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intrusive thoughts/contemplation - real event ocd


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Hello, I wonder if you have any insight you can help me with. I understand intrusive thoughts can pop into anyone's head and are nonsense. I am struggling to overcome a time from my past where I thought about whether I could do something (that was relevent to where I was at the time, so not abstract). And when I say 'thought about' I mean briefly contemplated, entertained the idea, thought about whether it was appropriate or not, weighed it up. I decided that it was not what I wanted and was v. immoral (by my own standards and by societies standards )so there was no action. But when I hear words like 'it's just a thought, you didn't do anything' I can relate it to non-sensical, intrusive, scary thoughts but I can't relate it to something that was an actual contemplation on my part and so I'm feeling incredibly guilty about the thinking about it. And my conclusion is that this makes me a sick person to have ever contemplated. Perhaps I am overthinking this as my memory is hazy and skewing it and adding extra meaning as time and the obsession has gone on but it's difficult to sort my thinking out on this one and it's been dragging on for so long, I'm tired and sad. 

Edited by meadowflower
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Hey meadowflower. :) A lot of people with OCD do what you're doing, which is something called thought-action fusion. It's where logically you know something is just a thought, but emotionally you register it as powerfully as if you had actually done the thought in question, leading to very distorted levels of guilt and perceived responsibility. If you read other threads you'll start seeing examples of thought-action fusion all the time, particularly in those whose OCD skews towards feelings of guilt.

I'd advise you to start questioning and challenging the OCD's messaging here, which I suspect is something like "oh God, you actually contemplated something really bad, that means you were on the verge of doing it! If you were on the verge of doing it you're as bad as if you actually did do it!" Does that make sense to you, or is there a different way you can look at the situation? What about: "In order to understand myself, I need to think about different choices and then figure out how I feel about them. All human beings do this in order to grow and evolve. How can I know what I believe if I restrict myself from thinking about certain things? It's totally normal to contemplate even things I would classify as wrong or taboo, and these feelings are all about OCD."

At this point, your OCD might be coming back with, "Okay, but it wasn't just thinking about this bad thing, it was actively contemplating it! That's different and worse!" Nope, that's 100% OCD nonsense. You thought about something, realized you didn't agree with it, decided not to do it, end of story. Everything else is your OCD trying so hard to make your anxiety make sense that it's distorting your thinking. I've contemplated plenty of things that I'd consider wrong or bad, even how I'd go about those things, and I've never been remotely close to actually doing any of the things in question. You'd see the same for yourself if you weren't being affected by the OCD.

So now, let it go. Stop doing compulsions like going over the memory endlessly, ruminating about what could have been--realize that right now your emotions can't be trusted to be accurate or make sense. Do something sweet and kind for yourself, just like you'd do for someone you care about who's had a rough few days. You deserve it. ❤️ 

 

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I wonder if some people see 'intrusive' thoughts as not from their own minds. I'm not sure if that's true, or if it's a coping mechanism.

Humans now absorb massive amounts of; stories from around the world, data, ideas, scenarios both fictional and real, images, etc; and our minds play with those ideas that are essentially the culture we exist in. We are only usually aware of this after dreaming.

Internally we must draw a line; moral or immoral, legal or illegal, truth or fiction, real or imaginary, acceptable or not acceptable 'intrusive'.

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Thanks Saffron37, you're right, I'm having lots of 'yeah but...' thoughts. Yeah but...I think my situation is differernt because the thing I was contemplating was being suggested to me by others in that situation, them suggesting that I do it. And so it was just closer to actually happening compared to let's say me having an intrusive  random thought about pushing someone in front of a train on a crowded platform, for example. Both things didn't happen but one felt close and it has left me feeling this chronic guilt. And yet here I am on an OCD forum.

Urgh, It's really hard to take that leap of faith. It's really hard to be kind to myself and give myself the benefit of the doubt. It feels like I can never have self acceptance. But I will try to take your advice and do something nice for myself. A nice day at the beach I think. Thanks again, I appreciate it greatly!

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2 hours ago, meadowflower said:

Thanks Saffron37, you're right, I'm having lots of 'yeah but...' thoughts. Yeah but...I think my situation is differernt because the thing I was contemplating was being suggested to me by others in that situation, them suggesting that I do it. And so it was just closer to actually happening compared to let's say me having an intrusive  random thought about pushing someone in front of a train on a crowded platform, for example. Both things didn't happen but one felt close and it has left me feeling this chronic guilt. And yet here I am on an OCD forum.

Urgh, It's really hard to take that leap of faith. It's really hard to be kind to myself and give myself the benefit of the doubt. It feels like I can never have self acceptance. But I will try to take your advice and do something nice for myself. A nice day at the beach I think. Thanks again, I appreciate it greatly!

The irony is, if the thing you were contemplating was suggested to you by others, I think your choice to not do it is even more meaningful (in a good way!) . In fact, it sounds like a situation I'd be proud of--that despite others giving me permission to do something via suggesting it to me, I thought about it, decided I didn't agree with it, and didn't do it. Perhaps you could try seeing it from that perspective? Your OCD is hyper focusing on the fact that you had the thought at all, causing you to entirely miss the point of the situation--which is that indeed you are a moral person. 

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10 hours ago, Saffron37 said:

The irony is, if the thing you were contemplating was suggested to you by others, I think your choice to not do it is even more meaningful (in a good way!) . In fact, it sounds like a situation I'd be proud of--that despite others giving me permission to do something via suggesting it to me, I thought about it, decided I didn't agree with it, and didn't do it. Perhaps you could try seeing it from that perspective? Your OCD is hyper focusing on the fact that you had the thought at all, causing you to entirely miss the point of the situation--which is that indeed you are a moral person. 

Do you know in all my years of torture over this topic I never thought of that. I have had enough of this hold it's got over me, It's time for me to try to take a leap of faith and give myself some compassion. Thank you very much Saffron 

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1 hour ago, meadowflower said:

Do you know in all my years of torture over this topic I never thought of that. I have had enough of this hold it's got over me, It's time for me to try to take a leap of faith and give myself some compassion. Thank you very much Saffron 

It's incredible how OCD can twist even an achievement into "evidence" of the opposite, isn't it? Proud of you for seizing the opportunity to show yourself compassion. And you are extremely welcome!

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