r/OCD

I want to know what your “OCD exemption” is. That thing that for whatever reason doesn’t trigger your OCD despite all logic pointing to it should.

I’ve noticed over the years that sometimes something that SHOULD make me panic, just.. doesn’t?

Say you have contamination OCD (like me) and you’re really strict about hygiene and how things are cleaned and handled. Yet you’re fine with your pets coming into your bed with you despite them walking all over the floor the whole day.

I dunno I just think this could be an interesting conversation! I want to know if anyone else has moments like this and I find it fun to kinda prod at my OCD and make fun of it for not being consistent.

Hey everyone. Today I had a pretty good day of avoiding rumination/compulsions. I wanna ask y'all if you guys have this same problem that I do, where my ocd thoughts become scarier at night? I'll spend the whole day feeling fine and more able to ignore my thoughts, but then nighttime comes around, and suddenly the urge to ruminate/do compulsions comes back. For the most part, I'm trying my best to ignore it because I know the more I do it, the more uncertain I'll feel. Idk if there's any actual science behind why this happens, though. I'm sure there is, but I'd like to know if anyone else experiences this and what their opinions are. Do you guys take meds? Any other exercises I can try to help feel calmer? Thanks to anyone who reads and offers advice.

Hi everyone. I'm a 23 female. I'm completely overwhelmed and don't know where else to turn.

I experienced severe emotional abuse around toilet training as a young child. After wetting the bed for months, my mother would wake me up, strip my clothes off, force me to sit on the wet bed, and yell at me. In preschool I wet my pants frequently, and adults would make fun of me (they probably didn't mean to be cruel, but it was humiliating).
When I was in elementary school, long before puberty and before I even understood what sex was, I became fascinated by stories or videos of children having accidents. I would seek them out and sometimes experience leg squeezing/masturbating that I didn't understand at the time.

After puberty, my sexuality developed in what felt like a completely different direction. I've only been romantically and sexually attracted to adult men. I've had relationships with adult men, had normal sexual arousal, and for more than ten years this childhood association barely affected my life.

A month ago, I accidentally came across a video of a child having an accident and noticed an automatic feeling of arousal. It completely shattered me. Since then I've become obsessed with what it means. I feel trapped in an endless cycle.

What makes this so hard is that I can't deny the reaction happened. At the same time, in real life I interact with children completely normally. I don't automatically think about accidents, I've never wanted to involve a child in anything sexual or romantic, and I've never intentionally put a child in that situation. My values are completely against harming children.

This has triggered severe depression and anxiety. I’ve been having suicidal thoughts almost every day, and my symptoms became so debilitating that I had to take medical leave from school.

I’m receiving treatment for POCD, but I still can’t shake the fear that I’m a pedophile because the bodily reaction did actually happen.

I can’t accept that this childhood association exists at all. How am I supposed to live with it, and is it still possible for me to recover?

Used to love playing video games, drawing, reading ect. but now I think “what’s the point?” when I no longer feel satisfied with anything I do and every little mistake or detail I miss makes me feel like the thing is “tainted” and requires a reset.

I feel as though everything must be perfect and I must absorb every detail, and it’s so stressful I don’t even enjoy what I’m doing anymore. Can’t even trust myself to get through a movie or tv show because I might miss a line of dialogue or look away from the screen at the wrong time.

Hi,I have a question.I am a hoarder and I have ocd.Does anyone else hoards or is a hoarder? Does anyone like to keep stuff from their childhood?

Before starting I wanted to say that im not diagnosed with ocd however I did some research I do recognize myself in it and I needed the opinion of some people,

thank you so so so much to anyone who will read this because its long and i have a lot to say im scared i dont know what to do and I cried a lot today because I might be some fucking perverted monster

tw : mention of rape, pedophilia i guess and self-harm

For a few months now I had really bad disgusting intrusive thoughts that I can't control, it gave me the impression that my own brain has turned against me, i’m so scared of becoming an even more horrible person if I became an adult (im 15F)

So as much as it may seem completely ridiculous and disgusting im scared of becoming or being a pedophile, yet worse part is that im only 15 ?? and I could never imagine hurting someone younger than me

I never ever had a crush on a child and I DONT want to hurt a child I dont wanna hurt anyone actually

Ive already watched some sad movies that are about this kind of subject: like pedophilia, rape or sometimes incest and every time I ended up in tears because I am very sensitive to all this, my heart breaks for all those who have been victims of this kind of abuse

So I could never do any similar pain to someone, and honestly just thinking about it makes me want to puke

For some context :
when I was in middle school, I was constantly isolated from others because I had a kind of maladive shyness that prevented me from talking to others properly without being nervous asl, because of that people thought I was weird and no one ever really tried to approach me.. some of my classmates made fun of me whether it was openly in front of me or between them, I ended up not wanting to go to school anymore, so I missed a lot of classes and my grades were terrible

It was difficult and I felt so lonely

I'm ashamed and I know damn well that was stupid but I felt so lonely at 14 that I ended up purposely looking for pedophiles on the internet I wanted to have attention even for a few minutes I wanted to be loved

I went on some bad online chat websites, always saying my age and receiving tone of private messages (like 30-50 messages by really old men) It was fun at first to see that so many people could get excited with just my age without even knowing what I looked like I played the innocent who could get easily manipulated bcs that’s what they like

sometimes I had really disgusting messages so I stopped but every time I ended up coming back because I felt sad and lonely

I think I was groomed by one of those men that I thought was nice that I ended up blocking too because he was constantly messaging me and I was scared

I also think that all this influenced me in a way where now when I see a child I feel like I hear what these men were messaging me or I see through them everything these men described what they wanted to do with me

I have this impression that my brain no longer belongs to me I can’t control it like I have the impression that it’s rotting, there is not a day when I don't tell myself how disgusting I am

Now we are getting on the part I feel the most disgusted and ashamed with :

I once came across a porn video with a girl who behaved like a child and it was like some rape digusting cnc rp, the first time I saw this I was terrified disgusted and I wanted to vomit.. so I left quickly I felt like I did something horrible.. I considered that even if it's probably a rp it's still rape

But I couldn't help but watch this same video again later I came across many similar videos (like loli or cnc) and I couldn't stop watching them.. I knew it was horrible but I couldn’t stop.. i’m ashamed im disgusting I know that I need to kms but I masturbated to those often.. and after I would feel empty and I would sometimes slit my wrist with a blade because it was fucking disgusting

I have developed disgusting intrusive thoughts in my daily life because of that..

like when I see a child I don’t really care or sometimes I say something like “aw so cute”.. but then SUDDENLY I have some digusting image of them that I try so bad to shake off and it makes me badly suicidal

Everytime I finished those kind of videos I was crying excessively after, hitting my head or sometimes even self-harm
Then after a few days I told myself that I wasn’t a kind of perverted pedophile and that I was just exaggerating.. but then I couldn't help but watch more of this kind of videos..

So now im currently trying to stop watching theses because its bad and it’s fucking up my brain but i cant get rid of those intrusive thoughts

I know that pedophilia and rape are horrible but I can't help but have this kind of digusting thoughts like as I said at the beginning I think I have ocd but if I was really just a horrible person in the end and I was just trying to excuse my actions?

Im so so so scared that all this will influence how I will became when I enter adulthood.. I should kms before it happens as long as I'm still a minor.. I don't want to hurt anyone.. I wont ever dare to try because I absolutely DONT want to do this.. im so scared

so am I a future pedophile?????? im so scared of becoming one how can I stop this I dont want these thoughts anymore

also sorry if its messy english is not my first language and thank you so much if anyone read this

What songs do you guys like in relation with your ocd? May it be sad songs, encouraging songs or whatever. Thanks in advance for participating, ill start in the comments.

i dont know what to do. please dont give me reassurance because i want advice and i dont want this post to be taken down.

but im 18 and for the last 6 years ive occassionally looked at hentai/rule 34 of anime or cartoon characters that were 13-17 years old. for a lot of this time (since it was from when i was 12-18) i was either younger than these characters or around the same age. i know im not a pedophile because i have 0 real world attraction to people under my own age so i think the reason why im attarcted to certain characters is because of seeing them as peers? but i still ruminate on pocd a ton. i never saw it as morally wrong becausr i was thinking i was just looking at peers and i had no idea about the law at all for years.

but the problem is that im in canada and this is technically completely illegal according to the criminal code. i didnt know and i didnt mean to harm anyone and i never did. i dont know what to do. a canadian criminal defense lawyer on reddit told me it wasnt anything that the law really worries about but i still doubt.

but i dont know what to do. is this even an ocd problem at this point? im 18 and im about to go to university, should i go see a lawyer and ruin my life and get a criminal record for the sake of accountability and responsibility? and will telling this to a therapist make them call the police on me? but if i keep this just to myself then how do i live with the guilt of technically being a criminal and technically legally supposrd to be being in jail. how am i supposed to live with that? someone please please please help me

I can't even kill myself because I'm afraid of death this is so fucking unfair.

I constantly feel like I have no time and I'm gonna die, every day and every single fucking day I end up seeing people saying how the world is fucked and El Nino will kill everyone in 2027 and I keep checking and checking and falling back into old habits because I'm a stupid fucking idiot.

Therapy doesn't, Medecine doesn't help because everyone tells me this is the truth. I just want someone who is a scientist someone who knows what they're talking about to just tell me what will actually happen, not some assholes on youtube or twitter. But of course I can't even trust scientists cause they're LYING, everyone is going to FUCKING DIE, I'm going to die without achieving anything. I hate everyone, I hate myself maybe we should all just die.

Everyonje just wants me to have OCD and have me suffer forever. Well I hope they suffer forever too, if I could I would give everyone my OCD maybe then they wouldn't fucking talk about shit they don't know about.

Maybe it's not even OCD maybe it's all real, maybe all the times I've had OCD before were a lie maybe it's the truth this time maybe ythis is just my very rational and realistic reaction to the world ending. Maybe thi sis just how I'm supposed to react, maybe this just means I'm the normal one and everyone else is fucking crazy. God.

The only way I'll be happy is if I have scientists who can actually tell me what's real, other than that and I'll be miserable forever and it will be everyone's fault.

I feel like OCD has robbed me of so much life. So many experiences. Love. I have always been so afraid of making mistakes, making a bad choice, or doing something “wrong” that I wouldn’t let myself just live.

Im 26 now, recently diagnosed and really taking stock of my life. It has made me realize just how little I’ve really lived because of my constant worry, fears, and overthinking every single thing. So many opportunities missed or chances not taken. It makes me feel really sad knowing I may have missed out on some great experiences.

Have any of you felt this way? What did you do to make a difference?

My ocd was quite the annoyance but still manageable for quite a while after I was diagnosed. Suddenly 5 years into it, I was crying every single day after work nonstop until I got tired enough to fall asleep. I dread every single morning waking up. Doctors kept throwing ssris, anxiety meds, antipsychotics, anything they thought could work. Finally a different doctor put me on a tricyclic, something I haven’t tried before.

I thought I was manic with how great I felt. (Both my therapist and doctor had to convince me I wasn’t). That med pooped out within a couple weeks. I switched to another tricyclic, Clomipramine. This is the 16th medication I’ve been on. I have been living a great, nearly ocd-free life ever since. I still take it every day. I hadn’t realized how much ocd took over my life, suddenly I had so much free time without the worrying. Life is so great now.

There is hope!

How do we manage this????? This is my first time pregnant and I fear my OCD is risking this being my last.

I am upset and wrecked with anxiety every single day because I am either worried about the future of my baby or worried about the present situation with my baby. I keep thinking something is wrong, and I am not even far enough along to feel any movement which doesn’t help at all. I also keep ruminating on everything I did prior to finding out I was pregnant, worried that I have done something to affect the pregnancy.

It is hard to get a mental health appointment, and I have had one booked for several weeks but it is not until mid-September. And there is no reassurance when you only have two scans on the NHS, and when pregnancy tests don’t guarantee that you are actually pregnant or not at this points, that is no help either. Though I can’t stop myself from retesting.

I just seriously need help trying to manage this. I am finally going back to work tomorrow after over eight weeks of being off, but I am so worried about everything. That I might do something to cause something to happen (God forbid), that I might hurt myself, that I might hurt the baby. I can hardly think straight.

Hi everyone. I was just diagnosed this week. I’m shocked i didn’t put this together sooner but oh well.

Now I’m becoming aware of all my obsessions & compulsions which I thought were just my “neurotic and annoying personality.” I feel overwhelmed.

Realizing for me it’s got to do with contamination, morality, money, food/ED, su1cidality, end of the world type shit, social, and other things?! I can’t believe how pervasive it is and how I didn’t put it together.

Anyway I’m ready to ✨get to work✨ with my wonderful therapist but I was wondering if anyone can share some success stories so I know what to look forward to? 😭

Thank u everyone, hope you have a mentally peaceful day 🩷

I'm sure this is more common than we talk about. Anyone else feel constant anxiety about wetting/dribbling, even right after going to the restroom? I only feel at ease when wearing pads/protective underwear. I've been trying to find ways to cope that aren't costly and bad for the environment. What if I suddenly void with no warning (which I have no past of) and humiliate myself and make a huge mess lol? This disorder is exhausting.

Seriously, I hope it stays that way. My goal is to stop it completely until I forget about it

I have a very clear memory of being 9 years old when I felt like my OCD quite literally began in an instant. I was in my mom’s bathtub in her room watching something on her tv that I angled towards the tub, when I got the INTENSE feeling of impending doom. The worst feeling I’d ever felt in my entire life, just horrendous guilt. The thing I felt so horrible about was watching clips from the Chucky movie on YouTube. I have always been really into scary stuff and had briefly explored on YouTube, but I suddenly felt so horrible that the clips that I had seen had inappropriate concepts / curse words. I literally felt so intensely anxious and guilty instantly.

I think I tried to sit with it for a few days but I had this intense urge to confess that I had seen this chucky clips to my mom. Eventually I couldn’t handle it and I confessed to both my parents sobbing like three days later. Ever since then it’s been a battle, now I am 20 and my OCD has shifted to many different themes throughout the years and I think I handle it better now. But I remember that moment so vividly. Like a literally switch went off in my brain. I no longer was a carefree child and felt like a slave to my own brain.

Just wondering if anyone else has something similar to this experience? Like a distinct memory of the moment that your OCD hit them like a truck?

Thinking back into my childhood, I definitely showed signs of OCD that nobody ever saw. Interestingly enough, they were physical compulsions instead of mental ones (turning the light on/off a certain amount of times or else "i would get cancer" type of OCD.) It wasn't horrible, nobody ever noticed and if they did, they probably thought I was just a quirky 9 year old kid. Never got a diagnosis, never got treated.

As a teen, I also had my compulsions, like reading an essay at least 7 or 8 times before printing it for my teachers because in my mind, I had written something wrong and I had to check again and again and again... lol. But i have to admit, I thought it was normal! Again, nothing too horrible or tiring, so I never got a diagnosis.

But now, as an adult... WOW. My (finally diagnosed) OCD is hooooorrible. It manifests mainly in ruminating. Like, crazy ruminating that drives me insane, I can't lie. It is so incredibly debilitating because my brain makes up problems that don't even exist and my OCD doesn't let me live without a solution to those "problems." I need an answer now, so... you can imagine how my day-to-day life is when fighting my own thoughts ALL day long.

My question is... Has anybody experienced this? Your OCD being way easier to manage as a kid and teen and then "coming back" (I will guess that maybe it was never gone to begin with) awfully strong and debilitating as an adult? I feel like I am losing my mind. It is every single day that I deal with this. Maybe I will need medication because no amount of meditation or hobbies to occupy my mind gets rid of the

rumination...

Its suuuper slow, its steady, but its working! I have my therapist to thank for clocking my moral/work OCD and shifting to ERP therapy!!! he rocked my world doing that!!

seriously! even when you feel absolutely pummeled by your thoughts... even if you catch yourself an hour into ruminating and doing rituals... noticing and doing that ERP excercise still counts. dont give up!

dont let the discomfort scare you!!! the fear, the congestion, the discomfort is all part of the ERP package!!!! dont give up friends we got this!!! lets win our lives back together and celebrate our smaller wins!

I just saw one of my favorite (modern) ​poets do this podcast I guess, and they were talking about ocd. And I guess he has it or something. But then he said, "It took me a while to figure out there's actually quite a bit of narcissism in ocd." and "ocd is just a self-centered idea." ​​​​​

I.... just am lost for words. It took me over THREE YEARS​ to fight and overcome my fear of being a narcissist. And when​ I watched that video I felt myself literally slipping back into that fear that I spent so long fighting. How can someone say that? How can someone say that ocd is self centered and a narcissistic? Oh this is making me so mad. ​​​​​