OCD and intrusive thoughts

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How do you cast them away?
I have kind of leart to avoid them but at times I cannot help it. One that I particulary hate is more like a flash back from when I was molested as a child. And since I have also got synaesthesia I can also feel it, this particullary creeps me out.

Sounds like PTSD. The flashback part.


As for my obsessive thinking where I keep thinking about something that bothers me or upsets me. I try and distract myself by focusing on other things and trying to forget about it. If something can't be fixed until the next day or so, I try and distract myself and think of other things like my happy obsessions or do something like clean or computer and not worry about it. Took me a few years of practice for me to get better. It only gets bad again if I am very upset.

I have never been diagnosed with ocd but i suspect I have it. Situations will trigger really bad obsessive thoughts that turn into a nasty form of depersonalization, wich ultimately lead to panic attacks from hell. Showers are a huge trigger for me ever since I had that One bad panic attack there. And it sucks because I love taking very hot showers, I suspect the only way to treat really bad OCD/Anxiety is CBT

I dont have health insurance or lots of money so this isnt a option for me, so I have to be my own doctor and deal with the situation accordingly

I'm not diagnosed with OCD but I was just wondering if these thoughts are intrusive/obsessive thoughts;

Sometimes when I walk down stairs I see this picture (I don't really know if I see it or if it's a feeling or something else) where I fall down the stairs and get really hurt. Also, if I'm for example on a balcony and I'm texting I keep thinking about throwing my phone down or I keep thinking about me jumping off the balcony. I would never actually do it but the thoughts are there anyway. Things like that. Are those kinds of thoughts OCD thoughts?

I do a lot of rituals as well. Things such as at least double checking that the door's looked, that my hair straightener isn't plugged in, that the oven's off, that I've actually turned on the alarm on my phone etc. But I don't do it because of bad thoughts. I do it because it wouldn't feel right otherwise or because I would worry if I didn't.

That stuff sounds quite autistic to me, at least familiar.. As far as I know it's quite typical for autistic thinking to quickly check all possibilities of a situation, especially if it's a slightly uncomfortable one. (balcony, stairs). To me, the worst case scenario is, once "thought trough" ot imagined, it's actually ok to me since the probabililty favors the other scenario(s).
When I am on an airplane I regularly imagine the worst case scenarios - if I want or not.
On the bike for example my mind sometimes is ahead of the moment, like "what would happen if"- then I usually see that scenario for a second.

Vivid thinking, awkward short term memory because of too fast (possibly associative) thinking or absent mindedness (did I turn off/lock that or not??) are also typical. The down sides of this aspects might increase dramatically if there's stress involved..
But especially thinking in pictures (also yours are imagines it seems) seems to be very typical for the spectrum, makes me think of T. Grandin!

Oh okay. Perhaps it is. Yes, I often go through the worst case scenarios in all kinds of situations. When flying, when on a bike, when thinking about if I turned off the oven (for example, what if the oven's not off and that'll start a fire, which will make me go up and check it again), when in a social situation, when travelling to new places etc.

About the vivid thinking and thinking in pictures thing. I've never understood what that is. I don't know if I do it. All I know is I've got quite poor imagination. Or at least that's what I think. Anyway, care to explain what it means? Sorry for going off topic a bit.

My therapist says that I have some OCD traits but I have never been diagnosed as Obsessive Compulsive, only High Functioning Autism. Autism and OCD are alike in certain ways so that is why I have certain symptoms. The difference that I have noticed between OCD and Autism is: Both Autistic people and OCD people have repetitive thought patterns however people with Autism (such as myself) tend to enjoy the repetitiveness whereas OCD people tend to find it disruptive.

~Ark

Good point. I enjoy repeating things. It's like I thrive on it. But some things are just stupid, like checking the oven or the door multiple times. But I like my other repetitive behaviours. They make me feel safe.