What has your OCD convinced you is true?

[Limeandbasil90]

I’m deep in a period of fixed obsessive, rumination and intrusive thoughts. I’ve restarted my medication, I should never have bloody stopped them.

I just want to feel a little bit less alone

Thanks :)

That if I didn't shut the curtains before it was dark there would be a sniper waiting to shoot me, and that if I touched the floor after putting DC to bed something terrible would happen to them - same applied each and every time I went upstairs to check on them (many many times a night). Fortunately these days are behind me, although I still have tendencies. Full sympathy to anyone struggling 💐

I think they refer to it as false memory OCD. These false memories can seem so real but only up to a point. Awful thing to suffer from.

Thank you all so much for replying and being so open in your responses. You’ve all had a hell of a time with it.

My obsessional thinking mainly fixates around health. I’ve been convinced and I mean CONVINCED that I’ve had a brain tumour, HIV and MS (my thoughts about MS are still intermittently ongoing).

At the moment I’m fixated on my two year old child having a condition (I can’t even write it down) because of something I inadvertently read. It’s so tiring analysing everything, looking for evidence for and against - basically doing everything that isn’t advised but is so difficult not to do.

I was so much better when I was taking medication and then I stopped taking it. I’m having to titrate back up again now and my anxiety is worse whilst I build up a tolerance again. I could kick myself.

OCD is an evil and invisible disorder. I hate it

@Limeandbasil90 if you dont mind me asking what medication do you take and does it help?

We're trying to get help for our daughter who has been diagnosed with OCD after over coming an eating disorder but it's practically impossible to get anyone to prescribe to a 16/17 year old and things are quite desperate.

Also, you don't mind me asking, do you know what triggered your OCD?

With much love, as I know how awful this condition is x

Thank you.

I take Clomipramine and it helped very quickly when I first took it, though I had a very difficult couple of weeks with heightened anxiety starting it.

I’m sorry to hear about your daughter. Who diagnosed her? At her age I’d imagine it’s only a psychiatrist who would be willing to prescribe any medication (not a GP), but I’m sure you already know this.

I’ve always been generally anxious but I don’t know what specifically is the cause of my OCD.

I remember the day of my sons ohs and before went to his ward i had a shower in the Ronald McDonald room we had, I was lost in thought and showered the wrong way, washed my hair after my face and when I realised I broke down because I was convinced he would die because I did the wrong routine.
When he made it through the surgery I then convinced myself it was because I had done a new shower routine and have stuck with that routine for the last 9yrs.

It's exhausting living like this, people don't know, not really.

I feel the same. Never been diagnosed with OCD but I have routines that I have to follow every day. Has to be a certain order of doing things like I have to make sure I’m sleeping on the right pillows and that the one I don’t want to sleep on is put elsewhere. The blind in the bedroom has to be at a certain height so the cat can jump onto the windowsill without breaking his leg. This is the worst one: if I see a digital clock has the time at matching numbers, for example 17.17 I have to cross myself (like they do in church) or our luck will run out and something will happen to someone in the family.

Yes, same here. I was always slightly relieved when I saw a car behind me - I could tell myself that if I’d hit someone that car would have stopped.

I’ve also worried I’ve written something horrible in a birthday card, or when I post a letter I’ve put something in the envelope that shouldn’t be sent.

I also convinced myself I had aids as well.
My OCD is linked to anxiety. My anxiety is very hormone led

Sorry you have it too. It's a horrible condition.

Thank you for your reply. Yes, it was a psychiatrist who we paid privately for who gave her the formal diagnosis but unfortunately they didn't want to prescribe any medication, despite mentionin Sertraline and recommended family therapy instead which was useless.

We're now trying CAMHS hopefully for some focused therapy at the very least. It's very frustrating seeing her getting worse with a diagnosis but no one will help.

If is such an unusual illness and so little understood. I have wondered if it could be autoimmune in origin, although that's just me ruminating I think.

That I’m going to die from whatever lump or bump I’m obsessively checking at that particular time. That I’ll die if I don’t keep checking them.

That if I don’t check the front and back doors are locked several times before bed, and that the oven and hob are off, that someone will break into my home and kidnap my children… or a fire will break out and kill my children.

thats just a couple ! There are more!

Mine is that if I don’t do things in a certain way or order something bad will happen to my dd. It’s weird as I have a ds too and it’s not so much linked to him. It’s different things too. Could be which way I’m facing in the shower or if I don’t make it to a certain point before someone else. Sertraline and propranolol have definitely dulled it a lot.

Please can you tell me what medication you are on. I badly need it.

Clomipramine. I’ve tried SSRIs (including sertraline) in the past but they haven’t been very effective for me. I’m sorry you’re having a hard time too

I’ve also in the past thought that I was receiving subliminal messages, from number plates, news articles and so on. My feeling has always been that there’s a very fine line between severe OCD and psychosis. I don’t know whether anyone else shares this thinking

I don't have ocd,but my grandad did (I think it was a result of fighting in ww2)

He brought me up so this was perfectly normal when I was growing up

He went through some very strange phases-he would get up in the night to check he'd locked the door/all the plugs where off or I'd die

I would have to stand and lock the door (if we went out) as he'd be convinced he'd left the door wide open and we'd be burgled

If their was a food scare,we could never eat that food again or we'd be so ill,we'd both die on the spot

He went through a phase of wedging a long piece of wood between the front door/bottom of the stairs-he was convinced that if he didn't,the house would catch fire (we wouldn't have got out if there had been)

My parents couldn't have been less safety conscious if they tried-they still go by the train of thought 'it won't happen to us'

They have an old coal scuttle (that you access from outside) that is under the stairs

My father used to keep his motorbike there

My grandad became so frightened there would be a fire and we'd never get out,that my father bought a shed and stored his bike there

He also became so convinced that I'd get my foot/a scarf/my coat stuck in the motorbike wheel,he managed to wedge a bit of wood between the foot pedal and the wheel to stop it happening

He also bought me a pair of scissors and made them so blunt (and rounded the tips) they wouldn't even cut paper,but in his head I'd slice my own throat open if he just handed them to me

It's a very nasty illness

I have been on sertraline for 5 years and it has hugely helped intrusive thoughts around my health. However, I still have to check the taps are off every night, the hob, the oven and I have to tap them all 3 timesto prevent fire or flooding. This is something I have done since I was very young and can't imagine not doing it. The other area where I have constant intrusive thoughts is when I'm flying. I literally think the plane will crash any minute, because I'm on it. The stats don't apply to me in that scenario and the panic is very real.

I think I inherited this condition from my dad, and his dad. Both had OCD but haven't been diagnosed as I have.

@ssd I take Quetiapine and Duloxetine, sleep has been better on the former.

Mine started around the age of 8 when my DM married my SD. I also developed psoriasis around the same time.

Thanks. I tried setraline but it made me bleed , almost immediately and i had to stop. I might try citalopram but im scared of bleeding again. And that made my health anxiety worse.

I only seemed to have bad bouts of it with both my DSs but not with DD.

All the beds are tilted so our feet are ever so slightly higher than our heads.
All door handles are covered in germs and I absolutely cannot touch one in public unless I use a tissue or my foot, or pinky finger. Then my pinky finger is contaminated for the rest of the day.
I will accidentally turn the steering wheel the wrong way.
All hair in my pony tale must be pulled to the same tightness otherwise I’ll be lopsided all day.
The tape of the nappy has to be exactly the same angle and length each side otherwise something awful will happen and I’ll be a terrible mother.
if I don’t see my child take two breathes when I check on them at night then they must be dead.

I always think that I’ve written birthday cards in ridiculous crooked handwriting or didn’t make the message interesting so I have to rewrite them. My handwriting is absolutely fine.

there is it's called OCD with poor insight
a really bad no odd episode Lee me thinking my then partner was trying to poison me and the police where watching me and following me and bugged my house etc