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Apology-Want To Tear My Brain Out (Merged Thread)


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1 hour ago, don't know said:

I'm so fed up. 

So, what can you do to change this? 

Because you can, right this minute you could decide to implement the advice you’ve been given here. Yes it’s difficult but at some point you’re going to have actually do the hard graft, why wait? 

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I tried. Also the advice I get here is go to the doctor - I've done that, cbt - done that and it didn't help.

Sorry - I wanted to add that makes me sound like an awful person. I don't mean that, I'm just confused, frustrated and I don't know how much I can take. 

Edited by don't know
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16 minutes ago, don't know said:

I tried. Also the advice I get here is go to the doctor - I've done that, cbt - done that and it didn't help.

 

Putting to one side you’ve received far more advice than simply suggesting seeing your doctor, if the CBT hasn’t helped so far you have to try it again from another therapist. Sometimes the first course of treatment doesn’t help everyone for a variety of reasons, but please don’t throw the baby out with the bath water based on that experience.

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Taking CBT once and not having a positive outcome is no reason to say CBT doesn't work. Try a different therapist. And commit to the hard work necessary to recover.

Your first stop is often your doctor. You need help.

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30 minutes ago, don't know said:

I tried. Also the advice I get here is go to the doctor - I've done that, cbt - done that and it didn't help.

Hi, the reason I have been banging on about you seeing a doctor is because you put it across that you were diagnosed by one, but then had the diagnosis dismissed by 2 others.

Also, I got the impression that you have not been quite so open about your thoughts with your doctor, in comparison to the content you post on here.  

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I was in the beginning and then as I got further on I didn't really talk about it because I had some health related obsessions that left me nearly housebound that took priority. I also felt like I was lying to them whereas the first couple of times I knew something was wrong. 

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I ended up just saying I don't like my family or friends, I feel extreme anxiety or nothing  when I think of them and I felt a lot better. Literally I feel lighter. Must of been true. I don't feel any anxiety. 

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6 minutes ago, don't know said:

I ended up just saying I don't like my family or friends, I feel extreme anxiety or nothing  when I think of them and I felt a lot better.

See now, all the more reason to consult a doctor or psychiatrist about this.

You never know, you might have some other co-morbid condition like bipolar, where at times you feel anxiety over thoughts, & then euphoric at other times over the same thing. As a result, I am guessing you'll probably feel either guilt or nothing at all which will alternate.

GO TO THE DOCTORS DK! :)

 

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I don't know I ended up looking up those things about having no feelings and then I got really annoyed because I thought I've never felt like this. But then I was like it must have been real if I can say I don't like my loved ones and then all of a sudden my feelings disappear like that and to get such relief as well doesn't seem genuine.

Edited by don't know
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9 hours ago, don't know said:

Also the advice I get here is go to the doctor - I've done that, cbt - done that and it didn't help.

Unfortunately doctors are imperfect people too, sometimes you have to be a little persistent, sometimes you have to find one who has the right area of knowledge.  If you are still struggling it sounds like a situation where you need to try again if at all possible to get help and guidance from your doctor.

As for CBT, again, unfortunately, its not like an antibiotic where you take it a set number of times and then things are just better.  The goals of CBT are to help you learn and apply a new way of thinking, a new approach.  In order to benefit from CBT you need to buy in to that change and make an effort to apply it to your life long term, well beyond when you might stop seeing the therapist.  You can show up for all the appointments, even fill out some worksheets, but unless you are actively applying the knowledge on a regular basis it won't make an impact, it won't change your thinking or help you recover.  CBT is applied knowledge, its something you have to keep doing and using and becoming better at in order to really see change.  Think of it like learning a foreign language.  You can show up for classes, you can fill out some homework worksheets, but if you never use the language outside class, if you don't continue practicing after you stop taking lessons you aren't going to become or remain fluent.  It takes a commitment to really see the change, to really reach your goal.  The same is true of CBT and OCD.   Therapy is to help you get started, its to help you make sure you know what you are doing, but the real change comes from applying the techniques whenever you experience an intrusive thought.  Over and over you have to apply them, and what starts out as very rough and forced, soon becomes automatic and natural.  Like learning to ride a bike, like learning to speak another language, like learning to play an instrument, the more you invest the better you'll get

I know you want these thoughts to stop now.  You want to be better again.  You want it to all go away.  Those are completely understandable and natural reactions to what you are going through.  Unfortunately OCD recovery just doesn't work that way.  Just like someone who breaks an arm might wish they were healed right away, it unfortunately takes time to get better.  But the good news is you CAN and DO get better if you follow the treatment.  

So yes, you have tried some of these steps before, and they didn't quite work as you had hoped, but evidence shows that they do work, sometimes it just takes a few tries to get there.  I wish we could offer you something faster, something easier, trust me, we would if we could.  But CBT is the best there is to offer, we wouldn't be suggesting it otherwise.  Your best option is to try it again, and this time to really think about and apply what you are learning.  We'll be here, happy to help, happy to explain or support you on that journey.  But if you are looking for other answers, I'm afraid there are none to give.  Best of luck.

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31 minutes ago, don't know said:

It's all real, I just can't admit it to myself. 

It's pretty good at making it seem real isn't it? And exactly that is what keeps people stuck, unless they accept what helped me. 

Which was when my therapist said that with harm sexual preference relationships paedophilia and similar themes, the OCD takes one of our true core character values and alleges the opposite has been might be or could be true. 

And, because it sends false messages to the brain, making us respond to the wrong images or feelings, we believe it. 

And so we stay stuck agonising and distressed. 

I believed her. And from that point I knew the intrusions were false. 

Believe what others are telling you. 

CBT will only work when we are ready, despite the convincing (but false) feelings urges arousal etc., to change our thinking and behaviours so that the falsehoods lose their power and frequency. 

It works - I know because I have gone through this process. 

To sum up, until we accept we what we learn in the cognitive side of CBT, we can't make the B behavioural part of the therapy work and, as you have found don't know, the D disorder side runs riot. 

Edited by taurean
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Hi, 

i understand what you are saying but why would I react in this way? That's what I'm wondering if it wasn't at least partly true? I haven't had any thoughts since just letting it go. I don't even know how I feel about it to be honest. 

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You react in this way because it so very much seems to be true, and your brain steers you so that triggers stand out then seem believable. 

I have been exactly through the same with harm OCD so I KNOW that what the therapy is saying is true. 

Just accept this, and stop trying to work it out. 

Go back to the CBT work accepting this despite the ongoing arousal issues feelings. They won't start to go away - in fact they will only get stronger - until you stop believing them and over a period of time this becomes your new default thinking and behaviours. 

My therapist taught me to be dismissive of them, thinking "oh that's just my silly OCD" and hold that position even while it attacks. 

If I can do this - and I am no great mentalist - you can do this, don't know. 

Edited by taurean
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It really will help to immerse yourself in something.

Let the thoughts and feelings come and go and when you find yourself wanting to figure out what they might mean gently refocus on your work again.

Good luck:)

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23 hours ago, don't know said:

I ended up just saying I don't like my family or friends, I feel extreme anxiety or nothing  when I think of them and I felt a lot better. Literally I feel lighter. Must of been true. I don't feel any anxiety. 

What you did was confront your obsessions by agreeing with them. You unknowingly did a great exposure. By saying that, you left OCD nowhere yo go. Well done.

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17 hours ago, don't know said:

i understand what you are saying but why would I react in this way?

It can be difficult to understand, especially when you are in the midst of dealing with it.  

Short version?  You react this way because there is a short circuit somewhere in your brain causing a few thoughts to get stuck.  Because those thoughts are stuck you think about them more then you otherwise would, which makes them get even more stuck.  Its all a false alarm, but you have come to believe its a real problem, so its hard to let go of that belief.

Longer version:  Our brains are complex and complicated.  They take in tons of information all day every day from our eyes, ears, nose, mouth, skin, etc.  All of it has to be processed and dealt with, to see if its something our conscious mind needs to care about or not.  Right now you are hearing all kinds of noises, but you don't focus on each of them.  Why?  Because your brain filters out the unimportant/unintersting stuff.  You are seeing a ton of things, but again, your brain filters it so you only notice what is important.  Imagine being in a crowded room, lets say at a party.  Lots of voices, lots of people talking.  Suddenly you hear someone saying your name.  Why did you notice that?  There are literally thousands of words being spoken all around you.  Yet through all that noise, you noticed your name.  You notice because your brain has been trained that your name is important.   Every time you respond to your name being said, you remind your brain "My name is important, when you hear it, pay attention!".  You could do the opposite, you could start ignoring your name.  Whenever you hear it you could decide not to respond.  Over time if you do this you'll stop noticing your name.

What does that have to do with your problem? With OCD?  Simply this, while our brain is normally pretty good at figuring out what is important and worth paying attention to and what can be ignored because it doesn't matter, it isn't perfect, and its even less perfect in people with OCD.  Unfortunately for people with OCD, from time to time a thought will get incorrectly marked as IMPORTANT.  In turn we react to it as if it mattered, further strengthening its importance.  As this keeps happening we are building stronger and stronger connections with the thought.  As a result we think about that thought more often, we notice things related to that thought more easily, etc.  The thought wasn't important in the first place, but we fell in to a trap of believing it was.  

So to sum up, the reason you react the way you do is because you had a false alarm, and unfortunately, reacted to it in a way that made the connection strengthen, which makes it happen more often, which makes you react to it, which strengthens it, etc. etc. etc.

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Wanted to update you. I tried to get on with my work yesterday and then I felt calmer I felt as though I was normal again but then it came back again.

But here's the thing what if I don't really care about them, and I'm just disguising it as an 'exposure.'

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It will come back until your default behaviour is to ignore it. 

6 minutes ago, don't know said:

what if I don't really care about them, and I'm just disguising it as an 'exposure.'

This is the OCD at work, trying to hook you back in. 

Ignore it, refocus away again - and keep on doing that. It may be hard at first, but it will get better. 

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The more we listen to and connect/believe with intrusions, the more we give them power and they will keep on coming back again. 

This does NOT mean that our fears are true. It's the way OCD tries to trap us into believing what it is saying  within our brain. 

Our brains are however "plastic" meaning we can reprogramme them through CBT so that we ignore, and then become able to easily dismiss, the intrusions. 

This takes time commitment and hard effort.

But it works. 

Edited by taurean
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On 17/04/2019 at 19:18, don't know said:

I'm so fed up. 

I had a couple of hours where I tried to get on some stuff. I felt fine and actually got my feelings back, however it was ruined when I thought about my friends trying to talk to me and I got so much anxiety and felt ill. I don't understand at this point why am I scared I've lost feelings towards people when it seems like I hate them and want nothing to do with them.

What do you learn from this DK? 

When you focus your attention on other things, your emotions come back. When you start to analyse your emotions and how you feel about your friends, the emotions go away again.

This is what we have been trying to tell you all along. This disorder is counterintuitive in many ways - the more you try to figure it out, the worse it'll be. The more you live your life and ignore the worries, the more normal you will feel. 

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