OCD.. Terrified, please help!

[nikita190]

Hi all
I have OCD(mainly rocd) and anxiety.
I have dealt with the illness for 10 years and it's finally getting to the point where I cannot suffer this anymore, it's ruining my life. I have tried to deal with this alone but I want to now heal and get the right help and I know this is difficult with ocd as lots of people do not understand it.
I'm going to go and speak to my GP about seeking further help(already on sertraline)
I'm just scared that as I have children will they get social services involved? I know this is probably not rational but my MH does not affect them as it's all hidden from them.(I'm good at hiding my pain and do this in secret) I have never had any involvement from SS I'm just panicking over going to my gp for this reason.
Any advice would be great thank you xxxxx

I have ocd, and had cbt for it before having my DTs so it was already on my record. I started having intrusive thoughts once they were born, and my anxiety went through the roof, and I have pnd. I didn’t seek help for 8 months because I was terrified of SS involvement and my babies being taken away, and had even figured out where I was going to move and childcare for my DTs for when they said I was a danger to them before I sought help.

I was wrong. My gp was very understanding, said it’s perfectly normal and very common to fear SS involvement but that she could see quite clearly that my children were happy, loved, well cared for and safe, and I wasn’t a danger to them at all. She didn’t even mention ss until I brought it up!

Good luck going to your gp, and I hope you get a speedy referral for some help. My cbt utterly changed my life, and setraline after the babies were born has also changed my life, and have helped me become a better mum.

Hi OP,

It's great that you're going to get help for OCD. If it helps, you can choose to just tell the GP that you have repetitive intrusive thoughts and have to carry out compulsions/rituals, that take up a lot of time and interfere with your life. You don't need to go into a lot of detail about the nature of the thoughts/compulsions.

There should be no need for any Social Services involvement. OCD is quite common and does not pose safe guarding issues. If you have harm related OCD thoughts (i.e. thoughts similar to the 'throw the baby out the window' thoughts that people experience in post natal depression) then it's best only to talk to a specialist in OCD about those but otherwise there's no need to worry about SS involvement.