malina

Ah great, I'm glad to hear that! I definitely think the first psychologist you saw was someone who didn't know much about OCD, so I'm glad that you are seeing someone who is better able to help you now.

I'm so sorry you're feeling all of this Cora. Honestly, this disorder is pretty awful and it's so unfair. It's torture and it's relentless. And you have to deal with other things in life on top of all of the stuff going on in your head. I feel particularly bad for you because nobody is really helping you, yes you have seen therapists but you're still very young and you're navigating this whole system on your own, while having to go to uni, hold down a job and help care for your little brother. It is a lot, I'd be screaming hysterically and crying in your situation too. You can't see this because you are always putting yourself down, but you have so many wonderful qualities, I can tell. And while you may feel incredibly alone in your head, you're not alone, there are people who love you very much even if they don't understand everything that is going on with you, and there are also many people out there (on this forum and beyond) who know exactly how you feel. So don't you dare give up! Take some time today to calm down, do something you enjoy, speak to someone...give yourself a break. Then from tomorrow think about what you're going to do regarding your work.

Hi @Tamagochi, I was wondering if you have tried CBT before? I read in your post that you went to a therapist, but I think it's a bit strange/inappropriate that the therapist would tell you they thought this was your child without any discussion. I'm referring to this info: I just hope that you are getting the right kind of support.

Hi @Cerrys, I don't have an answer but I wanted to reply because I'm in the same position as you and reading your post made me feel less alone. I want to have a baby in the not too distant future but I'm absolutely dreading the idea as well. I have harm related OCD mainly and I keep thinking that having a baby will only make life more difficult. Then again, how much are we willing to let this disorder take from us? Sure, having a child will probably be difficult, but giving up on your dreams and plans because of a disorder seems so much worse. Somehow I'm hopeful that it'll work out and that any pain along the way will be worth it in the long run.

My therapist taught me a nice analogy to deal with worries. The idea is to imagine that you are at a train station and each worry is an incoming train. You acknowledge that the train is there but you don’t need to get on it. Just let it be there and then leave the platform. so take a deep breath, don’t try to get on to every single train that comes into the station, just relax and keep moving forward.

Hey Cora, you already know what you need to do. We've been over these scenarios so many times and I don't really think anyone can give you any further explanations from the ones that have been repeatedly given for two years now. It doesn't matter how much information you give us or put into bold text to get us to pay attention, everything has already been said. Time to be brave, take a chance and put some of this advice into practice now.

Hi @Ironborn, I'm sorry that you're going through this stress and that you had to deal with getting covid. First off, I think you should be aware that the vaccine doesn't completely stop you from transmitting covid. I am not saying that you shouldn't get it, I have been vaccinated myself and would encourage others too, but if you feel guilty for this reason in particular, you shouldn't. Also, I don't think you could ever possibly know how the virus spread at your workplace, no matter how many connections you link in your head. What you need to keep in mind is that you did your due diligence - once you got symptoms, you got tested, you told your colleague about the positive result and self isolated. This is all any of us can do under these circumstances. Is your colleague (Person A) sitting around, wrecking himself with guilt and feeling like a murderer? Because technically he knew he had come into contact with someone infected with covid and perhaps should have gotten tested as well? I don't want to blame anyone, but just to show you that you are not solely responsible for anything that happened and that other people (who don't have OCD) don't react in the same way. So whatever happened, you are definitely not a murderer. We are all living under the same circumstances, any of us could have gotten infected without even knowing it and spread it to others, even people who are vulnerable. The best any of us can do it to act responsibly if we know we have come into contact with covid (either by having symptoms or through another person) and you did all the right things.

Hi @Madchoc, I think what you're hoping for is a way to feel better right now (because who wouldn't want to feel okay?) but I think you need to be prepared to feel some discomfort in order to get better. Wanting your husband to change his top after eating fish fingers isn't rational at all, you are letting the OCD completely overtake your life and you have to do something to change this. You seem like a really lovely person and I feel bad seeing you in such a bad place. I think you have to start facing your fears, it'll be awful at first but nothing bad is going to happen. The worst thing that could happen is that you don't do anything, continue like this and let the OCD get worse.

Hi @Tamagochi, I understand that you'd want reassurance but I don't think any of us could reasonably tell you whether the child is yours or not. Other than the distress you're feeling and the scenario unfolding in your mind, what is actually happening? You say you're not in contact with the woman anymore and, even when you met, she didn't actually admit where she met you (or that she was indeed the woman you had a one night stand with) right? Other than the fact that you dislike this woman, it doesn't sound like she has done anything bad to you. She wanted to bring her daughter on your date, ok that's a little weird, but she respected that you didn't want that and she also respected that you didn't want to be in contact with her anymore. She didn't tell you this child was yours, ask for help or money or anything of the sort. Then you mention a DNA test as a way of knowing for certain, but that's not really an option. You can't just contact this woman again out of the blue, claim that you had a one night stand with her and demand that she subjects her child to a DNA test to check if you're the father, that would honestly be insane. So when you look at your situation, is there anything that is causing you a problem other than your worry about this?

😅 you answered your own question! But you asked because you wanted confirmation. You knew the answer but you wanted someone else to tell you and reassure you. Believe in yourself Cora, you have it in you to succeed here!

One thing to add - I think you are still waiting for that lightbulb moment, where someone gives you an alternative explanation and it makes sense and you're then able to get on with your life forever. This will never happen, I'm so sorry Cora, but it doesn't work that way. You have to practice! You have to consistently try to see an alternative explanation, you have to practice moving on, practice everything you have learned. If you do that, you will become better at it and more resilient and eventually the thoughts will subside. But I am sorry, there isn't ever going to be a single thing that someone will say or do that will make this all go away. You have to work towards it.

Now you are getting to the core of OCD: Doubt. Is it possible that you are making excuses and that you are this bad person or that theory A is true? Yes, it is possible. I am not saying it's true or that it's even probable but it's not impossible either. No matter how little likelihood there is of something, if there is even a tiny chance a bad thing could be true, our OCD latches onto it. This is exactly why reassurance doesn't work, because someone could come to tell you that your fear isn't true, but you will inevitably find a reason to doubt it. So this is the part where you have to take the leap of faith everyone is talking about. Both options (as in this case theory A and B) are technically possible. But you are living your life as if theory A (I am a terrible person) is the ultimate truth, you are reacting to it and seeking people's reassurance to the contrary. Theory B gives you an alternative, and more rational, way of looking at a situation. The purpose of this exercise is not to give you reassurance and to tell you that everything is okay. It's meant to show you that the way you evaluate things isn't the only way to evaluate them. But you can't get certainty either way and this is the part you have to learn to accept.

No worries, I'm glad it helped! Just to say, this disorder is incredibly confusing, how could it not be? It's as if your body has developed a mind of its own, and your mind has also developed a mind of its own too. There you are minding your own business when you're suddenly hit with sexual feelings towards the randomest things. And no matter how much you know it's all OCD, they are always overwhelming and feel real. It's not something anyone can prepare you for, it's not what your parents teach you about or what friends talk about. There isn't a way to know how to behave and we all end up trying all sorts of ways to handle what is happening. I'm sorry to say it but there are going to be many days ahead where you do things you don't like, but go back to this example. None of these are mistakes, none of them actually have any meaning beyond the fact that you are confused AF and trying to figure it all out. So next time, try out theory A/B (I just learned about this myself, I like it!), try to not immediately jump to blaming yourself and try to view things a little more rationally.

Not a bad start but I still see a lot of self blaming in theory B. How about this? Sometimes I have groinal responses to things I find inappropriate, like pictures of cute animals. I find these very overwhelming and don't really know how to handle them yet. I'm confused and I am trying to experiment with different ways of dealing with these feelings. Sometimes that means that I do things that I feel ashamed about afterwards. The shame is the meaning that I attach to what I have done, when in reality I was just trying to figure out how respond to the overwhelming signals that my body is giving me. I don't like how I reacted today, there may be other days where I don't feel proud of my reaction, but I need to learn to stop attaching meaning to how I react and do my best to move on. What about that?

Cora, there is just one thing I'd like to add - you treat these incidents like today as "mistakes" and I think this is part of the problem, because you give the incidents meaning, significance and as if they reflect something about you. Have you ever tried theory A/theory B with your therapist? I think it might help you if you try to view things from your OCD perspective and then from a more rational perspective. We could try with today's incident Theory A would suggest - I enjoyed the groinal response that I got in response to seeing cute animals, I got sexual gratification from this groinal response, people with OCD don't enjoy their intrusive thoughts so that must mean I don't have OCD. Am I on the right track here in theory A with regards to how you're thinking? Can you try to come up with an alternative Theory B?