Uncertain about how to be uncertain & recovery is becoming confusing

[PolarBear]

2 minutes ago, saddaniels said:

I guess I need a refresher course on what ERP is to be used for. Some people say it's used to desesentize. Some people say it's simply used to minimalize compulsions. Some people, like my therapists, say it's used to expose yourself to what makes you anxious so that thing won't bother you anymore aka having my TV zoomed in.

I can't habituate to having my TV zoomed in. I know it's off & I know that having the screen with a full picture is more reasonable/watchable than that. I'm not a rat in a lab test.

Then why don't you leave the darn thing alone?

[saddaniels]

Maybe I need to take a step back. Ok, so if accepting uncertainty is the main goal with ERP therapy, I get so confused as to how habituation plays in to the therapy. Let's say I was checking my TV over and over again to make sure it wasn't on wrong settings. For an exposure, if I'm correct, I would be asked to set things off setting wise & habituate until the anxiety comes down.

But where I get extremely stumped is, if the purpose is to accept that my settings may or may not be off, why am i, at the same time, habituating & getting comfortable with the settings being off.

It's weird & I feel like accepting uncertainty & habituating to exposures contradict one another.

Maybe there is a large chunk I am missing.

Its this cognitive confusion that gets me trapped everytime.

[taurean]

What keeps you trapped every time is ruminating. 

Remember, whatever our obsession we give it power by ruminating. 

Ignore the therapist, forget what they said 

Live with the uncertainty. Watch for a while on the setting you like.

When the urge to change, to zoom or whatever becomes overpowering don't give in but, rather, switch off. 

Next time you try, see if you can resist for longer 

Gradually build up the time you can resist before the urge means you have to quit 

You should find that gradually the desire to ruminate and the urge to fiddle will ease away. But it will only do so if you stop trying to work out whys what's and wherefores -  which are irrelevant pointless and leave you stuck. 

[saddaniels]

Like how am I supposed to get comfortable with settings being off when I know there is a viewing option to select that would obviously make the TV screen more appropriate to view?? 

What human being wouldn't take the better option of having a full TV display if they knew one existed? Just really confused. I want to work with ERP without totally dismissing it, but yes, it confuses me greatly.

[saddaniels]

And taurean, I agree. This ruminating isn't helping. The big problem comes because I genuinely feel like I'm doing something wrong with the therapy. Because what if it isn't OCD, what if it's my fault & there is something I need to change to make the therapy work...And then I ruminate.

Edited February 17, 2017 by saddaniels

[taurean]

So don't go down that path. Forget the therapy, forget the ifs buts and maybes  forget the options no one else gives them any consideration. 

Dwight Eisenhower - he who became supreme commander of Western allied forces during world war 2, and subsequently president of the U. S. A." never wasted a second thinking about anyone he didn't like " according to his son. 

Can you imagine Eisenhower agonising over settings for a TV or radio?  No, nor can I. 

 

 

[PolarBear]

Again, you need to make a decision, sad. Stick with what you think your therapist meant, which will leave you stuck where you've been for a long time, or try something different. The choice is entirely up to you.

[saddaniels]

5 hours ago, PolarBear said:

Then why don't you leave the darn thing alone?

I keep getting thoughts that there is something wrong with me for not wanting it zoomed in. Maybe other people wouldnt care if it were zoomed in, but I do. And because of that, maybe I'm being irrational & a zoom should be nothing & perhaps it's extraordinary to me. So therefore I need to make myself habituate to settings being off because others may be able to do it.

It ties back in with therapy. I get so so anxious about therapy.

[PolarBear]

Read my above post.

[taurean]

Daniels. 

Forget the therapy and do what PolarBear and I suggest. 

Park the ruminating bus and toss the keys into the river. 

You are being your own worst enemy and you don't need to be. 

[saddaniels]

I want to try that, but if ERP is universal to all OCD themes, including If I was anxious to set my TV off, than shouldn't I do that? I don't understand. What if I'm avoiding zooming in on my TV and zooming in should, in reality, be really easy & such a minor thing to do that wouldn't affect my TV quality according to other people

The route to leave things as is sounds like the best, but technically, I feel like I'd be messing the therapy up & that really scares me too.

Edited February 17, 2017 by saddaniels

[taurean]

19 minutes ago, saddaniels said:

The route to leave things as is sounds like the best, but technically, I feel like I'd be messing the therapy up & that really scares me too.

Daniels forget obsessing about the therapy, it is obsessing about that that is holding you back. 

If you aren't prepared to try what we suggest you try, there is no point in this thread staying open since we won't be able to help you. 

 

 

 

Edited February 17, 2017 by taurean
typo

[saddaniels]

Yes, I see that it is holding me back.

However, I believe that until I find where my mind has warped ERP therapy, there will be no chance to get better. ERP works if done correctly. I'd like to see where my beliefs have become faulty so I can get out of this mess. 

Exposure therapy, currently, isn't sitting well with me. I'm not sure how to apply it to anything my OCD centers around really, because each time I've tried, it doesn't work.

I'm just trying to figure out how to get it to work & what I'm doing wrong.

Edited February 17, 2017 by saddaniels

[PolarBear]

We've been over this a dozen times, sad. We've told you where you are going wrong. 

OCD has latched onto your recovery amd OCD is telling you to do exposures where none is warranted. Every time you change the settings on your TV, every time you ruminate over exposures, you are doing a compulsion. You are afraid of screwing up your therapy but you've been screwing it up for months now.

If you continue on the way you've been going, you will remain stuck. That's a fact. Keep changing the settings on your TV, you will remain stuck. Keep ruminating over therapy and you will remain stuck. It's as simple as that.

[taurean]

Absolutely. There will be urges, there will be fear. 

But that is just the territory with OCD in whatever form. 

Until you are prepared to listen to good advice given and sit with fears and urges, stay stuck you will. 

You have a choice - at the moment you aren't making it, so we can't help you. 

If 20 years ago I had had a Bear and Taurean helping me, I would have been listening and changing my behaviours. 

Edited February 17, 2017 by taurean
amendment

[saddaniels]

I hear you, I do. And what you say to do sounds the most reasonable, yet I keep thinking back to exposure therapy & desensitization & how people who are exposed to, let's say something that is dirty, eventually would be able to go about their day without worrying about what's dirty. And since I've tried, but can't seem to habituate to settings being off from what I think are reasonable settings, that I need to desensitize more.

 

Yes, if I could drop ERP, I'd do it in a heartbeat. However, my mind knows to much about the therapy & how the process of desensitization works if done correctly, etc.

But yea, I'd like to drop ERP and never do an exposure again, just resist compulsions, including my ruminating. For whatever reason though, I feel like without exposures I'm only doing half of the therapy right (RP). It's like I can't do it without the E part. 

And it gets me down, because if exposures don't resonate with me & they're supposed to desesentize & I'm not able to do that, then something is wrong with me.

I agree, dropping exposures sounds reasonable, but at the same time it doesn't because it's called ERP.

I wanr to stop. Desperately. There are so many what ifs that it's excruciatingly hard.

Edited February 17, 2017 by saddaniels

[ohwhyhello]

I don't think this thread is helping you, it's a circular conversation. Can you find someone qualified you can offer you professional insight? They are better placed to help you find a way out of this.

[saddaniels]

PolarBear, taurean, Snowbear, etc. have all given great advice & theirs sounds like the right thing to do. The OCD isn't having it though. My OCD is so large, I'm not sure I'll be able to apply the advice correctly. Thinking of asking my doctor for some medication to take the edge off. I'm trying to do this without meds because I want to strongly believe ERP would work better than meds, but obviously, it isn't. Stupid OCD is fixated on exposures.

[taurean]

14 minutes ago, saddaniels said:

. Stupid OCD is fixated on exposures. 

Set it on standard settings. My therapist told me to sit out the what ifs and turn them into what is.  She is excellent. So now I look at reality not the lies falsehoods and exaggerations of OCD 

Do I play around with the format settings or zooms on my laptop?  No. Why not?  Because they exist for only especial use, such as poor eyesight - and not for other reasons. 

The "what is" is that the laptop is designed to work on its standard settings other than for someone with sight difficulties or a rare need to zoom in because of a small font say on a website. 

[PolarBear]

We are going round and round. We tell you what to do and you tell us what OCD is telling you. We know what OCD is telling you but it's wrong. It doesn't matter how many times you t Dr ll us what OCD is telling you. It was wrong months ago, it is wrong today and it will be wrong tomorrow.

It's your choice. You can keep listening to OCD, in which case you'll remain stuck, or you can follow our advice. It's very simple. Your OCD is trying to make it complicated but it's not. It's very simple. Stay stuck or do something different and start toward recovery.

 

[saddaniels]

I don't want to stay stuck. I want to get out of this he** pit. I cant shake the whole point of exposures & desensitization. If people can desensitize to touching doorknobs, etc. why can't I desensitize to my settings being off from how I like them? I know you guys say it doesn't matter, yet, if desensitization is an important part in exposure therapy (and crucial to recovery) & I'm not able to do that with my settings, then I'm not doing something correctly. I'm not bashing anyone's advice on here, I'm only trying to get someone to see how I'm confused about habituation. Even if my OCD isn't centered around settings right now, I'd still be pretty anxious to set them off from how I wanted them right now. Therefore, I haven't desensitized.

Edited February 18, 2017 by saddaniels

[PolarBear]

And round and round we continue. You just keep going back to the same, wrong argument, despite lots of advice to the contrary.

Your OCD theme, right now, is not about TV settings so why would you do exposures about TV settings? It makes absolutely no sense. It doesn't matter if setting the TV wrong makes you anxious. That's no reason for you to do exposures by setting your TV wrong. By that logic, everyone with OCD should screw up their TVs just because it would make them anxious. It's ridiculous.

You have to stop listening to OCD. It is ruling you these days and it's because you keep listening to it.

[saddaniels]

It is ridiculous, I agree. Even in the past when I was obsessing over TV settings, I still didn't understand the point of exposing myself to settings being off. Seems like the more rational approach would've been to keep the TV how I liked it & practiced resisting compulsions. The exposure of settings things off & sitting with that anxiety didn't make much sense to me. I was told by my therapist to habituate to settings being off from how I liked them. Ok, but after that exposure is over, I can go back to setting things how I like them?? Exposures confuse me. I'm trying to understand their purpose for future obsessions. I am. I am really really trying to understand the purpose of exposures, to the point where I'm on edge all day ruminating about how to apply them & what their purpose is.

[PolarBear]

So you do agree it's ridiculous to change your TV settings, given your OCD theme is not about TV settings. So why don't you set your TV the way it's supposed to be and leave it alone? Does that not make sense?

[saddaniels]

Yes, I do agree its ridiculous to change my TV settings.

I'm pointing out that if the purpose of ERP is to desensitize to whatever you are exposed to, in my case wrong settings (I did this exposure in the past), then I should have no problem in the future (now) to have things set wrong.

It sounds silly to me, yes. But right now, thinking about setting my TV off makes me anxious, so that desensitizing in the past obviously didn't work & I keep feeling like I need to make that desensitization work.

No, right now, I don't think its right to change my settings, yet why should I even have a problem doing that if the purpose of ERP is get you used to having things set off.

Yes, I'm entirely confused & yes, PolarBear, your advice makes the most sense. Yet things are still really confusing to me.

Edited February 18, 2017 by saddaniels