paulmm
Well-known member
I have a compulsion that deals with guilt. I've talked about it in a few other topics, but I want to make a topic dealing with it specifically.
My OCD is mostly obsessive. I obsess about things I feel guilty about. My compulsion is that I cannot allow the things in like that I feel guilty about affect my life.
This compulsion started very simply. If I did something that I felt guilty about, I would be careful not to let it affect my life.
Then I realized that my thoughts about the guilt and the guilt itself was a direct product of the thing I did that I felt guilty about. Therefore, these thoughts could not affect my life. Nor could the guilt I felt.
It has gotten to the point where I have information stored in my head, vast amounts of priceless information, and ideas, and realizations, that are off-limits, because they are "tainted" by something I felt guilty about when I first thought of them.
I often think of worse case scenarios when trying not to give in to this compulsion. Many times, if I am feeling guilty about something and a thought pops into my head, for example "I forgot to get gas for my car", I won't be able to do it. I feel like guilty thoughts cannot affect my life, and therefore, I have to wait to be reminded by an outside source other than my brain to fill up my car with gas.
I will realize that I probably won't be reminded and I will run out of gas and I will be late for work and lose my job and end up a junkie and die. So to avoid this, I get gas. Then I feel guilty that I was unfairly advantaged by being reminded to get gas while I was feeling guilty about something. I feel like I shouldn't ever benefit from something I am feeling guilty about because if I feel guilty about it, it wasn't a good thing.
Then I will start obsessing about what would happen if I hadn't gone to get gas, i.e. lose my job, etc., and because this obsessing was caused by a guilty thought, any thoughts that come up during this obsessing cannot be used. This grows and grows until it includes a huge majority of the thoughts and ideas in my head, and makes most of my life off-limits. It causes severe depression, especially when i feel powerless to help myself. If I remember than i have a test tomorrow while feeling guilty about something, I will not be able to study for it, and I will be forced to allow valuable time to go by while I could be studying. It's like standing there and watching a child die and be able to help but do nothing. It's a feeling of absolute hoplessness and powerlessness.
Does anybody else have this compulsion to not allow their life to be affected by undesireable things, like guilt?
My OCD is mostly obsessive. I obsess about things I feel guilty about. My compulsion is that I cannot allow the things in like that I feel guilty about affect my life.
This compulsion started very simply. If I did something that I felt guilty about, I would be careful not to let it affect my life.
Then I realized that my thoughts about the guilt and the guilt itself was a direct product of the thing I did that I felt guilty about. Therefore, these thoughts could not affect my life. Nor could the guilt I felt.
It has gotten to the point where I have information stored in my head, vast amounts of priceless information, and ideas, and realizations, that are off-limits, because they are "tainted" by something I felt guilty about when I first thought of them.
I often think of worse case scenarios when trying not to give in to this compulsion. Many times, if I am feeling guilty about something and a thought pops into my head, for example "I forgot to get gas for my car", I won't be able to do it. I feel like guilty thoughts cannot affect my life, and therefore, I have to wait to be reminded by an outside source other than my brain to fill up my car with gas.
I will realize that I probably won't be reminded and I will run out of gas and I will be late for work and lose my job and end up a junkie and die. So to avoid this, I get gas. Then I feel guilty that I was unfairly advantaged by being reminded to get gas while I was feeling guilty about something. I feel like I shouldn't ever benefit from something I am feeling guilty about because if I feel guilty about it, it wasn't a good thing.
Then I will start obsessing about what would happen if I hadn't gone to get gas, i.e. lose my job, etc., and because this obsessing was caused by a guilty thought, any thoughts that come up during this obsessing cannot be used. This grows and grows until it includes a huge majority of the thoughts and ideas in my head, and makes most of my life off-limits. It causes severe depression, especially when i feel powerless to help myself. If I remember than i have a test tomorrow while feeling guilty about something, I will not be able to study for it, and I will be forced to allow valuable time to go by while I could be studying. It's like standing there and watching a child die and be able to help but do nothing. It's a feeling of absolute hoplessness and powerlessness.
Does anybody else have this compulsion to not allow their life to be affected by undesireable things, like guilt?