I honestly thought my thoughts would improve. I thought the “knowing” I have a specific type of OCD (scrupulosity) would decrease my overall anxiety and provide relief…and my symptoms do seem to be fueled by my anxiety levels. Why would knowing help? I see that ERP seems to help, which I’ve heard mention of in the past but hadn’t given much thought to, to be honest.
But things are bad. So bad. My thoughts keep alternating from telling me I’m stupid and telling me I’m a horrible human being.
I am trying not to let my mind engage the thoughts, because when they do, they rationalize that I am in fact those things, for reasons that aren’t true. Even being faced with the untruths, I still think them. For example, I am certain I am stupid for reaching out to my Pastor for help. Do I think I need help? Yes. Has my therapist or psychiatrist thus far been able to help me? No. Do I have any idea what else to do? No. Those things would say that I took the next logical step. But my mind constantly tells me I am stupid, so I must figure out the why (I always need to know the why!), and surely I am stupid because of that…as that is the most recent thing I did that caused anxiety. See the correlation? My mind makes the natural connections, anxiety causing behavior = makes me stupid.
I don’t want to go to church next Sunday, because my thoughts got worse afterwards, for the entire day, and have been torturing me ever since. I am a horrible human being! I am letting my thoughts control me from doing what’s “right”. I feel like a disappointment. I am a disappointment.
I really don’t want to do this anymore. It has just gotten to be a lot. That’s why I reached out to my Pastor to begin with, things had gotten to a “breaking point”, where I honestly felt like giving up. I don’t go outside my comfort zone unless the circumstances are dire. I am not the type to go to people and 1: ask for help, 2: tell them what’s wrong 3: let them help me. Why? It’s just against my nature to share my suffering with others (always pretending to be A-ok), and well…I just assume there’s nothing that can be done to help. Plus, any time I’ve tried to explain things, I’m not understood. That’s truly the most frustrating.
I was naive in thinking that a little revelation would help ease my mind enough to make a difference. “I am stupid.” Yeah, maybe that was predictable? I’m going to try, try, try to not let my thoughts torture me the entire evening/night. I will try to do the visualization technique and swim past the bad thoughts when they pop into my head. Do I want to wallow in them and just say “F* it?” Yes, yes I do. But I won’t. I’ll try my very best not to.
The Obsessively Anxious 