New to the forum! My OCD and recovery.

[Guest lunar]

Hello everyone, I have just joined this forum today as an ex-sufferer!

I'm 16 years old and from around the ages of 9 to 12 I suffered from OCD.

I was never diagnosed with OCD when I suffered from it, but my first experiences with mental illness were when I was very young and I believed that inanimate objects had feelings and I could not throw things away. I got therapy for this with a psychologist and gradually overcame this particular issue. However, after I finished therapy I relapsed and ended up with compulsions related to numbers and tapping due to satanic intrusive thoughts and also intrusive thoughts related to my family dying and that these things would happen if I failed to do certain things. I felt very alone (not knowing that there were others like myself) and felt that I could not speak to anyone about it as many of my intrusive thoughts were extremely disturbing and I thought that people would not understand that I had no control over them so I never said anything to anyone and was never diagnosed. I also obsessively hand washed for a few months before my intrusive thoughts began.

Due to my young age I was unaware of how irrational my thoughts were and now believe that my complete recovery was mainly due to me understanding that they were irrational (convincing myself that my fear was illogical and therefore should have no power over me), completing exposures for myself and also distracting myself from the issue by having lots of hobbies. I think that I knew that my happiness had become completely devoured by the illness and that I was ready to rid myself of it as it caused me a huge amount of stress and anxiety especially as I had no idea what was wrong with me.

For years I have avoided thinking about my condition in fear of somehow getting symptoms again. However, very recently I finally discovered that I suffered from OCD.

I am really interested in speaking to sufferers/ ex-sufferers of OCD and also helping people (especially young people like myself) with the disorder!!! Hello everyone!

I would definitely not describe myself as knowing loads about OCD as I have only just recently diagnosed myself of having suffered from it and found out about it, however I really want people to know that there is hope for OCD sufferers and that you can recover and improve with it!!! Looking forward to getting to know you guys. :original:

[Symps07]

Hi Lunar,

Welcome to the site, hope you find it useful & friendly

[PolarBear]

Welcome to the forum, lunar.