Doubts about Harm OCD and potential obsession?

*Possible trigger warning*

Hello, it's been a while since last time I posted on this forum. Must say I've been coping with my yet to be diagnosed Harm OCD. I was wondering i've read avoidance of triggers is bad, but
How is it bad exactly? I've come to the conclusion that Snaga did, which is, I am not a bad person, even though I do get quite a few obsessions every now and then, I wonder if avoiding gore and other violent material is bad for my ocd.

Besides from this, I had partly addressed this other subject, but I am quite unsure if you can have intrusive thoughts about people flirting with my partner and them flirting back. It used to be worse before, because my thoughts would often also involve my partner cheating on me sexually. I can't pinpoint the origin of these thoughts I've mentioned before. My girlfriend has been shown to be deeply in love with me, loyal and trustworthy, but these thoughts linger in my mind.

I don't think I've been cheated on before, might have been dumped once, but never been cheated. I feel confused about this subject in particular because I often feel like I want to know what my partner is doing, but then again, I am unsure if I am seeking reassurance for an obsession, or if I am just plainly insecure and this is some sort of trauma of jealousy-driven matter. Up until now, it feels as if I've progressed with every obsession I had except for this one.

Thanks for taking your time and reading this. And thanks to Snaga and making me feel like someone understood what i was going through, and allowing me to see things from a different perspective. Have a nice day.

MyPropeller wrote: I was wondering i've read avoidance of triggers is bad, but
How is it bad exactly?

**TW**

If you mean what I think, I think the answer probably involves it's counterproductive to training yourself to not be bothered by the thoughts. Say there's a firearm in the room. Guns are an easy trigger, right? So easy to wreak great harm in an instant. perfect example.
Intrusive thought pops up that I'm going to shoot my partner. So I do the compulsion part and unload it or disassemble it or lock it away or whatever. There-i remove the trigger. But that doesn't help stop the intrusive thought from hitting me again and again, does it? Instead I cop the attitude of 'so what? I'll worry about it when I've done it', and I resist the temptation to act on the trigger by removing it. Eventually it doesn't bother me as much because I've become accustomed to the fact that nothing bad is going to happen.

I'm planning a trip where I could be exposed to heights. I hate heights. I avoid them. A LOT. Not just 'what if I fell', but 'imma gonna push my partner over'. Or, 'what if I jump? I could jump it'd be so easy to jump I might jump'. That last really hits me bad around balconies. I'm considering doing some things that I normally wouldn't want to do-still don't want to. But thinking of making myself- things the partner can't share with me because I am afraid of them. I don't know if the Lexapro in taking is taking a little of the edge off my OCD (I'm taking it for general anxiety) or what. But I'm... thinking about it. Avoidance is easy, but it also takes away from what could be good memories of experiences shared. Only one way to get over it, and that's to not avoid it.


End TW

I don't know about the cheating obsession. I'm not generally jealous and have never even wondered about a partner. I'll go so far as to say I could do an open relationship as long as it runs both ways-I'll have mine on the side, too- and I don't feel as if I'm being used. So that's a bugbear that's never really nibbled at my brain. My partner's character is such that if they wanted to mess around they'd just say so.

All of which is to merely say that I'm just not wired that way, to even the point that my OCD can't even do anything with it. I'm not virtuous about it or anything, it just isn't something that tickles my brain.