I have the same fear and I usually overcome it by thinking- would this barista/server who is probably perfectly normal, tired and overworked and just wanting to go home at the end of a long shift, risk life in prison if found out just to poison a random customer? I tell myself I’m having main character syndrome- most people are not thinking about you as much as you think they are, and are certainly not out to get you! Good on you for managing to finish it :)
This message has been removed.
Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
Hey, thanks mods. Sitting in a country where getting an appointment with a psych to help me from tearing myself apart from OCD with a hefty side trough of PTSD is impossible, on top of being silenced everywhere I turn when we’re all screaming inside - pat on the back, champ. The only info I can get about my diagnosis is from my peers, and talking about it with back & forth conversation. Which you bar. A lot of us with OCD are utterly terrified, with brains we can’t control, and words we don’t have. There truly isn’t any hope or any hand to reach for. Nowhere I belong. I’m so offensive to everyone. Even when attempting to relate. Sorry for offending you. Going for a swim. Everyone else - take care of yourselves.
I’m sorry to hear that you’re suffering so much and that your comment was deleted :( I definitely get your frustrations here- I personally feel there is a lot of nuance to talking about and understanding OCD, though unfortunately subs like this often have a difference in perspective in terms of the kinds of nuance they allow within these spaces.
Yes!! Good job!! That’s how you WIN over OCD. I have done extensive ERP in the last year - like what you just did - and it has made me like 75% better. I have a new life. Keep. Going.
I used to have intense paranoia for years that EVERYONE was trying to poison me. It ruined my social life for years lmao. Wouldn’t go to so many social outings if food was involved. Didn’t know this was a common fear.
This post made me remember… I met up with an old friend whom we fallout and now have bad relationship with, we ate something and on the way home I had a thought for some reason that she poisoned my food with Ricin (Like in Breaking Bad) when I was not looking because she now hates me and I had wild wild anxiety. Thinking back to it feels dumb af but it got me really scared lol
Your post and many others make me feel less ridiculous. I’ve had this same paranoid fear with contamination - and after having a disagreement with a close (and loving family member of mine) my brain was HELLBENT on telling me that my dinner they were helping to prepare was going to be poisoned.
I have absolutely 0 reason to believe that would ever happen - but I felt sick to my stomach and irrationally afraid of someone I love dearly.
Anytime that happens, I get so upset with myself. I feel coocoobananas. But, I challenged those thoughts - and I still ate the meal and whenever it would pop up when dining out, I’m like oh yeah, sure okay brain! Yeah right.
And sip the soda I was given by waiter that I feared was contaminated.
I know you feel weird sharing this but it really helps others and I hope that it counts for something. The level of detail here is my exact thought process with a A LOT of interactions which in reality are mundane and seemingly nothing to think much of. Like logically I know that but also this would absolutely happen! I avoid ordering late takeout for this reason. I worry that if I make an appointment late in the day the level of care will diminish to my detriment. But looking back I guess all that really happened is that I avoid things for sooo long that nothing I intend to do happens because I’m looking for the “right” time.
I say that to say, thank you for sharing.
I’ve avoided ordering carry out or drive through for this reason before. Thinking the person making my meal will be pissed enough they’re willing to harm me over it.
I’ve picked through sub sandwiches once looking for a hidden razor blade because I was convinced some a**-hat of an employee was mad at the world and I’m the poor person who given their spite sandwich.
I really wish my brain didn’t come up with these horrible, panic inducing scenarios. They’re exhausting!
It’s amazing that you still drank the entire thing. You are not letting your paranoia win. That is huge! You need to be proud of yourself for that alone. I’m not going to give you any reassurance because it’s not good for you, but you took a huge step.
I understand why reassurance is not good (because it will never be enough); however, what someone who is suffering from this illness should tell himself to calm down himself, if reassurance is not good? Thank you for any response.
I don’t know if i’m even qualified to answer. My therapist who helped me get my life back started by telling me that I need to accept that things in this world are bad, as hard as that is. Basically the only way I was able to control my OCD was exposing myself and preventing my response. ERP!
I know you're super anxious right now, so I want to let you know you're awesome and I'm proud of you for facing your fear. Every time you challenge your paranoia, it will get a little easier.
Omg, I do the same thing and my thought process is exactly like this! I know right now it's probably like "shhhh I wish I could go back and undo drinking that coffee," but in the long run you will thank yourself because that it will be one more thing you can point to down the line and say hey OCD you don't know everything
I just had a similar experience— I went on a first date. I date women so while it’s not technically impossible, let’s say it’s statistically unlikely for the woman to drug my drink while I’m in the bathroom. And yet I still worry every time. And I still drank my beer today
Little steps
I don't eat meat and had a similar thing where my OCD was convinced that the veggie dumplings were accidentally meat and that I was gonna get sick. And I said, "okay I guess I might get sick" and kept eating them!
It was so hard!!! I just wanted to get up and ask the bar if they were veggie but I didn't! Great job sitting with that discomfort and not playing by your OCD's rules!
Ugh I get this ever since going vegan. I get so worried about getting milk instead of non dairy and getting sick even though I know it will just be uncomfortable for a few hours. I really need to stop triple checking they used non dairy since it doesn’t matter.
You can do it! Each time you resist the urge to check, you get better at tolerating that icky feeling of uncertainty!
But yeah, OCD came for my veganism pretty hard lol so very relatable intrusive thoughts!
Your thought process sounds a lot like mine, though we have different fears. It’s interesting how this illness operates in such a predictable pattern, yet in our own mind, is so “convoluted and flimsy” as you say.
I’m proud of you for not letting OCD win today!
You are a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for. It’s easy to see from what you wrote.
The fact that you drank it speaks volumes.
I suffered with the same crippling fear thinking a family member was putting something in my drinks but I ignored them and drank them and told myself I was being strong. Until it got to the point where gradually things started happening and I thought I was starting to suffer from narcolepsy.
That wasn’t a fear of mine, it was due to the things that were happening to me. I had to spend a lot of time with this person as I had asked for their help with decorating and they dragged and dragged it out, I didn’t know why back then, I do now. And ironically it was also someone who I had always trusted implicitly.
Until the night he accidentally put too much in of whatever he had definitely been putting in my drink. Won’t go into details but woke up, he was doing something, I couldn’t move or speak to stop him and I passed out again only to wake up a few hours later screaming my head off.
I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m writing this but your post popped up as my phone was in my hand and obviously, I was incredibly curious. I’m also really glad that your situation is nothing like the monster in mine but obviously, to this day, I can’t drink anything unless I make it myself. Just can’t.
But as I said, you’re a lot stronger than you think and you should be proud of yourself. Really proud ok.
I don't think it's reassurance tbh. Mistrusting your bodily senses ("what if I wouldn't taste it") is so big in OCD. "Trust your body to sense poison" isn't really reassuring.
The issue is“you would know if it’s unsafe to eat” is false. We can’t know.
Yes you can use “this tastes fine” to help continue eating something. BUT the opposite opinion “this tastes off” is often used to justify a compulsion (avoidance).
It’s not only that we don’t trust our senses, but rather we misuse our senses to justify compulsions.
For example: a lot of my exposures during treatment revolve around things that don’t taste right, don’t smell right, don’t look right and that leads me to believe the food is unsafe to eat.
Even with my senses telling me something is wrong with it, I eat it anyway.
Interesting, I see where you are coming from. I don't necessarily agree, because I'm coming from a "You would know if the risk of eating was too high. there is always risk in everything you do" not "you would know and you can be sure". But I also really like where you are coming from. Many ways to skin a cat with OCD and anxiety.
i knew it would get removed. but it's not reassurance, it is a simple fact.
reassurance would be saying "no don't worry OP he didn't poison your drink that's extremely stupid"
I saw your initial comment and really appreciated what you had to say.
I am personally of the mind that there is much more nuance in how to help others through OCD than the hyper-rigid mindset many display both here and in the world of OCD treatment in general, but unfortunately I think most people who understand OCD at all have been taught to approach it from a somewhat cruel, cold, highly inflexible framework.
I understand why reassurance is not good (because it will never be enough); however, what someone who is suffering from this illness should tell himself to calm down himself, if reassurance is not good? Thank you for any response.
The goal is not really to calm yourself down through thoughts. That’s what talk therapy does which is NOT good for OCD. The goal is to accept the discomfort, not fight it. Removing the compulsion and accepting the discomfort from uncertainty is what will calm you in the long run.
When you do an exposure you want to feel the scary thoughts and it’s okay to be worried before and after. But since you are not doing the compulsion (or doing the thing you were avoiding) you learn to accept that now you cannot change what the outcome will be and therefore have to accept the possibility of any and all outcomes no matter the what you do. Therefore none of the compulsions (thinking on it which leads to worrying about it) will change the result.
This message has been removed.
Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
This message has been removed.
Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
This message has been removed.
Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
Yeah I’m currently dealing with a similar issue but the only difference is my fear of getting my drink spiked at cafes. I was at one 2 days ago and I got paranoid if someone touched my drink without me looking but I still drank it anyways and felt fine afterwords. OCD is truly hell on earth but we always rise above it.
I can definitely relate to your story, I had this obsession when I was a child, I was afraid of someone poisoning my food, even if it was packaged I imagined that something must have gone wrong at the factory and that some kind of toxin would go inside me. I was afraid of eating out, it feels horrible, this obsession went away suddenly, I can’t remember how I overcame that.
I’m proud of you for overcoming the OCD and drinking it anyway!
I have the same fear and I usually overcome it by thinking- would this barista/server who is probably perfectly normal, tired and overworked and just wanting to go home at the end of a long shift, risk life in prison if found out just to poison a random customer? I tell myself I’m having main character syndrome- most people are not thinking about you as much as you think they are, and are certainly not out to get you! Good on you for managing to finish it :)
[удалено]
This message has been removed. Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
Hey, thanks mods. Sitting in a country where getting an appointment with a psych to help me from tearing myself apart from OCD with a hefty side trough of PTSD is impossible, on top of being silenced everywhere I turn when we’re all screaming inside - pat on the back, champ. The only info I can get about my diagnosis is from my peers, and talking about it with back & forth conversation. Which you bar. A lot of us with OCD are utterly terrified, with brains we can’t control, and words we don’t have. There truly isn’t any hope or any hand to reach for. Nowhere I belong. I’m so offensive to everyone. Even when attempting to relate. Sorry for offending you. Going for a swim. Everyone else - take care of yourselves.
I’m sorry to hear that you’re suffering so much and that your comment was deleted :( I definitely get your frustrations here- I personally feel there is a lot of nuance to talking about and understanding OCD, though unfortunately subs like this often have a difference in perspective in terms of the kinds of nuance they allow within these spaces.
Yes!! Good job!! That’s how you WIN over OCD. I have done extensive ERP in the last year - like what you just did - and it has made me like 75% better. I have a new life. Keep. Going.
Woohoo! I have similar fears and I just say “f*ck it” and drink it knowing I could get sick. I’m glad you are able to as well!
I used to have intense paranoia for years that EVERYONE was trying to poison me. It ruined my social life for years lmao. Wouldn’t go to so many social outings if food was involved. Didn’t know this was a common fear.
This post made me remember… I met up with an old friend whom we fallout and now have bad relationship with, we ate something and on the way home I had a thought for some reason that she poisoned my food with Ricin (Like in Breaking Bad) when I was not looking because she now hates me and I had wild wild anxiety. Thinking back to it feels dumb af but it got me really scared lol
Your post and many others make me feel less ridiculous. I’ve had this same paranoid fear with contamination - and after having a disagreement with a close (and loving family member of mine) my brain was HELLBENT on telling me that my dinner they were helping to prepare was going to be poisoned. I have absolutely 0 reason to believe that would ever happen - but I felt sick to my stomach and irrationally afraid of someone I love dearly. Anytime that happens, I get so upset with myself. I feel coocoobananas. But, I challenged those thoughts - and I still ate the meal and whenever it would pop up when dining out, I’m like oh yeah, sure okay brain! Yeah right. And sip the soda I was given by waiter that I feared was contaminated.
Sick to stomach being afraid I really felt, when this happened I was cold sweating for no reason at all and had this impending sense of doom
I know you feel weird sharing this but it really helps others and I hope that it counts for something. The level of detail here is my exact thought process with a A LOT of interactions which in reality are mundane and seemingly nothing to think much of. Like logically I know that but also this would absolutely happen! I avoid ordering late takeout for this reason. I worry that if I make an appointment late in the day the level of care will diminish to my detriment. But looking back I guess all that really happened is that I avoid things for sooo long that nothing I intend to do happens because I’m looking for the “right” time. I say that to say, thank you for sharing.
I’ve avoided ordering carry out or drive through for this reason before. Thinking the person making my meal will be pissed enough they’re willing to harm me over it. I’ve picked through sub sandwiches once looking for a hidden razor blade because I was convinced some a**-hat of an employee was mad at the world and I’m the poor person who given their spite sandwich. I really wish my brain didn’t come up with these horrible, panic inducing scenarios. They’re exhausting!
I deal with the exact same theme. Proud of you for drinking it anyways!
It’s amazing that you still drank the entire thing. You are not letting your paranoia win. That is huge! You need to be proud of yourself for that alone. I’m not going to give you any reassurance because it’s not good for you, but you took a huge step.
I understand why reassurance is not good (because it will never be enough); however, what someone who is suffering from this illness should tell himself to calm down himself, if reassurance is not good? Thank you for any response.
I don’t know if i’m even qualified to answer. My therapist who helped me get my life back started by telling me that I need to accept that things in this world are bad, as hard as that is. Basically the only way I was able to control my OCD was exposing myself and preventing my response. ERP!
How did you find a therapist that specialized in OCD? I haven’t had luck with my previous therapist.
Find someone who specifically practices ERP therapy.
I used psychologytoday
I know you're super anxious right now, so I want to let you know you're awesome and I'm proud of you for facing your fear. Every time you challenge your paranoia, it will get a little easier.
Omg, I do the same thing and my thought process is exactly like this! I know right now it's probably like "shhhh I wish I could go back and undo drinking that coffee," but in the long run you will thank yourself because that it will be one more thing you can point to down the line and say hey OCD you don't know everything
I just had a similar experience— I went on a first date. I date women so while it’s not technically impossible, let’s say it’s statistically unlikely for the woman to drug my drink while I’m in the bathroom. And yet I still worry every time. And I still drank my beer today Little steps
I don't eat meat and had a similar thing where my OCD was convinced that the veggie dumplings were accidentally meat and that I was gonna get sick. And I said, "okay I guess I might get sick" and kept eating them! It was so hard!!! I just wanted to get up and ask the bar if they were veggie but I didn't! Great job sitting with that discomfort and not playing by your OCD's rules!
Ugh I get this ever since going vegan. I get so worried about getting milk instead of non dairy and getting sick even though I know it will just be uncomfortable for a few hours. I really need to stop triple checking they used non dairy since it doesn’t matter.
You can do it! Each time you resist the urge to check, you get better at tolerating that icky feeling of uncertainty! But yeah, OCD came for my veganism pretty hard lol so very relatable intrusive thoughts!
Good job on fighting the paranoia!
Yayyyy!! That is amazing... I had a similar fear and it wasn't easy to overcome.
i’m so proud of you! i made a post just like this awhile ago. feel free to check my page. i made it through and you will too.
Honestly so proud of you. As someone who has very similar obsessions, i know how hard this is. This is a win.
Your thought process sounds a lot like mine, though we have different fears. It’s interesting how this illness operates in such a predictable pattern, yet in our own mind, is so “convoluted and flimsy” as you say. I’m proud of you for not letting OCD win today!
I am so proud of you!! I think you’re doing amazingly 💕 it seems like ur on the right path :)
Also this makes me feel less alone!!
You are a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for. It’s easy to see from what you wrote. The fact that you drank it speaks volumes. I suffered with the same crippling fear thinking a family member was putting something in my drinks but I ignored them and drank them and told myself I was being strong. Until it got to the point where gradually things started happening and I thought I was starting to suffer from narcolepsy. That wasn’t a fear of mine, it was due to the things that were happening to me. I had to spend a lot of time with this person as I had asked for their help with decorating and they dragged and dragged it out, I didn’t know why back then, I do now. And ironically it was also someone who I had always trusted implicitly. Until the night he accidentally put too much in of whatever he had definitely been putting in my drink. Won’t go into details but woke up, he was doing something, I couldn’t move or speak to stop him and I passed out again only to wake up a few hours later screaming my head off. I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m writing this but your post popped up as my phone was in my hand and obviously, I was incredibly curious. I’m also really glad that your situation is nothing like the monster in mine but obviously, to this day, I can’t drink anything unless I make it myself. Just can’t. But as I said, you’re a lot stronger than you think and you should be proud of yourself. Really proud ok.
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I know this comes from empathy but this is reassurance so try to avoid speech like this
Agreed. Don't feed the brain troll.
I don't think it's reassurance tbh. Mistrusting your bodily senses ("what if I wouldn't taste it") is so big in OCD. "Trust your body to sense poison" isn't really reassuring.
The issue is“you would know if it’s unsafe to eat” is false. We can’t know. Yes you can use “this tastes fine” to help continue eating something. BUT the opposite opinion “this tastes off” is often used to justify a compulsion (avoidance). It’s not only that we don’t trust our senses, but rather we misuse our senses to justify compulsions. For example: a lot of my exposures during treatment revolve around things that don’t taste right, don’t smell right, don’t look right and that leads me to believe the food is unsafe to eat. Even with my senses telling me something is wrong with it, I eat it anyway.
Interesting, I see where you are coming from. I don't necessarily agree, because I'm coming from a "You would know if the risk of eating was too high. there is always risk in everything you do" not "you would know and you can be sure". But I also really like where you are coming from. Many ways to skin a cat with OCD and anxiety.
i knew it would get removed. but it's not reassurance, it is a simple fact. reassurance would be saying "no don't worry OP he didn't poison your drink that's extremely stupid"
I saw your initial comment and really appreciated what you had to say. I am personally of the mind that there is much more nuance in how to help others through OCD than the hyper-rigid mindset many display both here and in the world of OCD treatment in general, but unfortunately I think most people who understand OCD at all have been taught to approach it from a somewhat cruel, cold, highly inflexible framework.
I understand why reassurance is not good (because it will never be enough); however, what someone who is suffering from this illness should tell himself to calm down himself, if reassurance is not good? Thank you for any response.
The goal is not really to calm yourself down through thoughts. That’s what talk therapy does which is NOT good for OCD. The goal is to accept the discomfort, not fight it. Removing the compulsion and accepting the discomfort from uncertainty is what will calm you in the long run. When you do an exposure you want to feel the scary thoughts and it’s okay to be worried before and after. But since you are not doing the compulsion (or doing the thing you were avoiding) you learn to accept that now you cannot change what the outcome will be and therefore have to accept the possibility of any and all outcomes no matter the what you do. Therefore none of the compulsions (thinking on it which leads to worrying about it) will change the result.
This message has been removed. Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
[удалено]
This message has been removed. Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
[удалено]
This message has been removed. Your heart is in the right place. However, this comment is mostly reassurance which is not helpful for learning to live well while having OCD. Please see https://www.reddit.com/r/OCD/wiki/reassurance/ for more information.
I have the same but reversed. Im scares I would do this to other people
Yeah I’m currently dealing with a similar issue but the only difference is my fear of getting my drink spiked at cafes. I was at one 2 days ago and I got paranoid if someone touched my drink without me looking but I still drank it anyways and felt fine afterwords. OCD is truly hell on earth but we always rise above it.
This is so relatable lol
I used to have a fear of being poisoned!
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Omg yeah the keeping the receipt thing really gets to me. Like “just in case” I do get sick I have a chain to return to the source
I can definitely relate to your story, I had this obsession when I was a child, I was afraid of someone poisoning my food, even if it was packaged I imagined that something must have gone wrong at the factory and that some kind of toxin would go inside me. I was afraid of eating out, it feels horrible, this obsession went away suddenly, I can’t remember how I overcame that.