Agrippina

I have recently started to see someone new and on top of all the typical OCD fears and scares I have become very stressed about the possibility of catching Covid from him. Is anyone else experiencing this, and what do you do about it? We are both sensible and taking all the advised precautions, both fully vaccinated etc and I know technically I could just as easily get Covid from someone sitting next to me in a cafe or sneezing close by. I am trying hard to ERP it as just an uncertainty that I need to put up with, but I suppose the problem is really that this is effecting how I behave with him. I am constantly trying to ignore all these fears while also trying to be in the moment and enjoying being with him. I think it is making me distracted and nervy when I am with him. Sometimes we will be talking and it is just so hard to ignore/put up with all the fears and thoughts in my head that I can't focus on what he is saying, then I start picking at my hands and looking worried and I find it very difficult to get back into the moment. Anyone got any advice or experienced something similar?

Do you mean Pure by Rose Cartwright? I literally just started reading it this evening! So far it seems to be well written but I have found it very triggering... I would be happy to discus it once I am finished.

Just wanted to say how helpful I found this thread. I have just started dating a new guy and I am terrified of having to tell him about having OCD and how it impacts on my life. I think the advice above was great and it has helped me feel a little bit calmer about my own situation.

I really liked The Imp of the Mind, Break Free from OCD and The OCD Workbook. All very helpful and I learnt a lot.

I suffer badly from this type of OCD fear. It is incredibly difficult but it is very important not to stop and do any checking. Over time you learn slowly that these are OCD fears and not memories of things that have actually happened. I know that doesn't sound very helpful but it does gradually help to lessen the hold these fears have on you.

I actually had TMS treatment a few years ago but at the time I had an incorrect diagnosis so the treatment was just done for depression and not OCD. It didn't work for me which I put down to it being for the wrong diagnosis so I have no idea if it would be any good for OCD. The treatment itself was expensive, really time consuming and there was v. mild pain (during the treatments). The time consuming part was incredibly hard for me at the time as they saw me 5 days a week for 3 or 4 weeks - the actual appointments were short, but being severely depressed and riddled with OCD fears at the time I found it very tiring and difficult to make it to all of those appointments. When I saw recently that TMS now included OCD among the things it treated my first thought was to wonder how it fit in with CBT? I could see it being positive if used in conjunction with CBT but my personal concern would be that people would just do the TMS, maybe feel a bit better but not learn the CBT coping techniques for when anxiety/OCD/depression hit again in the future.

Welcome to the forum! I am really sorry you are struggling, OCD is foul... Hope the forum helps a little - for me it shows me that the horrible fears I have are actually not limited to just me, other people get them too and they are all due to OCD. It makes me feel a bit less alone with it all, hope it helps for you too.

I used to have a lot of fears like this after nights out, even been scared (for no legitimate reason) that I had HIV a few times. Classic OCD. Alcohol seems to make anxiety, depression and OCD worse for most people. It certainly did for me. I cut it out completely 2 1/2 years ago and it has helped me, though I appreciate not everyone wants to cut it out altogether. Also although cutting out alcohol has helped me it has has taken medication and CBT therapy to actually deal with the OCD so it wouldn't be enough on its own to make such fears go away.

Thank you. That sounds about right - a really good day and then the OCD starts to niggle away at it, or in this case smash into it suddenly. I need to keep telling myself it is the OCD, that it is feelings and not facts, and to keep calm. I am currently feeling really scared but that is not evidence that anything negative happened.

I am working towards getting a job and my own place again this summer, have been doing CBT with ERP for 2 years and am on medication. I am generally improving and doing largely okay. I made a few friends during lockdown and yesterday we hung out together all day, went out for lunch and played boardgames, it was great. I then went to stay at my sister's flat, we chatted and had takeout and it was fine. Then like a sledgehammer I had a horrendous night - huge spike in OCD fears about all sorts of things, felt the sort of fear levels I used to feel when hungover despite not having drunk anything, awful and vidid nightmares and this morning a massive sense of things being wrong, having done wrong, having done something awful I can't remember etc. I know this is all fairly standard but I have been really thrown off by the sudden smack of it. I am trying really hard to be rational about it and I suspect the sudden spike of OCD fears was due to a whole day of socialising when I am not used to that. Please give me your opinions and also if anyone has experienced a sudden spike like this themselves. I have been reasonably steady for a while and this has freaked me out and scared me.

I gave up alcohol a little over 2 years ago now - it was a great decision and has definitely helped my anxiety.

That is amazing! It is also just the encouragement I needed to hear about this morning so thank you.

Hi @Blondie. I have actually suffered from very similar OCD fears myself. I know how real they can feel at the time. Something that I have learnt from CBT which I find very helpful is repeating to myself "Feelings are not facts". So when you have these thoughts and feel scared, panicked, sweaty with fear, itchy with terror, shaky, etc those feelings are like your body telling you that you should be scared of the thoughts you are having, essentially telling you to react to the thoughts in all the checking ways you are currently doing. However, feelings are not necessarily facts - just because your body is reacting as though you should panic does NOT mean those signals it is giving you are correct. So when you get the thoughts and your body reacts to make you feel scared that is the OCD at work. It is hard but you must tell yourself that just because you are having a physical reaction of feeling fear etc does not mean that that is the appropriate response - the OCD is sending your body false signals. I am not sure how well I have explained it, but when I feel all panicked and my chest goes tight and I feel all sweaty and shaky with fear I tell myself "Feelings are not facts" over and over and try to distract myself. With practise it really does help because naturally we want to believe the signals our body is giving us regarding how to feel etc, but the OCD messes the connection up.

Stumbled upon a new 3 part radio programme where the actress Tuppence Middleton talks about OCD with professionals. The first episode is pretty good - I thought she was very eloquent and the doctor she spoke to was fairly good at explaining it. Here is the link for any who want to listen: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000v2rw For me it feels kind of amazing to hear a woman about my age who is successful and doing so well in life talk about her OCD. I have always felt such shame, guilt and terror in even telling people I have OCD, so to hear it openly discussed like this felt quite significant to me.

Having CBT over the phone sounds like it would be really hard. I am currently getting CBT therapy over video calls which is okay, but I really miss being able to see my therapist in person as I do think it makes it easier. I have been having therapy now for over a year and a half. I have found it very helpful and it has made a huge difference to my life. Personally I found it took quite a while before I noticed a difference, but that may have been because I was very depressed at the time as well. It took several months for me to notice a real impact, but it did happen so if things are slow please keep trying.

The way you have described your fear does make it sound like OCD to me. I am currently applying for jobs, looking at flats and generally planning to move out of my parents home after a long period of my OCD being really bad which forced me to move home. Sometimes I will get really scared and freaked out and consider cancelling/postponing all my plans to move out because things just get overwhelming. The last time it happened I opened up to my mother and we agreed that when the time comes I will move out gradually and maybe for part of each week live in my new flat, rather than suddenly just moving out completely. Is there any way you could make your change to uni life a bit more gradual and therefore a bit less overwhelming? Would you consider part-time or could you possibly go home for the weekends?

I suffer from a variation on this problem and for me I think it is down to a type of perfectionism. So if I am going out somewhere I want to be and feel as 'perfect' as possible - makeup, clean clothes, feeling good, looking good and part of feeling good is not having something like needing the loo annoying me. I sometimes become really worried about making sure I go to the toilet multiple times before I leave the house, before a meal, before watching a movie etc so that needing the loo doesn't 'ruin' something from feeling 'perfect'. It is something I am working on as I have this perfectionism streak about lots of things - CBT is helping. There are also people who are scared about having an accident and so go to the loo multiple times before they go out to try and make sure this doesn't happen. Or people who have fears around using toilets other than the one in their house. I guess my point is you might need to think behind the obsession a bit to try and work out what aspect of OCD is invoking this fear in you, then it will be easier to get help for it.

That sounds so stressful and difficult. I hope you are getting strong support from those around you. Are you able to be honest with the medical professionals involved about your OCD and the impact it has had following your surgery as this info might help them to understand your situation and decide how best to help you?

I found The Imp of the Mind pretty good, also The OCD Workbook.

What you describe is very familiar to how I feel and have felt in the past. It sounds like you have a good support system in place but I notice you didn't mention what sort of therapy you might be utilising - are you and your therapist working with CBT and also with ERP? I have found them incredibly helpful, still really challenging but definitely really helpful. I still have times where I am just terrified of doing anything in case it somehow might cause harm to someone else, but slowly over time the CBT is making an impact and after over a year and a half of therapy I do see lots of changes and improvements.

I am currently suffering really badly with one of those OCD fears where I feel scared that I have somehow sent an insulting message to someone... I was reading an article online, a celebrity reminded me of the daughter of a friend of my Mum's and I had this horrible insult pop into my head. I then got really scared I had somehow communicated this insult to her - through email/text/phone/internet - and I have all the physical scared symptoms. I get this every so often, used to be a lot more regular, but somehow it doesn't matter how often it happens I still feel like it is true. And in this instance it scares me so much because the girl in question has depression so an insult would be even worse than to a healthy person, and her Mum is my Mum's best friend, so anything bad could spoil that friendship. Do any of you get fears like this? And if so what do you do to get past them? I know it is OCD, but it is so hard to push past the fear... I am forcing myself not to check my computer and phone for any evidence of a sent message to her, but my god it is hard!

Negative: I have two much free time due to lockdown. Positive: My pets love having so much attention.

So ERP is essentially an off shoot of CBT. It is one of the many tools CBT can teach you, and it has been shown to be very effective in dealing with OCD. I hope that makes sense, I am not the best at explaining it! Not all CBT practitioners will cover ERP, so if you are interested it might require seeking out a specialist but there are some decent books about it as well.

Thank you @FranticS and @malina, @Handy I am not sure trying to find someone else with OCD to date is the right way to go about it! I have recently started to date a man I met online and our third virtual date is tonight - super nervous! I am not sure when I will mention having OCD, but I might casually introduce having anxiety to gauge his reaction... wish me luck!

I used to suffer from this really badly. For years at work I was terrified of every conversation and would then go over and over and over them in my mind afterwards. It is definitely OCD and unfortunately by going over the conversations or doing other compulsions you are just feeding it. I have been doing CBT and ERP for about a year and a half and they have really helped with this. Might be worth considering?