Intrusive skin crawling thoughts, (WARNING, MAY BE TRIGGERING FOR SOME PEOPLE)

[JustAstateOfmind]

Why?? I have a physical response to overlapping, clustered lumps and bumps, but only if they're where they shouldn't be any. If i see clusters of seeds in a packet, or flat layer of holes like a beehive, I am fine, and this will not affect me.
I had a nightmare there was hair that looked like hay growing out of my son's tongue all over, with sunflower seeds laying against some of it inbetween. This made me wake up with my skin crawling, and feeling repulsed all day. Even now writing this is triggering my skin crawling and mental distress. It is very difficult to talk about.

I had a vision of seeds scabbed and layered all over my child's skin when I was changing his nappy, this was a random thought, which again I found very distressing and impossible to forget. I know all of this is fake, but it is like my mind fixates on it, and it is very difficult to replace these thoughts with nice things.

At the moment our kitchen floor tiles have worn so that there are holes in some of them. When you look in you see lumps layered in those porcelain holes, which shouldn't be there. I still look sometimes, even though it distresses me; I think this is because I am trying to desensitise myself to them, to try and cure myself. It got so bad the other day that I stuck labels over the holes, until Dh fixes it. Somebody was coming over, so I have had to remove them, and the labels were reminding me of what is underneath, so counter productive.
The thoughts make me feel disgusted, and my skin crawls and I feel nauseous. I have told dh to get the electric sander out the garage, as I keep looking at them, and trying to sand them with sand paper, and scrub them with a toothbrush because when I clean the floors, water is getting in, and I want it clean. If I saw this on pavement outside I wouldn't notice, or be bothered. It is when it is on places it isn't meant to be.

What the hell is wrong with me? Is this something sort of mental break?

I am epileptic, and on medication. I have no idea if this has any bearing at all on this thing. I am really disturbed by it.

i haven't always suffered from this. Please help!!

Just wanted to add, I don't have any other intrusive thoughts about anything else for instance I am not checking locks, and have no repetition rituals, it is just this!

sounds like intrusive thoughts or some sort of severe OCD. you should talk to your GP about it.

Trypophobia

I have it too but sounds like it's overlapping with very bad intrusive thoughts which can be signs of other MH issue like OCD (I have it and it presents in this way)

I have no OCD about anything else, no repetitive patterns of checking things. It feels more random. It is only these dark repulsive thoughts.

Hoe do you deal with you trypophobia if you don't mind me asking? I am fine with all of the things it mentions when I google it, it is just when it is where it shouldn't be, and it has to be layered, and clustered to provide a reaction, if that makes sense.

OCD doesn’t necessarily present as repetitive checking, the ‘pure’ version presents as intrusive thoughts.

Thank you, I looked it up, and I'm not sure I have enough of the symptoms of it, but I'm not an expert.
I just feel so embarrassed by the whole thing.
I will research the pure version, as I haven't heard of that form.

Thank you. I am so embarrassed by it, and worried they will send me for mindfulness, or CBT which I don't have a lot of faith in. Being epileptic, and on strong meds is another complication

Honestly it all just feels such a mess. The whole thing started at the same time as starting my epilepsy meds afew years ago. I don't think this is a side effect though.

I have trypophobia, just reading your description had the visions in my head and made me feel I'll. it will take a couple of days for those images to stop coming into my head.

I don't have this as intrusive thoughts but like I said above they will come into my head over the coming days, the only way I push them away is by staring at something, usually out of my window to my fence and focusing on that for a while forcing y mind to stop 'going there'

No need to be embarrassed, often big life changes trigger things so and having kids is definitely a big change! I’d get an appointment with your GP and go from there, best to get help early.

Oh yes my son has this with certain foods. Won’t want to suggest any new issues so will leave it there.

I basically try to desensitise him. It doesn’t really work but he’s autistic and pretty rigid.

Yes, I have had this for 2-3 years 🤭 I kept putting it down to other things, and trying to cure it myself. It started at the same time as my epilepsy meds after a big seizure. I haven't felt the same since.

Oh no, I am so sorry to have triggered this for you. It is awful isn't it? I will try your technique of looking out the window, stepping away. It is the same for me, it affects me for awhile afterwards. I never forget the image, and it can come into my head randomly ages later too, the images are so detailed too. Sometimes something will remind me of them too.

I am so sorry about your son, seeing his distress must be terrible. I hope he will.be okay. 💐

This sounds like an exaggeration of the natural disgust reflex that kicks in when we see things that could infect us with something that makes us ill. Would it help to reframe the preoccupation this way — as something that's a natural mechanism that's there to help you, but which is just getting a little bit too loud and over-vigilant in a way that's unhelpful, rather than as a sign that there's something deeply wrong with you and that you're going insane?

I forgot to mention one of the epilepsy meds I am on actually helps treat OCD. This makes me even more worried on what is wrong with me, because it seemed to coincide with the beginning that particular medication, and a big falling out with a relative.

Phone your GP or 111, or speak with your health visitor if you have one. Tell them what you're experiencing.

There is absolutely no need to be embarrassed whatsoever. But, imo, chatting to a health professional, gritting your teeth and being honest will be of enormous help. Yep, it's hard, but you'll feel like the world has lifted, if you can.

Or, you could write down, as you have here, how you're feeling, what you're experiencing and put that letter/note at your doctors reception/on their online portal with your name and contact details. They'll know then how you are before speaking with you.

There is so much support available.

You can do all and more, but reach out, get support, absolutely no shame in it whatsoever. In fact, it shows just how strong you are.

Btw, with you about CBT and mindfulness!

Thank you, that is very helpful, I am getting myself worked up into a frenzy thinking I am losing my mind. First the epilepsy, which isn't under control yet, and now this. They both seem to have came on together. Could it be a neurological issue? Although I have had an MRI, and all looked normal.

Thank you for taking the time to reply to my post. Do you think they would give medication for this?

I don't have epilepsy but I do have psychiatric conditions with some overlapping medication options (I've taken valproate, lamotrigine and topiramate, as well as pregabalin and several benzos). On top of the fact that their use in psychiatric conditions demonstrates that epilepsy meds can have a profound effect on mental state, IMO (and based only on my personal experience) some of these medications can absolutely have an effect on intrusive, repetitive, obsessive or ruminative thoughts.

I haven't looked into the science of it but it seems entirely possible to me that your medications are affecting the way your brain processes this kind of thought about these kinds of stimulus.

It's also possible that it's just chance that they started at the same time you started a new drug, but I wouldn't discount the drugs having an effect on this either. Either way, I think it's worth mentioning to your neurologist — I hope you're seeing a neurologist, if your epilepsy isn't under control yet?

Thank you, I take lamotrigine and brivact or my epilepsy. The issue started when I began the lamotrigine on it's own, but I hadn't titrated up to the higher dose. Online it is saying intrusive thought can happen but at the higher dose, I have no idea. It just seems really coincidental it has came on with that drug.

Neurology has passed me on to the epilepsy nursing team, without even telling me, I will ask for a appt with the neurologist.

I hope you can get to see someone about this. If this is caused by the drugs, then it's a side effect that's having a significant effect on your quality of life, and that needs to be somehow managed or mitigated. If it's not caused by the drugs, it's still something you shouldn't have to be dealing with alone, and if you end up wanting to try medications to see if they help, that's something that your epilepsy team will need to at least be aware of.

Either way, you're not crazy, and it's not anything to be ashamed of — it's just your brain trying to keep you and your home safe, only it's got a bit overenthusiastic for some reason and needs reining in a bit 😄

FWIW I'm not a big fan of mindfulness and CBT either, but if they do offer you CBT, it often works a bit differently (and better, IMO) for these kinds of specific issues than it does for more general anxiety and depression. To me it can feel like it's more specific, actionable behavioural techniques that try to retrain your brain, and which make logical sense, rather than the more cognitive kinds of techniques they often teach for things like depression which feel like you're just arguing with yourself about your thoughts and feelings and not getting anywhere (Again, just IMO — I'm not the oracle on therapy or anything, just had a lot of it for a lot of different things!)

@JustAstateOfmind I also think it sounds like OCD. I have diagnosed OCD and I don't check locks/windows etc or have it in the stereotypical cleanliness way (although I'm sure any presentation of OCD is distressing in its own way).
I'm more the 'pure OCD', intrusive thoughts/images/doubt etc.
All the OCD experts recommend exposure response prevention for any type of OCD.
OCD Action and intrusivethoughts.org may be worth a look. X

Thank you for your post, and kindness. The thing that is worrying me the most isn't so much the stimuli like the floor that is triggering the visceral response (bad enough), but the images my mind has created in my sleep. They're so detailed, and when I replay them through the day, or when I am reminded of them it is like I am seeing a picture in my mind so clearly down to the finer details. I noticed the very first time this happened was when I started Lamotrigine, then since then the dose has been repeatedly changing, the latest time it has happened the dose has been adjusting again (maybe a coincidence there possibly). Dh is saying maybe it just needs to settle, but I'm unsure. I don't want to take something that is doing this to me for how ever long, and what if it doesn't stop. I am terrified the seizures will get worse taken off it, and god knows what else they'll put me on in it's place 😱

I was saying to dh I hate taking meds that interfere with my brain, and kind of forget how I am supposed to feel.

Did this start or get worse around the time you had your son?

Please don't apologise!!! You gave a trigger warning and I chose to read on to see if I could help in any way x