Do you struggle with intrusive thoughts? Do they seemingly pop into your head from thin air? You might be grabbing a coffee or commuting to work when, all of a sudden, an unwanted thought pops into your head. It can be a bizarre image or a crazy thought. You are left questioning that thought or perhaps you think about it obsessively and start to become anxious.
The thought could be harmless, like doing something embarrassing in a social setting, or it could be more harmful, such as a tragedy happening to your family members or other loved ones who you would never want to harm. If you struggle with this, please take comfort in knowing that you are not alone.
If you struggle with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), you can experience intrusive thoughts regularly and you may be looking for a way to stop them in their tracks. These thoughts are automatic which may make you feel like you do not have control over them. This only worsens your stress levels and may even lead you to cope in unhealthy ways.
Anchor Therapy is a counseling center in Hoboken, NJ with psychotherapists specialized in helping children, teens, adults, and couples with OCD, anxiety, depression, relationship issues, trauma, life transitions, and more. Anchor Therapy is accepting new clients and is now providing in-person sessions and teletherapy sessions to residents of New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, and Utah.
What is OCD?
OCD stands for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, which is a common mental health disorder that is characterized by excessive thoughts, also known as obsessions, that lead to repetitive behaviors, like compulsions. The obsessions and compulsions can become so severe that they interfere with daily life.
Symptoms normally start off gradually, and you may feel tempted to ignore your symptoms. However, ignoring the problem will only increase your stress and anxiety. Ultimately, when you want to relieve your stress, you will most likely end up giving into your thoughts and performing compulsive acts. Despite trying to ignore your thoughts or urges, they will keep reappearing. This leads to ritualistic behavior, hence the OCD cycle.
OCD typically has themes. For instance, someone with OCD may have a fear of germs, being a germaphobe. Due to their fear of getting contaminated with germs, they may do things compulsively to ease their worries, such as continuously washing their hands or applying hand sanitizer until their hands are dry and chapped.
What are the symptoms of OCD?
OCD can include both obsessions and compulsions, but it is possible to have only obsessions symptoms or only compulsions symptoms. It may take time to even realize if your obsessions and compulsions are extreme or senseless.
If your symptoms take up a lot of your time and interfere with your daily routine, such as your social, school, or work functioning, chances are that seeking OCD treatment and learning how to modify your behaviors will help you in the long run.
OCD Obsession Symptoms
OCD obsessions are recurring, constant, and undesired thoughts, urges, or images that are intrusive and cause anxiety or general distress. In an effort to get rid of them, you might partake in a compulsive behavior or ritual. The obsessions may come into play when you are trying to do other things or you think of doing other things.
Some OCD obsession themes can include:
Doubting or having a hard time accepting other people’s uncertainty
Worries of contamination or dirt
Needing things to be symmetrical or in order
Hostile and/or frightful thoughts about losing control and harming yourself or other people
General unwanted thoughts, including sexual thoughts, religious subjects, and aggression
Examples of OCD obsession signs and symptoms may include:
Fear of being contaminated by touching an object that other people have touched
Doubting that you locked your house door or car, turned the stove off, unplugged the iron, etc.
Extreme stress when things are not orderly or facing a specific direction
Images of driving your car into a crowd of people
Disturbing sexual images
Avoidance of situations where your obsessions might be triggered (e.g., shaking someone’s hand or driving a car)
Thoughts about acting inappropriately in public settings
OCD Compulsion Symptoms
OCD compulsions are behaviors that you feel forced to perform. You may perform these repetitive behaviors or mental acts in an effort to reduce your anxiety or stop something bad from happening. When you engage in the compulsion(s), you feel no pleasure and you may only feel a temporary relief from your anxiety.
You may create rules or rituals to follow in an effort to manage your anxiety when you are experiencing obsessive thoughts. The compulsions are uncontrolled, and are not connected to the issue they are supposed to fix.
Some OCD compulsion themes can include:
Checking
Counting
Washing and cleaning
Ordering reassurance
Following an inflexible routine
Orderliness
Examples of OCD compulsion signs and symptoms may include:
Continuously washing your hands until your skin becomes irritated and chapped
Checking the doors a certain number of times to make sure that they are locked
Checking the stove a fixed number of times to ensure that you turned it off
Counting in specific patterns
Silently repeating a word or phrase
Arranging your pantry so all of the goods are facing in the same direction
Does the severity of OCD vary?
Yes. OCD normally begins in teen or young adult years, but it can develop in childhood. Symptoms will start out gradual and can vary in severity throughout your lifetime. The types of obsessions and compulsions that you experience can alter over time as well.
When you experience a great deal of stress, OCD symptoms normally get worse. OCD is generally recognized as a life-long disorder. You may experience mild to moderate symptoms or your symptoms can be so severe and time-consuming that it negatively impacts your life and makes it hard to function on a daily basis.
What are OCD intrusive thoughts?
Intrusive thoughts are one of the most popular symptoms of OCD. They are simply unwanted thoughts that pop into your mind. It does not matter whether or not they are rational or irrational, or even in line with your values and beliefs. You may find your OCD thoughts alarming, disturbing, or weird.
Everyone has these kinds of thoughts once in a while. For instance, you may be traveling on the subway to get to work in the morning and think “what if I just screamed out loud on this subway car in front of all of these people?”.
For people without OCD, these thoughts can pass just as quickly as they come. However, if you have OCD, you may feel forced to fixate on your intrusive thoughts. Your OCD will even make you believe that those thoughts must be real and valid and demand that you do something, like a compulsive behavior, to make those thoughts vanish.
You may feel like intrusive thoughts are inescapable if you have OCD. While you are producing the thoughts, you feel like you have no control over them. Therefore, you let the thoughts direct your behavior.
What are the different types of OCD intrusive thoughts?
While unwanted words and sentences can be intrusive thoughts, OCD thoughts come in many forms.
Intrusive thoughts can also be:
Disturbing images - A mental image of your house burning down since you forgot to turn the stove off
Ideas and uncertainties - “What if I really hit a car when I was driving and I do not remember it?”
Physical sensations - You may get the feeling that your breathing has suddenly become irregular for instance
Unwanted impulses - You have to check if you locked the door five times before going to bed
Unwanted and potentially incorrect memories - Wondering if you accidentally hurt your dog when you were playing with him
Intrusive thoughts affect everyone differently. But, all intrusive thoughts have one thing in common- they cause distress and anxiety, making you feel like it is all too much to handle.
How can the connection between intrusive thoughts and compulsions be explained?
Intrusive thoughts trigger your compulsions of OCD. An intrusive thought can feel so dominant and constant that you feel like you have to make it go away.
For example, if you are a germaphobe, you may believe what your brain is telling you when it says: “If I wash my hands 10 times in a row with this soap, I will no longer feel contaminated.” Your rational mind may not believe this; however, that does not matter. You will do it anyways or else your anxiety will start to overwhelm you.
Things like hand-washing and checking to see if you locked the doors are visual examples of OCD. It is important to remember that not all OCD compulsions are visible. Some rituals can be silent, mental rituals. For example, you may count to 30 before you lock the door.
Whether or not your compulsions are visible, partaking in them can temporarily relieve the distress and anxiety you feel about your intrusive thoughts. They do not solve the problem. Every time you take part in compulsive behavior, you unconsciously train your mind to automatically do the same behavior the next time you have an intrusive thought.
Unfortunately, this can cause a vicious cycle to form.
What can I do to stop my OCD intrusive thoughts?
Separate your thoughts from your anxiety. OCD is what you have, not who you are. If you have OCD, you will likely have obsessive thoughts. You may feel so overwhelmed by your OCD obsessions that you would try or do almost anything to make them stop.
While this may not be easy to believe, your thoughts are nothing more than words. They are not inherently dangerous. Just because your brain generated it, does not mean that you have to take it seriously.
Also, your thoughts do not define who you are as a person. If you have a negative thought, it does not mean that you are a negative or bad person. Intrusive thoughts do not have to align with your core values, beliefs, and morals.
More often than not, OCD intrusive thoughts attack your values, beliefs, and morals. There is a focus on things that upset you. This is especially true for OCD thoughts that spark fear within you. These worries tend to be fixated on the things that you are most concerned about. For instance, you may worry about the health of your family and one of your intrusive thoughts may be about a close family member getting deathly sick.
When is it time to seek the help of an OCD therapist?
There is a distinct difference between being a perfectionist and having OCD. When you are a perfectionist, you mandate flawless results. When you have OCD, you are not just worrying about real problems in an excessive manner.
If your OCD obsessions and OCD compulsions are impacting your quality of life, seeking psychotherapy for OCD is recommended. And it’s recommended to seek a therapist who is specialized in helping with OCD.
If your OCD goes untreated, it can cause further complications, such as:
Troubled relationships
General poor quality of life
An extreme amount of time spent engaging in ritualistic behavior
Health issues (e.g., getting skin irritation from washing your hands too much)
A hard time attending work, school, and social functions
Suicidal thoughts and behaviors (feeling suicidal? Help is only a phone call away at the free National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988)
How can CBT for OCD help me?
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for OCD has been proven to be one of the most effective treatments for OCD.
CBT for OCD intrusive thoughts is a type of treatment that can help you cope with and alter problematic thinking, behavior, and actions. CBT therapy for OCD will not only take your associations (the association you make between your distress and specific objects, situations, and/or thoughts) into consideration, but it will also break the instinctive connection between your feelings of anxiety and ritual behaviors.
CBT is not only helpful for OCD, but it can also assist with the anxiety you may be facing as a result of your OCD. CBT for anxiety is a leading treatment that will help you feel like your best self again. If you are interested in learning more about CBT therapy for anxiety, check out our blog post: “How You Can Treat Your Anxiety Using CBT.”
You are not alone in your struggles with OCD intrusive thoughts. By working with a CBT therapist for OCD, you will learn to break down your associations and effectively manage your intrusive thoughts. From exposure to ritual prevention, your OCD counselor is there to help you every step of the way.
Victoria Scala
is the Social Media Manager and Intake Coordinator at Anchor Therapy in Hoboken, New Jersey. She is a graduate of the Honors College of Rutgers University-Newark, planning to study Clinical Mental Health Counseling at the graduate level. As a Social Media Manager at Anchor Therapy, Victoria is committed to producing content for and managing the office’s social media presence and blog.
