I am pregnant and experiencing severe OCD. PLEASE help me :(

Hello. I am 21 years old and 5 months pregnant. I am definitely experiencing severe symptoms of OCD (intrusive thoughts) and overwhelming stress and anxiety over all of the bad thoughts. I realize that the OCD symptoms started a few months ago with checking lights, making sure the A/C is off when I leave, checking the stove, checking the plug outlets where I plug in my curling iron or straightener and I will check these things many times, sometimes even turn around when I'm on my way to work to make sure that the house doesn't burn down and my husband will want to divorce me for my stupid mistake that would cost everything we had. Another symptom I realized was OCD was being afraid of germs now that I am pregnant, fearing that not washing my hands enough or cleaning my body with the wrong soaps would hurt the baby..this fear wasn't as irrational as my others and only lasted very short term but it all led up to what I am dealing with now. The first thoughts that really made me feel paralyzed, sick, and scared to death was that something would happen to my husband. I have been praying the same prayer every night and I always make sure I say all the same things because I am so afraid of ever losing him because I don't know what I would do, he is my everything. I started fearing so much that he would get in a car accident or something would happen at work if I didn't make sure to pray for him and kiss and hug him goodbye and tell him to be safe and suddenly these horrible terrifying thoughts started attacking me that I actually wanted to hurt him or kill him. These thoughts would make me break down in tears and cry so bad and I would be so scared and pray to God that he wouldn't let anything happen to my husband or let anyone hurt him and to forgive me for these horrible thoughts. I would see images of me doing horrible things to him no matter what I was doing, whatever I was occupied with at the time became involved in the thought: for example, washing dishes and having the knife in my hand and seeing scary things that people do to others on TV didn't help. Soon that turned into thinking sexual thoughts about children and this one hurt me so much to be thinking awful things like this. I couldn't understand how I could possibly ever think something this way, and one day I made the thoughts go on to some random guy so I would feel guilty over that instead. In my mind, it made me feel so guilty to have these sexual thoughts about this kids father like I imagined doing the things I do with my husband and just horrible things. I feel that I have these thoughts and hurt myself with them and attack myself because hurting my husband like that is the worst thing I could possibly ever ever do. I would never cheat on him or want to cheat on him and I want these thoughts to go away. I felt so guilty about that guy and I was trying to forget it and I was making love with my husband and those thoughts kept popping up .. thoughts such as what I had visioned but also hearing things in my mind like the way you say your partner's name during that act of love and passion..only it was saying that guys name and hearing him say mine. It is so disgusting and I feel so disgusting to say this and admit it. I told my husband what was going on with me and I completely broke down in tears and was so so upset. After he accepted me instead of getting upset and he comforted me and laid my head on his lap and rubbed my head for me and then during that all I could think of was the guilt and how i didn't deserve someone who loves me that much and my mind raced to all these different guys, mainly ones that he would be more upset about and I don't know why. I told him of all of these thoughts and he tried to help me but I know he doesn't completely understand. It went on for a few days and I tried to tell myself what he said.. "they are just thoughts, accept them and let them go." But finally I thought bad thoughts about his best friend, almost his brother, and the thoughts haven't changed to person to person since that .. maybe because this friend is the one that it would hurt him the most if those things and thoughts really happened. I have felt so sick and guilty of these thoughts and they only get worse. I think bad bad things and anything can trigger a thought. I think I also feel bad because I think that his friend is attractive.. but I am not attracted to him. I have NEVER had these thoughts about him until now that it is killing me. I think about all the things my husband and I do and its with this guy instead. It hurts me so bad I can't do anything with my husband and I'm afraid to make love with him or be passionate. Even when I go to kiss him or talk to him or hold him I keep getting the thoughts or hearing that guys name or the love noises i talked about. I know this sounds crazy and I should just get over it but its hurting me so bad and I feel that I would feel better if I could tell my husband all of the bad thoughts. This is the 4th day I have been dealing with the thoughts about his friend and it has broken me down so much. I told him I wanted to talk tonight because I cant handle it anymore and he said okay if that will make me feel better. I just feel so guilty all of the time and its the strangest things that make me think these terrible thoughts, like dirty dirty things. and I am a pure person and I had an innocent mind and I just want that back. I have never done anything sexual or have had sex with any other man in my life other than my husband and I never want to. I get thoughts like I want his friend to do that stuff with me and compare them and i Hate it because there is no comparison. They are very much alike each other physique wise and i just get bad thoughts about everything. Like his friends lips are bigger so he'd kiss better or do u know.. oral better or like maybe because he is a bigger guy he has bigger fingers or bigger whatever I don't know what I think this because I am so deeply emotionally and physically in love with my husband but these thoughts are not true I never want to think that and that thought came when I was thinking about how much I lLOVE kissing my husband and I love his lips. Its just stupid things like that that trigger thoughts. I see this re occurring thoughts of having sex with all the different people I had bad thoughts about the way that my husband and I do and now its just with this guy and it is killing me. I am in the process of setting up counseling and waiting for the phone call to set up my appointment and my husband wants to come with me. I am so lucky to have a husband who does his best to support and understand me and loves me unconditionally. He said he hates seeing me so upset and sad and unhappy and its killing him inside because he doesn't know what to do. It's killing me that I keep doing this to him and I keep telling him I had a bad day when he comes home and asks me how my day was and I just cry. I have been this way for 2 weeks now and I really need help. The thoughts attack me all day long .. I don't go 5 minutes without having these thoughts honestly and it makes my tummy hurt and makes me feel like throwing up and gives me migraines. I feel all alone and I feel like something is so so wrong with me. I was completely fine before this and my husband says its partly because I'm pregnant and EXTREMELY emotional and my anxiety is getting worse and worse because of this. I need help I'm scared all my stress will hurt my baby. I just want this to go away. I was going to quit my job in a month from now because I'm pregnant and have been sick but I just quit today because I can't bear to go anymore. I am too emotionally weak right now and emotionally exhausted and depressed. I just need help. Can someone give me any advice? I'm sorry this post is so long. Please help

Yellow, please don't worry about these things - well that's a silly thing for me to say, but what I mean is, I haven't had children myself, but I've spoken to women who have, (including an ex therapist), and women can have some very strange thoughts whilst pregnant.
I'm no expert, but it sounds to me like a mixture of ocd and pregnancy related depression.
I'm glad that you're arranging counselling, so that you can get the help and reassurance that you deserve and need.
With ocd, it's as if our brains are our enemies, isn't it, determined to come up with whatever they can to upset us?
I hope that you feel better soon.

Thank you so much for your response. I have been having much trouble with this and I broke down and told my husband all about the bad thoughts about his friend and it seemed the more I confessed and he wasn't saying anything, the more thoughts kept popping into my head no matter what I thought of it just made the thought turn sexual and involve his friend. I don't really know how to explain it differently. I do not have any sexual feelings or attraction to this guy but the guilt is what makes it worse and worse. My husband got really upset and I really hurt him because I don't think he understands that these thoughts are killing me and hurting me .. he thinks that they come from a place deep down that I really want them to happen and its just my thoughts amplified.. but that isn't true at all. And with OCD, I've read that it can cause very much self doubt about things so it has been making me doubt myself that I really want these things, even though I know I don't. I have NEVER had thoughts like this about him or any other man other than my husband and I think it is the fact that I have always been faithful to him and I have only ever been with him that causes so much guilt to me. I won't confess any more bad thoughts to him now.. he is so hurt I can tell and I wish I kept it to myself.. he said I could talk to him and tell him if it made me feel better. But he says that confessing all these things is only feeding my problem and he's right. Today I keep having bad thoughts continuing when I thought it would feel better after I told him but it doesn't and I think a large part of it is because I know he's at work and coming home soon but all day I have known he is so upset and doesn't understand.. and actually thinks I want all these dirty dirty thoughts to really happen. I just need help and I feel like my emotions and this mental state I guess you would call it, is just out of control possibly because of the pregnancy hormones and just the slight OCD issues I have always had somewhere deep within .. they just rose to the surface and became a huge problem. Thank you for your reassurance, its hard not to hate myself for this and I have been still afraid to even touch him because I fear the bad thoughts will come to mind and I don't want to be thinking about someone else, whether it's unwanted or not. I know the fear of it is what brings the thoughts but I can't figure out how to just feel at peace with this. I feel like I don't deserve his love anymore.

Yellow, to someone without ocd, your thoughts may sound hurtful or strange, but believe me, as a fellow ocd sufferer, they don't sound strange at all; I know where you're coming from, and it sounds as though you've got a sort of confessional version of ocd too, which I understand.
The trouble is, we doubt our own minds, and when we confess our thoughts to people, they don't understand that it's a sort of self sabotage. The only 'purpose' of those thoughts is to upset us, by giving us fears that we have 'forbidden' desires.
I've had far worse thoughts than you, and, like your husband, the people that my thoughts involved have sometimes been hurt by them, and not able to fully dismiss them as ocd fuelled, because they didn't fully understand how ocd brains work. You did right to tell your husband - you are suffering, and he wanted you to tell him, so that he could help you - you had to tell someone, and who else would you tell but the person closest to you - there is no-one else whom you could have told, in your circumstances. I've done the same.
Perhaps you could explain to your husband that if people with ocd told their nearest and dearest about their ocd thoughts, they would be similarly hurt, but that they have absolutely nothing to be really worried or hurt about.
Get yourself and your husband along to that therapist, so that the therapist can explain to your husband that your thoughts are not related to any secret desires on your part.
Best wishes,
funky.

Thank you very much. You're right and that definitely helps. But I did something really really bad today. I thought I was getting better and just the nagging of his name in my head like taunting me about the thoughts kept happening, and I told myself that I don't have to think of anything I don't want to think about so I won't. It kept happening but I thought I was progressing. Well it has been about 2 weeks since my husband and I have been intimate at all and I felt really aroused just thinking about his body and how much I miss him and just want to make love with him and everything because he's at work and I was just waking up laying there. I have been so so afraid of making love with him or doing anything with him thinking that those bad thoughts would arise that I would think the friends name or images or anything like I have been during the bad thoughts. So, I thought that if I could do it to myself and touch myself without thinking the bad thoughts or images, then the fears would be gone about making love with him and along with that, the bad thoughts would probably go away too because I know that it is my fear about that that is fueling them. So I did it and this time I stared at the picture of my husband's face on my phone and it was working until the friend's name popped into my head because I was trying soo hard not to let it and it did.. and I was trying to just imagine my husband's body and instead this thought of the friend's body popped up like his chest and grabbing it like i do my husbands and stuff..and I could see it how it really is because I know what it looks like.. they walk around with their shirts off all the time and he has a tattoo of his wife's name on it and I thought of that too and now I'm having the bad thought that it said mine instead. THAT IS HORRIBLE. I don't know why I thought these things and now I'm feeling like I'm going to be sick and I don't know what to do. I'm sweating and feel nauseous and I just need help. The thing that bothers me so much too about it is that I have never thought of anyone else during sex or when I did that to myself .. ever. I don't imagine other guys just my husband. I know it is because I was really really wanting my husband but it got me off so fast.. and I know it wasn't because of the bad thoughts that intruded but those thoughts didn't stop it either. I stopped when I thought of them and then tried to keep going and keep them out. I kept thinking my husband's name but then right after I'd think the friend's. I need to tell my husband and I'm so scared he'll want to divorce me. He said that out of anger and I think just being hurt the night I told him about just the thoughts of his friend. He got so mad because I was having a break down over it .. I mean I was really broken down. And he didn't say anything about it like it was okay or anything.. it just hurt him too much. The next day he said that we had a lot to talk about when he got home but that the end result would always be for better and for worse. We didn't end up talking about it though... just kind of acted like nothing happened. I'm scared to death that he will want to divorce me. And I never do that stuff to myself either, we usually make love all the time and its been 2 weeks and I just was so scared I wanted this all to go away. How can I possibly make him understand that? You're right.. its not a secret passion that I want to fulfill with his friend but the doubting of it all and the fact that I got off and all that makes me doubt that and I know its not true!! It's just that his friend is attractive and I know what he looks like enough to see it in my head and that hurts me SO much beyond belief but knowing that I think that about him makes me have bad thoughts like this too and afraid to be with my husband.. now im more afraid than ever and it's killing me. I've never heard of anyone having this problem with OCD before. I've heard of all the other things I started off dealing with and going through, but not this. I know its OCD but I don't know how to stop feeling dreadful and actually be happy and feel peace within.

This is going to sound extremely trite in view of what you've just written, but do you realise that if you'd tried desperately to avoid picturing and becoming aroused by Bugs Bunny, that's exactly what would have happened? You can see the serious point that I'm making.

Stop beating yourself up - have you booked an appointment to see a therapist yet? It's important that a professional person can explain to your husband what is really happening.

P.s. - Yelllow, I hope that I didn't upset you with that silly 'joke' above. I meant well, and I was making the serious point that if we try to avoid thinking about someone or something, we are very likely to end up thinking about them.

I hope that you can get the help of a therapist soon. Best wishes to you.

Yellow, please would you read my last post to you again? I've added an apology to it. Thanks, and best wishes, from funky.

Funky, no need to apologize for anything at all! You are completely right and what you said made me laugh. It's true. I guess my problem is just trying to hard not to think about it and then I end up thinking about it all the time and it really is tearing me apart. Thank you so much for responding to my non stop chatter about this. I know I sound ridiculous and this is all so stupid but it's been so hard on me. I am trying to get this appointment but the way our insurance works, I have to get a referral from my OBGYN first before I can go to the therapist and they haven't called me back and it has been over a week. They called me twice just to ask questions they needed about my insurance but said they were still working on it. Hopefully by Monday I'll be able to set up an appointment for not too far in the future. I can't handle this stuff anymore it's just too much and I just want to be happy and feel peace again. Thank you again for helping me, it really means a lot.

Hello there, yellow. I'm glad that what I wrote was helpful, not hurtful. Very best of luck with that therapy, I hope that you can see someone soon.
You don't sound ridiculous or stupid, everyone with ocd knows that their thoughts are illogical, but if that was enough to stop our minds from behaving as they do, none of us would have problems.
All the best to you,
funky.

Yellow,
Just wanted to say good luck with your situation. I have never been pregnant but we want to try soon. I have had some really bad patches of OCD in my past and I am terrified. My best words of advice are that as torturous as these thoughts are, there will be a time in the future when they will at least decrease a lot (whether that's due to less pregnancy hormones, medication, therapy...whatever). Things will get better. Best of luck.
S