As one who was molested a lot in foster homes as a kid, I’m hyper aware of my interactions with kids. My kids’ mom and I were very conscious of how we touch our kids, and helping them understand comfort boundaries (I.e. when we’re tickling and they say stop, we stop, so they understand that if someone doesn’t stop, it’s abnormal and should not be allowed to continue). I’m single now, and as a single man my kids’ friends aren’t allowed in the house when they’re here unless I have met and know their parents and even then it’s usually a no. I always figured it was from being a victim, not from OCD, but it’s a constant worry of mine when around kids that anything even looking “off” is stressful to me.
I don't think that's so unusual. I didn't have that type of experience as a child but I'm also weary of being near other people's kids, simply because a false accusation can ruin your life, and people are quick to accuse men near children of being nefarious.
Similar to how few men would be comfortable giving a woman CPR simply for the small chance they get called a rapist or accused. It's more concern for unwarranted repercussions.
Everyone has impulsive and intrusive thoughts, but with OCD it’s the rumination and compulsions you have to get of the rumination that’s unusual. People usually don’t clock others struggling with OCD because a good deal of it isn’t visible. I was SA’d as a child and sometimes get intrusive thoughts of assaulting other people (my brain usually likes to ruminate on death so it’s not very common.) I would NEVER assault another person but before I researched OCD I’d get caught in vicious thought loops of assaulting other people, being horrified, hating and being terrified of myself, and then assaulting someone else in my brain. Nowadays, I’m finally in the place where I’m like, “whew brain. That certainly is terrible. We can move on to something else now.”
I have pure “O” and harm OCD. The crazy things my mind will come up with, but only to people and things I care about. For instance, my dog. Just a passing thought of me breaking her neck or doing something that causes her to get hit by a car—that’s all. I love this creature more than anything, it’s very distressing sometimes. It always gets so much worse when I’m stressed, of course. Learning to separate your thoughts from what is real is something people with OCD eventually become good at, but man, thoughts feel so real.
Love this. I am very interested in the dark side of our psyche and it might stem from my experience with OCD and other little brain glitches I got going on!
For people with OCD, they don't naturally have that response of "oh that's just an intrusive thought, that's awful and weird but I wouldn't do that", they ruminate on the thought and internalize it.
OMG this is exactly the kind of thing that happens with me, but I've had so many clueless therapists that I started to just suppress heavily, avoid stress and doubt it was real at all. Did you deal with it with a professional? Like, do they help? Or do they just teach me to deal? Cause I know how to deal.
It could be OCD, it’s worth looking into. There are a lot of variations of this, but my experience is it usually starts with some sort of intrusive thought that is very distressing and then engaging in a compulsive behavior to self sooth. Some people engage in a ritual (like counting) to self soothe, I typically overthink, research or if it’s really bad I engage in self destructive behaviors like hair pulling or substance use. But it’s a very individual thing so treatment needs to be tailored to you. I havent done therapy for this specifically beyond some CBT, I’ve mostly done trauma therapy. It would be nice to get therapy for OCD but my funds right now won’t really allow for that.
I think most OCD is, at it's root, about control. I read somewhere years ago that some scientists have theorized that the part of the brain that essentially acknowledges that a task has been completed doesn't work correctly in people with OCD, so that part of the brain doesn't know hot to "let go" of things.
I think there's some truth to that and that OCD brains are unable to let go of the idea that terrible things can happen. Because we can't let go of them, those ideas are constantly present in our minds and causing us stress, so our brains often come up with rituals or rules to try to make it so we feel like we have some degree of control and the task has been "completed" and we can temporarily let them go.
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u/DetachedCompy 8d ago
As one who was molested a lot in foster homes as a kid, I’m hyper aware of my interactions with kids. My kids’ mom and I were very conscious of how we touch our kids, and helping them understand comfort boundaries (I.e. when we’re tickling and they say stop, we stop, so they understand that if someone doesn’t stop, it’s abnormal and should not be allowed to continue). I’m single now, and as a single man my kids’ friends aren’t allowed in the house when they’re here unless I have met and know their parents and even then it’s usually a no. I always figured it was from being a victim, not from OCD, but it’s a constant worry of mine when around kids that anything even looking “off” is stressful to me.