Bad experience with other organisations ocd support ☹️

[felix4]

On 09/12/2022 at 09:21, Lynz said:

OK? This was my experience though so it's not really fair to just dismiss it as "rubbish". To be fair it was a few years ago (maybe 6-7 years ago) when this happened so it might have changed now.

I agree! However, having taken a look again the other day, following comments in this thread, it does appear fresher & better moderated to several years back. There were a few estranged former OCD-UK users on there back then, & one in particular stated how he/she used to visit every now &  post on here for "fun"! I clocked who it was from a comment & way of spelling, because they were using a different guise, & have quite a unique logic on OCD. 

I amazed about the support group thing, & treating themes as individual?!?

I know I have had run-ins on here in the past, & guilty myself of being a bit silly at times, but I know which of the 2 charities & forums that I would sooner be on! 

I hope you are all well, & upwards & onwards!  

 

[Lynz]

29 minutes ago, felix4 said:

I agree! However, having taken a look again the other day, following comments in this thread, it does appear fresher & better moderated to several years back. There were a few estranged former OCD-UK users on there back then, & one in particular stated how he/she used to visit every now &  post on here for "fun"! I clocked who it was from a comment & way of spelling, because they were using a different guise, & have quite a unique logic on OCD. 

I amazed about the support group thing, & treating themes as individual?!?

I know I have had run-ins on here in the past, & guilty myself of being a bit silly at times, but I know which of the 2 charities & forums that I would sooner be on! 

I hope you are all well, & upwards & onwards!  

 

Thanks Felix. I hope you're doing well also.

I'm glad to hear it seems better moderated and fresher. I'm sure the charity does a lot of good work but like many organisations they're not perfect despite the best of intentions. I never intended to "badmouth" anybody but rather I was commenting on my individual experience of the forums from a few years back.

I echo the sentiments that we are lucky to have OCD-UK, and whenever I find myself slipping back into unhelpful thought patterns I often remember advice given on here by members such as snowbear, taurean, polarbear and others, who are very knowledgeable about OCD. This advice has often helped me to not jump back into a full-blown relapse.

In fact I credit this forum mostly with helping me stay "recovered", as I don't see myself as an active sufferer of OCD anymore, for which I'm incredibly thankful

[felix4]

26 minutes ago, Lynz said:

Thanks Felix. I hope you're doing well also.

I'm glad to hear it seems better moderated and fresher. I'm sure the charity does a lot of good work but like many organisations they're not perfect despite the best of intentions. I never intended to "badmouth" anybody but rather I was commenting on my individual experience of the forums from a few years back.

Thank you Lynz,

Actually, I think it best to amend what I said about forum moderation on the other charities forum, & I have just noticed that all/most the "moderator" replies seem to be automated responses advising the poster to call their helpline, & not a personalised OCD knowledgeable reply at all?

I am glad you are recovered! I was about 95% there, but then got discharged by psychiatry in August & asked to stop 1 med & double another, a few weeks later I had a complete meltdown! It has been quite a scary time with, like so many others, trouble getting in contact with GP's & so on. Thankfully, I got a call yesterday from psychiatric assessment triage, & they have come up with potential reversal back to med dosage before changes, & a treatment plan!

Thanks again, & like I said, onwards & upwards!      

[bluegas]

TBH I hate all this my dads better than your dad nonsense!! If it’s a charity then it’s non profit organisation and is genuinely trying to help people! I think people need to try cherry pick the bits they find helpful from all the different free resources that are out there ! This particular charity is my favourite and I find the most helpful but having said that it’s very cbt based and I’m not a big big fan of cbt but I like I say it’s still nice being part of a community 

[taurean]

It's important to emphasise that no-one is going to move forward unless they accept that they are sufferers from OCD, they don't need to believe the fear it is suggesting, and they have to cut out the compulsions.

Aka CBT.

But additional tools help, snd we do discuss these on here, me especially so.

And the less we drive to Tey  and fix things, and the less time we allow the OCD, the better. Spending too much time on OCD IS too much drive!!! And it will only make our OCD problems stronger.

Therefore, apart from any therapy we are entering into, any self-help book we are working through, I myself would not recommend using more than one online platform for those reasons.

My message is to get to understand how the OCD works, accept OCD is what you are experiencing, accept it lies or is exaggerating, don't believe it, stop carrying out compulsions - and we will progress.

Things that, for me, can additionally help are:

Beneficial distractions work and hobbies.

REDS - relaxation exercise diet and sleep.

Forgetting the past, leave it be, and grounding ourselves in the present.

Mindfulness and meditation.

Watching for negative automatic thoughts and looking for positive alternatives. 

Think happy and we will be happy.

Do things to help other people - this switches focus away from ourselves.

Now, we don't really need any other poert of call for help, do we? Because  If we do all of these things they   should make a big difference.

 

[Summer9173]

5 hours ago, felix4 said:

moderator" replies seem to be automated responses advising the poster to call their helpline, & not a personalised OCD knowledgeable reply at all?

Yes this is true, I had a little look at posts where there was 1 reply and it would be the automatic replies which is a shame  

[Summer9173]

I really hope I haven’t offended anybody again, I was simply speaking from my experience with that specific charity. Having that happen as silly as it sounds was actually traumatising and I felt very pushed into a corner from that, also made triggered OCD very bad as it leads to people pleasing. However, I also know I’m not the only person whose had similar experience with that charity too after making this post xx

Edited December 10, 2022 by Summer9173

[taurean]

I think you should stay here with us, summer, and your therapist  and apart from that do lots of non-OCD things to ease down on the drive which I personally know only makes our OCD stronger.

I think you are doing great summer. Don't try and rush things. You will get there by following the principles of CBT, some of the additional tools I mentioned,  and getting refocused .

You havent offended anyone. On the contrary, you gave given learned folk like me the chance to explain things, to everyone's advantage  

[Summer9173]

35 minutes ago, taurean said:

I think you should stay here with us, summer, and your therapist  and apart from that do lots of non-OCD things to ease down on the drive which I personally know only makes our OCD stronger.

I think you are doing great summer. Don't try and rush things. You will get there by following the principles of CBT, some of the additional tools I mentioned,  and getting refocused .

You havent offended anyone. On the contrary, you gave given learned folk like me the chance to explain things, to everyone's advantage  

Thank you @taurean  I agree, I love the work OCD-UK does I think it’s an absolutely amazing charity, planning on doing my own little fundraising in work to raise money for the charity too as I want to give back the support they’ve provided  Whereas the other organisation that shall not be named, well for me anyway , just made me feel worse so I guess it’s finding what helps for your own recovery journey in  terms of support and what doesn’t 

[taurean]

That's good.

I think we have got some good messages over on this thread.

OCD-UK is a great support organisation. It's focus on CBT is because it's the bedrock evidence-based treatment for OCD. When we go through a course of CBT we will learn how to accept our intrusive thoughts  label them as OCD and learn how not to respond to them. 

And how compulsions only worsen the disorder and maintain the cycle of distress.

That it's easy, but counterproductive, to spend too much time on OCD. Over-researching will be a compulsion, as spending too much time in the drive to desperately find answers ( and I have been guilty of this myself).

Far better, once we know the cognitive stuff, to work on putting it into practice, reducing time the OCD has to cause trouble by getting busy on other things.

And, yes, there are other tools which  in addition to CBT  can help us, such as being kind to ourselves,  compassion-focused therapy ( boosting up our "soothe" with relaxing and enjoyable activities), and how to calm our mind and body using meditation and mindfulness.

So hopefully readers will resist that temptation to go searching, spending too much time, when the solutions are not far away, using OCD-UK. 

Edited December 12, 2022 by taurean

[northpaul]

1 hour ago, taurean said:

And how compulsions only worsen the disorder and maintain the cycle of distress.

If I were to design a flyer about therapy then that would be one of the key points.  In my therapy all the other bits were less important (but still important) than that single key point.

Do we have any good flyer designers?

[taurean]

15 minutes ago, northpaul said:

If I were to design a flyer about therapy then that would be one of the key points.  In my therapy all the other bits were less important (but still important) than that single key point.

Do we have any good flyer designers?

You know, there are books written, lectures given - and good stuff, of course - and very necessary.

But,yes,  the absolute essentials of dealing with OCD really can be summarised on a flyer - the devil is in the detail, which is needed to explain how all the variants of  OCD work, and why, and why we have to believe it is OCD and not real.