deepblue

Australia

Pants

Ponder

Pleasure

Life

Crackers

Age

Well this seems as good a place as any ? Welcome to the site ?

Inside

softly

Norman

Time

Frying

(of the) Dog

Have you ever heard of the 'helicopter view' to OCD? That's where you try to understand your predicament by looking at your situation as someone else would from above. When I read your post it struck me that you're in the classic trap of OCD. Put simply, you're self doubting and seeking to reassure yourself by checking. Evil masterminds don't worry about doing bad things and certainly don't have a morale crisis over things they've thought or read about. All you've written shows to me is that you're not a bad person, and that the OCD is leading you to believe you're the opposite of who you are. Take care

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Autumn

Well now I'm drinking coffee and staring at the photo. Probably for the best they're not in reach or they'd all be gone in no time!

Overboard

Is it a good sign that I'm staring at the photo with my mouth wide open?

Pipes

Just to echo what everyone else has said, I definitely have OCD related dreams. It might be a dream where I experience a situation that provokes my OCD, through to trying to perform a cleaning ritual. We can all be our own harshest critic, and you have to give yourself a break from time to time. A dream has no more significance than a random thought. Just as "it's only a thought" applies to OCD, so does "it's just a dream". Plus if dreams were real, I'd have a car which from time to time can fly, would be able to leap great distances, and would have found out who that blonde really was...

Hi Annabel, I've moved twice whilst my OCD has been really bad. With me, most worries are at their worst before I start facing the actual problem eg once I started the actual physical move I found I wasn't as anxious as I thought I'd be before hand. That doesn't mean I wasn't stressed at all, it just wasn't as bad as I'd feared. Also the physical exertion of lifting, carrying etc tends to work as a distraction for me. As for feeling settled I'm not sure about that. I've lived in my current home for over 10 years, but it isn't the same as my last home, nor the one before that, and it never will be. But it is my home. I'm not sure what settled really means to me, just remember for you that your new home is where your family will be together and that will hopefully help. :original:

Hi Bronny, when I was first diagnosed with OCD and depression in 1989 I was given a course of ECT. More than 20 years later I still have OCD and depression - it didn't cure me of either, although at the time it really did mess with my short term memory. It may be effective for you, it may not, but if I was offered ECT again I would decline it. Hope this helps

Hi Anabel, do you think that any of your flat mates will actually be counting the number of times each of you uses the washing machine? Hmmm, I suppose you could always put an extra load of washing on when no one else is around... Sorry I've not been much help. Deepblue