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Can someone please explain false memories related to OCD? I feel like I have had these but have never realized it’s related to OCD

I just started Exposure and Response prevention teraphy due to my OCD getting worsed as time pass by and I would like to ask question to someone who has gone throught his process already.

I love him so much and I'll never have him again and it's all my fault. My ocd got so bad after he left me and it's all my fault.. I was stupid and cheated on him for some reason and he found out and broke up with me. This was almost 5 years ago now and I'm still in love with him, but he has completely moved on and wants nothing to do with me. But then he says things that confuse me and i always feel like its not over between us even though hes said mutiple times that he doesnt love me anymore and doesnt want to be eith me I've tried dating other people but I just can't do it. I love him so much it hurts why did I have to be so stupid why why why why whyyy I hate myself so much

So I’ve managed to stop myself from deliberately imagining the intrusive thoughts to test myself pretty much all day, but I’ve been feeling miserable all day and still feel like I’m evil and that it might be true that I like the feeling of acting on that evil thing and it’s really scary and horrible I just want to feel normal but now it feels like I’m actually evil and will eventually be evil. It feels like as long as I think about the thoughts I will want to do that or it will feel like I want to or would like the feeling of acting on it 😞 I’m genuinely believing I’m bad or like the feeling of doing that

i keep accidentally looking at peoples private parts and i don’t mean to but i just happen to glance and i hate it because i feel like i make them uncomfortable. like yesterday my friend was talking about how her shirt made her uncomfortable because it was low on her chest and i glanced down there and i feel so bad cus i made her even more uncomfortable than she was before. i naturally keep my eyes to the floor but sometimes my end up on someone’s butt and i have to look up and tell myself how horrible of a person i am that i did that.

I’m really struggling. I’ve had BDD as long as I can remember- most days I feel so unbelievably sad and hopeless and I’ve never known what it’s like not to feel this way. I’m constantly thinking about which people are looking at me, what lights are on and off, how I can move my hair in front of my face so people can’t see me, what clothes I’m wearing, how to lose weight or dress to look skinny, and I spend hours at a time digging bloody holes in my face just because a tiny pimple felt so excruciating to know about without getting rid of. I have acne all over my face and I feel like sobbing whenever I see myself in a mirror. I can’t have my makeup off in front of people (haven’t been able to in a decade since I was 9 years old) but I also can’t sleep with makeup on, and this makes it so I can’t travel with my family or friends or stay at people’s houses unless I have my own room and bathroom (which is obviously not the norm). I miss classes and socializing often because I feel like I can’t go outside in the light so I sit alone in the dark for days at a time. I push everyone in my life away because of it. I was hospitalized a couple of times for an eating disorder and had to spend months at a time in inpatient treatment, so I’ve tried lots of intensive therapy and outside of treatment I met weekly with a therapist for 3 years. I’m just feeling so lost, alone, and helpless. I need advice, help, something. I always wonder whether I’d just be better off not living, even though I know that decision can’t even be on the table. It sucks.

I turn 18 in one month and on one hand I’m excited but on the other I’m nervous about the pressure that comes with this age, new responsibilities, the pressure to move out like everyone else my age…has anyone else felt this way? What ways have you felt less stressed?

I keep getting a shock feeling and shivers and feel intense over the thoughts but I’m still not convinced that I don’t like the thoughts and keep deliberately imagining the thoughts to see my reaction. I’ve been doing this since one time when I imagined the thought it felt like ‘I like the feeling of imagining doing that action’ like it felt as if when I imagining doing that horrible thing that I liked the feeling of squashing someone’s face with a pillow (the thoughts are about smothering) now I’m worried I like the feeling of suffocating someone and it’s just awful I don’t believe myself anymore I’ve been having so many crying episodes but I’m not convinced and keep bringing on the thoughts and now I’m genuinely believing that its possible I ‘like the feeling of doing that’ and I feel like I’m in hell, I don’t want to like the feeling of doing something horrible and I’m worried I get a good feeling from imagining doing that or that I would like the feeling of doing that and it’s driving me insane I’m so worried. Recently I keep getting a jittery feeling and anxious every time I have the thought but My head is convincing me that I’m some how ‘deliberately’ making myself anxious and I’m not actually anxious and I secretly like the thoughts and want to do that but for some reason I’m ‘pretending to be worried or anxious’ please can someone help I’ve been worrying for days I really don’t want to like the feeling of doing something horrible but I’m worried it’s true 😞😞 please help say if I’m getting some sick good feeling from imagining that and it’s really scary but I don’t know it it’s my fight or flight and I’m confused or whether because I’m imagining the thought in so much detail combined with the intense anxiety makes it feel like an ‘urge’ and then it’s somehow translated into ‘feels like I like the feeling’ I’m really worried I don’t know what to do please help

Is anyone else scared to not fight their intrusive thoughts about seriously hurting people and even killing them? Like the premise of ERP is to just let the thoughts flow and not do compulsions, but I’m scared if I don’t stop them or ruminate to keep them in check, then they will get out of hand and I will suddenly want to act on them. I’m terrified that suddenly I won’t be the kind, empathetic, harmless person I’ve always been. It doesn’t make any sense to me. I also fear that it’s not OCD and I’ve just been faking it or trying to convince myself that it is OCD.

I was diagnosed with ocd in second grade, I’m 21 now.. it started out with me being a “clean freak” I would have melt downs if things were out of place or order. I would also have to sing the abcs while washing my hands. If I was interrupted, I would have to start over. As I became a teen, depression and anxiety hit. This made me become messy in a way. Things being in order didn’t matter. However, intrusive thoughts and repetitiveness took over my brain. (still struggling with this BAD) for example anytime I cook on the stove, I will look to make sure it’s off what seems to be a thousand times or else the house will burn down or we will get carbon monoxide poisoning and it will be all my fault. I KNOW ITS OFF DEEP DOWN but I can’t stop looking at it because WHAT IF. I have the same problem with social media. I have to have my boyfriend check to make sure I didn’t post anything every time I get on Facebook or Snapchat. My brain tells me I posted a stupid picture or something embarrassing knowing damn well I didn’t. I can’t stop. This takes up my life. It’s so draining. Every little thing I do I overthink. I seen this app on TikTok hoping to find my people. I feel like I’m going crazy..

My therapist suggested I really think about which of my worries about germs are based in scientific fact, but when I look things up on the internet, it just gives me more worries. How can I do research when I have contamination ocd? Sorry if this doesn’t make sense

One thought that suddenly came to me was ‘stop trying to find peace in violence’ it’s become a regular habit of mine to ‘test myself’ on intrusive thoughts, which entails me deliberately imagining and intrusive thought that bothers me to see how I respond and how anxious I will get over it. It’s become a very bad habit to the point that everyday I am ‘testing myself’ I am hoping that by imagining the thought I will get a disgusted feeling or start feeling anxious to prove that I ‘Don’t like that thought’ except I ran into a problem where sometimes I get anxious and feel ‘disgust’ over the thought but a lot of them times when I deliberately imagine the thought it felt super real and worse and even to the point where I would have the thought and it felt like ‘I liked the feeling of imagining doing that action’ in that horrible intrusive thought which made me get into such a bad state of worry. But I jsut thought to myself ‘why are you trying to find peace in violence?’ How is imagining something violent or something horrible going to give you peace? I was under the illusion that ‘testing myself’ will make me feel better because it will let me know I don’t like the thought but it backfired and made me feel even worse. Because it’s absurd to think for a moment that imagining something so awful could bring you ‘peace’. If you want to feel peaceful are you going to watch a violent film? No. You are going to watch something light hearted, like a romance or comedy or something. There is no peace to be found in something violent. So if you are struggling with ‘testing yourself’ you need to know that it will never give you peace, your brain will always come up with something new or doubt your feelings or not believe the evidence because that’s the nature of this problem, to DOUBT. Obviously easier said than done though, it’s been a habit for months now, the worst part of it is, before I knew I hated the thoughts because as soon as they would come I would hate it but since ‘testing myself’ it made me get use to thinking of the thoughts and now I can bring on the thoughts no problem and not get anxious but then the fact I don’t get anxious makes me worry and stress even more. Dwelling on intrusive thoughts or deliberately imagining scenarios where your acting on these horrible thoughts is not going to help you, it’s just feeding the obsession and making your fears worse, it will never bring you peace of mind, so stop trying to look for answers/peace in violent thoughts because you will never find it. I don’t know what ever gave me the impression that deliberately imagining my intrusive thoughts in so much detail would make me suddenly think ‘oh yes I definitely hate that’ I can move on with my day peacefully now’ because that’s not the case, at least for me it just made it ten times worse the questioning became worse, I started focusing all my energy on how I feel and whether I hate the thoughts or not and it became an everyday thing

I’ve been feeling on edge since I woke up, last night my mum was sleeping and I was deliberately having the thoughts (testing myself) and my head was flinching when having the thoughts and it felt like I didn’t want to do that, but other times it feels like I do want to do that or like the feeling of imagining doing that (the thoughts are about smothering) but now all day I’ve been down because I feel uneasy and on edge and still worried I like the feeling of doing that, and also feeling guilty and like I’m evil because I’m as having the thought while my mum was asleep and I even turned on the light to look at her and try to imagine the thought because I’m testing myself and now I’m thinking oh my god why was I doing that and say if I actually did do that in that moment and I’m worried 😞😞 I started crying after I done those test thoughts but still don’t believe I’m good or not evil 😞

it was quiet for a second and my mind was like it’s quiet cause you want all of these thoughts to happen. i didn’t get anxious like i usually do and it made me worried that this isn’t OCD and this is all me. now my mind keeps going back on this and i genuinely hate it cause the anxiety i used to get when this all first happened is not the same rn and it makes me even more worried that it’s not like that anymore cause i want these things to happen. i hate that this is all happening and i feel completely out of it. i feel like out of body and all stuck in my head and it sucks completely. i keep getting spike of anxiety and that is scary. does anyone else feel this way or knows what i’m talking about? i feel like this is just me and no one else gets this way and that is also very scary.

I don’t think anyone will ever understand what it feels like to think about death 24/7 for so long, it’s been a year now, 2022 was not the one. It was almost every minute of the day for a whole year. Almost as if you were watching a horror movie that really scared you except you can’t turn it off and go back to reality/your normal day, you constantly have to watch that movie and can’t click off it. For me this was the heafty price to pay for watching documentaries about evil people. I don’t even like the word ‘serial k’ I don’t like saying it or writing it. It almost feels like your in a war zone in your mind on the front lines especially if the intrusive thoughts are gory, absolutely awful, like I’ve witnessed people dying in front of me thousands of times over and over and the worst part is in the intrusive thoughts you are the culprit, you are the person being evil, this problem is like a curse, would not wish it on anyone, I really hope anyone with this problem who is suffering can be healed from this, it’s so unfair

So the past few days have been bad, I woke up this morning haven’t had much sleep, and I straight away had an intrusive thought about my cat, I don’t even know if I can call it intrusive because I probably brought it on myself, but it was about smothering and it felt like when I had that thought that I liked the feeling of imagining doing that. So then I tried imagining it a few more times and it still felt the same but at the same time felt like I wouldn’t want to do that but these days even when I get anxiety or ‘disgust’ towards the thoughts I feel as though I’m not being genuine or faking it. I’ve had this problem for a year now, at the start I was a nervous wreak and new I hated the thoughts but now I don’t even know anymore. It feels like when I have the thoughts now it’s no longer about the ‘actual thought’ for a long time now I’ve been focusing on ‘how it feels’ because before it felt like I ‘liked the feeling of doing that when imagining it’ I no longer have the thoughts and feel ‘why did I have that thought’ or ‘disgust/shame’ all I’m doing is trying to analyse ‘how I feel’ when imagining doing that horrible thing. I have no problem bringing on the thoughts for months now I have deliberately brought them on and I’m trying to work out why it feels like ‘I like the feeling of doing that’ when I have the thought. Sometimes I get an electric shock kind of feeling and twitch my head like ‘ew I don’t want that’ but now I’m thinking maybe I’m faking it, I don’t even know when I’m anxious anymore, it’s possible that I’m highly stressed and anxious over the thoughts but I don’t even know it. I’m so confused. I definitely get some sort of feelings when having the thoughts but because I’ve been thinking that it feels like ‘I like the feeling of doing that when having the thought’ I feel like it’s distorted my perception of everything. All I know is it feels like an intense feeling but I don’t know ‘of what’ I’m just confused and I was explaining this to someone and they started asking me ‘are you excited, do the thoughts make you excited’ and when someone asks me something like that I feel like it just makes things worse and I start spiralling in my mind. But it’s like I can’t even answer that question, I don’t feel particularly ‘happy’ when having the thoughts but I just don’t know what I’m feeling when having the thoughts and this feeling of ‘it feels like I like the feeling’ is really messing me up, I don’t know how it can feel like I like the feeling of doing something I don’t want to do but at the same time sometimes feel like I don’t like the feeling of doing that. Now I don’t know if that feeling is a genuine desire and I’ve come to like some sick feeling now, I don’t want that to be the case. I’ve been suffering a lot with this problem the amount of times I’ve cried and The way I have reacted to this problem is like never before, I have never felt this bad in my life. I don’t know if I’ve confused it feeling like an ‘urge’ to me ‘liking the feeling’ maybe I’m constantly putting my body in ‘fight or flight’ and I don’t even know. Maybe what I’m getting is constant ‘urges’ because I’m deliberately having the thoughts to test myself and when it feels like an urge I’m confusing it with ‘liking the feeling’ but with other intrusive thoughts I’ve had I 100% new I hated them. Like last night before sleeping I kept having these horrible gory images coming to my head and I hated them and knew I didn’t want them, but with this why is it different? Is it possible that I’m more scared of thoughts that involve sharp objects but because these thoughts are about smothering, I’ve been experimenting with the thoughts since they don’t involve sharp objects and aren’t ‘so alarming’ but are still horrible but because if you have a thought about a sharp object it would be ‘one horrible action’ you imagine but with this smothering thing it’s like your imagining ‘one action but it carries on’ (sorry this is tmi but I’m trying to understand why it feels like that) all I know is if there was a way to get rid of this instantly i would do it but in the mean time I don’t know why it feels like I like the feeling of doing that horrible act, maybe my fight or flight is making my mind think that I want to do that or it feels like an ‘urge’ but I don’t feel ‘happy’ but I just don’t get it I don’t know what to do I really want help, this has literally forced me to book a therapist because I’m so lost and confused and worried. But I’m worried because wits not like they can take this feeling away, this feeling of ‘liking the feeling’ feels extremely real, what if I’m getting some sort of sick satisfaction out of imagining doing that that’s why it feels like I ‘like the feeling m’ I’m worried and don’t know what to do I feel like I’m lying about everything as well please help

i just got a fortune from a fortune cookie that read: “we are what arises in our thoughts” are you serious?? 😭 why did i have to get that fortune!! it’s stressing me out i just wanted to throw that thing away!

After a year I’m finally trying to find a therapist but I’m worrying. It feels like I’m a criminal about to turn myself in or I keep having images of me talking to the therapist a laughing while I’m talking about it and then they think I’m evil. Or the other thing is the intrusive thought that bothers me the most is about smothering and for some reason it feels like when I imagine that thought, that I like the feeling of doing that action when I imagine it and I don’t know if it’s because I’m confusing an urge and the vividness of the thought with ‘I like the feeling’ but it’s horrible, for it to feel like I like squashing someone with a pillow and stopping them from breathing, I don’t understand it and I feel like if I tell the therapist there going to think there’s definitely something wrong with me. Say if it’s true? Why does it feel like I like the feeling of doing that when I imagine it? None of my other intrusive thoughts feel like that and it’s worrying. Sometimes I have those thoughts and ‘flinch’ or get like an electric shock feeling or anxiety but most times it feels like I like the feeling of doing that action when I imagine it, I can’t explain it which makes it worse. All I know is if there was a button to take all this away I would press it instantly. But I feel like I’m beyond help and that Maybe I’m enjoying some sick feeling now, maybe I was normal before but now I’ve discovered I like the feeling of doing that horrible thing, I’m worried. These past few days have been awful I don’t know what to do, my head keeps wanting to test out the thought by deliberately imagining them to see if it’s true and if it does feel like that I have to keep imagining it until I get anxious or something. 😞 I really want help but I have a lot of doubts I feel like They won’t be able to help me because now maybe I like that sick feeling. I wish I could go back in time and not watch that stupid documentary my life has been ruined..also I’m worried about getting the wrong therapist and they will think there’s something wrong with me or not be able to help or I don’t know I just don’t see how they can help me, they can’t take this feeling of ‘liking the feeling of doing that’ away from me but I hope that feeling maybe is just a mistaken feeling and that maybe I’m just confused

I have a few questions/thoughts I want to know if anyone else is experiencing them. 1. Does anyone else’s head create scenarios of them being evil and in the scenario it seems like your actually bad and it even scares you by making it seem like ‘you enjoy’ doing that in the scenario? Like I saw this video of this dog and I had an intrusive thought about smothering and it felt like when I had that thought that I ‘liked the feeling of doing that action when I imagined it’ and I got worried by that and then my head proceeds to imagine a scenario where I’m alone with the dog and I ‘choose’ to be evil and I’m pulling a creepy smile and I’m actually evil and do that evil thing. But then that makes me worried that I’m actually evil and that in the future I will choose to act on the thoughts/urges because in that fact scenario I was evil, but I think my Brian made that up to scare me idk 🤷🏻‍♀️😞 2. Even when I cry and I’m sad or telling someone how stressed out a I am and feeling miserable, I keep feeling like maybe I’m faking being sad and I’m actually evil, or maybe I’m not actually sad and I don’t know if that’s because these evil people in these films/documentaries always pretend that their innocent or haven’t done it but they have, so now I’m suspicious of myself constantly thinking I’m faking my emotions or maybe I’m not actually sad. 3.being alone is a big issue for me, like being alone with a cat, or a person or anyone who is vulnerable is like alarm bells ringing. It feels like ‘evil mode activated’ i don’t know how to explain it but it feels like I’m in a horror movie or it just feels like foreboding or like there’s this evil vibe or I feel like I’m evil and it’s horrible and i usually get that feeling if someone mentions ‘you could go and stay with so and so/you could stay home alone’ or something like that, but it’s like when I’m alone it just feels terrible, like I’m evil can’t be trusted. 3. This is one of the scary ones for me but feeling like ‘I don’t even know why I’m not acting on the thoughts’ I’ve gotten use to having the thoughts so much and sometimes I have intrusive thoughts and they feel so incredibly real and like that condos ctually happen or feels like an urge and In that moment because I’m not getting anxiety I don’t even know WHY I’m not acting because still not sure whether I’m evil or not or I’m believing that I’m bad. 4. Whenever someone talks about the future or ‘my future’ I get anxiety or if I talk about the future or if I talk about something that makes me happy or when I’m being affectionate to my cat and calling him cute I suddenly stop in my tracks and start feeling like I don’t know maybe a sinking feeling or feeling down that I’m evil or something 5. I don’t even believe myself anymore. It spoke sometimes I will have an intrusive thought and I will flinch my head like ‘Urgh what is that’ or scrunch my nose (those are my reactions to not liking the thought’ but I don’t even believe those reactions anymore. Just not when writing this I had an intrusive thought about my cat and I shook my head as if to say ‘what the hell was that’ and then I didn’t believe that I was disgusted by the thought so then my head wants to have the thought again to check and then I end up reimagining the thought multiple times in a desperate effort to know that I don’t like it. I just don’t believe myself anymore but I have no energy to cry and be upset because I’ve been crying most of last night and the previous night

I stopped thinking about this but I started again recently, before it just felt like ‘urges’ but I deliberately imagined doing that intrusive thought and I don’t know why it felt like I liked the feeling of doing that action in the thought, (it’s about smothering someone with a pillow) but sometimes I think of the thoughts and I get an instant shock of anxiety and my head/face flinches and that tells me I don’t like it but at the same time sometimes it feels like I like the feeling of squashing someone with a pillow and it’s really scary. I had a break down crying twice today I couldn’t take it anymore everyday it’s the same garbage. Me deliberately imagining the thoughts to check if I like the feeling of doing that and if I don’t get anxiety or a shock kind of feeling And it feels like I do like it I feel uncomfortable and have to keep thinking it until it doesn’t feel like that please help me, I don’t know how to explain this but it feels really real. Before I was worried the ‘urges would cause me to act but now the urges combined with the vividness of the thought and the feelings of ‘you like the feeling of doing that’ is torturing me I just wanted a normal life please I don’t want this to be my fate, What if I was normal but after thinking and imagining doing that in to much detail now I like the feeling of doing that through imagining it please help me. Sometimes I think maybe I’ve confused the urges with it meaning that ‘I like the feeling of doing that’ so every time it feels like an urge I’m taking it as ‘I like the feeling od doing that’ please help me none of the other intrusive thoughts have felt like this it’s only the smothering ones and it’s awful please help