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UPDATE: with my harm ocd hitting full swing... i find myself triggered by my pocd again... and i feel like a horrible person... i tried not to post... i tried to do what people told me... but right now i feel absolutely horrible... I genuinely feel so guilty and wanna exile myself from society... I cant handle the anxiety... Im doing horribly right now because I feel so so guilty about this... Youtubers are constantly getting accused of doing p3dophilic activity and inappropriately abusing and inappropriately messaging women and minors and abusing others and its making me think my real events are as bad or as worse as them... Ive vented a lot to a lot of people in the PM's about my OCD... some of them younger (minors)... because I wanted reassurance from everyone and anyone... but this situation triggers me the most because I was venting about my 18+ HOCD situations... (the 18+ HOCD situations were about 18+ s*xual HOCD situations that triggered me immensely...) When I was 19, in an HOCD support group I was in, I vented to 2 minors in the PM's about my 18+ HOCD situations... The leader of the support group (that i vented to) was 17... I was 19 at the time... the other minor i vented to was younger (14-15)... the younger one told me she was uncomfortable when i vented to her in the PM's twice... The 14-15 year old said she was uncomfortable the first time and i tried to stop venting to her... after she said i was a bad person for supporting trump, i vented to her again because her saying i was a bad person triggered me... she said she was uncomfortable for the second time and then i blocked her... i kept asking the leader of the support group for reassurance for my 18+ HOCD situations for months because she kept giving me reassurance... i thought she was cute but didnt pursue her because of my age... i dont ever want to ever be a P or a MAP or a groomer in any way... I'm so genuinely triggered... I don't want to be a P or a MAP or a groomer or a bad person... I wanna be a good person who does good things for other people... I dont want to be arrested for any crimes... I just want to be a good person who helps people in the medical field... I only want to help others... the last thing I want is to commit any form of harm towards minors in any way... 😭😭😭

Good evening everyone. I have OCD since my 15yrs old. Now I am 39 yrs old. I used to take SSRI in the past but decided now to do the necessary efforts defeat my fear of virus & infection by myself. My father died in March 2025. I placed his body in a room where there were 2 mirrors which were partly covered. I placed him there for like 20mins to do some prayers before transferring him to another room. I must share 1 other detail. My family was insisting that we put him in the other room. I fought them to place my father in the room where the mirrors was partly covered because this room was in the house that he owns and the other room was in another house next to his. Before passing away, he was making plans to renovate his house including that room. The family which was residing in his house was insisting so much not to place him there that I believe at one point that they were doing things to steal the house for themselves so I fought them. I felt the need to place him in that room even if it was for 20mins. Now the fear that his soul is trapped in the mirror keep coming into my mind. And there is also a secondary fear that my fight with the family has disrupt his rest in death. The fear is not distressing or impairing as over the years, I started to understand how OCD works and how do the brain can trick you and make you believe that some things are real, BUT still, even with that knowledge, sometimes you don't know for sure which can be real because your brain is a part of you and functioning within you and may still trick you despite your knowledge. And I still want to know that my father has found his place near God. Now I am thinking and getting afraid that my father's soul is trapped in the mirror. I frequently prayed to God to take care of him and to forgive his sins. I also ask Jesus to take him in his Kingdom. The thought and fear that my father's soul is trapped in the mirror came into my minds frequently, though not everyday. Do you think this is real or is that OCD which is causing this? I am going to share what I have found online: Yes, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) can absolutely manifest as a compulsive need to search for every detail and seek complete clarity or certainty when faced with uncertainty. This behavior is a core characteristic of the disorder for many individuals. Why this happens in OCD Intolerance of Uncertainty (IU): A central feature of OCD is a very low tolerance for doubt or uncertain situations. People with OCD struggle with the normal level of uncertainty that most people accept as a part of daily life. The "Doubting Disease": OCD is often referred to as the "doubting disease" because it generates persistent and intrusive doubts about everyday actions and potential outcomes. Compulsive Information Gathering: The urge to seek clarity leads to compulsive behaviors, which can include: Excessive research: Spending hours on the internet (e.g., Googling symptoms or reviews) to find definitive answers. Mental review: Repeatedly replaying past events or conversations in one's head to ensure nothing was missed or done incorrectly. Asking endless questions: Seeking constant reassurance from others to alleviate anxiety and uncertainty. Checking and rechecking: Meticulously examining details, such as light switches, locks, or documents, to achieve a feeling of absolute certainty that everything is "just right" and no harm will occur. What do you think?

TW: POCD mentions I joined a discord server for a game I've been playing, and a few people who were 16-17 were in the chat. Everything was going ok enough, I was panicking, but managing to push through and talk well enough. But then they started making like, sexual jokes, like, nobody was actually being legitimately NSFW but, ya know. Just jokes about fan service in anime and stuff. I tried to just endure it and not immediately run away, tried to play along and be funny, but I couldn't take it, I just left the server and also left every single other discord server I was in.

This is my first time ever making a post or even talking about this in general, but I just want to vent i guess. For years ive been dealing with gerd/acid reflux, it has me constantly burping all day everyday and causes severe stomach pain at some points when it comes to my meal timings. Recently though, it’s like I can feel its effects more intensely. It’s been causing pressure in my chest, a racing heart, and other odd sensations within my body that Ive never had or noticed before. Earlier this year I literally had to call paramedics after a gerd flare up caused some weird pain in my chest. Of course my habit of searching up every little symptom ended up sending me into one of the most intense panic attacks I’ve ever had :( I genuinely thought I was having a heart attack and I made the call. Even after getting the all clear, my brain wouldn’t stop spiraling and I had my father contact many of his cardiologist friends and even got a second ekg because I was convinced something was wrong with my heart. There is nothing wrong with it, it’s just gerd! And nowadays, even though I KNOW that the odd sensations and feelings of discomfort that I feel are very likely caused by gerd, I can’t help but feel like something else and more serious is going on, and I enter this rabbit hole of looking up new conditions and diseases that I manage to convince myself that I have that I most definitely do not have. I zero in on normal bodily functions like breathing, heartbeat, the sensation of swallowing, etc and the more I focus on them the weirder it feels so I start to panic and am forced to do breathing exercises to calm myself down quite often. It has been so stressful to my mental health this past semester and the anxiety messes with my sleep! At times I find myself unable to sleep due to my body jolting awake as I fall asleep and feeling a sudden rush of adrenaline. Of course I searched this up too (I’ve really been trying to stop searching up symptoms, but I can’t help it sometimes) and found that my nervous system being stimulated due to my anxiety contributes to these jolts! So im essentially stuck in this loop of feeling slightly unwell, getting anxious about it, trying to figure out what’s wrong which then makes me more anxious, and then ruining my sleep which results in me feeling even more unwell. I’m so tired of this, I just want to be calm and worry free :( I will note that I have been seeing doctors and am working towards seeing a proper gastroenterologist! I just wanted to let out my frustrations about how I currently feel and see if maybe someone is going through something similar. Now im just rambling at this point but I also got all 4 of my wisdom teeth out last week. If you’ve ever had a tooth extracted, chances are you know about the risk of dry socket. This week has been so bad with me being paranoid about getting it, even while I’m already past the risk window! I keep checking my extraction sites and every little spike of pain causes me to worry. I’ve limited my diet to liquids and mush, and as a foodie it’s been so difficult to deal with. Im so hungry all the time now and I just can’t wait to be fully healed

Hey everyone, this is my first time posting on here. This is a long post but I would REALLY appreciate some responses to this. Does anyone else deal with parents who are unempathetic and claim to understand OCD but actually do everything in their power to make it harder for you at every single turn? For example, I live with my parents and younger siblings currently (now that I’m employed again, I WILL be moving out in 2026 come hell or high water) and I don’t use the same fridge as them because they don’t care about making me feel even slightly comfortable enough to use it. I have my mini fridge in the garage but I moved it into the kitchen because it’s too cold in the garage in the winter and the compressor shuts down, which means my food melts. For the past 3 years, I’ve had to keep my fridge in the garage despite the fact that the food melts because my dad claimed that the kitchen couldn’t accommodate the electric power of a mini fridge (this was a lie). For the last 3 years I’ve had to stand in a freezing cold garage and microwave ALL of my food as soon as I buy it before it melts. However, this year my dad said that the fridge would be able to go in the kitchen (nothing has changed from the previous years; he just didn’t want to feel the cold air from the garage every time I went in and out and because it was affecting HIM, he decided to do something about it. But he didn’t care I was freezing my behind off for the last 3 years). Anyway, I had to move the fridge by myself while my dad (a tall, 200+ pound man) watched me struggle because he told me he didn’t feel like washing his hands and wearing a pair of gloves in order to help me. When I pointed out that not being able to move my fridge would lead to a greater decline in my health, more disordered eating, and diabetes (which I only got while living with them because I wasn’t eating frequently) he didn’t care. My mom refused to wash her hands and wear gloves too. And before anyone says that them washing their hands and wearing gloves would have been enabling the OCD; it wouldn’t have. It would’ve been helping me. The fact that I was even going to let them touch the fridge was the brave exposure that I was doing. It is truly evil to refuse to do something as simple as washing your hands and wearing a pair of gloves because “you don’t want to” when you see that your family member is starving and experiencing health issues because of a household environment that you created that they’re not comfortable to live in. I would appreciate some helpful advice or encouraging responses from y’all!

I make my boyfriend want to die and I feel disgusted with myself My boyfriend and I have been together for 2 years and nearly all of it has been long distance. We started talking April of 2023, we started dating September 2023 though we acted like a couple way before then, then I moved like march of 2024. Immediately after I moved, I started confessing a bunch of stuff to him. I still talked to my ex the months while my boyfriend and I were just in the talking stage. It wasn’t in a romantic way and it was maybe a few days out of the month, like maybe once a month or sometimes more. I’d ask questions about how I was in my past relationship with him so I could be better in my new relationship or I’d talk about my mental health and things I wasn’t comfortable talking to my now boyfriend, about. My boyfriend started talking to me literally like a month or two after my relationship had ended so I don’t think I was completely over it, I needed time to heal. I liked my now boyfriend so much though that I just blocked all of that out. He treated me so well, he was so handsome and interesting, I loved being in his presence. I was so happy with him and I felt like my old relationship didn’t matter anymore. Anyway, I also stalked my exes socials even when my boyfriend and I had started dating. I stopped talking to my ex when my boyfriend asked me to be his girlfriend though. I didn’t think it was wrong, I didn’t realize it was wrong at the time. I didn’t want to be with my ex, I didn’t like him anymore and I actually ended the relationship. He treated me so horribly that I stoped loving him, or liking him at all. I confessed everything to my boyfriend though while on my way to my new state. I hurt him so much and that was only the beginning. He initially wanted to break up, but eventually chose to stay. It was a rough few weeks though. Then I got my first job ever and that opened up a whole new can of worms. This was my first real, serious relationship. I started finding other people attractive, I found myself wanting to other people to think I was pretty, I had thoughts, and I also stalked people from my past on insta. I confessed yet again, everything to my boyfriend. Every single thought, every single small action, everything. I had never experienced these things before, being in a relationship and still finding others attractive, being in a relationship and stalking people from my past, wanting other people to notice me. These were things I was used to doing while single and things I’m not sure if I did in my past relationship, but I just didn’t notice. I felt horrible though, I felt disloyal, I felt like he needed to know. I made him feel so horrible and depressed. Then I got a new job, same stuff happened, I confessed, and the cycle repeated itself. Then again, I confessed my every thought, every small action, everything. He begged me to stop confessing, he said he didn’t want to know anything, he said I was making him depressed and insecure. I was making him feel like he wasn’t enough. I confessed such horrible things to him, not cheating just things you should never tell your partner, things you should keep to yourself. If I imagined myself with someone else, I confessed, if I stalked someone from my past with no weird intentions but then maybe started to think I found them attractive and my intentions were weird, I confessed, if I walked past someone on purpose or found someone attractive at work, I confessed. If I didn’t confess, it would eat at me. I’d feel sick, I wouldn’t be able to eat for days, I’d lay in bed crying and I’d call out of work. I’d feel so dirty and confessing was my only way to feel clean again. I stoped confessing around December of last year. The damage was already done though, I changed my partner and our relationship. Then my partner got a new job and I started to think he was cheating. I’m not going to go through every single thing that happened, it would be too much. I made him unfollow girls from work who made me uncomfortable simply because I was insecure even though they were just his friends, I was constantly questioning him and getting upset, I was constantly stressing him. He wasn’t perfect and did some things to make me uncomfortable, not display just things that weren’t okay, but it didn’t warrant my behavior, I was too controlling. He lied to me twice and I found something out that really hurt me. Again, wasn’t anything disloyal, just not okay. It really broke my trust and since then, I haven’t been able to feel secure. It’s been over a year and I still question him about situations, I question him about irrelevant girls, I stress him out so much. For the past few months I’ve been questioning him about a girl he talked to for maybe two months before him and I met. They were just friends as well but she was really weird and he ended up hating her. I’ve consistently brought her up probably every week for idek how many months. I’ve asked if he looks at her account, finds her pretty, I ask him and over and over again if he liked her, I’m always bringing her up. One time, the same day I brought her up, he had listened to a song, the same song she posted herself to on her story. It wasn’t a very popular song, and he said he had seen it in an edit but he couldn’t find the edit anywhere. Ever since then, I’ve questioned him about it and I’ve accused him of looking at her account. Inconsistent things have happened in the past before though and that triggered me. Like him saying he doesn’t have Snapchat but there being a green dot on his name, him saying certain people are blocked but they disappear off of his blocklist, there’s been a lot more. I’ve asked for proof of things, I’ve kept tabs on him, I’ve been so horrible. I used to have his location but I deleted Life360 because that’s weird. His location was off one time that he said he was with family and I questioned him. I stalk his PlayStation and if he says he’s busy but it seems he’s playing video games, I question him. I ask to see his blocklist to make sure every girl I had him blocked, is still blocked. He visited recently for a week and it was amazing, we’ve never been happier, but after he left I spiraled. I searched that girls name on insta to see if she’d come up and she didn’t. A few days later I asked him if he had blocked her and he said yes, I asked to see and his blocklist order had changed. He said he didn’t know how and I spiraled. We had talked about it a few times prior to him leaving but it wasn’t enough. When he got back home, his WiFi was out for over a week and he couldn’t text. He had to walk far out of his neighborhood which is dangerous, just to text me. I spammed him, I told him I wanted to break up, that I was done, that he’s a cheater, etc. I kept having these ups and downs and these mood swings. One minute I was convincing myself he cheated and the next I was like, he could never do that to me. He would walk out of his neighborhood sometimes just to answer, I knew it was dangerous for him but I felt so insecure that I didn’t care. He asked me to stop texting until he had WiFi again and I tried, but then I’d start to spiral and overthink again and I’d spam. Finally he could text because he had went to see family in Mexico. He promised he’d answer some old messages an hour after waking up the next day but ended up not doing that. He had to sleep on the floor and he told me he had spent the day so tired, trying to sleep. I didn’t care, he broke his promise and I was so upset. I’m used to him ignoring my messages sometimes so this really pissed me off, especially since I spent a week not being able to talk to him. This happened on Christmas by the way. I spent all day waiting for him to keep his promise and reply to my messages but he never did. Then he didn’t reply to me for like 12 hours, no update or anything. I spammed him again, and I sad the meanest things I could think. I hate you, you’re horrible, you’re just like everyone else, you make me want to die, I hate you so much, etc. I had convinced myself he didn’t care about me anymore. He broke his promise and he didn’t update me. He answered at like 2pm today saying he had went back to California and he still didn’t have WiFi at his house. He said he didn’t update me because his phone had died. Then today, I questioned something he had said during a conversation where I was talking about that girl. We ended up getting into an argument and he called me. He was crying, saying that he’s so tired of me bringing her up and that she’s not relevant at all, and I make him want to die and he’s so tired. This made me realize how absolutely horrible and disgusting I am. I love him so much and I just want to be happy with him, I don’t realize what I’m doing until after. I convince myself he’s this horrible cheater sometimes and I piece together a bunch of things in my head that I think is evidence. I stalk his every move and think certain things are proof that he’s cheating when really, they’re a product of my imagination. I’ve ruined my relationship, most of it has just been be stressing him out and making him want to die. I know I need help, this isn’t normal. These mood swings, my overthinking. I don’t know what’s wrong with me and talking to a therapist doesn’t help. He’s cried to me before, saying he could never cheat on me because his dad cheated on his mom and he was cheated on twice as well and it’s just such a horrible thing that he could never do. Is my relationship past the point of fixing? Have I ruined things too much? Everything is so dirty now and I can’t make it clean again. I can’t undo everything that has happened and so much has happened. Every single day I’m stressing him out. He’s mentally ill too and I make him need therapy, well his family too but still. I haven’t been there for him when he’s needed me the most, I make him swear on the people he loves just so I can believe him, even when they’re sick. I’m literally such a disgusting person. I don’t mean to be this way, I really don’t, I don’t want to be horrible. He makes me so happy and I’m so happy with him. I just convince myself he’s cheating or doing things behind my back and it feels so real in my head. I ruin his happy day, the holidays, his birthday, I ruin everything. These past two weeks that I’ve convinced myself he’s doesn’t care about me or love me and that he’s cheating, I’ve imagined myself with other people that I know or knew because I’m so scared of being alone. I’ve looked at people who are attractive, I’ve hoped people would notice me, I’ve been so horrible. I was convinced he was cheating and I’d end up alone. I don’t want other people, I just want my boyfriend. We’ve been together since I was 17 and I’m almost 20 now, is it too late to be better for him? I feel like I’m so manipulative sometimes too. I don’t feel like I do any good. I make him insecure, I stress him out, I don’t stop when he tells me too, I just keep going, I trigger his ptsd by being so stressful, I hurt him and make him depressed, I haven’t supported him in crucial times and I even STILL questioned him about things when he was going through heavy things, I let my insecurities consume me and I let the need to confess, consume me.

I was doing so good, but of course I got triggered on Tuesday right before the holidays and I haven’t felt peace since then. I’m dealing with ROCD, which is what I always deal with. It’s the same intrusive thought too; it’s difficult for me to interact with men, whether it be employees, men in public or friends because I always get the intrusive thought that what if I kissed them and I don’t remember. Simple interactions cause me to get this intrusive thought. On Tuesday a worker from target brought my order to my car and when he walked away I was hit with that intrusive thought and have been dealing with it since then. I’m in a happy relationship and I know OCD attacks the things we love so it makes sense that this is my strongest theme. But it’s debilitating and it’s ruining the holidays for me 😢 any word of advice or encouragement from anyone who has dealt with this same intrusive thought/theme?

Hey everyone , so about 2 months ago my partner and I had decided to mutually split up, on my end it was due to my inability to fully manage my relationship OCD symptoms due to circumstances and my tendency to believe that they were really my desires despite them causing me(and partner at the time) distress. Anyways after the breakup I found out that my ex partner held a lot of resentment towards me because of my actions during the relationship like my impulsivity and compulsive confessions which were hurtful and eroded trust over time. That I completely understand which that was a big reason why I decided to end the relationship as I didn't like how I was as a partner towards them and didn't want to further hurt them. However the way they went about their side of things really affected me. Not only did my ex partner become cagey with me but they also went behind my back and started to be very obvious with their involvement with a mutual friend of ours. I tried to respect their space as by this point in time we had already broken up but it had not even been a month since then, and they also knew I was able to see everything hinting at their new relationship on social media. When I called them out on this they proceeded to bring up everything wrong that I did during our relationship and they held on to stuff that I already felt immense guilt for and stuff that I had already acknowledged could only be worked on if I was not in the relationship. Moreover they brought up subjects that I had confessed during periods of OCD spirals and compulsive confessions, which they believed were true I guess. Saying that essentially "I hope you get to do those things". Furthermore they also said something along the lines of "I know you have OCD but OCD doesn't make someone say fucked up things to their partner over and over again". I thought I was on the right track by making it clear that I wanted to make things right by separating and dealing with my symptoms on my own time and not having someone I care about being involved, but them doing and saying all these things eventually did lead to me to acting out on my compulsions which involves sleeping with men even though I am a lesbian. In a way it was a form of revenge for them moving on so quickly but also a form of self punishment because of all the shame I carried after that relationship cut off. Does anyone else with ROCD carry this kind of guilt after a relationship ended, this truly sucks.

Some notes I thought worth sharing as I've delved into my OCD patterns with my therapist (and myself via journaling). Perhaps like others here, I oftentimes view my thoughts, ruminations, and OCD behaviors as simply pathologies. They just exist, I don't know WHY they exist, and they're simply "part of the condition." There may be value to this line of thinking, but I am also gradually understanding that my OCD patterns developed in response to specific traumatic life events. For example, I am a former binge-drinking alcoholic. In 2023, I had my first ever panic attack while driving while I was severely hungover. I thought I was dying of alcohol poisoning. One terrifying ambulance and hospital trip later, I was mired with horrible shame and an utterly terrifying fear of alcohol. My brain had learned that alcohol -> panic attack -> shame -> I'm a terrible person and I've failed. This is a big part of where my health anxiety stems from I've learned. I want to control what goes into my body to ensure I'm maximally healthy so I never panic again. Moreover, my brain learned to demonize alcohol and shame me HORRIBLY for ever indulging in it again. Drinking alcohol -> I'm a terrible person. Both these things in conjunction began a patter of OCD behaviors trying to perfectly optimize my food and drink intake while also feeling deeply afraid and ashamed for still wanting to eat junk food and drink booze. Point is, there is a root to this OCD. My ruminations and checking are not just "parts of a disease" they are an effort to assure I never have a panic attack again, and avoid behaviors that lead to feel intense shame (drinking booze). Similar thing happened recently after a traumatic relationship. She and I loved each other dearly, but I was constantly crippled by feelings of anxiety and feeling "less than" her. This again culminated in INTENSE shame, fear and anger directed at her (which fueled the shame cycle), ruminations to always "solve" my anxiety and be the "perfect" boyfriend who always made her happy and solved all her issues. Even after this relationship, I have ROCD behaviors and ruminations about family members and friends sometimes. My brain DESPERATELY wants to know that I'm "enough" and to avoid all behaviors it irrationally views as "shameful." Queue feelings of fear towards social interactions, which then reinforces the shame for wanting to avoid anxiety inducing social interactions. My point again is, these don't seem like meaningless compulsions and behaviors. They may (or may not) stem from genetic factors, chemical imbalances, etc. Who knows. But my OCD behaviors have pretty clear beginnings and they are PROTECTIVE measures that my brain learned to keep me safe from health concerns and fear. They aren't simply useless things my brain does on repeat. My brain is smarter than that and so is yours. They don't do things for utterly no reason. I am not a therapist and please do not take any of this as more than food for thought. You may also find that there is a deeper reason behind your behavior than you think. Happy Holidays, everyone here is "enough" just as you are and I feel your struggles. I hope you all can find some peace :) I need some peace and love too.

In a span of less than a flipping week, I've gone from crying because I didn't want to leave my boyfriend to go on my 2-week trip abroad to see family to feeling nothing for him at all and feeling the need to break up. I cannot feel anything. I feel numb on the inside, but function okay on the surface. I feel numb to nearly everything with a few moments of emotional clarity during which I do appreciate him and enjoy my time. But most of the time it feels like I don't feel anything for him, feels like I don't want to talk to him, feels like we've grown apart (we were literally sleeping in the same bed for the first time ever last week??). I've been crying to him on our nightly calls for a while now, but since this trip started it's been mostly me complaining about this issue and crying my eyes out. He just wants to help me out in some way, but I've even been getting frustrated with him because he sounds so nonchalant about it (he isn't, I'm just really annoyed by anything small lately). I'm trying to summon things that should make me anxious, such as thinking about what it would be like if I broke up with him, but it won't elicit any response other than crying out of frustration. I can't even think of past happy memories or imagine our future, because my brain is so fried from all the anxiety and stress I've felt the past couple months. I'm just so emotionally numb and exhausted, it doesn't feel like I'm living my life. When I'm not feeling like we need to break up, I feel like I need to be in his arms. It's just going from one extreme to the other. I hate this so much. I know there are techniques to help with this (hell I even recommended some to someone else on here suffering from this). But I'm just afraid I don't know the truth about my feelings, despite me literally not feeling ANYTHING remotely deep. It also doesn't help that I've been PMSing and starting my menstrual phase like tomorrow. It's always so much worse around this time.

It’s been a few weeks since I’ve been on this app and I just wanted to give an update! I’ve been experiencing OCD for roughly 2 years and it’s been a revolving door of obsessions. I had been to therapy once and it seemed to help for a few months until October of this year when I had one of the worst breakdowns of my life stemming from one of the worst thoughts/urges I had ever had. I couldn’t eat, sleep or focus for almost an entire month and it was unbearable! Since mid-November, I’ve been going to one on one therapy and I’m currently on Lexapro (the lowest dosage available). At first, I had increased anxiety and it was very hard for me to function. I can say now that my body is starting to make the turn! I’m eating & sleeping very well now but the only thing that’s getting me is that I’m still having those lingering thoughts! One thing that has kept me ground is remembering that the thoughts & urges I’m having will pass and they don’t last. I’m in a way better position than I was months ago. Stay strong!! (Question: who else experiences unwanted thoughts but doesn’t feel anxiety about the thought? What do you do in that instance?)

18+ UPDATE: This is my first post of the day so please take that context in mind... I'm genuinely feel so triggered and anxious... I'm gonna go to sleep right now, but I genuinely dont think I'll be able to ever be able to look my friends and family in the eye if this is true... ive been holding in the compulsions today all day... but right now its genuinely terrifying me... i have a girlfriend now and i dont want to lose her... Oh dear god... I dont know... but I think my worst fears came true... I think I unknowingly ERP'ed with a minor on an 18+ discord server 5 years ago... they currently are on Astralspiff's discord, having been there since 2023, and have switched their username, with a chicken emoji as their bio... they also switched their profile picture from Nana Osaki to a fan art of Kasame Teto... its making me think that these three things are certainties that she was a minor on the 18+ sexual server... and that I ERP'ed with her not knowing this... Im genuinely feeling shocked and sick to my stomach right now... they don't have their age listed on discord or anything, but they joined 5 years ago and it was 4 years ago that we ERP'ed... god I feel disgusted and horrified right now... someone talk to me... please.... in the past, I have been catfished by a man pretending to be a woman, had a minor on a dating app who lied about her age and i unknowingly flirted with her because I assumed she was 18+ and her bio said so, and sent an 18+ pic to a "woman" online who now I suspect of being a catfish... this is the reason why I'm so scared of whether or not I unknowingly inappropriately chatted with a minor without knowing... it genuinely scares me... Its making me think that I unknowingly inappropriately chatted with a minor in the past without knowing and it genuinely triggers me... I have tried to go back through most 18+ online interactions ive had with women online to make sure they didnt lie or they confirmed their age... i have two situations on discord that trigger me that ive posted about in the past... and a couple have deleted their discords so thats triggering me really bad... most who deleted their discords were verified but still... why delete your discord, you know...? for context i was on 18+ explicit discord servers meant for sex that you cant just join regularly on iPhone due to it being for adults only... Ive also been to a website dedicated to adult 18+ literature... they also have an 18+ chat room where you can talk to other users... i know ive made stupid mistakes going on here... i wont deny that... and now im paying for it with the uncertainty... veterans of the site, who have been on there for over 9 years, have told me that the chances of a minor lying about their age and coming onto the chat portion of the website are rare... but it still triggers me all the same... Im scared of someone one day in the future accusing me of doing horrible things like unknowingly inappropriately messaging minors, or have my worst fears of unknowingly explicitly messaging a minor confirmed to have happened and I didnt know about it...

(EDIT: Just to clarify; i don’t currently have a therapist through NOCD, this was in person where I live.) Has anybody had a really bad therapist experience that made your OCD symptoms worse? I’m in the middle of a horrible flare up of ROCD, and my therapist who helped me find out I have OCD left last month. I had an appointment with my new one today, which I was looking forward to. I go to the appointment, and the first thing she tells me is, “you’ve been in therapy quite a long time… what exactly is it that you’re looking to happen?” and just something about her phrasing felt odd. She said, “I’m just unsure what to do with you, help me get a better understanding.” So I tell her I want help managing my OCD, and I very quickly open up about my ROCD because i was dying to externalize it. Very quickly I also start crying, she said she isn’t used to people crying in the first session, that ut usually happens after a couple. After explaining that I don’t want to break up with my boyfriend but I’m fixated on persistent intrusive thoughts, she gives me a funny look and says she’s never heard of ROCD before, that that sounds like anxiety or self sabotage. I told her that ROCD is categorized by constant rumination, googling genuine doubts vs anxiety, checking feelings, etc. She said, “Oh, so you always do that when relationships are ending?” Hearing the phrase relationship ending triggered me and really fed my OCD’s voice, because I don’t want this relationship to end. She then asks if I have any other things I focus on and I told her I have health OCD and explained to her the constant googling of symptoms. She said, “you’re a teacher, surely you know not everything you see on google is accurate. That seems like it’s making you more anxious.” I said that I know that but I can’t make myself stop when I get anxious. All in all it was just awful, and really made me question everything.

Hey so, idk if this is ocd related or no but I just need support and help. I've been talking to a guy for like 2 or 3 weeks, he said he likes me a week in and we started flirting and basically almost getting official, planning valentine date and stuff. Then out of nowhere he says his ptsd got bad, we decided to take a break, my anxiety and ocd got bad thinking about hid past. Basically a lot happened and it was bit overwhelming. I crashed down, cried and well almost a month passed basically no talking. I just accepted we ain't a match and texted him to clear things and say I appreciate him but we just don't match. He just kinda said oki thanks, hope you take care and you can still text me as a friend with smiley faces. Now this kinda relieved me knowing he ain't hurt but also made me upset he didn't seem to care ad much as I did. I was crying almost every night because well I did genuinely really really like him (I'm demi, I don't date really and when I like someone I LOVE them). So I'm upset for once again having bigger emotions than someone and not seeming as important in someone's life, someone I thought loved me and told me they loved me like crazy couple weeks ago and how they want me in their life. And now he just saying oki bye like nothing. Yet I feel bad for feeling upset because idk if its valid? I always struggled understanding what emotions are appropriate when and I was always told I'm overreacting so now that I'm grown I don't trust myself and idk what I'd valid to feel rn. I'm kinda lost and sad and mad at him yet also at me for trusting someone once again. This kinda was my final blow and now even tho I have people who like me and even conffesed but I feel disgusted by a thought of trusting or flirting with anyone again or being close to them. I'm so hurt by everything. There's a whole other story where I got rejected and I'm still friends with him and that whole stuff still hurts too especially with him still constantly bringing up his ex yet nit getting much support from him. Idk I'm just so lost and unhappy with me falling for people so fast and hard while they don't seem to care. I want love where I feel safe and treasured but at the same time I wanna stay away from it so I'm just lonely and sad :[ Sorry if it was a mess

Please only read and respond if you’re an adult, thank you. Might delete this too because I feel like such a creep. Recently in my recommendations I found a video from this YouTuber I admire, who posts educational videos about various different sociopolitical topics, mainly relating to feminism. I clicked on this video and in it she discusses the relationship between a 24 year old woman who’s in a relationship with a 19 year old, soon to be 20 year old man. The Youtuber repeatedly describes the man as a teenager and even “a baby” and calls the woman a predator, saying how their relationship perpetuates sexual abuse that’s a byproduct of our misogynistic society. Normally, I would agree with this woman, especially in regard to age gaps, but I couldn’t help but think back on my own relationship while watching it. A few months back, I (22F) joined a dating app in the hopes of searching for a long term romantic partner, as I have never dated anyone before. I ended up meeting this cute girl on the platform. Although I was unnerved by her lack of age in her profile, I thought that, since this app’s users were 18+, there was nothing I needed to worry about, so I swiped right and started chatting with her. We hit it off until she started asking more romantic/sexual questions, to which I asked for her age first, where she told me she was 20. I immediately got kind of uncomfortable with the idea of dating someone younger than me, which led to my brain getting paranoid, so just in case I asked her to send a photo of her ID with proof of her age. She complied, and her ID seemed to confirm that she was not only 20, but she had basically just turned 20 like a week prior. This honestly made me feel worse, as I was interacting and seeking a romantic/sexual relationship with someone who only just got out of their teen years. I asked my older sister for advice and she said how her two friends, who were now married, had a three year age gap and met at similar ages, and that because me and this girl I met were both adults and out of high school, everything should be fine. She (the girl) asked if I wanted to start casually seeing each other and I agreed to it. After a while of talking, I eventually met her at her place where I later lost my virginity to her. Ever since then, because she wasn’t comfortable being in a serious relationship yet due to personal reasons, we’ve decided to just be friends with benefits for now. I haven’t been to her place since then but we still talk to each other over the phone and over text, and our conversations and the things we send each other do get sexual on occasion. Like I said, I’ve always been a bit uncomfortable when thinking about our age gap, but I’ve always chalked it up to just OCD and that “we’re both adults and it’s not a big age gap so it’s fine” and “it’s not like you like her just for sex or for her age, so it’s fine.” But after watching that video, it’s honestly made me re evaluate some things. For starters, the obvious would be the YouTuber describing a 24 year old woman dating a 19 year old who would be turning 20 the same year as she turns 24 as a predator. Note that the video never mentioned that the 24 year old met her partner when he was underaged and she was an adult, nor that she met him when he was just 18, but that she was a predator for being a 20 something year old dating a 19 year old, which made me question if I’m a predator or at the very least engaging in predatory behavior for being a 22 year old dating a 20 year old who has only very recently turned 20. (What makes it even worse is that as this point in my life I’m a college graduate.) Then, going on to the rest of the video, I’m now worried that my relationship with this woman is perpetuating the pedophilic rape culture that we unfortunately live in, due to how she mentioned how focusing too much on the legality of things can ignore more important aspects like mental maturity and power imbalances found in different life experiences, and how this often mirrors behaviors that predators use to groom and target prey. Next, the woman discusses how, even if a woman is a predator towards a man, this is a symptom of the misogynistic society that we live in, which honestly triggers my Gender Identity OCD a lot by making me question if I’m participating in traditionally toxic male behavior. It also hurts that this woman oftentimes talks about actual pedophiles and rapists and misogynists and conservative bigots on her channel which makes me feel like I’m either actually one of them or I’m unintentionally excusing and normalizing their types of behaviors by not only being in this relationship but continuing it in the first place. One of the worst parts is that before this relationship, I probably would’ve wholeheartedly agreed with her, but now that I’m in this age gap relationship I’m like “well actually/maybe” when it comes to her video which makes me feel like I’m trying to make excuses which is exactly what a predator would do. Even going on this app, I see a post talking about sex that’s like “only read if you’re 21+”, so clearly anyone under 21 is sexually inappropriate to be around even on the eyes of other people on here. TL;DR: Watched a video where a woman describes a 24 year old woman and a 19-20 year old man’s relationship as predatory, and as a 22 year old woman in a FWB situation with another woman who only recently turned 20 before I met her, I am now questioning whether I’m a predator who’s perpetuating and excusing harmful sexual behaviors. Although it may seem like it, I’m not looking for reassurance on why I’m not actually a predator, I just sort of wanted a place to vent and maybe just seek some advice, as well as maybe some people’s opinions on whether or not they personally think I’m a predator. I’d honestly prefer if you were all brutally honest with me about your opinions rather than sugarcoating things. It might give me some more clarity tbh. If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask and I can clarify anything you want. I can also send the two videos this woman made if you want the full context on that too.

To start off, I have not been professionally diagnosed with OCD as of this entry, but I have MANY symptoms that align with different subtypes of OCD. After looking into OCD, I can recall multiple things in life that are affected by my OCD aligning behaviors. The first time I remember having a big episode was when I was around seven years old. I don’t remember every detail of it, but I remember the horrible anxiety and looping thoughts that came with it. I had stolen a $1 pack of hair ties from a Save-A-Lot when I went grocery shopping with my mother. After getting home, I felt so disgusted and guilty about it that I hid under my bed having a breakdown for hours. I had convinced myself that I just committed one of the worst sins to be and that I just booked a one way ticket to hell. This thought and the feeling that came with it left me unable to function, but I was scared to tell my mother that I stole. Eventually, the crushing weight of my soul’s fate won, and I told my mother what I had done and why I was so scared. I don’t remember how the situation resolved, but I believe my mother was able to convince me I wasn’t going to hell for it as long as I asked for forgiveness. Ever since then, I would get intrusive thoughts about disappointing God every so often. Usually, I was able to talk myself out of obsessing over it, or I would distract myself from it. That was until I turned 14. Now, this episode didn’t really “feel” like an episode at the time. I didn’t have the insane impending doom or constant panic that wouldn’t calm down for days to weeks at a time. In this episode, I hyper-focused on my faith and being a better Christian. That sounds like a good thing, right? Well, of course it is… except my brain took the opportunity to create some compulsions and mental obsessions. I remember I became terrified of cussing or “being mean” to anyone, because I was fearful of upsetting God by being such a sinner. Now looking back, I realize the urge to do better should have came from a place of conviction and love for God, but it mostly came from guilt and fear. Time went on and I slowly fell back into my “normal” every day ways. I actually had reached the point, after a couple years, of doubting that God was real. I became agnostic and went on with my life doing typical teenager things, until another crisis came when I was around 17 years old. This one did have a specific trigger, which was an intense car accident. I was on the way home from school in the wintertime, I believe November. I was pushing 80mph, driving like an idiotic teenager, when I hit something in the road that caused my tires to pop. I had lost control completely and football spiraled into the woods for about 30 yards. It looked very bad, but I somehow walked out of it without even a scratch. This absolutely petrified me, and I went into another existential spiral. It started with me refusing to leave my house because I was convinced something would essentially fall from the sky and kill me if I left the house. After obsessing over that for awhile, it spiraled into thinking about what happens when we die and if we really just dissipate into nothingness, or if we do go to an afterlife that lasts forever and ever and ever. Both sounded terrifying to me because I couldn’t accept just becoming nothing, but I was also fearful of existing forever, because I was worried I would do something bad in the afterlife to make God mad and I would be sent to hell. At this point, my parents attempted to take me to a therapist. I’m not sure if she was attempting ERP, but she didn’t make what was happening clear, so I was terrified. She had me put on some headphones while playing a noise and she told me to think about my fear as intensely as I could, which freaked me out badly since I didn’t understand what ERP therapy was (if that’s what she was trying). Anyways, I never went back to her and decided to just rot on the couch watching Netflix to avoid any thoughts, until one day my brother helped break the cycle. He walked in the house, looked at me and said, “You’re so fat you’re going to have a heart attack. You’re coming to the gym with me.” To which I did, and after a few days of exercising I felt much better and shifted all my focus onto the gym. This episode lasted for less than a month, I believe. All was well with that for a few years. Then, here it all came back about two years ago, and I believe I was around 23 or 24 years old. This was also in the wintertime. Once again, the terrifying thought of “what happens when I die?” came back for me. It had me distressed almost 24/7 to where I felt shaky and anxious all the time. I could barely function. I tried seeking therapy and the person I talked to said “have you tried just not thinking about it?” which irritated me very much, as the problem wouldn’t have existed if I could have simply done that. I believe around this time I was diagnosed with bipolar, but I feel as if it was a misdiagnoses due to the lack of evaluation. My doctor attempted to put me on antipsychotics, which just made me feel horrible. I stopped taking those or talking to anyone and decided screw it, I’ll try to handle it myself. This was when I started confiding in my brother and his wife, and they reopened the door to God for me. I started reading the Bible with them and going to church with them, and I had realized that God wants you to come to him out of love and not fear/guilt. A lot of things I was taught improperly at a young age had been corrected through this journey, and I felt as if I really understood the love and peace that comes with a relationship with God. After a few weeks to a month, I was coming out of this episode since returning to my beliefs as a Christian had given me peace. This episode lasted for a little less than two months, I believe. All was well and I was living my life in peace, but slowly started drifting away from reading my Bible and going to church, so bam, here we are now. I’m now 26 years old and I’m in another existential/religious crisis. This one started at the beginning of November. I had been vaping for a while but suddenly I got this thought stuck in the back of my head that my next hit could be my last, because I could get popcorn lung and die. This freaked me out enough to make me cold-turkey quit vaping. Well, a couple days later I started having extreme anxiety with chest pain and arm pain so I was convinced I was having a heart attack. I went to the ER, and all my scans and tests were normal. I followed up with my doctor and all my labs were normal other than slightly elevated cholesterol and low vitamin D. I was hoping this would make me snap out of it, but then my brain caught the thought of “what if I die in my sleep and my 4 year old son is stuck here with my dead body for days at a time until someone notices I haven’t shown up to work or taken him to his dad’s?” And I completely lost it with this thought. I was petrified to go to sleep, and it was even worse on the nights I had my son. I became terrified of sleeping, which has resulted in me sleeping less even though I’m already struggling on 3rd shift. This spiral went on for about two weeks when the religion based intrusive thoughts started. My brother was watching a sermon while I was at his house, and a statement the preacher made had triggered me to think I wasn’t bearing enough fruits as a Christian, so God was going to write my name out of the book of life. So, I was spiraling on both of those thoughts for a while. I have since gotten the religion one to slow down, but the fear of dying in my sleep had spiraled into general fear of dying young, or even at all. I was feeling a tiny bit better when I saw my doctor and he prescribed me adderall and buspar. One day after starting the adderall, I started my period for the first time in five months, and I feel like that combo completely ruined what progress I had made. Now I’m stuck in a place where my brain is telling me “you’re gonna die anyways, whether it’s tomorrow or in 60 years, you’re going to die so everything is pointless and you might as well give up and sit here rotting in thought until that day comes.” I HATE this thought. I don’t want to feel like life is meaningless and pointless, but my brain is keeping me imprisoned. I’m at the point where I can’t eat, sleep, or even function half the time. I’m stuck in a never ending panic attack and it WON’T STOP. I stopped taking the adderall a few days ago but had to go to the ER because the panic would not stop. They gave me an Ativan, which helped for a few hours, but the panic had come back by the next day. They’ve prescribed me some other stuff to start soon, and some hydroxyzine for immediate relief. The hydroxyzine isn’t really doing much so I’ve just been stuck in a state of panic. I’m terrified to be alone so I’ve been staying with my dad and his wife. I tried to sleep at home alone today and woke up after just three hours freaking out. I’m now at work, planning to leave early at 10pm and I’m so exhausted from not being able to sleep or eat. I will probably go back to my dad’s house in hopes that my body feels safe enough to get at least SOME sleep. I don’t know if it’s the exhaustion, but I’m feeling extra discouraged today, feeling that there’s not a way out of feeling like this. I feel so stuck and miserable and I hate it so much. I cannot stand being stuck in a constant and never-ending panic, but my body just won’t give me a break. Also, the intrusive thoughts have me slightly scared to try the new medication I got today, so that sucks. So, yeah, that’s where it’s all started and where I am with it right now. I have other symptoms of other subtypes, but nothing that’s completely taken over my ability to function in the way the existential and religious thoughts have.

How do you tell the difference? I’ve been officially dating my boyfriend for three weeks, but realistically we’ve been pretty much a couple since September. I was idealizing him pretty hard from October until last week, I won’t lie. I felt like I was chasing him, and now that I finally have him, the dopamine dropped. Which would be fine, normally, except when we were in the car last Saturday, he made a cringe joke. Nothing crazy, nothing that went against my ideals, just.. cringe. I suppose it gave me an “ick”. But my body reacted completely disproportionately, telling me “oh my god I have to get out of this car now”. I was immediately hit with a sense of dread, guilt, and impending doom. Feeling like I was going to have to break up with him eventually. But what we have is great, and up until then I was really sure i liked him. I still feel warmness towards him and enjoy hanging out, but dear god I can’t stop ruminating, testing, and just feeling guilty. Deep down, I don’t want to break up. But my body keeps telling me to run and feels so real though, even though it’s not what I want.

My bf has a tendency to disappear when he’s stressed. He got home Tuesday night and I haven’t heard from him. It immediately made me anxious cuz we’re not of the same faith and his parents don’t know he comes here. Or maybe they do and they’re not saying anything. Idk. Anyways. He vanished. Haven’t heard from him. I’m panicking. I’m annoyed and I’m worried I don’t love him anymore and that I wanna date other people. How do I know if I do or if I’m just temporarily annoyed cuz he disappeared again. We had such a good time on Tuesday and it was the last time I got to see him before going home for the holidays. He texted me he got home. That was it. He has 6 days of work in a row starting Thursday just recently so I’m assuming that’s the reason but now I’m worried he doesn’t like me and he’s second guessing. I’m also worrying that he’s only using me for his own gain like sex wise when we’re not even supposed to be having it so I’m just nervous now and idk what I’m feeling. How do I know if I don’t live him anymore. I’m scared. I just wanna live in peace. He usually gets back to me within a couple days. I go home in the morning so I hope I hear from him then. Idk. I love him and I miss him and I wish he was around but I also feel tired and nauseous and it feels like my body and brain are like. Break up with him but I don’t want to do that cuz I want to marry him one day. But what if I don’t actually wanna do that cuz I don’t feel butterflies or feel that much passion lately. Everything feels distant. I only see him once a week at best lately. He’s picking up more hours and I’m scared we won’t be able to have our plans for our anniversary. I was gonna cook dinner. I still will. I just need him to secure a day off to do it. I’m gonna go cry and crash out for a while. Goodnight

does anyone have any tips on how to deal with pocd? i’m currently stuck in the stage of really believing im a P. how do i get out of it? i want to go back to the times where i would get a thought and then just brush it off and live my life like a normal person. how can i deal with this and make myself feel better? advice would be greatly appreciated

Hello I'm a first time poster and still pretty new to NOCD! It's been a really frustrating past few days because I told myself last week that I was going to be better at not seeking reassurance from my friends and the last few days I've been reassurance seeking to the max. I feel trapped. I am so frustrated that I need that emotional reassurance that my friends don't hate me and that I’m not an awful person just to feel even slightly okay. What are some things you guys do when you feel the need to seek reassurance? Any tips to ride out the extreme anxiety and uncomfortability that comes with not going through with the compulsion of reassurance? Any tips would be great because I'm ready for a change!