Intrusive thoughts

[monkertron]

hiya, i'm new to this forum and wondered about picking up some advice etc. I'm seeing a therapist at the mo. about my mild OCD. I think it's mild anyhow! I do some door checking as my main sort of compulsion. The therapist asked me to record my intrusive thoughts at the time and after my compulsion. I'm tryin not to be dumb, i'm sure i don't think anything, but i must do. I doubt whether i have locked the door! is this my instrusive thought?? Also anyone got any good tips to fight compulsions! Cues etc? Ta

[Karen]

Hi Monkertron

Welcome to the forum.


<b id="quote">quote:</b id="quote"><table border="0" id="quote"><tr id="quote"><td class="quote" id="quote">The therapist asked me to record my intrusive thoughts at the time and after my compulsion. I'm tryin not to be dumb, i'm sure i don't think anything, but i must do. I doubt whether i have locked the door! is this my instrusive thought?? Also anyone got any good tips to fight compulsions! Cues etc? Ta
<div align="right">Originally posted by monkertron - 16 May 2006 : 14:32:49</div id="right">
</td id="quote"></tr id="quote"></table id="quote">
Yes, the thoughts and doubts you have about whether you locked the door are intrusive thoughts. I would suggest just writing down everything that comes into your head prior to acting on the compulsion and again what thoughts come to mind afterwards.

As a start with the compulsion you could start to gradually delay how quickly you allow yourself to check. So maybe start with 5 minutes and do something else in that 5 minutes to distract you. Gradually build up the time between having the thought and acting on it.

If your therapist asks you to do something and you are not sure of what is being asked of you, I would suggest asking for clarification. There is nothing wrong with asking for something to be explained again if you are not sure.


Karen



Happiness is not a state to arrive at but a manner of travelling.

You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough ~ Christine Cagney, Cagney & Lacey

[mum2four]

Are you thinking any think at all why the door needs to be lock maybe not at the time of the compulsion but maybe at other times.

I dont alway have my intrusive thought at the time of my compulsion . I usaly have the last fue thought's of the whole line of thought but not the whole line of thought is alway proberly there for me but I only seem to notice the loudest part the part make me feel I have to do or NOT do something.

So I could have thinking obsession with the line of thought that go kinda like if i dont do my dishes some one may make a suprises visit accused me of being a bad parent then take my kids from me then I end in court fighting to get them back the debate with them judge then get arrested in court locked up and then i will not handle jail and I'll go insane or kill my self for sure. So my head connects the dishes to the fear of going insane or killing my self and the complusion became doing only all the bowls one day then takeing a brack to think again someday I could make my self do the nex one but a lot time I wuld only be able to do one load of dishes a day with feeling line I was loosing the plot and needing to rock or bang my head cause my head would npot stop thinking. I alway did the cup's and bowls together and I think i did this this cause thay are what my kids use the most and as long as I had them alway clean I felt safer about getting a surpise visit form child welfare for what eva reason. But I also would only do the plates together and maybe put storage cantianer on top on the plates or pot and pan if I was having a good day. On bad day would do pot's and pan and one load and containers as another load and the knifes and forks ect in one load. I would alway get stuck if there cups and bowls on the sink again thoue cause I felt like I could not do another load till the cup and bowls were all done. I was also getting so bad that I could not just wash the dishes I had t soak them in boiling hot water a fue time till I ready to deal with dishes. So my dishes were not done eva it was never process that was driving me insane but I truly felt I had to do them that way no matter what anyone said to me I would agrue it logicly. It seemed logical to me at the time but nevere to them ut I did not care at the time of the argument. I have OCD since I was kid and never knew till now at 28y that I was dealing with OCD so my abilty to know that what I'm thinking and how I react to that line of thought was minamal and limited to what eva caused an me to debate with someone about why I had to do something a set way. It's only since my med's that I have come to notice that I think and do things different. Now I can do all my dishes if no matter how many are on the sink. I can mix them ups compleatly with out feeling stressed out. I can have my kids standing next to me whild I do dishes with out feeling like I may hurt or upset them some how.

My point it that there could be many reason why you dont feel like your hearing the reason for behaviour. One you may be too focused on te behaviour rather than thought behind the behaviour. Or the thought may quieter than the compuslive thought. You may not be having the main thought right before or right after the compulsion. maybe yur fighting the urge and there fore the thought might be happening way before and by the time you can nolong ignore the compulsion the thought has happened and its just the compusion continusing to repeat it self till you pay attenstion and give in to it.

Since being on med's I have been hearing my thought so much clearer. I dont fully know why but I think it because it felt like I had more than one line of thought running like a tape in my head at all times. On a bad day I would turn the music up loud in an atempt to clear my head by contrating in the words of the song it also seem to tune out some of the hgarbage to concentrate on at least one line of thought that was the loudest. The way I discribed it was like several radio station out tune but the meds seem to be one by one reducing the amount od line of thought that played