anime and this character had abs and he was 12. i remember at the time (from what i can remember), i made a weird comment on his physique. saying things like “omg how did he become this buff haha.” and “oh im going to jail.” i even said “it’s only a 4 year difference.” like WHAT?!? just because it’s a 4 year difference, doesn’t make it okay. its WEIRD!! why would i say that? i also want to mention that i have a hard time keeping my thoughts to myself bc of my ADHD, so i tend to blurt things out. i just find it disturbing that i would have such thoughts, let alone say it out loud. i never had attraction to kids bc its immorally wrong and disgusting, but i feel no different from the ppl who would hurt children irl. I’ve tried forgive myself multiple times, but what i did is irredeemable. i feel like i am using my OCD as an excuse. i am so scared that i am a p, i want to d1e. my life is ruined.

(TW- Please don’t read if you have ocd relating to one off/random medical events) ^ ^ ^ ^ okay so this is something I’ve been confused about for YEARS and completely sped up my ocd symptoms, I had a one off seizure a few years ago, it wasn’t a major one but enough to have family take me to the hospital afterwards, I don’t remember anything whilst it was happening and I was unwell at the time too. I did all the tests and nothing came back, even tested for epilepsy but I don’t have that. No one has been able to give me a reason and that set off my ocd since mine is mostly based around things I cant see hurting me or others (contamination ocd) or me making the wrong decision (rOCD, real event etc etc) (no clue I had ocd at this point though, only got diagnosed last year) I know they can be stressed induced too but I remember not feeling that stressed that night and not much was going on… Is there anyone that’s experienced the same thing?? Could it be OCD related at all?

hi im experiencing a lot of anxiety and guilt right now. im 16 now but in the past i said many offensive bad things, slurs and racist jokes with my friends. it was disgusting and im not proud of this. I'd never say those stuff to an actual black people to idk make fun or shame them because im not actually racist, i could never hate another person just because their skin colour is different. but i did say disgusting stuff as "a joke" and i feel very guilty about this. I don't think i was always a bad person but for around two years i was just acting mean and pretty shitty. i wish i could turn back time, but that's not possible. i was talking about stuff I didn't have a clue about, i said n word just because "its just a word, it's not that deep!". but now i know it's really more than that. yet I can't move on. i keep thinking about it so much i want to throw up. I can't look in the mirror now i don't know what to do. lately im trying to become a better person, be nice to people close to me and just to finally feel good. but i feel like I don't deserve to change and i create scenarios that people will bring up my past when ill finally be a better person.

I know I was here earlier on with a question as well lol but has anyone ever found that when a new false memory takes its place at the forefront of your mind, it's almost easier to disregard the old false memories and say "Yeah that stuff didn't actually happen that way". It feels like OCD giving you a little reward for letting it place a new, shinier false memory in your head. Anyone experience the same thing? Maybe I've asked a similar question before.

I keep getting triggered by news stories related to my obsessive thoughts. I was feeling ok for a few days but now I'm spiralling again because of the news.

Very brief mentions of pocd and nsfw jokes,id like this to be adults only . Repost bc i had to edit something Does anyone have experience with real event ocd attached to your online footprint etc? I keep checking old messages,trying to find old people i knew i used to talk to etc. To find out every problematic thing I did and if I've ever been unfollowed or blocked by anyone I used to be friends w online/atleast on good terms w. I am particularly concerned abt doing something bigoted,esp racist bc i have racism ocd,and doing something predatory bc of my pocd. I remember hanging around people who could use 'edgy' or offensive humour in my teens and i remember a lot of sex jokes and that i would join in on sex jokes sometimes . i dont remember details w the offensive humour as much,i feel like i didnt join in on it as much but i was definitely WAY passive abt things and prob let a lot of bad stuff slide i shouldnt have bc i didn't speak up it was wrong,I remember one friend in an online community would say slurs and horrible jokes when i was 16. I dont remember my response to it as much but i feel i didnt speak up abt it aside one time i found in the dms where he made a bad joke on a thing i shared for social justice. I cant stop going thru old messages and stuff or trying to find ppl from the past. I feel like if I don't check it now,that eventually it'll come to haunt me or that I'll stumble across it eventually. I worry what if someone messaged me on one of these apps I un-installed or on one of the accounts I don't have access to,confronting me abt all this stuff I did. I had an obsession w this back in 2020 and did check in depth on all my accounts,but now that it's been 4 years the obsession is back in full swing.

TW My brother came home 4 days ago (I think) from a hospital stay of just over 3 months. In the hospital, he attacked one of the staff and almost k*lled her, in his dysphoric mania. Now he's out of mania, but I'm scared that he'll harm or try to k*ll our pets and/or my mom and dad. Since he's been home, my OCD has flared up badly, and I've started to have panic attacks (leading to seizures and fainting), destroying my lips, and having overstimulation over every little physical sensation. My joint pain is becoming unbearable and the medications aren't working, I may have an autoimmune disorder that could destroy my organs (Lupus), I'm frustrated because walking feels like hell, I keep falling, I keep getting dizzy and seeing stars and I'm just so tired. I can't sleep since my brother came home. Yes, I close my door at night, but I'm still terrified that he will hurt my cat. I've started to hate anything that I've touched with my hands cuz I don't wanna get stuff on my face and I hate the feeling. Yesterday I kept obsessing over whether or not I was cheating, if any of my memories are real, obsessing over if everything is perfect or perfectly in place, and over everything my brother does. I've become paranoid over everything and I'm so tired. Thank you for listening.