obsessive intrusive thoughts

[mlondon]

My anxiety started 5 years ago. At the time I was scared of everything from going out, riding the bus to thinking I was going mad. I had anxiety 24/7 even when I was at home. I had to stop work and move back home. I managed to get back on track and then my relationship broke down. At which point I moved to Australia to study and live with my grandma.My life improved greatly over this time and for the past year and a half I have been living on a tropical island for work. But my anxiety has not gone away for good, I had months without anxiety but then it comes back with such extreme intensity.

On a side note, I got my anxiety to the level it is through CBT, Mindfulness, meditation and Escitalopram.

What remains with me now is the extreme fears I had at the beginning. For example I was terrified I was going mad and that fear has always stuck with me, in fact I feel sometimes it is worse than before. I have obsessive thoughts when I am anxious in which I imagine hearing scarey voices or images from horror films and question aim I going mad? Is this it?

It could possibly be OCD. Does anyone else experience these or similar thoughts?

[bottleblond]

Hi

The human brian is a very complex device. Sometimes it behaves normally yet other times it leaves us questioning our own thoughts and fears.

I'm certainly no expert in this at all but i would say your thought process is very normal and the only thing fueling how you feel is the anxiety. If you being to worry about what you are thinking then you begin to think you are abnormal and that these thoughts are alien.

Our brain takes in every little thing we encounter from films, music, news, work, conversations, things we hear and see in ever day life and it's natural for things to pop into our heads when we least expect it. There is nothing wrong with that at all. Thoughts are only thoughts hun and they can't harm us in any way at all so please try not to allow this to disrupt your happiness. You're fine, You're sane and youe normal.



Lisa
x

[RLR]

Thought patterns such as those being described does not constitute Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. With respect to the ruminative thoughts about fearful stimuli, it is more probably the particular fearful stimuli itself which arises because the nature of the anxiety is fear.

Realize that approximately 99% of all generalized anxiety is rooted in irrational beliefs or outcomes. It is common for persons who become fearful to conjure very natural representations of fear-invoking stimuli, in this case voices or images from horror films to which you were likely exposed to in the past. This is simply the brain's way of imparting rational substance to otherwise free-floating fear anxiety.

The actual nature of psychosis rarely fosters insight that permits one to wonder whether they are "going mad" and this is due to a phenomenon known as anosognosia, which essentially means the inability to recognize that something is wrong.

While more serious forms of clinical depression and anxiety can rarely produce psychosis, it is restricted to forms of a nature that would require long-term in-patient care. In other words, it's absolutely not the case in your instance.

With respect to your clinical treatment, if influence from the original chief complaint remains in the foreground to the extent being described, then I'm constrained to point out that the source of the issue has not been addressed and while improvement may be reported, it is of a level which is merely allowing you to cope with the issue rather than overcome it, if you see my point.

Regardless, you can relax from the standpoint that the manifestations constitute psychosis. They do not and I would encourage you to work more aggressively with your therapists in seeking to define the actual origin of your fear anxiety, which can be resistant if defense mechanisms are being utilized.

Best regards,

Rutheford Rane, MD (ret.)