Ocd or anxiety? Some insights please

[Scottyboy]

Hi everyone

I am looking for some insights. I have read a few books the last month about worry and anxiety I have been writing down my thoughts and have been looking at my behaviours. Some insight would be appreciated.

I always remember being preoccupied with worry, catastrophe and disaster as a kid. I was never at ease and thought something bad would happen. I grew up catholic and expected the worst (hell, fire , god is watching etc). However as I grew older the worry got worse and now the irrational fears and catastrophe have gotten much more intense. They are out of touch with reality. They aren’t stresses that are normal day to day stress. And they morph once one passes a new one comes up.

I’ve spent a fair bit of time reading about generalized anxiety disorder and I’ve come to realize that I engage in a lot of reassurance seeking behaviours that seem to align more closely with OCD than generalized anxiety. I am going to be seeing a psychologist in the coming weeks but was curious about those who have come to a similar insight, if they could comment or those familiar with the distinction between the two. I started to compile a list of things I’ve done over the years and have noticed a pattern that resembles the compulsive reassurance seeking of OCD. I just never saw it because I don’t wash my hands or check the stove ten times. Some examples include:

- getting tested for hiv even though I am in a committed monogamous relationship for many years
- Transforming a bug bite into a bat bite and going to emergency room for rabies shots (dr. Laughed at me)
- Going to the doctor for a dog scratch thinking I would get rabies
- Googling my name to see if misinformation is being spread about me online (I’m not a famous person so I don’t know why i think this would happen)
- Thinking I had prions diseases including fatal familial insomnia
- Checking twitter incessantly to see if a photo of me was posted
- Blocking people from my past who I haven’t spoken to in years because I decided they might try to ruin my life for some reason
- Crawling on my hands and knees around my parents basement for an hour looking for mouse poop thinking I have to make sure I can’t get hantavirus
- Placing all of my clothes in large plastic ziplock bags when I go to a public gym because I’m afraid of bed bugs in lockers
- Hiding my face on public transit because I’m afraid people are filming me
- Purposefully going to talk to people at work just to confirm they aren’t mad at me
- Shaking my head at various points in the day to confirm I don’t have a headache
- Googling and reading about potential for hiv from haircuts
- Deleted Facebook because I was scared about people knowing about my life
- At one point I was obsessed with North Korea and fantasized about bombs and where I would hide. I read about nuclear fallout and how to survive.

.. and the list goes on. I realize they are all irrational fears but the behaviours and constant reassurance seeking just keeps the cycle going. Is this ocd or anxiety?

I have spent a lot of time trying to relax and I actually can chill out but the worrying intrusive thoughts just keep coming back.[COLOR="blue"]

---------- Post added at 01:51 ---------- Previous post was at 01:04 ----------

[Berry4]

This really does sound like OCD. I have been tested for HIV a ridiculous amount of times especially when I use to get it done during a relationship that had lasted 7 years.
A type of CBT called ERP can help.

[Scottyboy]

This really does sound like OCD. I have been tested for HIV a ridiculous amount of times especially when I use to get it done during a relationship that had lasted 7 years.
A type of CBT called ERP can help.

Thanks for the comment. This might explain why relaxation (without CBT And changing my behaviours) is doing little for me. Meditation actually made my OCD worse too.

[.Poppy.]

I think anxiety and OCD tend to overlap, especially where health anxiety is concerned, because of those reassurance seeking behaviors. It's kind of natural that you would want to feel relief, so you'd go looking for it (reassurance) and then when you find negative information it spikes your anxiety so you look again hoping it will be different this time, etc. etc. I have been diagnosed with anxiety and depression, but wouldn't be surprised if there is some OCD lingering back there too, because of those same cycles as well as some of my other tendencies.

Thankfully, though, medication and CBT have helped my anxiety and any other OCD stuff that might be going on is minor enough that I can live with it. I think as long as you are able to find something that works, that is what is important. I hope the psychologist is helpful.

[MyNameIsTerry]

With OCD there are the themes, the cycles and the behaviours. But alone they aren't enough for diagnosis since most people probably have elements of this behaviour and doctors look towards impact. If it is impacting on your life then a diagnosis is a possibility.

I think GAD gets misrepresented hence becomes a catchall when you have a variety of themes/worries. Whilst GAD is more general, and overlaps into things like Agoraphobia and Social Anxiety Disorder a lot, I find it's more persistently there and becomes worry about anything no matter how small.

OCD is very diverse but I think it's less inclined to jump on things such as a phone ringing, someone knocking at the door, the everyday triggers that can be present in GAD.

Certainly looking at your list you have plenty of OCD themes in there. Reassurance seeking is a known compulsion but reassurance is also something all humans seek out at some point anyway so it's about it being compulsive. All anxiety disorders could have an element of needing some comfort from others to calm you down. I can see various behaviours in there which are less reassurance seeking but would easily fall into compulsions though which adds to the feeling this is OCD. And the paranoia is in there too although obviously that can be present in anyone (I suspect it's at higher levels of anxiety, which I found).

Or maybe even a co morbid condition e.g. GAD+OCD? If the above is everything though I would be leaning towards OCD over GAD.

What about meditation makes you feel worse? I ask because I found it hard at first because it was asking me to focus on my breathing which I was already doing too much of. And I had the same with relaxation techniques such as PMR, Calming Breathing Technique, etc.

I found you have to stick with them as they can be a form of exposure for some of us. And once your overall levels of anxiety fade they naturally become easier.

Also I find the behaviours in OCD can mean people who start with something like sitting with their thoughts gets skews by their negative thinking style problems into trying to control or obsess over them which is not what meditation is teaching you to do. Those with intrusive thoughts are also exposed to their triggers with their thoughts which can make meditation seem counter productive but it does work in retraining you how to respond to thoughts that just pop up into your conscious mind.

[Scottyboy]

Thanks for taking the time to write out such a lengthy comment.

I actually meditated for years and did Jon Kabatt-Zinns mindfulness based stress reduction program. I think the issue is that the meditation made me super aware of all my thoughts and sensations in the body. It magnified them and then I just focussed on them and JUDGED them and assigned meaning and analyzed. I know it’s not what meditation teaches. Conceptually I love mindfulness but it seems to have made the ocd compulsions worse.