r/HOCD

i always knew i was straight i always knew it. Always was talking about girls with my friends before these toughts and i remember i had like 2 girls that think were very pretty in school. But there was this dude who was saying i was gay to bully me but he was saying it so convincing. and around that time i started to take pills for my exams. and i didn’t feel like watching porn anymore which was kind of good and weird. but then after like 4 days i wanted to watch it again and i didn’t get a erection and it made me stress so much, i tought maybe he is right maybe i am gay. And sometimes i am genuinly convinced the pill made me gay. And another thing that stressed me out. I used to be homophobic but now i am not anymore which kind of stresses me out. And another thing that is weird i was in a relationship with a girl and i remember kissing her for the first time and it felt good so how can i be gay? I always reassure myself everyday with google, reddit, chat gpt, tiktok, for around like 20 minutes and i do it multiple times a day. Sometimes i watch porn in purpose to test if i still like girls. The first 2 days were afwul i was so stressed out and the toughts of same sex disgusted me. but now it feels like i like it? I dont know i miss the old me :(

i feel like im spiralling all the time. if im not thinking about whether or not im attracted to girls, im reviewing my memory or checking if im aroused by girls. I saw a couple of videos that said lesbians are more common to have ocd, and saw a video where people realised that they didnt just have intrusive thoughts but also actual attraction. I am so terrified thats me. Half the time i feel like im convincing myself i dont like girls, and it doesn't even feel genuine or real. I spend hours to days figuring out if i like girls i see on the internet.

I was never homophobic, i was always open, and i never really liked girls like that. I had curious childhood experiences and did enjoy women focused erotica from the ages 10-12, but even during those times i only expressed desire in men.

i think its genuinely time to admit that im bisexual, like it just feels too real. i must like women, my thoughts genuinely feel too real. and i feel like im blocking my natural thoughts and i hate it so much. Before this, i barely even noticed women or thought twice about them. Ever since I'd discovered masc women, my ocd has flared up so much and i am so convinced i like them because they're conventionally attractive and masculine. Everything feels so real, and im so uncertain about everything. I cannot be straight, this is genuinely just impossible. I dont even know my own attraction anymore, every thing feels like such a lie.

I must be bi-sexual, even a person who had hocd who realised they were bi told me that I was. I feel like im just scared of change. I just want a break. I feel like I'm bi, i feel like bi is right for me, i feel like i have always been bi and im just lying to myself. what is stopping me from admitting it, and worse of all, what if i start doing erp and realise that i do like women. Everything just feels so wrong. I don't think i'm me anymore.

ive made so many posts but nothing makes sense to my brain except the fact that i must be lying to myself. i must be suppressing my attraction, i must be convincing myself i dont find them attractive because it feels too real and i feel like im just saying it to get rid of my anxiety. why do i do this, why cant i admit it, i might just be a self aware bisexual with ocd. i dont even know whats my voice and whats ocd.

I’ve had thoughts of kissing my same sex friends. It is very distressing to me as a guy. I used to always know myself as straight. Now I have never ending anxiety about being gay. These thoughts developed recently in my year long struggle with HOCD (if I even have it)
Did yall experience this and how did you recover if you did?

Hi. So i need some help. I am 38 year old male. History of extreme anxiety and worry and I get a thought which I seem to fixate on until it passes. No official OCD diagnosis. Yet. Anyway my current situation is this. Ive been very anxious lately as i usually am. Well one day at work I had some groinal aroual at work in the middle of a conversation with a male coworker and it has caused a severe spiral into me questioning my sexuality. Like severe like i cant tell the difference anymore. Now im getting sexually intrusive thoughts constantly at work and gym and its giving me severe anxiety cause IM feeling groinal sensations. As far as I can remember ive been obsessed with women but mind doubts that . I go from sex with my wife to over 5 days a week and wearing her underwear on my face as a joke. To now questioning everything. Really troubled.

so my so ocd started when i was like 13 as a random “what if i was a lesbian” thought out of nowhere (ive only had crushes on guys etc). i got immediately anxious and started to ruminate. since then, i had it 24/7 like 3 to 4 years before it just faded away. i had no thoughts like that for 3 years until they came back about 1 1/2 years ago when i was watching this series where a teenage girl started to have feelings for a girl and was dealing with denial before accepting her true self.

since then my ocd has been pretty on n off. when it started, it was on my mind 247 like couple months before slowly fading away. but since then it has like been coming to say hi after any possible trigger for like a day and then disappear again, so its been lil annoying but pretty easy yk. and there has been months without any thoughts.

however a couple months ago i saw this one guy that i didn’t like or feel attracted to any way, but it was more like a side quest way yk. i made it very clear before we met that i didn’t want to do anything with him yk like that. well he didn’t care about my boundaries, nothing like that happened but he kept trying to pressure me and insist me. he finally stopped pressuring and just dropped me home but during the time where he liked hugged me i had a thought that “i feel like a lesbian rn while hugging this guy”. so now i’ve been back to this 24/7 spiral for the last 2 months and it actually worse and realer than ever. mostly cause i have found out about these new fun things like the term “comphet” and i’ve found people who had so ocd and the thoughts turning out to be true like they actually were in denial while having the ocd spiral. like this one woman said “sometimes what we are most scared of is the truth”

now one of my biggest thoughts that i just cant let go of is this memory of this girl i was friends with when i was like 15 (i had so ocd already back then and during this memory). but i was so obsessed with her like she was a few years older than me and at first it was like a popular kid letting you into her group way. i thought of her in this pedestal and started to use similar clothes like her (not like a psycho way but like admiring way) then we actually became friends but the admiring didnt stop like i still really wanted her acceptance and that she liked me more than anyone and lowkey some “keeping me safe n taking care of me” way too. it felt a lot of like a crush and sometimes i had these ocd panic moments during rumination where i was 100% sure it was a crush and im a lesbian, but then thinking more n being like no im not and it isnt. like i remember thinking back then and being afraid if this is me being lesbian in denial but i didnt want to kiss her or do anything sexual with her. and when i tried to imagine it, it felt off like i didn’t desire it. but i remember still liking when she played w my hair etc. when i was 16-17 we were friends still but i feel like the admiring faded away and then the “obsession” also disappeared and i felt like she genuinely were just my friend.

now i don’t recognize myself from that time like at all. i was really messed up, confused and anxious about like everything and idk i just dont see myself when i look pics from the time. before the thoughts came back, i just thought that i was having severe ocd and also i was 15 like obviously its the time where people are confused about who they are and might feel all sorts of different feelings about things they really don’t relate to when they are older. but i never actually thought it was a crush until now when the thoughts came back cause i feel like if i told that story to any lesbian, theyd be like girl that was a crush. i keep replaying and trying to remember the exact feelings that i had in every single situation and i get so confused cause im not even sure which parts of the memories are real and which are me having maybe intrusive thoughts back then about feeling something i actually didn’t feel and now years later my brain remembers me feeling the feared feeling. i can’t let this go cause in so many coming out stories people explain having these huge admiration type of feelings towards their friends and later when coming out as lesbians realizing they were having huge crushes.

i dont know i just feel so anxious and confused, also im questioning every single no matter how intense crush on boys cause of the new comphet thing, and i can’t even feel attraction to any guy anymore cause im constantly analyzing myself if this is attraction, or wanting attention from attractive men or what the f im feeling and what is anything supposed to feel like.

im sorry this was so long.

i am so scared im sexually attracted to women, like i feel arousal all the time and i feel like i like it. And i constantly think about what i did when i was a kid, like i was aroused by lesbian or women focused porn when i was a kid and enjoyed watching it. i think when i read smut i focused alot on the womens reactions, even if i found the man hot and demanding. i genuinely do not think im straight, like i enjoyed fantasies with men, but i never was attracted to actual men, and like i was always scared of sex and thought that i never wanted to do it(truth be told i was insecure of my body) i always thought i would hve sex with a man, but like now i feel like im sexually attracted to women. do straight people even feel this?

Truly lovely. If it's not a major depressive episode, it's the lingering persistent depressive disorder. And if it's not that, it's the anxiety that leads to avoidance cycle. And then the OCD, which I am actually self-diagnosed with. Well, not really. Went to a therapist last year about it but never asked what I was actually diagnosed with. I think I just have a lot of thoughts that make no sense at all and any therapist that tries to make sense of what I'm saying will take them literally.

But anyway, it's not the terrible SO-OCD where every man around me looks attractive and I get physical responses and test myself to see if I'm attracted to them. The fact that I can even type that when I'd be scared to do that a year ago is astounding. No, I feel like my actual attraction to women is some form of objectification or admiration of women that straight women often experience, and I have to expel the thoughts out of my head because I don't deserve to enjoy pleasure. Plus it doesn't help that I'm terrified of relationships so I've rarely acted on my feelings, which makes me unable to relate to most lesbians.

So there's that. I'm catching it before it becomes this huge spiral but it's probably already too late.

is it normal for it to not feel as intense compared to when it started? i used to get a chest ache from the anxiety and now i barely feel it.

its not a mega obsession like before, but its still part of my daily life.

also, if i dont do avoidant behaviours and only reassurance seeking can it still be ocd? im pretty confused on that and ig thats reassurance but yeah

im tired :(

any tips for someone who has had this for 2 years and doesnt have hope?

Hey guys,tbh I'm at the point where I'm just wishing with all my heart that I'm experiencing hocd not smth else,like being completely turned on by females to be smth else by sudden and against ur wellness?, common,this is bs.

I'm completely sure Abt my sexuality before,most of you guys speaking Abt intrusive thoughts,images,but for my case there are rarely ppl can relate,guys like like I'm numb I don't have what if I'm gay thought I have you are gay statement,also I don't have fear or doubt like it's supposed to (feels like my mind got convinced that I'm gay and no need to question it or doubt it anymore,like it gave up).

the reason is bc I'm at the stage of experiencing just feelings,I can't stop thinking Abt whenever I see some dudes,I feel attracted to them(facially )or forcedly aroused in my body toward their body's (I was never feel like this to them before in my life,never, always females body who arouses me), I'm not into doing anything with them,i don't lust them or like them,girls they are my heart,I liked them so much and I was so horny toward them.

If I watched porn I'm completely horny if I was not sad to the womens,also fantasy,I'm not into gay porn or gay fantasy,and if I got a beat in my chest if I saw same sex body I keep looking at it till I don't feel nothing.

I'm tortured guys,imagine your brain makes ur body responding to smth ur not into and ur conscious mind betrays u,can anyone relate?

i feel guilty for posting here so often, but its my way to cope, so i apologize.

im just so desperate right now.

Looking back into the beginning of this, it seemed more like hocd than how it is now.

i stopped wearing jorts bc it made me (15f, at the time13f) feel masculine, i hated going to beaches and pools, malls, and it certainly became worse during the summer time, i spent hours online researching about homosexuality (eventually found out abt hocd).

If we go back to when i was a smaller child i used to wash my hands until they bled bc they didnt feel clean enough, i used to pray before going to sleep to make sure no one that i cared about got hurt or died in their sleep, i couldnt hang up the phone with “bye”, i had to say “see you later” because that would make me believe the person on the call would die or disappear.

but now it feels too real, and my therapist thinks its depression.

I feel instant arousal with nudity from the same sex, my throat tightens when i see a guy thats my type (or at least i wish it is).

also my bf recently broke up with me so i feel more lonely and miserable.

im also confused on my situation being ocd or not (i dont want reassurance im just venting) because i dont have images and sentences popping up in my mind, its just the sensations and the Google/AI/Youtube/reddit usage, the only time i get intrusive thoughts is with my best friend bc i get urges to kiss her, images of us kissing in my head and stuff and its so disgusting.

i just feel stupid and shitty.

i should be leaving the house and enjoying summer but since my therapist told me i only have depression and not ocd ive just been crying and sad again.

maybe thats the truth of my denial coming out.

i need help, but i cant seem to find any.

ive been bothering people too much on reddit.

half the time i feel like im convincing myself that i dont like masc women just to get rid of the anxiety, i feel like i do find them attractive and that i like love them in a way. i feel like im lying to myself all the time, and i hate it so much.

there was this woman whom i thought was a boy and found her hot. as soon as i found out that was a woman, i was like 'nevermind!" but what if that wasn't my natural thought? and then i started to spiral, and i feel like i still do find her attractive because well she lookse exactly like a guy.

furthermore, 2 days ago half asleep i had a thought that was like 'i cant believe i convinced myself i wouldnt like masc women if i saw them out on the street, like ofc i would, they're so attractive!" and then i felt calm and once i was concious i realised what i thought and immediately started to spiral and attempted to justify the thought.

i dont like masc women, i dont think i have ever (except for a girl dressing up like a guy and i found that hot when i was like 10-12 ish). my brain thinks im bi, i think im bi, i bascially have to be.

i am also convinced my therapist thinks i like masc women

Like. I have only ever had crushes on guys and dated guys. Suddenly, 1 month after a traumatic rejection from a guy, my mind has latched to the idea that I'm into girls.

Like whenever I'm in public or scrolling reels, my mind notices someone attractive every 5 minutes and feels that I'm attracted. With time it has started to feel more strong and real.

My mind is making me feel as if i have also developed a crush on someone specific.

My mind creates vivid sexual imagery that makes me feel that maybe I'm aroused. I get scared.

I'm unable to function at all. I just wanna die because...i don't want this and this doesn't align with me, yet my body and my mind are convincing me even though I'm so AGAINST it.

So i went out yesterday and i noticed that I always notice women more and not really men like when i went out yesterday i can say i saw many pretty women but i can only say ive seen like one attractive men. On top of that i think ive always been like this even back then and ive had less anxiety (ive been doing a little erp) so do i just like it now and accepting it????

hi, i take 75mg of sertraline, im 15 and i dont feel the urge to do compulsion, i started in april-may i think.

once i stopped taking it for a week and i felt really bad, but now im ok

i got a headache for 3 days and i think i emotionally went down again, but rn im wondering if everything i went through was ocd or if all those 2 years were lies, like, why am i not suffering? why am i not crying everyday, anxious everyday like i used to be? where is my attraction to men? was i always forcing attraction to men? im not sure and idk who i am.

also, ai says that for ocd i need higher doses for it to work so maybe im just depressed and i dont have ocd, since that low dose works on me :(((

is this a backdoor spike? i dont even do erp and my therapist doesnt think its ocd (also im not from the US nor the UK so idk where to get a therapist that believes in hocd

guys idk what this is, i am starting to doubt if i ever truly was attracted to men and if i ever liked them bc i think i might have always forced attraction to them, but i had crushes at school and got super nervous when my crush first spoke to me, and also got super nervous when my ex first did a call with me, like my heart was beating super fast.

i broke up with my bf a month ago and its a weird situation, throughout the relationship i frequently asked myself if i loved him or not and i dont wanna get into details on why we broke up but i think i miss him now, not sure tho, im very confused.

Also, right now im in this weird state (not the first time) where i stop feeling anxious, i stop using ai with the same frequency, but i dont really do erp or anything like that (my therapist doesnt think its ocd and says homosexuality has no connection to ocd) so im trying to figure out if it ever had hocd.

i know i definetly have ocd bc of past episodes that were textbook ocd in childhood but now idk. The attraction to women feels too real: butterflies, groinals (feeling wet and tingling), thinking they are pretty, impulse to kiss my bsf and no natural attraction to men, i have to force it and my throat hurts afterwards, it feels tight.

ive had this since 2024 and im not even 18 yet. im confused and tired. also i dont get many intrusive thoughts :((((

what should i do?

since my HOCD problem started I noticed how I have the urge to mention the girls (in my case) that are part of my obsessions and it's a bit uncomfortable. sometimes people will notice your insistence and ask the reason you're so into someone. I think it's kind related to oversharing and stuff 'cause I have the same problem with other obsessions too. idk, maybe this post it's a sort of reassurance but I'd like to know if I'm the only one with this problem or not.

Why do I cry ? Because I’m being forced into something I don’t want ? Because I’m losing a grip on my original identity? Because my potential new identity makes me sensitive to certain topics I was never sensitive about ? Because while I don’t feel pleasure from the idea of it, nor does it FEEL natural, I don’t feel disgust amymore ?

Or maybe it’s because my desperate struggle to normalcy has become impossible now.

Excuse while I finishing crying

I’m so confused. I didn’t start having these dreams till I started obsessively worrying about my sexuality. What’s worse is in the dream I feel aroused and feel like I’m enjoying it.

I don’t understand it. I thought I was straight but these dreams have me rethinking everything and idk what to believe anymore.

Questions that bother me

Hey,

i am in the beginning of my 30s and i did some mistakes concerning porn and i pray that Allah swt protect all people from porn.

\-> i never had a relationship with a girl

\-> i found my questions unfortunately in porn which lead me into more insecurities, anxiety and hopelessness. My Iman, faith did downgrade than 10 yrs ago

\-> i was bullied that i have a voice like a girl, some told me i were gay and etc

\-> so in conclusion i faced a lot insult even from my family

\-> of course these points harms my masculinity

now i am in my 30s. I didnt have any experience with a girl. Family tell me to marry. I want to marry but i feel lazy, i feel nowadays less libido. No mood to watch porn Alhamdullilah and this frightens me. I sometimes want to be alone. I dont feel proud to myself to marry. Then i think if i had sexual experience i would feel more masculine. This porn stuff bothers me a lot. My prayers dont get answers like they got answered years ago.

I am going to gym but this year i got sick several times then i had a leg injury. So i feel like the German football team as i live in Germany.

I am powerless. I have a lot worries about future. For example: I am worried about first time that i dont be able to perform good and etc..

What are your suggestions ?

Thanks

Hello everyone. About two months ago, I started obsessing over a recurring experience from my adolescence. I don't remember the exact dates, but whenever I was play-fighting or tickling each other with my brother, I would experience involuntary erections. Back then, I didn't pay much attention to it, but lately, I’ve been constantly worrying about it—asking myself if this means I’m gay or even a pedophile.

Now, absurd thoughts like 'What if I am attracted to this man?' constantly flood my mind. Because of this intense fear, I can’t even look at men anymore and I feel a deep sense of shame around them, constantly questioning my sexual orientation. I seem to recall having similar anxious thoughts during puberty as well.

My brother is male, and I actually built up the courage to tell my family about this. They reassured me, saying these kinds of mechanical, involuntary bodily responses happen during puberty, but I still feel an overwhelming sense of shame. I often view myself as a bad person and wonder why I’m going through this torture.

I’m completely exhausted by this constant mental loop. Could you please help me? Has anyone else experienced this type of OCD theme, and what should I do to overcome it