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onepunch

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  1. As for worsening of symptoms when resisting a compulsion, in my experience if you resist a compulsion and continue on with your life and daily activities long enough, the anxiety should go down eventually. The trick is to refocus on your daily life while brushing off the obsessive thought as just that-a thought. That means when you refocus on your daily activities, the goal is not to be thinking, ruminating, or analyzing about the obsessive thought. All of these are compulsions, as you already know, it is only going to fuel your OCD. Analyzing or giving the thought any kind of importance would only feed your OCD thought. My advice would be to carry on with an activity that you can be absorbed in. The OCD thought will be there while you do this activity and it's going to feel uncomfortable and it's going to try to distract you from focusing on the activity, so if you find yourself starting to think about the OCD thought again while you are in the middle of your activity, simply brush off that thought and continue with your activity. It is hard i'm not going to lie and it takes practice but once you get it, it will be easy. The more you are into the activity and learn to brush off the thought and anxiety, the less power the OCD thought will have over you. And lastly, you said that you just got on a new medication. In my experience, in the first month or so when I'm on a new medication, I notice my anxiety levels are higher as my body is adjusting to the meds. I also notice my obsessions seem to produce more anxiety and it is also harder for me to resist compulsions when I first get on a new medication. Maybe if you give it about another week or two, the medication would start to help you feel better and resisting compulsions would be easier as well.
  2. I guess what works for me is to be able to accept uncertainty. If you resist a compulsion and your OCD is telling you that you are in denial of the risks then u should take a risk. Accept the possibility that the thought may or may not come true and go on with your life. For me, having this mindset helps a lot.
  3. Thanks for the replies, it was really helpful. However, now I'm a little scared of turning on and off the light switches in my home, especially the one that lit up with a spark. Every time I walk by that particular switch, I consciously remind myself to avoid touching that switch. Should I do exposure exercises and turn on and off all the light switches in the house, especially the switch that sparked up? Would that be a good idea?
  4. Last night I turned off my backyard light switch in the dark and I saw the light switch light up a blue spark inside the switch. As it lit up, it made a static electric shock sound which surprised me. It is like when you unplug something quickly and you see a spark...except this was a spark that lit up behind the light switch while I was touching it. I also heard the spark sound when I turned off the switch and now I'm thinking in my mind whether or not I got shocked. I'm not sure if the spark shocked me or not since it lit up behind the light switch as I was touching the switch.The fact that I was touching the light switch while it lit up inside makes me think the electric spark came in contact with my fingers. I didn't notice any pain or anything which makes me think this is OCD. I do have major fears of getting shocked even if it's just a little shock because the thought of having electric current go through your body makes me think it can permanently damage the organs in the body. This is probably OCD but I hate it how this type of OCD gets me every time where it makes me not sure if I got shocked or not. Usually, my compulsions for this would be to go on the internet and look up symptoms of getting shocked to see if I have any of those symptoms but I know doing that will only make the anxiety worse. However, my anxiety is really high right now because I'm not sure if I got shocked and should seek medical attention for it. What should I do in these type of OCD situations where I'm not sure I got shocked and starting to get really anxious? Should I just not do anything and sit with the anxiety and try to agree with the thought that I did get shocked?
  5. Trauma might have kick started the genes since genes can turn on and off all the time. And maybe some other factors that contributed to the disease but hasn't started yet until that last variable sets it off. At least that's what I think?
  6. Yes, there is no clear cut cause. It could be because of many variables that contributed to the cause, you are right but which variable was responsible for setting it off is what I want to know.
  7. I think it might be both and some other factors that contribute to developing ocd. Its interesting to know which variable had the most effect.
  8. Yes we shouldn't take it as fact but if the results in the study is consistent with how your OCD developed, then we should take it into consideration.
  9. D-Cycloserine is a medication that is effective for OCD patients to use along with CBT exposure therapy. Based on this study, D-Cycloserine is known to increase the effectiveness of CBT therapy when both are combined.However, patients taking antidepressants should not take D-Cycloserine because the antidepressant would inhibit the effects of D-Cycloserine. Here is the link to the study. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25970252 D-Cycloserine can permanently change your reactions to compulsions and triggers when combined with exposure therapy. Think of it as a hammer that breaks down the compulsions and triggers so that it stays broken for a while. You can try this medication in place of antidepressants if those antidepresants aren't effective for you. Or, if the antidepressants + CBT combo or CBT only (without medication) is not effective, then you can try this out. Thought I shared this
  10. There's a study on the association between OCD and Childhood trauma. Here is the link to the study. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17557315 I always thought that OCD was because of mainly genetics, but based on this study, environmental factors such as exposure to emotional and physical abuse at a young age is associated with the development of OCD symptoms. I'm not sure if this study is saying that childhood trauma causes OCD, but there certainly is a connection. This makes a lot of sense and the only reason I came across this study was because I suspected there was a connection between the two since I had an emotionally and physically abusive father when I was young. My father would always make me feel guilty and worthless and he would beat me and verbally abuse me when I was young . I remember living in the house always fearing for my safety which led me to becoming hyper-vigilant. I remember the day when I developed my first OCD symptoms, it was because the feelings of guilt and anxiety. I remember we were moving to a new house and while we were checking out the house, I found a box of matches in the back yard. I decided to light one up because I was curious and bored. After I lit up the match, the fire surprised me and even scared me a little since it was my first time lighting a match up (I was only 10.) After I lit it up, I started feeling really guilty. My dad was in the front yard talking to the owner of the house. I remember feeling guilty and scared at the same time because I didn't want my dad to know that I lit up the match and didn't want him to think I was playing with fire, fearing that he might beat me or yell at me. I kept feeling guilty and thinking I shouldn't have done this and that I was a bad kid for playing with fire, thinking i could burn the house down by accident which made me feel even more guilty. And then I started having "what if" thoughts, such as what if my dad found the used match or match box and suspected me? and then I started to feel anxious and in my mind I was trying to come up with ways to get rid of the guilt and anxiety. I decided to throw away the burnt match and match box and hide it somewhere where no one will see it. After I did that, it still wasn't enough. Guilt and anxiety was still there. More doubtful thoughts started coming into my mind, and I started thinking "what if the home owner finds the matches or match box and calls my dad to ask about it? should I just tell my dad that I burnt the match? maybe if I come clean then he would forgive me and not hurt me and I wouldn't feel so guilty after." Sounds familiar right? I believe the triggering of these first OCD symptoms was because of the overwhelming feelings of anxiety and guilt that I was experiencing at the time. Then I started over-analyzing the situation, if i tell him the truth then this might happen and if i don't tell him the truth then this might happen. It was like I was trying to be perfectly certain that I wouldn't get beat or yelled at. This is how it all started. After we left the new house to go back to our old apartment to move the stuff out, I would still be ruminating about the match incident for days. The beginnings of a deadly cycle. It started from me being constantly afraid of my father, having feelings of guilt embedded into me, and having anxiety most of the time when he's around. Notice a pattern here? Guilt, anxiety, fear. It's what makes up OCD. All three of these feelings stems from childhood trauma. Sorry for the long post, I thought I just wanted to share that. What I still don't know up until today is, if my father wasn't abusive, would I still end up having this debilitating condition? Now that there is a study done on this exact situation, I'm starting to really think this was not genetic at all. I mean, no one else in my family has OCD but me... I'm curious what are your thoughts on this? Anyone remember their first OCD symptoms? Anyone with similiar experiences?
  11. I'm currently on 10 mg of paxil. Every time I smell marijuana smoke or I see someone smoking marijuana, I would go out of my way to avoid inhaling the smoke because I'm scared that the marijuana might get into my system and interact negatively with the paxil. I'm afraid if I inhale second hand marijuana smoke while I'm on paxil, it would either make my medication stop working or it would give me unwanted side effects. I'm really OCD about this. I also avoid second hand cigarette smoke because I think it could do the same thing to me. The worst part is not being able to control it. For example, today I was walking back to my car and I see a someone in the next car smoking a joint with his windows down. I held my breath while I was getting into the car to make sure I didn't inhale any marijuana smoke and then I made sure all my windows were rolled up so the smoke wouldn't get into my car. Thats how bad it is. I also remember one time when I was standing outside and a group of people were smoking marijuana right next to me, the wind blew the smoke right to my face and I inhaled some of it and then I started feeling weird. I started feeling more anxious and began ruminating a lot and I ended up not being able to sleep for most of the night. It triggered my OCD really bad and up until this day, I don't know whether it was just anxiety or if the second hand marijuana smoke actually had a effect on me while I was on paxil. Every time I smell marijuana, I start feeling anxious. There doesn't even have to be any smoke around. Like I said, the worst part is not being able to control it. I could be walking back to my car and someone in the next car could be smoking marijuana with the windows down and I wouldn't even expect it. The thing is, I don't even know if this is rational or irrational because marijuana tends to interact with a lot of psychotropic drugs since both drugs target the brain. So sometimes I think maybe it's a good thing that I'm taking extra measures to avoid inhaling pot smoke but then it would give me a lot of anxiety and cause me to ruminate a lot. So I'm kind of confused, what should I do in situations where I'm around people smoking marijuana? Should I hold my breath? Should I just walk away without holding my breath? Should I even walk away at all? Is it really a cause for concern? Should I even be worried about pot smoke affecting my medication and giving me bad side effects? I guess the fear mostly stems from the fact that SSRI has a lot of side effects already, and if it is mixed with marijuana, it could be bad for my body..since both drugs deal with chemicals in the brain.
  12. Snowbear hit the nail on that one. Your OCD takes a small risk, magnifies it and gives it significance. Then you get anxious and try to get rid of that feeling by either avoiding the feared stimuli, seeking reassurance (asking others if there's any risk of danger to the feared object), doing compulsive rituals (ex: cleaning mouldy spots or spots that looks like mould or washing your hands, "decontaminating" yourself), or ruminating (over-analyzing the situation in your head to see if its safe). Then the thought seems more real because your brain thinks "why would I be doing these things if the thought wasn't real?" So by doing those actions listed above, you give more power to the original fear. As a result you feel more anxious and then you resort to doing more of those actions listed above (they are called compulsions) in attempt to get rid of the anxiety, but doing those only makes things worse. Out all of the compulsions i listed, try to see which one you are doing that is responsible for feeding your anxiety. You said that you're planning to end the relationship because there's some mold at your boyfriend's house. That would fall under avoidance. If you do that, your brain is going to confirm that the original fear is rational and that fear is only going to come back stronger the next time it strikes. It doesn't matter if you don't go to your boyfriend's house anymore. You could be at someone else's house that doesnt have mold, and if you see something that even resembles or looks like mould, that fearful thought is going to come back stronger. Of course, that's only an example. My point is OCD is always going to create that doubt if you play its game.
  13. Don't listen to thomas. 1st post and he's already giving bad advice. Troll alert? Anyways, you need to stop over-analyzing and seeking reassurance. That's the source of your anxiety. It sounds like you already know that by now but you don't want to make the changes because it feels uncomfortable. You're so used to ruminating that it becomes a habit, which is why you need to break that habit. If you really wanted to overcome this, you have to get uncomfortable. There's no other way around it. Nothing will change if you continue to stay in your comfort zone. These thoughts that you get, whatever the content is, and even if they seem real you have to try your best to put them aside and go on with your day. It's going to feel really uncomfortable at first but you'll get used to it if you're consistent, I promise. Things will get easier but you have to make an effort.
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