Imp of the peverse - WARNING some might be odd/distressing to people who don't get this.

[elfycat]

On another thread I mentioned an act that I sort of daydream of. It's not a daydream but rather a little naughty voice/image that will never be acted on. The imp is cousin to the imp of mischief, only a bit more, well, peverse.

For me these include, but are not limited to:

Wondering what it's like to jump of something high

When reaching for a knife and DH is washing up, so I reach around him, I wonder what it would feel like to stab him (he knows this)

How it would feel to punch my 3 year old when she is being a threenager

What it would feel like to cut off your own arm (following on from the film where the rock climber had to) in particular the feeling of going through the elbow joint.

Obviously I am not going to harm myself or anyone in my family. I haven't name changed as I know it not to be a problem and SS do not be called as I am not a danger to anyone.

So anyone else understand why I am not a total nutter? And how are you other imp-sufferers getting on with the naughty one whispering in your ear.

What OP is describing is the normal weird stuff that goes through people's minds - she's not frightened by it, finds it amusing if anything, doesn't encourage it, and doesn't seek a deeper meaning.
It turns into OCD and intrusive thoughts when you panic and wonder what a thought means about you and start obsessively reassuring yourself you won't kill someone/ didn't leave the straighteners in/ send a hideous email etc.
Having been diagnosed with OCD I feel that one is the normal reaction is OCD types aspire to!

I randomly beep the horn for no reason. When the road is empty is swerve at times. It's like a road Tourette's.

Whenever I am getting a train and someone is standing too close to the tracks I think a lot about pushing them.

I get these 'thoughts' too OP. The stabbing, the driving into oncoming cars, the jumping over the edge... The nearest you can get to enacting them is a computer game. You can jump off tall buildings and stab people and it's as real as you like.

Quite scarily so. i can see how people lose a sense of reality when playing them for any length of time.

I used to have to physically stop myself from jumping in front of a tube train when I was a teenager. I wasn't depressed at all - it was just a bizarre thought. When I was suffering from PND/stress, I often used to fantasise about jumping off a bridge with my babies. That was one of the things that made me think "er, really should see somebody about this...".

I think intrusive thoughts are far more common than we realise. I still have them now on occasion, but definitely not enough for me to think I have a problem.

elfycat

I have not read any of the responses on this thread nor have I read your previous threads. Can I ask. Do you suffer from OCD?

I did tell DH about the stabbing him while he was washing up one. He volunteered to stop doing washing up and I assured him that he could continue . Luckily he knows me and my imagination. We used to while away long car rides having weird hypothetical conversations about what we'd do if aliens attacked/ the plague hit/ tsunami hits.

We got quite detailed and even to packing lists. We had some very long car rides in his army days, to visit family/friends.

Some of them even featured in my NaNoWriMo novels over the years.

So he still washes up, is unharmed and hasn't run out of the door with the kids while calling our GP.

I know mine are benign. I know other people might worry about theirs and if so that's a warning to get help.

I get them too. Traffic is a big one for me - driving off a bridge or into central reservation or oncoming traffic; a constant one is not slowing down and driving into the back of someone on a dual carriageway.

Not in a depression way, more in a 'what if' way.

For once I feel really quite left out in the crazy

This is not a common occurrence by the way.

No OCD here. The only time I ever showed OCD traits was in my theatre nursing years because I had to have my tray of tools set up and extremely tidy. Useful if you need an instrument but cannot take your eyes out of off the patient. You can 'touch type' along the rows of imstruments and get the one you need. And avoid the sharp things that were all corralled into one spot my hand never went.

But that wasn't OCD, just being bloody good at my job.

Otherwise - I'm hot on timekeeping but only because I consider it rude to waste other people's time. Housework.. not so much. handwashing. Well I can do it extremely well (see theatre nurse thing) but normal washing - one squirt, rub round and rinse - mostly only after toileting and before cooking. Knitting, happy to leave minor mistakes. So no.

Intrusive thoughts/temptations - the only one i get is about swerving off the road while driving. Not into people, just off into the hedge/ditch. Tentatively told DH a while back and he revealed he has the same thing!

According to my therapist intrusive thoughts (ie weird ideas flitting into your head) are common and normal.
There are studies of weird stuff people without OCD say they've thought about.
It is only an issue when it tips over.

I used to have perverse impulses, but thinking back they seem to have stopped around the time my depression went away.

However, I know someone whose imp persuaded her that Ann Summers Cookie Dough lube would be nice on toast, and acted on it in front of her horrified loved ones.

I get them too, especially the just randomly launching myself off a bridge or shouting something hideously offensive in a quiet public place.

I have never suffered from any kind of depression or ocd, I think it's probably very normal, found the links up-thread very interesting.

Thank God!!
I thought it was just me
I would never act on any of these thoughts and thankfully they don't bother me really

Ohh bridges. We have a whopper nearby and I have to go over the Dartford crossing to visit my friends. Mind you that's another one I got bored of after a few years. The Orwell bridge is another matter. It's so concrety and I have to wonder about the force needed.

I really thought it was just me!! Am so relieved!! I always imagine flinging myself off balconies/roofs and wondering how/where I would land... I get the dropping my keys/phone down the drain thing too (except I DID actually drop them down a drain once ), I imagine driving into walls/trees/off bridges - you name it I wanna smash into it OMG and throwing a baby/toddler over a fence/wall/bannister - I get this 'compulsion'/image when I'm holding them - awful!!

DisgraceToTheY

Noooooooo!. Why? Why would you listen to the imp in front of other people?
did she say how it was?

Hmmm. Maybe the imp got me to start this thread... I do know people in RL who are on here. Oh well too late for a name change now

Mines punching someone in the face. Just a fleeting thought when I'm bored senseless in a meeting just a what if thought, that pops in my head, I imagine, then it goes away again.

Agree with the comment about how easy it would be to press the self destruct button on your life though.

I'm not depressed and I get them, I do have Borderline Personality Disorder though and thought they were because of that. I do have an over active imagination too though.

It's always weird stuff too, like 'What if I fed bleach to the hamster?' which I wouldn't, I like the hamster, she's very nice, but what IF I fed her bleach? Would she die instantly? Would she suffer? I got this most recently as she's on antibiotics which she takes through a little syringe and it looked dead good for feeding hamsters bleach with

I wake up in the night with urges to do weird stuff too, like jump out of our third storey window to see if it hurt or I could make the jump and I'll lie awake wondering for ages. I often have the thought to grab the wheel and swerve whilst DP was driving along the motorway too. I didn't want us to die, or mangle the car, I just wanted to DO it.

I too had thoughts to stab him, when he was helping me cook. It's like 'I could so easily just stab you right now, I could, nothing can stop me' but I wouldn't actually do it nor do I want to stab him really, I like him equally, if not slightly less than the hamster He knows I want to stab him, he thinks it's funny

I get this too, the traffic, the train pushing / jumping.
I think the jumping-off-a-building thing has a name, appelle de la vide or something (call of the void)?

Glassware/china departments in large stores, I have the overwhelming urge to go "wheeeeeee" & run along next to the shelves knocking everything off!

I have these intrusive thoughts too so am finding this thread interesting. I too am a nurse and one of mine is when walking into a bay of patients with a wash bowl of water and a patient is lying there asleep I have a sudden thought to throw a bowl of water at a sleeping patient. It disturbs me a bit although I know of course i would never do it. I am very anxious and depressed though ( as I think a lot of Nurses are). I'm kind of relieved so many others have these thoughts, it's reassuring that i am not completely abnormal.

Yes, me too! I was really relieved when they got rid of slam-door trains so that I could stop thinking about jumping out when the train was moving - usually when it was going past a steep drop. Another odd but less drastic one was wanting to throw my shoes over the side of cross-channel ferries.

Yes I get crazy thoughts like that too OP.

I have been told by a psychiatrist I have OCD, so intrusive thoughts are extremely common for me

I stood by my husband on our wedding day and wondered what would happen if I just turned and ran. :o