Really weird ocd thoughts wanting bad things? but i don't anyone else relate?

[Lockey1995]

Hey,

So atm I'm a bit down have an annoying cold barely slept last night but this has been going on for a while these thoughts are really and do get me down on a regular basis :( So basically there's two types the first one is my mind sort of wishing bad things or illnesses on my self. E.g. I'll read something or see something and my minds saying I want that, would you rather have this or this or saying basically I wish i had this then I'm like no, no, no in my head but that just makes the thought stronger.

Second thing is swallowing things weird one this but sometimes when I'm drinking a bottle of water or something I'll have a voice in the back of my head to swallow the cap or something?! or if I have a screw in my hand or when I'm fishing with hooks. I'd never do such a thing but the thoughts get quite overwhelming is this suicidal thoughts or depressive or what? :(

Can anyone relate to these or am i unique on this one.

[Pepperpot]

No you're definitely not unique on this. I think everyone has some OCD in them to some extent. I, personally, if I'm up on a bridge or something think to myself "I'll just throw myself off this bridge", and I look over the edge. There is no way I'd do it, but I think it. I don't know what to suggest to you though. Terry is pretty good at talking about these kind of thoughts.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I've had them too, Jack. My mind would ask me to choose between something and the consequences of not picking the right option would mean I would get some illness or a loved one would die. This could apply to anything really, how many red cars pass me in the next minute, whether I can read the credits at the end of a film 5x before the name goes off the screen. That's all part of my Magical Thinking issues in OCD. But I know what you mean about the "wishing things on yourself" as it was like that for me.

It's just intrusive thoughts. If you react with those no's, you only tell your subconscious that these thoughts are important to you. It doesn't understand whether you want them in the good sense, just whether they are worth sending to your conscious mind. The less you bother with them, the more the subconscious thinks "oh, conscious mind doesn't care, I will stop bothering sending them then".

Intrusive thoughts clash with your beliefs. That's really why they end up sent to the conscious mind to make a decision about them. Reaction with fear is the expected response which the survival system then sees and reinforces them with. It makes more associations too. Reacting with positive/negative responses don't feed back because they are not part of the survival system hence it takes longer to mothball these fears by effectively starving it of the expected response.

Swallow that cap. Jump off that bridge. Push that person in front or the car/train. Stab yourself in the eye with that fork. It's all the same issue, intrusive thoughts. Just try to see if as your subconscious running through options and finding no match so it needs you to make a decision for it. For instance, stab myself in the eye with my fork doesn't match to what my beliefs/schemas are so the subconscious can't action it for me because it doesn't conform to what I have programmed into my subconscious mind as I grew up. So, if throws it out to my conscious mind saying "ok, this doesn't match so I don't know what to do about it". I react with fear, it thinks it's important, but it's not. This is why so much of anxiety is "learned behaviour". So, see that as an option the mind is running through and some options are incorrect so the conscious brains needs to say "meh, who cares" because it's not an option to consider.

[SLA]

You are not alone Lockey. Been there and bought the t-shirt!

Terry's advice is spot on.

I wrote about my experience of intrusive thoughts recently. There is a link to the article in my signature.

Hope it helps. You are not going crazy, you are a normal person with a stressed brain.

[KeeKee]

I always used to get an urge to touch the iron back when I used to actually iron (the tumbler is my saviour!). I get urges to touch the sharp end of the knife and so on. Even people without mental health issues get these at times.

[Lockey1995]

Thanks guys, glad I'm
Not only just managed to reply been away without signal for a few days.

[RosieBelle]

Oh I get all of these things that all you guys have mentioned. My anxiety seemed to start around a fear of not being able to swallow/choke and now I get these random intrusive thoughts like you had, like the swallowing a bottle cap etc...I get random thoughts/images of me swallowing a pen cap and it's so annoying. So you're definitely not alone :hugs: