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New, long time sufferer


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Hello everyone,

I am 33 years old, and have suffered with OCD since about the age of 17 - or at least that's when I noticed a very heavy onset. There were a couple of tiny obsessional episodes when I was younger, but nothing in comparison to how the condition evolved in my teenage years.

I think it most likely that the main event that triggered the OCD was at age 17, my then girlfriend leaving me. This was my first proper relationship, and I think I'm quite a sensitive person, so this devastated me. Also I was about to leave for the big wide world and university, so was probably unable to work out how to cope with that. I think OCD was (and still is) a coping mechanism for me, to deal with life, and to inject some artificial certainty in to situtations where things are uncertain. I suspect that the OCD would have developed eventually as a response to traumatic or uncontrollable/uncertain events, no matter what. I suspect I am, like a lot of other people, just wired this way.

Along with my OCD I also have high levels of anxiety, and sometimes, though not frequently, panic attacks. Usually the attacks are just before going to bed or cause me to wake up after little sleep and be unable to get back to sleep. I also overthink things A LOT. Of course when I overthink and worry about things, I get more anxious, and then my OCD flairs up worse. I will then get more anxious if I don't complete a ritual correctly, and so become even more anxious. I sometimes descend into a feeling of unreality where I'm cycling through the same thoughts over and over, and performing more and more complex rituals, slowly removing more and more freedom of movement and thought until I can barely perform a simple task. When I get like this, it's hard to interact in my relationship, and also puts my job at risk as I'm unable to concentrate when I'm there.

The main flavours of OCD I get are

- emotional contamination, where I feel looking at or being in a certain place will cause negative effects,

- unwanted thoughts which I try to neutralise,

- feeling that talking about a certain subject, eating a certain meal or listening to a certain song will pull me back to bad times I associate with them,

- checking, mainly of locked doors (although this one isn't such a bad thing!),

- and counting the steps I take (as in putting my feet down, not going up a flight of), touching things a certain number of times, and ordering things and making sure nothing is touching anything else, and a whole host of other little things that sometimes seem quite arbitrary.

I was wondering if anyone else has had similar experiences, and if anyone else also has high anxiety and overthinks things. I think these could be all tied in to OCD, meaning that people suffering from OCD have a higher tendency to these sort of things.

I am here to find out a little more about how OCD effects other people, and to try to make myself better, I'd also like to know that this is fairly normal, even if it is a disorder, that other people get these same things. I have been using CBT on and off for a while now, and am usually fairly succesful with it when I do use it, but I then get lazy and stop, so I really just need to actually put the CBT properly into practice.

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Guest saffymar123

Hi Attemptingtoheal,

I have quite similar ocd traits to you. I have ruitals that make me extremely stressed if I don't carry them out/correctly.

I repeat my steps in and out of rooms, do a correct number of steps before a certain point (crack in pavement, room, to car)

I have many intrusive thoughts and my ocd is mainly repeating everything I do until the thought won't happen or come true because I've repeated whatever it is to a certain number or it feels okay.

Certain objects places or anything that relates to a bad time can not happen, like socks I wore in hospital will bring me back there somehow if I ever wore them again, not going somewhere that doesn't feel right because of a negative experience there before

Checking things over and over like my doors, all my drawers have to be shut, wall switches switched up and down to 14 (at the moment) to off, straighteners, windows.

My ocd is terrible and I repeat things over and over and over. All day every day. I sometimes don't go out, takes me an hour to get out and in of bed, get horrible thoughts and have certain routines and rituals. So for me it's more "bad luck" and bad things happening, but those are my other bits I do.

I get a sense of relief and comfort when someone shares their ocd with me when it's similar so I thought I've got nothing to lose by doing the same to you!

When you say using CBT do you see someone? I've had my first session last week, it's my first in years as I had it at a young age and always have, but I had a dreadful stage where I got help, and 7 years later had a relapse in the past 6 months where it's worse than ever and ruining my life. I'm also on medication for it. I'm also relatively new to here so I'd love to hear back from you! It's a good forum. Helps me a lot.

Saff xx

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Hi Saff,

No I don't see someone for my CBT, that might be why I keep getting lazy and not following it through. I learnt about the basic principle of CBT a long time ago from someone. It was described to me as forming a new habit in place of the habit of OCD - doing the thing that worries me in a 'normal' or reasonable way, so for example switching the light off once, then leaving it like that and allowing the feelings of anxiety to fade, even if I later go back and 'correct' the ritual. Eventually you learn to feel less anxiety and re-teach yourself the normal way of doing things. That basic method has worked very well for most of my physical and mental compulsions, but isn't all that useful in breaking the thought process that leads there in the first place. I'm now researching as much as I can from Internet sources, books, forums, etc, to better educate myself and be able to see OCD as a result of a brain oddity or chemical peculiarity, rather than a real thing, and so to shatter the illusions OCD creates. I don't mean that in any offensive way by the way! I'm also looking to educate myself as to good threat analysis, rather than relying on what the OCD tells me is a threat.

At the moment I'm of the opinion that this may never go away, but can be managed to a point where it no longer interferes with daily life. I'm trying to develop a 'tool box' of useful strategies to apply when needed, such as relaxation techniques and CBT principles. I think this perhaps would be useful to you. I know it can be a terrible place to be inside of the OCD and this is much easier said than done, but I think you could do well to reuse those CBT strategies that worked the first time and slowly, slowly, you'll be able to chip your way out of the problem. Then keep those strategies in mind in case the problem comes back. Also I think remembering that the OCD is a condition in the mind, not a real thing you have to act on, could be very helpful in shattering the illusion that you have to do these rituals - it helped me to do this anyway.

I can relate to the sense of relief and comfort you feel when someone shares their OCD!

The amount of time you take to do things due to OCD sounds much worse than mine - it reminds me of the much more severe OCD I had when I was younger - but the focusses sound very similar. I don't go into shops or restaraunts that I went to with an ex, or places where I used to work and hated. I feel if I do I may somehow be 'trapped' in that time period again, or contaminated by similar experiences I had then, or the same people will show up in my life. I won't watch certain TV programs because I used to watch them when I was a kid, and I don't like who I was then and feel I'll become that person again if I start watching and specifically enjoying those shows, like it turns me back in to that person. The same can go for wearing certain clothes. Interestingly this maybe shows I define myself by insignificant material factors like this, rather than by how I act and don't look at my life as a whole but rather focus on tiny parts of who I am.

I tend to have to take a certain number of steps from one room to another, or in to a car, shop, etc. It's like each place is a 'zone'. Each room is a zone, the car is a different zone to the street I step into it from, so I have to have the correct amount of steps in each one. I have trouble getting out of bed too, again it's the zone thing. Oddly I sometimes have to touch the floor with my feet three times, then step out of bed normally, or it's somehow wrong. I've annoyingly developed a habit of only being able to step on to the floor from my bed when the clock shows an odd number of minutes rather than even, which is a pain in the ass! :original: Also some days if I've had a bad thought as my foot has touched the floor, e.g. about some negative experience, I have to lift my foot off the floor then put it down again with a 'clear' mind. This tends to be worse if I've had a crappy dream or am feeling generally rubbish about some event in my life.

One of the most interesting things I've found about my OCD is that the 'bad thing that may happen' if I don't perform whatever ritual it is correctly, varies according to what I'm most worried about. When I've been thinking about someone I don't like, the worry is that they'll appear in my life, move in next door, or something similar, but when I was interviewing for my new (now current) job, the fear was that I'd not get it. Just typing that last sentence itself was hard because it made me think I was doing something bad by putting that idea out there, that my job could somehow suffer now I've typed it. But anyway, the thing I find interesting, and that should in a way make the OCD more obviously not a real thing, is that these rituals aren't the imagined prevention of one event, but vary depending on what I'm thinking about at the time. As you may be able to tell, I've thought a lot about this stuff, but I think that the more knowledge you have around the subject, the better prepared you are to help heal yourself.

Nice to hear from you, I'm very tired so I'm going to go to bed now, but stay in touch. I really hope the CBT helps lessen the problems the OCD is causing you.

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  • 1 month later...
Guest dilee7

I was going through with OCD same as you since i was a teenager.but im a 32 year old married woman.my ocd started with the same way you had faced.before i faced to the society i used to enjoy my life with my family.i had childhood problems but i didnt feel it that much.how ever i becAme a lover as a teenager when i was 15.My familly found out that and they abused me physically and mentally.i was very secured by my family members. They didnt let me go anywhere on my own.they told me off in front of other people.as a human being i became so upset with anxiety and depression.i became a shy person to face to anyone in this society.even i coulnt face to visitors who came to my house.i only had my pets as my closed friends.however with all these abuses that loverleft me by having another affair.i started doing things to make my mind not to worry.in one way i was worrying about i was like in a cage in my house.on the other side he lefy me and i couldnt contact him.how ever i started writing good things and bad things on a paper with one to ten numbers and i stated counting them till i get a good answer ( its like i take off one numer untill one number left).how ever thst became worst if i

didnt get a good

answer. However things changed i became strong and i forgot him.and now i hate him.but my ocd is still there. I use it for daily life.im suffering with this for 16 yrs now.im 32 and i want to be happy with my husband. But he doesnt like to enjoy life. Thats a bad luck for me.if hes good my ocd atlest could have reduced.he started mentioning about girls.that makes me so upset as an ocd person. I got jelous and angry.i became not to trust him as he did text to one girl without telling me.but i still wanted to have a good life. Now im fedup with everything.i just want to live for now.i lost my good times.i wish i could cure my ocd. Thanks for reading my life story.

Edited by dilee7
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Sorry to hear about all that happened to you Dilee. I'd say as well as OCD, there are trauma/PTSD issues, and current relationship issues in there too for you.

I too am having relationship issues and I'm not sure whether it's my OCD causing a lot of it, or it's her causing it, or it's a blend of both. There may not even really be much of an issue, I just feel there is because I'm constantly thinking about every little thing. I think you should look at your current relationship problems separately from your OCD as it sounds like your husband may be being a bit of an ****. Just my opinion of course. :)

Here's the great thing, you CAN cure your OCD. You need to look in to:

- Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

- Exposure Response Prevention (ERP)

- The Four Steps

I'd also suggest looking in to courses for dealing with anxiety - your doctor should be able to point you in the direction of any local help, and NHS courses can be free and fit around work times. Also check out one or both of the books I've seen people recommend you.

The best thing though, if you can manage it, would be to get a therapist, either FREE through the NHS, or privately if you can afford it (I prefer this route).

I understand that taking the first steps to curing OCD can be very difficult, and in fact OCD can stop you from taking them, but I think you should try to do whatever you can and slowly, you should start improving and being able to take bigger steps towards being healed.

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