***How Are You Feeling Today???*** (may trigger)

I mean personally I'd be terrified at the idea of pregnancy, but why on earth would it be creepy to be happy to be pregnant by someone you like? Even if but a dream.

I dunno. Some of my friends whom I've told have said that. They were guys tho so that might explains it...

Artninja1995 wrote:I dunno. Some of my friends whom I've told have said that. They were guys tho so that might explains it...

I was about to protest that *I'm* a guy but after looking at my avatar, never mind. I'm more openly gender balanced than most, xo I don't find it creepy or inexplicable in the least.

Well now wait, dammit. I AM a guy and it's not any more creepy than when I see expectant fathers more excited over the stork booking reservations than their wives are. Yeah. ###$ that $#%^.

I didnt mean to imply that all guys are like that. I dunno :/ They just thought it was creepy cause i wasn't dating the guy and he already had a girlfriend so.

Agh so it's going haywire again due to the few times i thought I was different from everyone else in my childhood. But that was cause I felt like I looked more freakish than anyone else; I thought my head was bigger, I had bigger eyes. But of course OCD is just LOVING that right now.

Ain't big eyes supposed to be a good thing? That's what mascara and eyeliner are for, right?

And I still don't think it's THAT creepy. Besides which anything goes in Dreamland.

i mean like big big bug eyes. Like in my own eyes I seemed more...cartoonish? than everyone else, I dunno. I have a really strange way of looking at things I've come to notice over the years.

agh crap and now HOCD is being a bother. It's like trying to make me thing I don't want to be with guys anymore and that I'm starting to reject them

***extra trigger warnings***

Artninja1995 wrote:i mean like big big bug eyes. Like in my own eyes I seemed more...cartoonish? than everyone else, I dunno. I have a really strange way of looking at things I've come to notice over the years.

I KNEW... I knew I knew I just knew, you were going to respond that you had big bug eyes. WHICH... you KNOW, works on some people. I mean there's a song about Bette Davis' eyes, not that you're really old enough to know that so I'm assuming it's still enough in the popular consciousness that it rings a bell.

Seriously I wrote that and said to myself 'she's going to complain she has bug eyes'

Artninja1995 wrote:agh crap and now HOCD is being a bother. It's like trying to make me thing I don't want to be with guys anymore and that I'm starting to reject them

Oh btw I was gratified that you'd been girling it up, and disappointed that it was... mixed results.

Arrrgh HOCD. Sometimes... you, and Jdd also, both of you in particular- sometimes I wish I could be a matchmaker and set you up with a fella. Well, not Jdd, obviously- set him up with a chick... you know what I mean.

I fear... that there is no... well, Otter would be the one to ask. He's had theraoy, he's taken meds, though I don't know if for OCD... and he would be more authoritative than I. And I've never actually looked this up. I just know me. My intrusive thought Achilles' Heel has always been Harm-OCD. But I've never had a lick of therapy. I've never taken anything for it. So YMMV but as for me.... there's been no end, no 'cure', no point at which I no longer get intrusive thoughts. I've had harmOCD since I was ten, and I'm fifty-one now. At some point in the last decade, I largely stopped being bothered by the thoughts, and most of the time (not all) I do not do anything special to ward off the feared acting out of hurting someone. I don't care that much about the thoughts anymore. They're a part of me, and they're not going anywhere. Not that I wouldn't mind a magic pill that would take them away. Sometimes I don't think them very much, sometimes it's like every day I think of hurting or killing a loved one. Hell writing about it triggers it- I'm picturing it now. But I'm not freaking out because I've accepted I have those thoughts. I have them, and all the not wanting them in the world hasn't changed the fact that I get those thoughts and will probably have them until I assume room temperature.

But logic... dictates that I'm not a killer. I've never killed anyone. I've had plenty of time now with these thoughts and well it just ain't never come to pass. And I read that everyone- EVERYONE- gets crazy thoughts like HARM OCD or HOCD or TOCD on occasion and for Normals, the thoughts are quickly filed under Huh, wasn't THAT a funny thought? and forgot as quickly as they came. It's just us OCDers that are going to make a big deal over it. SO.... if EVERYONE has thought of pushing their S/O off the edge of a canyon, for example- then logically I'm not a sociopath to have such thoughts. Now- that's not how I feel. I feel like I'm the worst, most evil, closeted, sleeper psychopath there is- I feel like I'm the one you always hear ppl talk about on the news after the middle aged White male is arrested for something heinous- '.....he seemed like such a nice, quiet neighbor.....' THAT... is how I FEEL. But logic tells me different. Logic tells me if in 40 years I haven't acted on thoughts that EVERYONE occasionally has, then I must not be a killer.

So.... it.... particularly distresses me, when y'all are distressed with the H/TOCD. Very few of y'all that post in OCD, and mention OCD by name, or have had previous actual Dxs of OCD, unlike me who had to figure it out for myself- set off my Gaydar. Not that my Gaydar is all THAT great, but while I'm not GAY... I'm not straight, either. I feel somewhere in the middle. Have since adolescence. And past couple decades, felt that way with gender, too. I'm somewhere in the middle. Ppl that post first in the Sexuality or the Gender Identity forums, that don't sound, well, frantic, I've talked to and read their replies and stuff and you know sometimes I get the vibe hey, here's a person that's not sexually/gender normative.

Sometimes... y'all here in OCD will almost have me convinced you're at the most, Bi, or maybe somewhere else in the gender spectrum, but then something will come flying off your keyboard that erases that feeling in a heartbeat.

ANYTHING.. is possible. Human sexuality IS fluid- but I don't think as fluid as you fear it is- AND complex- though again, not as complex as OCD loves to make it out to be. Overanalyzing is OCD's bread and butter, after all. I'm no expert, and I can't diagnose even if I wanted to, and I can't even put it properly in words, but I feel... a difference, between the sexual/gender issues I'VE had, which are AFFECTED (and made more complex than they should be, and obsessed over because of) by OCD, and someone who presents here WITH HOCD, or TOCD. There's not much of a difference sometimes when you start thinking and thinking and analyzing and thinking... but there IS a difference between me and the bulk of y'all. I don't see myself in y'all too much, other than ofc being OCD as hell. I mean- I live a hetero existence. I like it that way. I'm some kind of Bi, THEORETICALLY... but I like boobies and girls far, far too much to ever be gay. That's just not going to happen. I crush on women, I idolize female celebrities, I feel more comfortable around women then men. But.. I guarantee you, I'm told to this day I would have made a good Gay person. I also guarantee, though I've never asked, that I'll bet you a hundred bucks at one time or another everyone who knew me has thought I was gay. Hell I used to think I was gay. And not OCD all I had to do was look at me and say, oh man, that's so gay.

I'm talking of the typical stereotypes, naturally. I'm not trying to say everyone conforms to those- in fact I'll wager more don't conform, than do. Just saying I am no idiot- I know what ppl have thought about me over the years, and I can't blame their logic. I'd think the same thing.

I don't think that with you, baby doll.

Based on what you write. Same for others on here, Jdd coming to mind because like you, he seems to have an extra, extra hard time with it. Without a long period since I'd say at least adolescence of some kind of sexual confusion? Without enough non-conforming behaviour to make other people think, Hey, that Artninja's prolly lesbian? (which, btw, I am extremely envious of you girls- you can be damn tomboyish and it's CUTE. Boys can't go in the other direction and I..... well I envy women the freedom) Without any kind of... excitement, at the thought of being with another girl? I mean genuine excitement. Yes, you could be in denial, you could be gay as gay and still be disgusted/unhappy/wish you were straight, but there would be a thrill at the thought of being with another woman. That would be what your body wanted. Or, if you were really Bi, there would be some aspect of women that form an itch no amount of menfolk could scratch. Somewhere, even with OCD, somewhere deep down inside I think a part of y'all would KNOW.

All the above is to get to this.... y'all MAY (may, I will not say for sure) be stuck with these thoughts for decades. Like me and my HarmOCD. But in the absence of real proof- "I kissed a girl, and I LIKED it!" In the end, they're just thoughts. Intrusive thoughts that, from where I sit, admittedly from a long distance, with two computer screens in the way, yours and mine- don't have the same flavor as OMG I really want to do it with a girl and I don't like those thoughts. Because it seems the HOCD/TOCD always starts with that What If?

I never asked, What If? I just wanted what I wanted, and it's not always been on the Zero side of the Kinsey spectrum. Doesn't mean I wanted those thoughts, but part of me wanted to want those thoughts. I don't SEE that from you.

So.... without proof otherwise, just intrusive thoughts. Like my Harm-OCD. Thoughts that are like a life form of their own. That happen to live in your brain, like a ######6 Goa'uld that doesn't have all the control over you that it'd like to have. Those thoughts live IN me, but they AREN'T me. If they WERE me, I'd be typing this from a maximum-security prison. If your HOCD/TOCD WAS you, you'd have been struggling for a longer time, I tend to think, and fought urges, not thoughts- URGES- itches that loudly want to be scratched. But intrusive thoughts AREN'T you. They're a separate thing.

But you might have these... for a long time. Because that's the nature of the OCD beast. It wants to be assured, beyond the shadow of a doubt. I don't just check faucets and locks and check my specifications on the product I run at work- I want to FEEL them, be ONE with them, meld with them and know beyond knowing that things are what my OCD-addled brain says they SHOULD be. especially work. They have bad nicknames for me at work, but I have to laugh because they are TRUE.

I can't have that 200% assurance. Hell 200% ain't good enough, I want 1000%. I can't have it. You can't have that. So.... these thoughts might bug you for a long time, and... it distresses me to see your distress. My HarmOCD used to bother me so bad. At ten, eleven, I thought I was horrible. I thought Satan was going to take control of my body. I thought i was on the edge of being demoniacally possessed. Mind you- I believe in all those things because I'm a Christian. But really- me? Possessed? No, it's intrusive thoughts. And.... I've had, because I've had no other choice, to tune harm thoughts out. I've had them four fifths of my life, and I tune them out because if I didn't I'd be miserable.

I sure would like to see everyone with H/TOCD find something that totally eradicates all intrusive thoughts. But.... lol I'm about to use a OCD-ism.... WHAT IF... those thoughts stick around? THEN what? THEN... Querida.... ya gotta come to an understanding between you and those thoughts that, from my POV, AREN'T you. Since my intrusive harm thoughts AREN'T me, I don't fight them. They want to be thought, so I let them do their little think, then they get put back in their mental closet. because I know from empirical evidence, I'm not a psychopath killer.

If you KNOW... and you have said repeatedly you never, before the HOCD, thought much about girls, or before TOCD, thought overmuch hey, I have BOOBS what are these damn things doing here?..... if you KNOW you're not gay or trans.... then these thoughts are just thoughts, honey pot. My harm OCD thoughts are just thoughts. I don't like them, I don't want them, but they're all bark and no bite. That's what HOCD and TOCD are. Bark, but no bite. No substance. And if, down the road, you still have intrusive thought HOCD/TOCD, remember this. Just thoughts. Bark and no bite.

Many hugs. Likely this will be triggering. I..... want so badly to see you not beat yourself up over this. If I thought- again, what do I know? I only know me. If I thought you were not straight, or somewhere on the trans spectrum to the point you really didn't want those boobies or felt like you in the wrong body and needed a wing-wang, I'd be more than pleased to talk and listen about being lesbian or being a trans man. Be gay, and be happy. Be trans, and be happy. But... you don't seem to be, and you're not happy with even the thought of it. Nothing about any of that seems to turn you on, or make you wistful that you wish you could be, or anything of that nature. They're just thoughts. Thoughts. Thoughts come and go.

You know you're absolutely right. I know deep down that I'm not trans, and deep down that I'm not a lesbian. OCD just makes it hard to believe that. I try to remind myself of that by looking at how I reacted when this all started. It was bad. I was a crying mess both times. I really hated myself. Hell when TOCD started I didn't have an appetite AT ALL. Didn't eat anything for almost a week. And both times I contemplated suicide, but I knew I would never go through with it cause, like I've stated previously, I'm too much of a chicken s**t.

And I have to remember that this is what OCD does. It will do literally anything to make me doubt and second guess. And an indicator of my distress should've been plain to see all along: I've started chewing on my nails again. Don't remember when I quit doing it, but I started back up again. That and I've had the compulsive urge to rub at my crotch whenever I feel the ghost penis come back, as if that would make it go away. Doesn't, but it doesn't stop me from trying. It's just the OCDs doing, and the anxiety along with it. Counselor also said it might have something to do with moving to a new place and going through big changes like being an adult.

As far as HOCD goes, it probably doesn't help that I've never had a boyfriend (well actually thats a lie, I had one one but I don't really count him. We only were dating for three weeks, and I think I only said yes cause I would have a boyfriend. I didn't actually like him in that way, he was just a good friend of mine. It was a mutual breakup, but I still feel a little guilty cause I was fawning over other guys while I was dating him :/) and never been kissed. I have been hugged by guys that I've liked, which was magical all in itself. I remember that that was a big wish of mine in middle and high school: to get asked out by a guy I liked. Hell I even joined volleyball in eighth grade to get the guy I had a crush on to notice me. Didn't work, but it made me happy that he still went to the games anyway. And if I didn't actually like the guys I've liked, then I wouldn't have CRIED over them. The first guy I liked I spent a good half of a middle school dance crying in the locker room with my friends surrounding me because he wouldn't even look my way and was dancing with another girl. And I've cried buckets when a few of my crushes told me up front that they only thought of me as a friend or sister.

I've been talking to a friend of mine who also went through HOCD and she beat it, and I've been going to her and talking to her about all of this. Even going as far as to report to her anytime a new intrusive thought springs up and I'm on the verge of a panic attack, both with HOCD and TOCD. I do feel guilty about it for constantly going to her ever three to four hours it seems like, but she keeps assuring me that I'm not bothering her, and she always says she wish she could do something more to help me. I always tell her that being there to listen to me and understanding is enough.

This may sound weird but I actually kinda like it when you call me "honey pot" and "baby doll". Never been called pet names outside my family so it makes me feel really special somehow, even if I'm not the only one XD and it really calms me down somehow, which I'm guessing was the idea.

Well, that's my way here on PF, I'm pretty free with the familiarities. PF allows me to be... more of what I feel inside. Which is... a lot like my current avatar

You remind me of me. I didn't really kiss a girl until 38. That's not a typo. And... I would have horrid crying fits over being alone. I'd go to a wedding then go home and bawl. I just wanted a girlfriend. it was awful. I know the feeling. Very much so. Thought I was gay for the longest time, not in an HOCD kind of way because in fact I'm not totally straight, though I'm straight enough I suppose. Being groomed by a pederast at the tender age of 13 probably didn't help my confusion, there. But fact is I only really crush on the girls. I'm in an LTR with the best girl I could have hoped for and she even puts up with me being more the girl than her, but then she used to be accused of thinking like a man (she really does at times) so it's a good fit.

Anyway yeah.... just trying anything I can think of to help. In they end you can't let the thoughts eat you up, even if you have thoughts like that for ever. Like my harm-OCD. I learned to live with it. I had to. So you may or may not be totally and forever rid of HOCD, but once you find a way to deal with it, the thoughts can be much less distressing.