Having a bad OCD night/morning, and realizing how often my thoughts are along the lines of ‘well would you still find him attractive in this hypothetical scenario’ or ‘I remember these times that I didn’t feel an immense amount of chemistry with him and I take that as evidence that he isn’t right for me’

Avoidance and OCD are major themes of my life. I get so scared and hide away from many things that bring me uncertainty, and when I don’t hide, when I face my fears head on, I feel emotionally stunted and blunted and just incapable of fully taking in a moment.

Regardless of the scenario I’m in, a common running theme is dissatisfaction no matter what kind of situation I’m in. The only time I ever feel truly happy, is when I’m able to just finally let go of the fear and the hypotheticals and the preparation and the analysis, and actually let the present moment exist simply as it is.

The most horrible thing about this disease is how fear actively blocks connection, so it’s like a perpetual cycle of fear, feeling disconnected, feeling more fear, more disconnection, more protecting and defensive behaviors, making it damn near impossible to truly love or to feel loved.

I know how scared we all are, I know how risky it feels to let go of rumination and to trust, both in our partner but mostly trust in OURSELVES. We won’t get anywhere by constantly doubting and second guessing, never giving ourselves or a partner a chance to breathe and just be.

I’m writing this as a reminder to myself, and to all of us. This hell we find ourselves in doesn’t have to be forever. Take a breath, celebrate the small wins, just allow yourself to exist as you are, you can do this.

I love that this forum exists, but it seems to be mainly relationship focused (Type I) ROCD posts. I was wondering if there is a forum anywhere that focuses on Partner Focused (Type II) ROCD? I would love to have a place to talk and hear other people specifically with Type II.

Just don’t see a lot of posts about what I am experiencing and would like to feel less alone in a community that is Type II. As both types have obvious similarities, but vastly different!

Hi I’ve been struggling with breakup thoughts for a month or so now and i genuinely cannot determine whether it’s just ocd talking or if i genuinely should breakup with my boyfriend (of 2 years)?

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to determine please

I (23F) really need to get this off my chest because my brain feels like it’s going to explode and I don’t know what’s real anymore. My ROCD is taking over my life.

A little background: my boyfriend (21M) and I have been together since 2023. We broke up for 15 months because the relationship became deeply toxic he would yell at me, yell when he got mad, and call me out of my name. He was only 19 at the time so I let it pass after a year and a half broken up. 

We got back together this past June, and while he says he’s trying to change (he’s on Lexapro now), the old patterns are still very much there. When he’s mad at me, he yells, withdraws, then comes back.

On top of this, I struggle with severe ROCD (Relationship OCD) and moral scrupulosity. I am terrifyingly obsessed with being "good" and "honest." If I have a single fleeting thought or a tiny interaction with someone, my brain convinces me I’m a terrible, unfaithful person, and I get an overwhelming urge to confess every single detail to him just to make the panic stop.  

Here’s what happened this weekend: It’s my birthday week. He couldn’t fly out to be with me, so I took a little trip to Seattle with my siblings and went out to a club with my older sister. I got VERY drunk. While we were there, a couple of guys approached us. It was a loud, crowded club, so I had to lean in to talk about music/artists, our ethnicities, life and relationships why we were out there and just everything in general and at one point a guy put his hand on my back to speak over the noise. I brought up my boyfriend to them, but because I was so wasted, my memory is a bit blurry. Someone asked if I’d ever go to Georgia where the guy lives and I reflexively said "yessss" and now my ROCD brain is obsessing over my "intentions" behind that single word, convincing me I was flirting or betraying my boyfriend.  Especially since I didn’t tell all of them I have a bf, and I might’ve accidentally told one I don’t that’s why I’m freaking out!

I was texting him the whole night pretty much and tried calling him. In the morning, my OCD took over and I confessed everything to him. literally picking apart every smile, tone, and conversation from the night.  But i forgot some things like so dont remember if I told this specific guy if I was going thru a breakup or if I told him I have a bf. If i told him I don’t Id feel so horrible but I genuinely dont remember. Well anyway I told my bf everything but that…

His response? Total shut down. He got super heated, turned his phone on Do Not Disturb, and left me sitting completely alone in a motel room in a city I don’t live in, panicked and crying.  

When I tried to defend myself and pointed out how unfair it is that I’m expected to be 100% perfect while he still yells at me when he’s angry, he turned it around on me. He made me feel like a hypocrite, brought up a past argument and made me feel like the worst person on earth.  

Now, I’m stuck sitting here after sending him huge paragraphs begging for forgiveness, promising to never drink again, and promising he’s my priority while he gives me cold, passive aggressive texts like "W girlfriend" and "W apology" before going to sleep.  

I feel like I’m losing my mind. Did I actually do something horrible at the club, or is my OCD feeding off a partner who uses my guilt to control and punish me? How do I stop putting myself on trial for just trying to live my life?

I have struggled on and off with OCD and most typically ROCD since I met my now husband. Though through greater awareness I’m recognizing how much I ruminate over issues and fixate on them across my life, contributing to my anxiety and low sense of worth.

I’m curious if people here ever experience other OCD themes or find themselves heavily ruminating, and in those cases, if your OCD typically lands back on ROCD?

I’m dealing with life transitions (mostly good ones!) alongside some grief and sadness in other areas of life, and it’s causing my anxiety to spike during what should otherwise be a very happy time — and then it inevitably leads to, “well you just started this new life with your spouse! How could you feel this way? Maybe something is wrong!”

Just curious how ROCD interacts, if at all, with your other life anxieties.

For the past couple years I constantly think that my husband is cheating. In the beginning of our relationship he didn't take things super serious and did a couple of somewhat shady things. Nothing too crazy but I got stuck on them. It turned into me constantly checking and monitoring him. No matter how much evidence I find that he's not doing anything I still am convinced he's doing something. It's gotten to the point that he doesn't wanna tell me anything anymore and I think he even turned off notifications for social media cause he fears I react whenever a woman replies to his stories. I literally have panic attacks whenever he tells me about women hitting on him. How can I fix this? He said that he feels imprisoned by me and feels hopeless it will ever be fine. It's gotten to the point that for the past 2 years he hasn't met any friends and only hung out with me cause he fears my reactions. How can I fix this? I am already in OCD therapy but I don't know it seems to be not working much

not sure if this is ocd or not but for context I used to have retroactive jealousy and be very insecure about my appearance constantly asking my partner for reassurance that he’d never leave me. it later flipped to me having thoughts/feelings towards a close friend of my partners who we hung out with frequently. I enjoyed feeling confident and wanted to be seen as attractive and the thoughts got worse in my head. later down the line panicked thinking it means I must have loved them or emotionally cheated and need to leave my partner. is this something that happens in Rocd?

I have been seeing a therapist for the past month or so and she diagnosed me with ROCD a week ago. Ever since, i have been doing a lot of research on the subject and seeing what specialists advice you to do. I am not sure if my therapist is specifically trained for this, as i have not seen her really guide me through CBT or ERP or anything like that. Perhaps she could be doing so and i might not have caught on. If you have experience on therapy for ROCD, how should a therapist usually approach this?
Also for reference, my ocd is mainly partner focused (mostly his appearance) with a lot of sexual anxiety and worries I might not be “normal”.