#help for severe ocd

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

questioning sexuality is so exhausting

[dersandmannkommt]

!! tw: ocd !!

new contamination trigger!!!!! woohoo! guess what it is?!?!

showering. yes. showering. y'know, the thing that makes you clean?...had a panic attack in the shower not even 20 minutes ago because if the water if touching me, then it's also touching potential germs and viruses and rashes, and the water will spread to non-contaminated parts of me, and spread it there, and so on. ive convinced myself that i somehow have mrsa??? i know that in less than a week, i'll be okay again, but ocd is ocd. writing these out actually help a lot; reminds me that even though my fears are valid and justified, obsessing the way i do is a bit silly.

if you have ocd, and youre still reading, heres a coping tip (this works for all ocd's btw) (currently the only thing keeping me from running to urgent care "just to be sure"). let's say theres a spot on your arm, dont tell yourself that "its not (fill in the blank), its not ____, its not ____, its nothing contagious!!" because youre only feeding into the fear. instead, imagine the worst case scenario head on. you have to. otherwise you'll just be running from the fears you obsess over for the rest of your life.

you have to imagine the worst case scenario, and then walk yourself through it all working out. like, i also have a fear of cars. ever since i was a kid, i would imagine them flipping over, me getting impaled by whatever i was holding, flying out the window, getting crushed, ect, the only reason i can even get into a car is because i imagine the worst case, and then picture everything working out. the car flipped over? im okay, a trip to the hospital and im home within a few days. or what about something like pink eye? worst case, i get it in both eyes. does that suck? yeah. is it scary? yeah. BUT people get pink eye, and then they. get. better. they wash their hands after touching their eyes, wash their pillow case, put some eye drops in, and move on with their life. i have to be able to do that. i have to be able to continue living.

so yeah, i was afraid to shower. but i did. i dont think i have mrsa. but even if i do, the sun stays warm, the earth spins, and it will heal and go away. if i have it, i will live as i did last week, but be a bit more careful, and change the bandaid out. i will have to contintue to live. just as everyone else.

if you're still reading this, and you have ocd, you'll be okay. stop getting stuck in your head, you know your brain is a little off, thats not good, but it is okay. you're okay. the earth still spins, the moon still rises. if all is not well, dont panic, because all will be well.

[adelle-ein]

ocd is uh. it's really bad huh

[dirt-grub]

Yea I didn’t rly acknowledge it continuing off that post you need to be normal about people who do drugs recreationally as well as addicts especially if you’re a self proclaimed leftist

[strictly-confectional]

writing down abt when we're feeling ocd brains just mostly to try to find other examples to talk about if we get in w someone who like, knows how to do shit w ocd and just. staring at what we've written like damn we're really in it when we're in it huh

[flonightingayle]

Sometimes, it’s easier to care for your brain if you personify it.

Instead of 3 lbs of neural tissue, you are now in possession of a houseplant, hamster, or other living being of your choosing. Anything that incentivizes you to care for it.

The hamster is sprawled beside its wheel? Let’s troubleshoot. Have we fed them? Have we drank enough water to keep them hydrated? Have we provided them with enrichment? Have we allowed the little fellow to climb off the wheel for a rest?

Sometimes hamsters get hurt (no, this is not the post to talk about horrific hamster demises). You can get a migraine, your mental health could worsen, or [insert individual specific thing here]. Do we get mad? Perhaps, yes, as these things are frustrating and it’s perfectly ok to be upset. However, the little chap is trying their best, so we should have grace and compassion for ourselves.

Take care of your hamster. Take care of yourself. You are worth it 🐹 ❤️

[somehwere-between]

Time to get a bit #personal on here because why not. But it’s in the tags so I don’t blow out my brains later

[running-in-the-dark]

and it just occurred to me that when we move, I might try to find a new therapist. there might be one/a few right in the town we're moving to (I haven't checked), but we'll be really close to a city then. so I could get there regularly (maybe. it's very scary but maybe I can manage it). so. I should probably do that? maybe find someone who'll like.... do more than just accept that I've got social anxiety (because that's what I said when I first saw my previous therapist) and help me figure out the real problem.

[sporadeen]

People on here hit reblog on every post about how difficult phone calls are then call people who have difficulty commenting on fics assholes and say "there are no excuses"

Do you not understand how anxiety works?

[halfd3af]

if I take my aripiprazole (abilify):

-panic attacks

-insomnia where I wake up every night at 6 to 6:30am (though might also be my cat wanting food)

-hypomania

if I don’t take it:

-psychosis

-depression

[nostalgia-tblr]

I had another fic idea and the brain was like "no, that's too fluffy and romantic and YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO WRITE NICE THINGS, PEOPLE WOULD JUDGE YOU" but then I went "but what if it was kind of... comedy fluff?" and brain went "...yeah, okay, if you really must." Which I fucking HATE! Why can't I write nice things, brain?! Everyone else is allowed to! FFS, it's fanfiction, it doesn't have to be ~deep~ or any of that shit!

This has actually been a bit of an issue when I'm trying to write The WIP because while I told myself yeah sure go ahead and write the massively self-indulgent epically long (by my own odd standards) fic but still sometimes I get stuck because I'm not "allowed" to write something that appeals to me and my own sometimes niche interests??

Like angst I can do because that's "proper" somehow? WTF is that about? It's not proper! It's still daft! And comedy I'm allowed because I dunno apparently if it will make someone laugh that means it has "value"? It's very annoying, I don't like it.

Do other people have this? How do you deal with it? You'd think after all this time I'd be okay with writing any old shit that I want to. If anything it might be worse now. I remember years ago I could tell myself "Look, if you've spelled most of it correctly then it's already in like the better half of all the fanfic on the internet" which isn't really TRUE but I could go along with that and let myself write whatever-the-fuck I wanted to.

You know how many of us go "I'll write this fucked up thing... but I'll post it as Anon"? I get that with fluffy fic ideas as well. Or with things that are "too shippy" (WTF?) It's just such a stupid and weird form of self-criticism and it bothers me a lot.

[viscerast]

do i have to ramble about autistic trauma and the reason why wheres so many neurodivergent systems again guys

[caffeinatedopossum]

OCD treatment straight up sounds like torture

[naturalbornlosers]

kinda wish tumblr had an option to change the "this post contains filtered tags: [tag name]" message to "this post contains [custom entry, ie "trauma trigger" or "ocd trigger"]" where you could make the messages in your settings bc sometimes certain words are triggers and it can be exhausting to still be . reminded of what you're filtering yknow. and then if i click its my own damn fault

[formulapisces]

still awake, i’m at the point where i actually miss stressing about things which weren’t OCD related. why cant i just be stressed about work? or have anxiety about deadlines? or be nervous about a presentation i have coming up? i cant even imagine doing that anymore because i’m too caught up in whatever OCD theme has decided to torment me for the week

[crayonurchin]

I really want to make OCD content as an educational tool. Comics explaining obsessions and compulsions, talking about the subsets, de-stigmatising the 'taboo' side of certain subsets, and also make comics/books with OCD metaphors

I feel a bit... weird, about it though? It's such a raw topic for me, having spent my entire 20s just in therapy to recover from this condition. But also, I'm not a therapist, I've just had lots of therapy. The advice I'd have given on this 5 years ago would be so different to what I'd give now.

IDK, mild ramble. But, I think one day, I want to help folk out by making content that's accessible. If I had known that ocd wasn't just 'ha ha I wash my hands and organise my socks' and was actually 'I can't stop thinking awful things and only certain things make the anxiety stop' when I was a teenager, maybe I'd have had a different 20s experience