Jump to content

My life makes no sense anymore


Recommended Posts

No.......you do want to get better :)  You just don't understand yourself/OCD.

As Malina mentioned earlier, you are making the mistake of waiting to feel right and this doesn't work, feel sure first and this doesn't work.  It's a common mistake that most of us make.  We read articles, watch videos, get reassurance from the forum, see a therapist etc....we understand what's been said/explained and expect we will feel better.......but we don't.  When we don't our brains start thinking "Well if I know all this and still feel this way, it must be me.....I must be a monster.  I must want to be like this.  I mustn't want to get better.  I must be that one person who is bad, that mustn't really have OCD"  This is still a common experience with OCD and anxiety.  It's all part of the confused, internal conversation we have with ourselves.

It is NOT ENOUGH to understand the principles of OCD, we have to make the changes and this is what you're not doing.  You're falling down the rabbit hole every time.  Going to therapy, listening, doing a few exercises, soaking up reassurance for an hour won't work other than for a short time.  Your life is filled with compulsions Cora, which is why you struggle so much.  I know you can't just stop them all at once but you can start to change them but you have to have a plan as to how you're going to do that.  And when you leave your therapy appointment that's where the work begins, not where it stops.  You have to work at it every day.  Your therapist should help you to devise that plan....to identify the things you're doing that are maintaining your OCD and suggestions of how you change that.  So far I've not seen evidence of that plan.

Even when you have a plan you'll fail many times at first, it's a struggle, it's hard work......but that's okay, everyone does.....but like every skill, you work on it, build on it and get better at doing it.

Work with your therapist Cora, use the advice you're paying for and benefit from it.  Come on Girl, you CAN actually do this :) 

Link to comment
  • 2 weeks later...
On 28/02/2023 at 13:13, Cora said:

But sometimes they are a big deal. I really don't want them to be but they are. For example, I'm the primary influence on my brother (because of how much time we spend together) and I can't hide from the fact that I might have altered his life is a very negative way. I'm not good as a career and I've made a lot of mistakes, and that's definitely left a mark on him. I can be toxic sometimes (say thins that I later regret, use the silent treatment) and even though I want to be and do better, I fail 9 out of 10 times. This is a really big deal for me. What if when he grows up, makes a bad decision and ruins his life (and other's too) and all of that is because of what I said and did while he was growing up?

I'm sorry I didn't see this response before @Cora but I wanted to reply because I think it's really important. The way in which you view life, yourself and others is truly heartbreaking to see sometimes.

There are several things to unpack hre.

You see yourself as a bad carer with toxic traits. Want to know what I see? A young woman who has had to make sacrifices throughout her young life and started to help care for a child as a teenager. A woman who had to grow up faster and sacrificed more than most to help her family. A young woman who suffers from debilitating mental health problems, hates herself, regularly thinks about ending her own life...yet keeps quiet about it because she has minimal support, goes to work, still continues to take care of her brother, cares about his wellbeing and development and his future.

How can you not see what is happening here? You've been going through a living hell for the past 3+ years, children (especially little boys) can be very demanding. Someone struggling as much as you are would inevitably find this difficult. What would you say to all the mothers and fathers with OCD and other mental illnesses, who are struggling to care for their children? Who snap sometimes or simply can't cope? Would you call them toxic and tell them that they are ruining their child's lives? I really doubt that you'd do that, so why say it to yourself?

Second, you have a highly over inflated sense of responsibility, which is a very common thing in OCD. Your brother may be a child but he's a human being who has agency. Also, children aren't stupid, I used to work with children and I think they are much smarter than people give them credit for. When he becomes an adult, his decisions will be his own. Have you ever even heard of somebody whose life has been ruined because their older sister snapped at them, or gave them the silent treatment? Life simply doesn't work like that. You are the one whose life is being ruined here, not him.

So you can keep trying to come back here and convince me and everyone else that your "toxic" behaviour is so important. I do think you are very stubborn in this. You can continue to treat it as important and you can continue to suffer. I really have no clue how to make you see things differently. Clearly, several therapists have also failed in this. What are you going to do? Continue like this or change something?

Link to comment

Hi @malina,

Thank you so, so much for taking the time to write this reply and I'm sorry I took forever to answer. 

14 hours ago, malina said:

What are you going to do? Continue like this or change something?

I'm sorry to sound disappointing but I don't know anymore. I truly feel like a horrible monster and it seems like anything I do is ill indented. (Just an example: for the past few days I keep feeling happy and satisfied when I see/hear someone, mostly my work colleagues, fail, whether it's something small or big. I like to hear their drama because I like the fact that they are struggling, and I can't even hide it to be honest. Like, what's the deal with that?)

Not to be too dramatic but my life is worth nothing at the moment, absolutely nothing, and I'm not sure how I can change that. I want to be able to erase everything and start from zero. 

14 hours ago, malina said:

When he becomes an adult, his decisions will be his own. Have you ever even heard of somebody whose life has been ruined because their older sister snapped at them, or gave them the silent treatment? Life simply doesn't work like that. You are the one whose life is being ruined here, not him.

I understand that his decisions will be his own but they could still be subconsciously impacted by my words and actions. Because it wasn't just silent treatment. It was the fact that I told him I wish he stayed at school longer (implying I didn't want him home), that I can't wait to leave this (our) house because he's too much to handle, that I'm not going to miss him (and actually mean it) if/when I finally move out, that I showed him that physical abuse/violence can be one of the options to treat a problem, screaming in his face and acting completely out of control, and so much more. I'm not as innocent as I maybe portrayed myself to be; I could actually be one of the reasons of his failures and mental health problems (he already struggles with self image and skin picking). 

I don't want the responsibility but I'll always have it. 

 

Link to comment
1 hour ago, Cora said:

I keep feeling happy and satisfied when I see/hear someone, mostly my work colleagues, fail, whether it's something small or big. I like to hear their drama because I like the fact that they are struggling, and I can't even hide it to be honest. Like, what's the deal with that?)

The deal with that is you're completely normal. Everybody thinks and feels that way sometimes, delighting in other people's struggles because they feel their own life is a constant struggle, they're tired of suffering in silence and fed up with feeling they are the only person in the world who has it tough. :( :mad: :taz:

The part that isn't normal is that you then latch onto having had the thought. You ruminate on it, as if just thinking it was something monstrous. And you label yourself a bad person.

The normal reaction (a person without your OCD theme) is able to recognise it's just a thought, doesn't mean anything, and they shrug it off and get on with their day. :) :whistling:

 

You haven't been this way your entire life (or not to this degree.) So you need to get back to how you used to be. That means working at it until you can...

- recognise that you're having a thought or feeling you don't like

- understand that having the thought or feeling means nothing and doesn't reflect you as a person or your true moral values

- shrug it off as unimportant  (instead of grabbing onto it, analysing it to death and beating yourself up over it.)

 

1 hour ago, Cora said:

Not to be too dramatic but my life is worth nothing at the moment, absolutely nothing, and I'm not sure how I can change that. I want to be able to erase everything and start from zero. 

Not to be too dramatic, but you can't erase everything and start from zero. Boo hoo. :dry:

My goodness we all want to!  But nobody can. :no:  Fact of life. Get your head around it, because that fact is never going to change. Not for you, not for anyone. :dry:

 

Maybe you don't realise that It's not just you that has to learn to get on with life starting from the centre of the messy muddle you're in. Dealing with the discomfort and unease of having to start over without erasing past mistakes is horrid. But that is life - for every single person on the planet. Not just people with OCD, and certainly not just for you.

The sooner you buck up your ideas and start practising how tio live your life while still feeling out of sorts the sooner you'll learn how to do it. Same as all those people out there who make it look effortless once upon a time had to learn the exact same lesson in the exact same way - by starting over while still sinking up to their necks in a muddy mess of past mistakes and uncertanties.

It's a hard lesson to learn. Even harder for people with OCD because we so, so, so very much want order and resolution :crybaby: and to somehow be able to start over with a clean slate. :(  And we can't. We're just normal people at the end of the day, with the same life lessons to learn as everybody else.

 

 

1 hour ago, Cora said:

I understand that his decisions will be his own but they could still be subconsciously impacted by my words and actions. Because it wasn't just silent treatment. It was the fact that I told him I wish he stayed at school longer (implying I didn't want him home), that I can't wait to leave this (our) house because he's too much to handle, that I'm not going to miss him (and actually mean it) if/when I finally move out, that I showed him that physical abuse/violence can be one of the options to treat a problem, screaming in his face and acting completely out of control, and so much more. I'm not as innocent as I maybe portrayed myself to be; I could actually be one of the reasons of his failures and mental health problems (he already struggles with self image and skin picking). 

I don't want the responsibility but I'll always have it. 

What you're describing is exactly what every single parent has thought and felt since humans first started having children. The guilt, the worry about doing harm, not getting it right, scarring the child in your care for life.

Again - boo hoo. Tough. It's normal. Get over yourself. :dry:

It's just one more messy thing in your past that you can't erase.

But here's the good news - you don't need to erase it:) You don't need to feel guilty - your brother will grow up, adapt, and somehow muddle through his own battles in spite of everything you, the world, life and every other influence he ever encounters does to him.

At risk of being boring and repetitive - every person on the planet has to adapt and muddle through the good and bad experiences they have in life. Your brother is no different. Your failures (and successes) are no different.

But instead of standing back and seeing this bigger picture - that it's all just part of normal life - you latch onto the idea that it's some huge failure of responsibility on your part. :omg_smilie: You obsess over the idea it says something about the kind of person you are. :crybaby:

I know these fears you have come from a lack of self-confidence.

But yet again, nobody is born with confidence. :no:  We learn it as we go.  Every person on the planet has to try and fail, and make a mess, and get in a muddle, and feel guilty for a while. :(  Before learning not to beat themselves up , not to treat these kind of thoughts and feelings as important.  :huh: Before learning that if they just pick themselves up, dust themselves off and muddle along in spite of how they feel, that that's how to develop confidence. :57439eb60db27_thumbup:

You're no different to me, or to anybody else in the world in that way.  It's just that you're at the start of your self-growth journey. The people around you who seem to be coping better than you are simply a bit further along that exact same path. Not different, not better at it. Just a bit further along the same road. :kicking:

So you have to stop thinking of yourself as a problem that needs to be fixed. Try looking at all of this from a different point of view.

Break the habit of over-analysing every thought and feeling and beating yourself up over it. (And it is partly a habit you've fallen into now.) Like any bad habit, you have to work at breaking free of it. How?

Same three steps as above.

1. Recognise when you're obsessing  about your thoughts and feelings

2. Accept that most of our thoughts don't actually reflect our true nature! :ohmy: That it is normal to have those kind of thoughts and feelings and it isn't important when you have them. You don't need to react with fear, guilt, confusion or compulsive ruminations about why you had it.

3. Choose to react differently.

And then practise, practise, practise reacting differently - not obsessing, not analysing, not ruminating, not making yourself feel guilty.

Practise noticing the thoughts and feelings in passing.

Practise treating them as something completely normal  - knowing that everybody else gets them too and you're not unique, not special, and certainly not a monster for being normal and just like everybody else.

Practise shrugging them off and getting on with your day.  IIn time this will build your confidence and you too will move further along that self-growth path. :kicking: In time you will become one of those people that others look at and think, 'Look at Cora. She has it so easy, I bet she doesn't think of herself as a bad person.' :(

And you know what? They'll be right! :)

 

Link to comment
8 hours ago, Cora said:

I'm sorry to sound disappointing but I don't know anymore. I truly feel like a horrible monster and it seems like anything I do is ill indented. (Just an example: for the past few days I keep feeling happy and satisfied when I see/hear someone, mostly my work colleagues, fail, whether it's something small or big. I like to hear their drama because I like the fact that they are struggling, and I can't even hide it to be honest. Like, what's the deal with that?

Ok let me tell you this. I have recently fallen out with a friend. She annoyed me a lot and we have stopped speaking a few months ago. Now she messaged me the other week because we bought some tickets together and she paid me back for my part of it. We exchanged some pleasantries and she told me that she was recently in an accident and she is still recovering from it. You know what I was thinking? I was happy she had an accident and I wish I knew what it was/what caused it, because I hope she caused the accident herself due to something stupid that she did. Terrible thought but I don't even feel guilty. And I love to hear other people's drama. Do you really think that you're the only one who thinks like this? Everybody does it, but it's not socially acceptable to say these things, so we all keep it a secret and think that everyone else is having kind thoughts, when they are equally enjoying other people's failures. And who cares? You didn't cause their failures, I didn't cause my friend's accident, our thoughts about these things have no consequence, but they give us some personal kick knowing that we are slightly superior to someone (that is the reason people think like this).

8 hours ago, Cora said:

I understand that his decisions will be his own but they could still be subconsciously impacted by my words and actions. Because it wasn't just silent treatment. It was the fact that I told him I wish he stayed at school longer (implying I didn't want him home), that I can't wait to leave this (our) house because he's too much to handle, that I'm not going to miss him (and actually mean it) if/when I finally move out, that I showed him that physical abuse/violence can be one of the options to treat a problem, screaming in his face and acting completely out of control, and so much more. I'm not as innocent as I maybe portrayed myself to be; I could actually be one of the reasons of his failures and mental health problems (he already struggles with self image and skin picking). 

I don't want the responsibility but I'll always have it.

And again, do you really think that this is unique in a sibling relationship? Heck, I've heard parents threaten to leave their children out on the street because they were too much to handle. I'm sure they weren't proud of saying that but children can be such a handful and sometimes you just lose it. I've had friends whose parents hit them when they were children, this is still acceptable in some cultures. Dealing with children isn't easy and I think everybody has moments where they lash out. You need to stop making everything into such a drama.

8 hours ago, Cora said:

I could actually be one of the reasons of his failures and mental health problems (he already struggles with self image and skin picking).

Again, do you really think that he is the only child who acts out or has issues? He's approaching adolescence now right? It won't be easy because it isn't easy for anybody. We are on the extreme because we have OCD, but in reality everybody has problems. Everybody struggles with self esteem. Children today are exposed to a lot more than they used to be. Like Snowbear said, he is going to get through life just like everybody else. He'll struggle like everyone else and he will find his way, just like everybody else.

Link to comment

The Germans have a word for delighting in another person’s misfortunes: schadenfreude. It is such a common feeling that the word is contained in English dictionaries. You are not unusual Cora. I personally have never met a saint.

Edited by Angst
Link to comment

Thank you so very much, @snowbear, @malina and @Angst. And, once again, I'm really sorry for not replying sooner.

On 13/03/2023 at 04:26, snowbear said:

The deal with that is you're completely normal. Everybody thinks and feels that way sometimes, delighting in other people's struggles because they feel their own life is a constant struggle, they're tired of suffering in silence and fed up with feeling they are the only person in the world who has it tough. :( :mad: :taz:

 

On 13/03/2023 at 10:31, malina said:

Do you really think that you're the only one who thinks like this? Everybody does it, but it's not socially acceptable to say these things, so we all keep it a secret and think that everyone else is having kind thoughts, when they are equally enjoying other people's failures. And who cares?

Can I please ask you something? What if you have this kind of thoughts about a person in your life that you love very much (or at least you think you love them)? Is that scenario any different? What does it say about me? I'm asking because I've had such thoughts about my best friend who is one of the most wonderful people I've met. A few years ago, she thought she was pregnant (because of her late period) and while we were talking about it, I felt a little sparkle in me and I told myself that I do want her to be pregnant because I would very much see her struggle. When she got her job I felt jealous and even annoyed. I don't get how I can have such feelings if I love and care about her. 

She has also been having a difficult time with her roommate making her life in that flat miserable and sad. A few months ago she sent me quite a few voice messages and while listening to them, I kept thinking that I love that she has drama in her life. I had to stop for a second and come back to the messages only after the thought was gone.

Unfortunately, I've always been like that: jealous of people's accomplishments and happy of their failures. I remember when I was 14 me and my then friends entered the science school competitions (I did chemistry and they did biology and physics.) They were (and still are) a lot smarter and capable than me so they won the first and seconds prizes, respectively, whereas I got the 7th place 😂🤦‍♀️. I was so jealous and upset with them and their accomplishments that I refused to talk to them the whole day. I didn't even congratulate them. I think felt real hatred and disgust towards them at that time. Even though we are not friends anymore, we were back then and, once again, I don't understand how such conflicting feelings could exist in my body. 

I struggle to genuinely feel happy for the people I love. On the other hand, I don't struggle at all to feel happiness when they fail. I don't think I care when this happens with random people but it matters to me when it happens with my family and friends. And it has always troubled that I can be like this with them. Sometimes it makes me think of psychopathy. 

Link to comment

Okay, I understand that writing a third post in a row is selfish but I didn’t want to make the other two posts confusing. If the moderators think that it’s better to merge this thread with any other one, I’m more than okay with it.

This happened yesterday and it hasn’t left my head yet. But I am aware the reason for that is that I’ve been doing compulsions.

I was hanging out my dad’s washing because I felt bad to leave them on the side after taking them out from the washing machine to put my own washing in. (My dad wasn’t home so that’s why I did it.) In that load of clothes he had a pair of underwear and when I saw it I felt slightly triggered because I didn’t want to touch them in a weird way or get a groinal response and feel like I was enjoying it while touching them.

While taking the clothes outside, I did accidently touch the underwear in (what I perceived to be) a wrong way and I immediately freaked out, which was then followed by an IMMENSE urge, mixed with an arousal, to touch them again. The urge felt like a desire and the more I was avoiding them, the stronger the arousal and urge were getting. It felt so wrong and so, so weird but I couldn’t just leave that pair of underwear while the rest of the clothes were hanged out so I did pick them up. And I felt like I was enjoying that in a sexual way. It was a new level of enjoyment. A real, real one. The arousal I was having was so powerful that all I could think about was having s** with my dad. It even made me want to masturbate.

The arousal stayed with me for hours. Yes, for hours. And when my dad came back home and was talking to me, the way I was behaving around him was influenced by that arousal. What I mean is that I felt like I was almost flirting with him and staying closer to him in the kitchen in order to make the arousal stronger. Even the way I smiled felt weird and wrong.

This whole thing reminds me of a different incident that happened a few years ago and I was meant to bring it up with my therapist but never got the time. My parents and I were at a party and I was trying to squeeze through two people to get from one side of the room to another. The person behind me was my dad and it looked as if I moved my body way slower than I normally would because I wanted to touch his private parts with my butt. I don’t remember anymore if I did indeed touch him but my intentions were so creepy and perverted.

I feel really messed up. If my dad gets way closer to me than what my head deems as acceptable, it has to be sexual, even though it’s obviously not. Any hugs or kisses from my dad are viewed through sexual lens now, and I want it to stop.

Link to comment
6 hours ago, Cora said:

Okay, I understand that writing a third post in a row is selfish but I didn’t want to make the other two posts confusing. If the moderators think that it’s better to merge this thread with any other one, I’m more than okay with it.

This happened yesterday and it hasn’t left my head yet. But I am aware the reason for that is that I’ve been doing compulsions.

I was hanging out my dad’s washing because I felt bad to leave them on the side after taking them out from the washing machine to put my own washing in. (My dad wasn’t home so that’s why I did it.) In that load of clothes he had a pair of underwear and when I saw it I felt slightly triggered because I didn’t want to touch them in a weird way or get a groinal response and feel like I was enjoying it while touching them.

While taking the clothes outside, I did accidently touch the underwear in (what I perceived to be) a wrong way and I immediately freaked out, which was then followed by an IMMENSE urge, mixed with an arousal, to touch them again. The urge felt like a desire and the more I was avoiding them, the stronger the arousal and urge were getting. It felt so wrong and so, so weird but I couldn’t just leave that pair of underwear while the rest of the clothes were hanged out so I did pick them up. And I felt like I was enjoying that in a sexual way. It was a new level of enjoyment. A real, real one. The arousal I was having was so powerful that all I could think about was having s** with my dad. It even made me want to masturbate.

The arousal stayed with me for hours. Yes, for hours. And when my dad came back home and was talking to me, the way I was behaving around him was influenced by that arousal. What I mean is that I felt like I was almost flirting with him and staying closer to him in the kitchen in order to make the arousal stronger. Even the way I smiled felt weird and wrong.

This whole thing reminds me of a different incident that happened a few years ago and I was meant to bring it up with my therapist but never got the time. My parents and I were at a party and I was trying to squeeze through two people to get from one side of the room to another. The person behind me was my dad and it looked as if I moved my body way slower than I normally would because I wanted to touch his private parts with my butt. I don’t remember anymore if I did indeed touch him but my intentions were so creepy and perverted.

I feel really messed up. If my dad gets way closer to me than what my head deems as acceptable, it has to be sexual, even though it’s obviously not. Any hugs or kisses from my dad are viewed through sexual lens now, and I want it to stop.

The only way to get it to stop is to change your reaction to all this. This is genuinely all the same twisted logic as usual. You're even indicating it as OCD when your saying groinal response.

 

I'm pretty sure I've already went over how the sexual response cycle works on one of your posts previously but a short reminder you don't exactly get to control what sensations you get in your genitals but just like thoughts, images or feelings you get to choose what they mean.

 

Oh no you felt sensations in your groin when touching your dad's underwear. Cool. So what's the right response? You continue hanging them up and not get caught in the cycle. I would doubt that you felt aroused for hours but what you may have been doing is focusing on the sensations from your groin for hours making any little sensation really noticeable for you. To me that is a clear compulsion along with rumination that you are doing over it.

 

None of this matters. What does matter is that you aren't responding to this as you should be and that's what is making this worse. By now, I'm hoping your noticing that for the most part, it seems like your posts are centered around sexual themes so why is this one any different? Sure different content, but still a similar trigger, similar compulsions and that's all OCD needs to keep going.

 

Also just to add, this whole OCD logic of "but it felt like I enjoyed it or wanted to do it" is not in isolation just to you, it's actually a lot more common than you think. With that, try and recognise, just because something feels real, doesn't mean it's legitimate.

 

So what do you do now? Well (you won't like this at all), you did the compulsion previously to that, so now you need to do the ERP to undo that/ change your response. An example could be imagining the entire moment again with hanging out the underwear, exaggerate it to as bad as it could possibly be and then whatever comes up in terms of sensations, sit with it. It is just a sensation after all. It will be uncomfortable but you can do it. You can even try using well maybe I did enjoy touching the underwear or... maybe I didn't and this is all just another lovely OCD trick (Theory A Vs Theory B).

 

Hopefully that helps

Link to comment
22 hours ago, Cora said:

Can I please ask you something? What if you have this kind of thoughts about a person in your life that you love very much (or at least you think you love them)? Is that scenario any different? What does it say about me?

Really Cora? :no:

What this sentence says about you is you're not taking on board the replies you've just been given. We explain it's normal and you come back in the same breath with yet another 'Yes but...'    Which only goes to show you didn't mean the 'Yes' part. Just the 'But...'  :dry:

Nobody here thinks you're a bad person except you. But what we think doesn't matter.

The only person it matters what they think is YOU.

The only person determined to put you down and make you out to be a bad person is YOU.

No matter how many times you get the reassurance you crave that you're good, you carry on putting yourself down. :(

So I have some questions for you.

You want to be a good person, right? 

Do you think a good person would continually put themselves down like you do? Do you agree that by being so unforgiving towards yourself that is maybe an expression of being a not-so-good person? :unsure:

What if all this stuff you worry about - thinking bad thoughts, doing bad deeds - is goodness itself :angel: beside the real evil of being nasty and unforgiving towards yourself :taz:  ????

What if the path to becoming a truly good person was simply to stop beating yourself up? To stop trying to find fault in yourself? To start being the good, kind, loving person you genuinely want to be by being kind towards yourself?

Because here's the thing... this isn't a 'what if' like all the 'But what if...' questions you come back and ask us again and again. This 'what if' is a truth. A reality.

The path to being a truly good person is to accept yourself, flaws and all. To be forgiving towards yourself when you have a 'dark' thought or do something you consider bad.

You want to break free from this misery and doubt? Start by accepting ALL of these things you do are normal.

Think of yourself as a nice person who sometimes thinks bad things - in other words, nice, normal, exactly like the rest of us. No better, no worse.

Accept your imperfections are no worse and no different to anybody else's imperfections. Accept you're not perfect - and that you don't have to be perfect to be a nice and good person.

Just that small acceptance of your own flaws - the same flaws we all have - will free you up to live normally.

In demanding 100% perfection (never allow yourself to think a bad thought, never do a bad thing)  you make yourself so afraid of even the smallest hint of 'badness' that it drives you to OCD. Telling yourself you're bad, doubting yourself, labelling yourself as a bad person.

I bet your friends secretly thought similar things to you the stuff you're beating yourself up over. :laugh:   'Shame Cora isn't in the same league as us when it comes to tests. She's kind of stupid only coming 7th. Maybe we should drop her and be friends with someone better' or  'I wish Cora was pregnant and not me, so much better if her life got ruined instead of mine'

BUT they'll have shrugged them off as just nasty thoughts they thought in the moment, not reflective of the nice people they really are the rest of the time, and not anything they need to think about for a second longer. They'll have shrugged them off and thought 'What am I like with my secret dark thoughts?' :laugh: and then...' I'm glad Cora's my friend. She's such a kind person.' :)

They won't have analysed the thoughts to death until they convince themselves their real self is a bad person. That's what YOU do.

So, you want to be a nice person like your friends are? You want to be a good person like us?

No problem!

All that needs to change is for you to do what we all do when we think 'bad thoughts'.

Think them. Accept that you thought them. Attach no importance to it. Shrug it off. And go straight back to whatever you were doing before.

Stop all this 'I'm a bad person nonsense. #' All the responses that run along the lines of... 'OMG, this/that means I'm a bad person. OMG, I'm horrid because... OMG, I'm different to all those nice people on the forum because they don't think and do the stuff I do. And even if it does happen to them too, they certainly don't enjoy it or do it to the people they love!'  :ohmy:

 [ Oh yeah? You think? 🤣 🤣🤣   Is this girl naive or what? 🤣 ]

In short - get over yourself.  :dry:

Stop demanding 100% perfection or else it must mean you're some kind of evil monster. None of us are that perfect, that good. Nobody.

The only difference between you and us is we accept we're not perfect. And we realise we don't have to be perfect. We accept it's normal to have dark thoughts, to do dark things sometimes, and to enjoy those moments with genuine delight. And we know it's ok to let it go immediately afterwards without beating ourselves up or labelling ourselves as bad people.

You want to be a nice person, a good person, a normal person? Then do what we do.

 

We accept we're not perfect.  We realise we don't have to be perfect. We accept it's normal to have dark thoughts, to do dark things sometimes, and to enjoy those moments with genuine delight.  We know it's ok to let it go immediately afterwards without beating ourselves up or labelling ourselves as bad people. We accept our flaws and we forgive ourselves and we get on with being the nice normal people we truly are. :)

 

Link to comment

You literally have to start and take responsibilty for yourself and begin to take some of this advice on board Cora......and you're not doing.  That may seem a tough cal, but you are here amongst your peers who are fellow sufferers, who do know what it's like, who do know how it feels, who have felt those same doubts.....and yet still...steadily, in trepidation, with great anxiety......started to implement the advice.  You're not doing that Cora.

We can't allow you to carry on using the forum as you are doing.  We are all here to help, to support, to advise, to be whatever we can in a helpful way but not to aid you to harm yourself further by use of compulsions as you're doing.  I'm not going to try to offer further explanations as to the "whys"  because as well-intentioned as they may be they are providing a reassurance that won't be assuaged.  It's now time for you to look at that responsibility for yourself and decide whether you're prepared to make some changes.  The alternative is to live this half-life......a life lived in anguish, of dependency on others, a constant life on this hamster's treadwheel.......it needn't be that way.  Like the rest of we OCD sufferers, there is a choice to steadily use the advice that is known to work.  Sorry, but you don't appear to be doing that.

Link to comment

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...