Exposure Insight Please

[Guest itsnotmeitsmyocd]

Hiya Forum Friends,

So i just need some insight on this.

I am at the stage whereby i am over half way up my exposure ladder plan. I had an unexpected exposure last night, which was one that was quite a bit further up the ladder. I took it on, it was pure hell which was to be expected. I am exhausted but happy i made the choice to accept the unexpected challenge and dropping my compulsions too.

One thing that i am confused by is that during this exposure i didn't actually have Intrusive thoughts, well i had a few but only ones that i am habituated to now so they were not an issue. Not having the ones i am working on was lovely and very rare! However despite not having them the urge to carry out my compulsions was absolutely constant as was my anxiety- despite having no intrusive thoughts- odd. I have never had it that way around, whereby i do not have an IT but have the urge to carry out compulsions to such a strong intensity.

[PolarBear]

Intrusive thoughts can be very fleeting. Some don't stick around for long at all. At the same time, I believe we become habituated to our compulsions so that you don't even need an actual intrusive thought to pop into your head to compel you to perform a compulsion. Don't dwell on it. It is what it is and kudos to you to recognizing what it was and tackling it the proper way.

[Guest Nikki79]

Sorry to interrupt this thread but just have to ask about intrusive thoughts. I have ones now that are lingering for days and days.

[Guest itsnotmeitsmyocd]

Thank you for your advice Polar Bear,

I think you have hit the nail on the head "I believe we become habituated to our compulsions so that you don't even need an actual intrusive thought to pop into your head to compel you to perform a compulsion". This is exactly what the situation was like.

You're also right about about not dwelling, so i am going to draw a line under it and move on. Otherwise it could easily become rumination- ocd is like a mine field at times!

Thank you so much for your kind words also, it means a lot

[Guest dan2]

Hi itsnotmeitsmyocd

Do any of your exposures involve things where theres some actual danger or that would be sensible to avoid?

u see this is the tricky thing with exposures, many of the things that I myself avoid seem logical

i.e. peeling non stick surfaces, formaldehyde containing air fresheners to name a couple but there r many more

would you say you just expose yourself to the things that u know r irrational but your ocd produces feelings of fear but not things that r rational or bordering between the 2?

[Guest itsnotmeitsmyocd]

Hiya Dan

Nice to hear from you and i hope life is treating you well

Well yes all of my exposures involve some form of actual / potential danger - i could harm / kill someone, myself, a pet. I could say something so vile to someone that it ruins our relationship - see my point? To me these are all very real dangers the same as yours are regarding contamination. As a general rule you can't out logic ocd - as we well know! There is always some logic to the danger, in the case of the air fresheners, yes there is an amount of risk, however most people use them. So i would say that in this case it's ocd talking and an exposure is required- the freshener should be used just as a person without contam fears would use it. I know it's tricky, i could "supposedly" logic myself out of doing most exposures. Of course use common sense (which i know you will) if for example you have a fear of smoking no one would say to start smoking! Maybe a good gauge is to base your decisions around what most people without contam OCD would consider normal. Or of course come on here and ask us

[Guest dan2]

Thanks for getting back to me :original:

This resonated with me so much, many of my issues are around contamination

To imagine how a person without contamination OCD would behave is useful, I agree thats what should be aimed for.

I was also thinking, like u said RE: common sense, the line has to be drawn somewhere otherwise u kinda go crazy, this is what I was thinking personally i.e.

I just had a meal, cooked by a friend, who had refrozen the meat - which the guidelines say u arent supposed to do due to bacterial build up - however I know that the risk is small - so I decided to take a risk, after been so sick of how my OCD was restricting me at the supermarket over buying wheat based products; and I actually felt great afterwards for taking the risk, cos I was sick of the restrictions the OCD was placing on my life and as usual, it momenterally made me feel a little braver as far as my ritualistic checking behaviours go - which was great - but I know this will wear off, but its funny how it works

I was suprised when I heard you were still doing exposures, because last year I think, you were doing them then, personally I had tried as hard as I could to forget about the whole OCD thing whilst obaying multiple minor checking rituals because it seemed too much effort

but this experience has made me want to stop them, again, and hopefully maintain it this time for more than a few days then back to the norm