Obsession with looking up distressing things related to HOCD

Hello everyone! I don't want to beat around the bush and am quite... distressed, for a lack of better words, if the title didn't clue you in. I'm a 21 year old lesbian who's been having a really hard time lately following a stressful incident that triggered about a million awful things at once, including my OCD. I've been recently diagnosed (?) with OCD - if you could even call it that, as I've just had both a therapist and psychiatrist tell me I have OCD and prescribe medication without specifying much else... so not the most helpful thing ever, but I've known that I have it if the last six or so months of my life has been any indicator since my breakdown began. My intrusive thoughts themselves started in about late October, and I've since experienced a whole "fun" array of them including violent thoughts, pedophilic thoughts, incesteous thoughts, fear of being a sociopath, obsessing over false memories, and... HOCD... obviously in my case, this is heterosexual OCD since I'm a lesbian woman. All of the listed have been painful and scary to deal with, but it seems my HOCD is what surfaces the most and is making it incredibly hard to function.

I don't want to make this post any longer than this has to be (and I can already tell it's going to be long - thank you for sticking with me) so basically, my HOCD started in October when a nice dude talked to me from his card window and my brain decided to start telling me I was attracted to men and was actually straight all this time, even though I barely saw his face, and the conversation was about a 5 second exchange. It sounds silly, but this set what was probably the worst month or two of my life in a long time into motion. I detail the experience more here (obsessive-compulsive/topic201066.html). I was extremely suicidal and having intrusive thoughts of being with men - my brain was telling me that I was actually straight even though I have the most beautiful girlfriend in the world who I'm incredibly in love with, and that I would one day submit to a man, as is "natural" for women, and I would enjoy having sex with one. I took up drinking and drugs to try to make the thoughts go away. Every time I would see a man on TV, my brain would start telling me things like "don't you think he's hot? You know you do! Look at his muscles!" and such, even though I had never felt that way before, and have always been naturally attracted to women's bodies while brushing off just about everything regarding men. My suicidality reached the point where I got prescribed heavy medication and had to go to the ER for suicidal thoughts to check myself in to the psych ward.

Some time after this, my HOCD calmed down... and though it was still there, it wasn't nearly as horrific as it once was. But even then, life wasn't a walk in the park, as I started to deal with my previously listed thoughts too as well as symptoms from my delightful assortment of various other diagnosed mental illnesses. It's a bit of a mixed bag as far as the thoughts go - sometimes I'll have violent thoughts, other times I have POCD, but the HOCD was fairly at bay until another event triggered them once more... which is what brings me here, since they're currently destroying me again.

This is incredibly embarrassing for me to admit but I need help so I'm going to attempt to be honest here. I have always coped through fiction since I was a child - the stories and characters I loved were always a form of escape for me, especially when I was being bullied and heavily abused by my father. I'm currently in love with two wonderful lesbian characters who are a couple from my favorite novel series and they are, frankly, my world. I pretty much rely on them for my happiness and they lift me when I'm down even when things seem to be the worst of the worst in my life just by thinking of them, which I suppose has been a bad move on my part since my mood relies on them and I've unhealthily centered my life around these two characters. I've been very attached to them for a little over a year now and recently my feelings for them have started to be affected by my mental illness (after my whole mental breakdown started, surprise, totally not related!) and it's making me panic badly. When I got hit with my first huge wave of HOCD - I could barely look at them because I was so consumed by shame. My thoughts were "how can I say I love them when I'm not a lesbian? They're so strong and proud of who they are, and I'm a faker" and "I don't deserve to love them", things of that nature. I was in a lot of pain when I felt that I had lost them due to my thoughts but once they went away, my feelings of affection returned and I was relieved.

However, about a month ago, I stumbled upon a blog that depicted these lesbian characters I love so much being written as being brainwashed into having sex with men... just some dumb fetish stuff I should ignore, except that this resounds deeply with my HOCD. Being forced into being with men in such a violent and cruel way, much like my thoughts that tried to tell me I would enjoy having sex with them and that it would inevitably come. Long story short, I am downward spiraling again because... I'm consumed with impulses to look at the blog that depicts these horrible things. Totally makes sense, right? The first time I stumbled upon the page, I actually masturbated to the content on the blog while weeping furiously and wanting to throw up, and then followed it up by having a severe self-harm relapse. I didn't want to do that and it still fills me with incredible sickness. After this, I tried to ignore the impulses to look at the blog again since I knew it would have horrible consequences and make me feel worse, but every second of every day I was filled with anxiety and obsessive thoughts to just look! Maybe if I looked, the anxiety would go away... maybe it would be better to face it again and stop wondering what they're writing so why am I resisting it? After a week of not looking and trying to distract myself, I looked at the blog yesterday and now my intrusive thoughts of HOCD are nearly back in full bloom from what I read on it because it was... uh, truly vile. However, instead of the thoughts being particularly about myself being with men, they are about the characters I'm attached to. When I think of them, I see them with men in the crudest ways and it's making me sick to my stomach, it's making my heart ache. I don't want it to be like this forever. I don't want to lose something that means so much to me just because I found some content on the internet I didn't like. I had a bit of a breakdown and self-harmed again because of this and will probably continue to do so. Why can't I just ignore them like a normal person? Even now I want to go back and look at the blog, it's like some sick obsession I can't control even though it's tearing me up inside.

Within these past few months of experiencing these things, I've come to realize I've had symptoms of OCD for a very long time and I've always sort of hard obsessions with checking in on things I didn't like, starting from when I was about fourteen or maybe even younger. For a majority of my experience dealing with mental illness, I always assumed this was a form of self-sabotaging behavior since I also have Borderline Personality Disorder and am an expert at tearing myself down when I find the smallest shred of happiness in my life.

My question is: where do I go from here? As I stated, I do not want to lose something I love so passionately and dearly to my thoughts. I currently only feel upset and disgust when I think of these characters and it's making me want to die. I want to be able to say "screw you stupid person writing this gross blog and screw you gross thoughts! You know none of this is real, I'm gonna keep loving them!" but I can't even if I try to hype myself up to it or whatever. How should I work up the courage to seek help for this? I've told multiple doctors of all kinds within the last few months that I've been having intrusive thoughts but I never detail what sort they are because I'm so embarrassed and scared, which is why it's my fault that I've not actually gotten any real help with OCD specifically. Especially now that it includes fictional characters! Which is extremely dumb! Except that it's not dumb to me, because I love them and it's really hurting me. Should I just be honest? Will I be judged by any doctors? I'm admittedly overwhelmed and don't know where to begin since I have a lot of problems and other mental illnesses I need to get sorted out which include but are not limited to my Bipolar 2, agoraphobia, and my chronic dissociation.

I just started DBT, will that help with OCD or should I seek out OCD treatment specifically? I was also prescribed abilify which the psychiatrist I saw explained would take care of everything (including my OCD) but I've been too scared to take it since the last time I was on medication I got extremely physically sick.

If anyone has any advice on what I should do personally to try and help myself at the moment or how I should ask for further help from professionals without feeling embarrassed or guilty, I would greatly appreciate that you share! I'm in severe anxiety and the depression is unbearable. I very much need help. If you made it to the end of this post all I can offer is my thanks, I know it was a lot to read through but I think that's everything that I needed to say.

Thank you again and I look forward to any responses! I could really, really use anything you can offer.

You shouldn’t be embarrassed to talk to your therapist about these thoughts. They are there to help and will not judge you. If I were you I would see about starting OCD specific treatment, such as cognitive behavioral therapy. Lastly TAKE YOUR MEDICINE!! It will really help, if this medicine doesn’t work or makes you sick talk to your doctor and keep trying until you find the right medicine.