Storytime: Danny Ignores his troubling thoughts

[ineedahug]

Danny has OCD, but he is working on not responding to the thoughts in his brain.  One day he is driving to work, and hears a loud thud.  His brain says "What if I just hit someone!" He thinks back for a second, and he does remember possibly seeing something moving in the corner of his eyes.  He starts to panic, but then thinks, "Wait a second-- this is just my OCD! It's going to throw out any reason it can for me to double check, but I'm not going to listen!"

So he continues on with his day.  He starts thinking about the work he has to do as he arrives at work, parks his car, and starts tackling his to-do list.  Then he thinks, "Did I lock my car? I was distracted and I think I may have forgotten to lock it!"  Again, he decides that checking would be a compulsive behavior.  There have been hundreds of times he had that same thought, and it turned out to be nothing.  The doubt lingers for a while, but eventually goes away.  He feels good knowing he was able to resist a compulsion.  

After his busy day, he gets back to his car, and realizes in horror that it had been broken into.  hundreds of dollars worth of equipment was now gone.  As upsetting as this was, it wasn't quite as bad as getting pulled over and arrested for a hit and run earlier that day.  

The end.

 

Did you like my story? It may be a bit far-fetched, but it's not impossible for something like that to happen eventually.  It probably wouldn't happen twice in a row like that, by maybe 0.1% - 5.0% of the time.  Someone could be wrong in thinking their warning thoughts are "just OCD".  It isn't impossible.  

Thoughts? 

[Guest OCDhavenobrain]

I don't understand your purpose with writing this story.

It is not impossible that your compulsions will save your life one day. True

Edited July 29, 2018 by OCDhavenobrain

[bobfish]

Well, that's the sort of absolute worst-case scenario that OCD sufferers fear. I suppose you're essentially asking at what point should something no longer be considered a compulsion and should it become wrong (and potentially dangerous) to resist performing the action.

Resisting compulsions doesn't mean you should forego sensible safety precautions. If I heard a loud thud while driving, to be honest, I would probably pull over and check. Personally I don't think that in itself is an OCD compulsion, and in fact I'd say it's a reasonable thing to do. But I reckon that someone whose OCD responds to this scenario wouldn't be satisfied with that. They might still fear they've hit something/someone, or something is wrong with their car and it's going to explode, and they might perform more checking, e.g. retracing their route several times, checking their car thoroughly - these would be compulsions and should definitely be discouraged. 

With the second example, I think you're missing the point a bit. The reason that the checking compulsion needs to be resisted is that otherwise, every single day, the OCD sufferer will constantly worry about their car door, no matter how many times they check and double-check, and will consequently have a terrible quality of life, day in, day out. They'll be overly worried about the car door and their compulsions will go beyond normal, healthy checking. Yes, there is a small possibility that, if they resist their compulsions, one day they might actually forget to lock the door and their car might be broken into, but it's really not worth living in such an awful state just because something bad might happen. Let's face it, bad things happen to each and every one of us at some point, but if you're obsessing over things that could go wrong every moment of your life, is that really the sort of life you want to lead?

[ineedahug]

25 minutes ago, bobfish said:

Well, that's the sort of absolute worst-case scenario that OCD sufferers fear. I suppose you're essentially asking at what point should something no longer be considered a compulsion and should it become wrong (and potentially dangerous) to resist performing the action.

Resisting compulsions doesn't mean you should forego sensible safety precautions. If I heard a loud thud while driving, to be honest, I would probably pull over and check. Personally I don't think that in itself is an OCD compulsion, and in fact I'd say it's a reasonable thing to do. But I reckon that someone whose OCD responds to this scenario wouldn't be satisfied with that. They might still fear they've hit something/someone, or something is wrong with their car and it's going to explode, and they might perform more checking, e.g. retracing their route several times, checking their car thoroughly - these would be compulsions and should definitely be discouraged. 

With the second example, I think you're missing the point a bit. The reason that the checking compulsion needs to be resisted is that otherwise, every single day, the OCD sufferer will constantly worry about their car door, no matter how many times they check and double-check, and will consequently have a terrible quality of life, day in, day out. They'll be overly worried about the car door and their compulsions will go beyond normal, healthy checking. Yes, there is a small possibility that, if they resist their compulsions, one day they might actually forget to lock the door and their car might be broken into, but it's really not worth living in such an awful state just because something bad might happen. Let's face it, bad things happen to each and every one of us at some point, but if you're obsessing over things that could go wrong every moment of your life, is that really the sort of life you want to lead?

Yes that was the point I was making.  Thank you for the thoughtful response.

I think I am afraid that resisting compulsions-- the "right" thing to do-- will eventually let me down.  I want to do the right things that will help my mental well-being, but I don't want to be wrong about something important. 

[bobfish]

23 hours ago, ineedahug said:

Yes that was the point I was making.  Thank you for the thoughtful response.

I think I am afraid that resisting compulsions-- the "right" thing to do-- will eventually let me down.  I want to do the right things that will help my mental well-being, but I don't want to be wrong about something important. 

If I remember correctly, you're self-administering ERP at the moment, aren't you?

It's totally normal to be worried about resisting compulsions, otherwise you wouldn't have OCD! If you don't have access to a therapist, I suppose the next best thing would be to draw up your ERP hierarchy and maybe post it on this forum, if you wanted some feedback and support?