Hellofriend

Hi, sorry to hear that you're struggling. Is he seeing an OCD therapist specifically? I found that other therapists not specifically trained in OCD were not effective.

Thanks, taurean! I suppose when I'm refocusing the thought goes away almost instantly. That's why I'm worried it's avoidance. I know that sounds kind of weird.

What's the difference? My compulsions are mental and my therapist tells me to acknowledge the thought and then use mindfulness to redirect to the task at hand while letting the thought exit on its own. How is that different from avoidance?

Hey, I don't have the same flavor of OCD but I can tell you that confessing will do nothing for you. Trust me. I did this a while back and it just made the urge to confess "one last little thing" over and over again. It was never enough for OCD.

Did you go through treatment?

It's truly horrendous. I feel like I'm purposely blocking out the bad thing that I may have done.

Each time the intrusive thought pops up and I feel my stomach flip telling me to look into it, I acknowledge it and continue doing what I'm doing. While this is happening, I want to cry and feel really anxious because I'm dying to "figure it out." Eventually it subsides and I feel a bit depressed because I'm so tired from it. Normal? Am I doing this wrong?

So I'm embarrassed, I gave into a major compulsion. I went through my bank statements again and tried to pin point each night to make sure I didn't do anything bad. I want to do it again, but I know it gets me nowhere. My hands are sweating just talking about it. OCD has me now which sucks, but I can get out of it. For ERP I found this person's Facebook and just flipped through their pictures and my anxiety was through the roof with tons of questions. I didn't answer them and got busy. Is this appropriate for ERP in this case or would it make it worse?

Thanks PolarBear. Sometimes my stomach flips when the thought comes in and I can't control it. What should I do in that case? Just divert attention? Sorry for all the questions.

Ok, I shall try. It's been really hard. Any tips you have to just leave it alone? My therapist says to just sit with the anxiety and welcome it. Should I just ignore or acknowledge and redirect?

Hello, before I was diagnosed officially with OCD - I had an obsession that had me in its grips for almost a whole year (2015). It eventually went away on its own (after much compulsive behavior - checking, ruminating, confessing) and I hadn't thought of it in 3 years. Well, after feeling like I've been making progress in therapy, this fear came up again and has totally paralyzed me. I know I messed up by reacting to it, but it makes me sick. Before I met my partner, I had a thing with a colleague. We eventually just became friends. It was a very confusing time for me, but I definitely set some boundaries with co-worker. That being said, there were some other things I didn't do so greatly. I met up for drinks once or twice with him, but it was not inappropriate (we just talked about work and commiserated). For some reason (being young and dumb) I hid this from my SO and felt very guilty. It ended up resolving itself because it was just a lesson learned and i felt I blew it out of proportion. At this time, I hadn't had an OCD spike in YEARS. Anyway, I quit my job and moved on. Coworker ended up messaging me and telling me he still had feelings for me. I freaked out and felt so guilty. OCD had me. I combed through bank receipts, messages, etc to make sure nothing had happened. I'll admit, our text messages were overly friendly but nothing flirty on my end. I didn't know how to handle it. Anyway, OCD told me I had to confess EVERYTHING to my SO. I told him about how I felt I led him on, how we met for drinks, etc. My SO was unbothered. My OCD wanted him to punish me. I spent hours making sure I told him everything. After months of agonizing, it went away and I don't know why. Well, it came back. It's urging me to make sure I haven't kissed this person during this time and repressed it. I remember feeling guilty coming home one day after drinks - was I guilty because I kissed him? I'm trying really hard not to memory check and have mostly been successful, but I'm looking for more tips. Am I ok to tell myself, "I've already resolved this. No." And try to get busy? I would never contract this old colleague as he's married and that would be highly inappropriate and solve nothing. I've also been fighting the urge to confess to my SO. I find doing imaginal exposures make it worse. Perhaps I should just focus on stopping the compulsions instead? Help!