Ashley

Can I ask, what are you wanting people to say to you when you state this? It's a hard thing to hear for many people who may not know how to respond to such a blunt statement, so encouraging you to talk to someone like the Samaritans is well meaning on their part. At the risk of repeating what others may have already suggested, assuming you are in the UK the first thing I would suggest is to see if they offer any sort of supported living through the council or local mental health secondary care services. This would be your own space, with support if and when needed, and hopefully linked into mental health services to help you more long-term deal with the OCD.

I hope you will be able to feel differently and realise there are always options and I hope you can find something soon. The forum is here to help if we can, can I ask where abouts are you? Are you in the UK?

Locking thread as per SeaBreeze request, but happy to reopen it again if requested.

I am afraid it's not a feature. although it's a good suggestion to look into. I am at a crossroads with the forum in that having it as a separate website to the main OCD-UK website as it's advantages but also causes headaches with people needing accounts for both, so I am toying with the idea of creating a new forum using new software linked to our main website. So it's possible if I do that we may be able to make changes like this happen. For now, the best solution I can offer is you can email yourself the link to something you want to save by clicking the three dots next to a post, then Share and copy the link to email yourself. You can then perhaps note what that link is and contains rather than copying the entire text. The other option is with Google Chrome browser you can add extensions for saving screenshots of a page or the entire page is saved as an image. I can try and find the best extension to use if you need me to

Forgive a very brief reply, long day and drained eyes. I have scanned your original post and if I am understanding you correctly the local MH service feel you need help for trauma first, before CBT for OCD? If so, that's not unheard of and in some cases does need to happen in other cases both could be done at same time. Obviously in your case I don't know the full clincial situation Marko so I dont know which is right route for you. Often the same services in England may deliver both treatments, i.e. EMDR for Trauma (and some limited evidence it may help with OCD) and then move on to CBT for OCD. Obviously the accessing of that treatment seems to be the issue if I am reading correctly? I don't really know how you may access services in Scotland for trauma, I would perhaps need to know what area you are in (please email for your own privacy) and then make some generic phone calls next week to see if I can fund out what local services offer.

Interesting project Abigail. I am not sure if this helps get this idea going because it's not so much about OCD makes me feel right now (perhaps in the past), but how getting treatment for my OCD makes me feel - 'Frustrated'.

That's what OCD does, our mind and body tend to talk to each other with very little needed to instigate the conversation between the two.

David is a psychiatrist but also an OCD specialist, so he will be a good person to conduct an assessment for you. Subject to that assessment, he may then suggest treatment with himself or one of his colleague psychologists. Subject to assessment, feel free to email us support@ocduk.org and I can share a list of other therapists we know that treat OCD.

Depends who you ask! Look for peer reviewed articles rather than just website articles. Dr Veale does have a lot of peer reviewed research papers on OCD and also treats patients privately. However, as Caramoole points out I could give you access to the top ten ranked OCD experts in the world and I am not sure that right now any of them could help you. That's not to say they can't one day, just right now you are so entrenched in not even willing to accept you have OCD and the physical about what you can and can't do that I am not sure OCD therapy will help you until that changes. Until you learn to accept that maybe your sexual libido is linked to OCD and that actually you may not be gay, but are 95% likely to be suffering with OCD. At that point, therapy may be able to help you move forward. Remember therapy can't do the work, you have to do the work and the first aspect of that is belief and acceptance that the problem is the OCD.

I know, I had hair (well some) and it wasn't grey when we started lol. Thank you everyone for your kind words, you have all played a part by being there for each other, so huge to all of you

To this forum, which from what I can tell started exactly 20 years ago today. We have seen so many people come and go from the forums in that time, many have gone on to lead full and productive lives where they no longer need the forum or support from the charity. In those 20 years, the support and companionship people have shown each other has been so beautiful to see. We don't always see eye to eye, but I think everyone that uses the forums regularly has always tried to be here to help others, and that is our strength as a community. I would have not been able to keep the forum going without the help and support of my moderating team over the last twenty years, one of whom is now chair of OCD-UK. To the moderators past and those present still today I thank you for being there to help the community, help me, and help the charity. The charity's founding was in Nov/Dec 2003 when Steve and myself decided to start the charity, the forum is twenty years old today, the website came shortly after that and the charity was formally registered with the charity commission in April 2004. We have done a fair bit in that time, but there is a lot more we have yet to do, and what we need to do. So thank you everyone for your help and support in whatever capacity that was over the last twenty years and here's hoping the charity is no longer needed in another 20 years!

Hello Chris, This link will show your activity on the forum, your first post seems to be Oct 2021. As Mini mentions you registered this forum account in July 2021 so it will only show your history for this forum account. If you had a previous username then you will need to login with that account to view the posting history, unless you requested the account to be deleted then it's possible the posts are gone too.

Well according to you, you don't have OCD? So I guess not! I am being facetious, but actually it's a point I need to make because I suspect until you believe you at least 'could' have OCD I don't think therapy can help you. I wonder if the therapist job is to help you accept you 'may' have OCD before they can even start to think about helping you treat yourself. That's not to say you need to give up on therapy, the opposite, but I am not sure they can focus on therapy, until you have acceptance of the problem is that you have OCD, not that you are gay.

As I suggested yesterday you must subconsciously believe it could still be OCD or you would not keep posting on our OCD forums. So shall we assume it is OCD?

Hello there. Whilst we cannot diagnose OCD, what we can do is make an informed comment if something may sound like OCD symptoms and what I think you are describing are all the common symptoms needed to diagnose OCD. Obsessive fears/worries which you ruminate over, compulsions by rechecking and avoidance and I am guessing you get some anxiety/stress when you are worrying over this? If so, then I would suggest it might be diagnosed as OCD. To determine if this is OCD for certain you would perhaps need to speak to a trained health professional and I can advise you on the NHS pathway for this if you need me to if you're in the UK. The good news is that OCD can be treated and people do get better, sometimes in stages and sometimes completely. The treatment we recommend is not actually ERP as such on its own, which may not always be enough. We recommend CBT (to also include ERP) as a more rounded treatment package. Some people also take medication (SSRI usually, a form of anti depressants). And don't worry, I have come to realise no OCD manifestation is unusual because they all are to some extent, because it's such a unique and individual complex condition, in some respects every persons OCD is unusual. Ashley.