PolarBear

Hey Angst. Supposedly March 4, but Trump changes his mind more than his orange makeup.

Hey, KC. I'm not on a lot right now. I'm Canadian and trying to hold on during the cluster**** going on down south. I'm glad you're doing well. One day at a time. Focus on taking care of yourself.

You can accept that things are different, stop doing all this needless work, and get on with your life.

There is a type of obsession called intrusive feelings. Just as valid as intrusive thoughts, images, urges, etc.

We do not know what causes OCD. No one knows. With that, one shouldn't discount any possibility. We are way beyond the placebo effect in our understanding that SSRI's and other serotonin regulators can and do calm overall anxiety in a good number of people.

You can have OCD and depression as to separate disorders. You can also become depressed because you have OCD. I was diagnosed with having both. It is good to treat them both. If your overall mood lifts as you treat depression, you are more able to deal with your OCD. If you begin to get your OCD under control, you'll have less to feel down about.

OCD will always find a way to suck you back in. It's mission is to keep you thinking about, and doing compusions around, the Big, Bad Thing, whatever that may be. You focus on the more obvious compulsion you performed, getting a test done. I guarantee these past several weeks have been loaded with compulsions for you. I bet the possibility of asbestos being present has been top of mind, all the time. You've likely ruminated endlessly. How many times have you stopped to look at the area of concern? All of that is your doing. OCD is very much like addiction. Just one more hit. Just one more check. It's never just one more. One leads to another, which leads to another. So wait anything out. Literally, get on with your life. Get back in the game. Q: What if I heard wrong? A: Oh well. Action: Clean the house like you were going to, before the question (obsession) appeared. It's difficult at first. It gets easier the more you do it.

No one knows what causes OCD. We know what it is and how to treat it.

What you are attempting to do is a compulsion. You're trying to soothe yourself by saying you can say anything and it doesn't matter. It is true; it doesn't matter,but you don't need to reassure yourself.

What you want is certainty. What you need to learn is that OCD will not let you be certain. It doesn't matter how methodical you are. OCD will always find something else. You can't win against OCD. Not be playing by its rules. Instead, stop playing the game.

It is common for anxiety to increase after starting an SSRI. It usually improves after a while. If you don't see an improvement in the next week or so, I suggest you speak with your doctor.

I strongly recommend you stop doing this. OCD is illogical. You're trying to make sense of an illogical disorder. It most likely won't work and you'll drive yourself batty doing it.

Telling yourself that you did nothing wrong would be a compulsion. It is self-reassurance. As with any compulsion, it won't work. Soon enough, you'll get another obsession, you'll want to reassure yourself, and round and round you'll go.

No, it's the fact you have OCD. Without changing how you respond to thoughts of things less than perfect, NOTHING you do will make your feelings of dissatisfaction go away. You can buy a brand new house, perfectly painted and perfectly smelling and, in short order, your mind will find something wrong and off you'll go again. Remember this: if you move, you take your OCD with you.

Worrier, you are yet again seeking reassurance. You keep circling around the same core question: Is this really just OCD? You have been told multiple times by multiple people that it is. You keep asking, in different ways. It's reassurance seeking. It's a compulsion. I want you to know that unless you grit your teeth and put a stop to this, we'll be having this same conversation five years from now. I've seen it happen. Some sufferers get so stuck on whether they have OCD or not, they never deal with the obsessions that started the whole mess. OCD is known as the doubting disease. Just when you feel you know the answer, the disorder throws up doubt. It can be an endless circle unless you put a stop to it.

Go for it. Go further and stop collecting the water.

Worrier, OCD is basically intrusive thoughts that cause distress, followed by compulsions, all wrapped up in doubt. You have many thoughts that your problem is more than OCD. There's the intrusive thoughts. They cause you lots of distress. You already know you do compulsions, like coming here for reassurance. And you have loads of doubt. Compare the two paragraphs above. It's OCD. It's all OCD.

There's tons of info out there on reducing anxiety. High on the list for sufferers is to curb their compulsions. Briefly, getting your mind on other things. Exercise. Relaxation. Mindfulness. Eating right. Sleeping right. Going for walks. Meds.

Yup. You can learn ways to minimize your anxiety.

Here you are, full of doubt and yet again asking for reassurance. Leap of faith.

Nope. That would be a compulsion. Before you get to what to do about those thoughts, you need to deal with your doubts that this is something more than plain, old OCD. Acknowledge that there is a ton of experience on this forum and if everyone is telling you that your problem is OCD, then it's probably just OCD and go with it. Stop yourself from coming here and repeatedly asking some version of the question, is this just OCD? Doing that is reassurance seeking, a compulsion, and will only keep you stuck. I'm asking you to take a leap of faith, accept your OCD and commit to treating it as OCD... even if you don't fully believe it right now.

@worrierYou have spent months trying everything in your power to convince us your problem is something other than OCD. You've been told dozens of times that your problem is just OCD, by numerous people. You keep coming back with yeah, but... We see this often. The reason you keep circling around and coming back to the same old thing is because of OCD. It's called the doubting disease for a reason. You are flat out told what your problem is, by veritable experts on the disorder because they live with it, and quickly doubt arises and you come back again. Further, every time you doubt and you post, you're looking for a little shot of reassurance. Your mind is telling you that your problem is much worse than OCD, so you come here asking for another shot of reassurance. Thing is, unless you force yourself to change this cycle, you'll be stuck in it for a long time. We know you want help with the awful thoughts yo have, but I think first you need to accept that all of this is OCD so you can start treating it as OCD. Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith.

Yup. Basically any negative emotion.

Yes! And get your mind onto other, important things.

Heh, that's why I put the word usually in there. I do remember you saying it is the reverse for you. And we know that high anxiety, real-world situations tend to spark OCD, where anxiety clearly comes first. I'll have to think of a better way to phrase that.