njb

@malina agree. Comes in many forms. Once the obsession begins and you are endlessly analysing and scrutinising and compulsively testing and ruminating it's all fuel. Certainly don't want any of them overall. I guess it's a tough one but once you are endlessly anxious and hyper aware and questioning own sexuality and identity and hyper aware of all mental and physical sensations you are pretty much of course wired to the obsession and become a huge machine of testing - that is without having addressed compulsion and rumination etc. I guess my point is I'm even scared to agree that things could be more specific because I'm now scared I don't have ocd - quite fragile today ! But I agree. Comes from all places.

@PolarBearthank you for your time. Yes I ought know better and will continue to work on this. I'm really going to try not caring. It's the only way I will ever get back to real me long term. So utterly overwhelmed by the realness of it all again. I'm right there yet again. Like a stupid hole walked straight into. With each compulsion there is more fear and despair. I'm off to distract. Thanks again Polar bear. Hope you are well and so happy to see you are still about supporting with your wise words. Njb

Hi @malina. Wow that's a lot of life event planning for anyone to contemplate at any time and it's all good positive stuff. Just keep pressing ahead. You've noticed OCD wants some part of it all and that's insightful. That it's started to bring you down is natural but it needn't stop you or at least bounding on like a determined person. Just remember, it doesn't matter the theme, it's all OCD and same fundamental challenge. Could be about lawn mowers or weddings. It's that pathetic a bully. So look, plough on and be insightful like you are, you know it will try, keep doing the do as best you can. Great that you're seeing a therapist and also reaching out with such a lovely post for support. Funny how we all see it in each other but struggle with ourselves. I guess I haven't much to offer other than stay with it, make those plans and recognise ocd for what it is. Njb

@malina thank you so much for taking the time to read and reply. Means a lot and your message is gratefully received. Very kind words and confidence inspiring. Hope you are well. Thank you 🤗 Njb

Hi, Haven't been here in a while and hope everyone is ok. Had a tough second half of 2021 as wife's cancer came back after 5 years free and is now stage 4. Treatable but not curable. Been ok though but OCD keeps knocking on the door. Thought I was doing average but started to watch a 2016 called Siren and at start there is a back story so there's a figure in a nude suit creeping about and I flipped the usual anxiety as it dawned on me it was a young person. The whole scene is a bit grainy and definitely dark as filmed in a supposed late night church erc. There is a point where the actress seems to have a developed chest and this has freaked me out utterly. I went straight back to OCD habits and watched it endlessly. I can see breasts and think 'attractive' but then see person as younger and see nurturing only as in not attractive. I cant work out whether they've given false chest to look like the temptress in back story or whether I even care as I can see it both ways in terms of like don't like. I've been pouring over internet and think the actress was about 11 which has utterly shattered my world. I just don't know how to get past this now. Had this theme for so many years now I just feel so ashamed I've not managed to move on. I can't tolerate this zombie existence of anxiety and hoping for it to end. I'm still so utterly susceptible to these invasions and spiral like an addict into bad behaviours. My logic side says that I couldn't see context ie grainy footage, can't make out age, figure not actually alluring etc but then it flips to you liked breasts and doubts over every second of the 1m or so of footage. I guess I'm just looking for a friendly hi where it doesn't exist anywhere else and a reminder to self that ocd is a powerful beast just waiting to get back in there. I'm still shocked how quickly I can go from happy to utterly utterly depressed. I am confident that given context ie seeing the age of the actress as in face etc and as a whole I would (hopefully) be calm and I touch with real me. I just can't stop seeing it as attractive and then not and despite all the years of OCD I'm in the anxiety pit saying I'm a paedophile or into young girls and it is killing me all the same. I'm shaking, not sleeping and utterly convinced. Feel so alone and ashamed, especially as I can't think straight after all these years. I should be better at this. Back to basics for me. Hope anyone reading is doing ok. Njb

You're don't seem pedantic to me over the years. Finely tuned yes ?but you're right. I'm grateful to be reminded we can beat this.

I will take being taken up on a point as at least it shows my work is being read ??

I will take being taken up on a point as at least it shows my work is being read ??

I agree. I meant more in terms of we know the person can help themselves but recognise we struggle to see what is right there as in the tools to help which we are able to offer others but struggle to apply sometimes...We can all help selves if clear of mind to apply the correct behaviours.

I think we see ourselves in others posts but are floating above trying to show the way out of the maze is in their hands but because its them they are helpless. Perhaps it is compassion, a human will try to avoid harm if confronted by an assailant whereas if with someone will defend them without concern for self. We identify with the articulation of the sufferer and that they equally identify with us and we all have the paradox that we are unable to help self. My heart lifts at a post when I relate and I also cry with tears of sadness when I read someone who is just like me. I don't cry at much but here I do i nice and bad ways in equal measure. I do know that I absolutely admire fellow sufferers if they walk our walk. Hugs...?

It is ocd. Remind yourself of that. From you post you've done a good job of reflecting and realising that. You know ocd ebbs and flows. Try to relable it and distract. Good luck.

Hi, Just hoping someone is there to kick me up back side and perhaps virtual hug. I'm so very down in it at the moment. I've slipped right back and consuming all manmer of matreial on paedophiles and hebophiles and getting further and further down the path of despair. I can't get past making self feel it was horny when doing rumination and am so utterly lost. I know we get confused over feelings and arousal but i left out that i couldnt stand the groin frustration (from that anxiety fuelled butterfly feeling and sickness and aroudal and confusion) and after i had stopped panicking a bit i relieved it (sorry explicit) but to the same sexy train of thought ehich i haf reached by ERP which was just erotic without age and i think just became age appropriate. Im lost and thats become a whole new worry as to whether i enjoyed something about 14yr olds when im not sure if was, think i wasnt but sont know. I know if i think 14yr at outset i go no ta. I do think having spent ages trying to like something chances are when i manage it and then say ok that comcept was attractive i could conjur up same arousal. Im sure if age 14 had bumped in would have crashed. I worry now ad I think ive unleashed some hidden dormant sexual deviance that if i say to hell wuth society i can happily be like Epstein and then some. Feel sick endlessly. Need some love and here's some for you anyway! ?

Your last post is spot on. It's an intelligent morphing thing. Tending to a seed so one gets branches with twigs and little twigs. It's like a mirror on mirror. You may be lucky enough to ruminate and nip it before it takes too long but you know most times it'll get you just when you think you've got that ok feeling to face life again. It's so tiring but compelling. Distract!!!!

There's the horrid power of ocd. It's what gives us that soul wrenching sickness that we have to attend to. I don't know the answer. I know it's all a battle of identity. What I do know is that if you had context you'd still stress but you'd be able to be in touch with you before viewing such stuff. We don't wait to see a whole tiger before deciding it's a tiger. I know it is all consuming and I'm there right now. Your heart is in the right place. You can't be sure. Ever. Truth is your ocd will cloud stuff even if you were sure. If someone e said to me here are clips of 13 yr olds dancing sexily you think I'd be cool, nope. I suspect a loy of people would feel uncomfortable but they dont have feeling reaction like someone with a mental illness. That's the power over us. We think like everyone else but some things hit our reactor and we lose it. We're normal uncomfortable x 1000000000. Try to relable it as ocd and move on. You can't be sure either way. It's like trying to solve an impossible puzzle. Point is there is no need.

It's not dog ocd. It's ocd. Could be about the tv or a plant or a shoe. It's one thing we all have just different themes. This theme about your dog is against your moral compass so ocd taunts you with it. Whatever angle you worry about it's all same seed with little branches and twigs and you're trying to answer every little bit. We all do it. I do it. Any emotion, it will be your ocd. Its really tough as you know. People on here will advise you better the my words but keep going.