Scary thoughts :(
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Guest
Hey livv,
I have had the thoughts of hurting others too. But they went away. Not with medication or anything( althought that can help) but simply understanding what the thoughts are and why they are not the problem. The problem is the response to the thoughts. Everyone has weird thoughts, but not everyone dwells on them like we do. You clearly are scared of the thoughts and that is because you are not the kind of person that would hurt someone. But even someone without anxiety disorder would be shocked about such thoughts, so don;t worry because you are not alone.
Understand a couple of things that will help you as they have helped most of us including myself:
1- the thought is not the problem it is what you tell yourself about the thought
example - " omg what if i hurt someone i loved"
reaction = omg why did i think that? am i the type of person that wold do that? why am i having this thought?
what you and all of us do is called ruminate. We entertain the thought as if it has some kind of importance. But it does not. These thoughts come from the some kind of part of our brain that reminds of of certain things like, the lyrics to a song. You ever get asked a question or try and figure out " what was the name of the bad guy in that movie?... but it wont come to you.." its on the tip of my tongue....
These intrusive scary thoughts come from that part of the brain. The problem is not the thought but the anxiety and fear after it.
a better response is - That is an odd thought, but it is only anxiety and i will move on.
The reason the thoughts keep coming is because you told your brain that it is significant because of the emotional response ( fear, anxiety)
You are probably like all of us who deal with this a kind and generous and loving person. Don't forget who you are. remember thoughts are only thoughts. they are random and often have no meaning. They say nothing about who we are.
Carolyn dickman the director here at the Stress once gave a great example
" if i am thinking of winning the lottery, does that make me a millionaire?
so if you are having thoughts of hurting others that does not mean you are someone who wants to harm others.
have you ever talked to someone about the thoughts?
It helped me a lot. before i went to see a specialist and got diagnosed with OCD pure-o, i use to share the thoughts with loved ones like my family and friends and girlfriend. I found out they had thoughts just like me, but they were not concerned about them and would not respond with such high emotion like fear so the thoughts don;t continue to pop up. Estinguish the emotional response and the thoughts go away.
another thing that helps me is, keeping busy. when i have the thoughts but i let them sit there and say something like " this is my ocd and nothing more, i give it no power i will not feed it fear or doubt" then i keep doing what i am doing.
what does not help is sitting there and doing nothing. when i get bored i can obsess. keep busy. do the normal things. spend time with your family, friends, go to school do homework, go to the mall. stick to your routine despite the thoughts. over time they go away on their own when you don't feed it fear.
I hope this helps
here is a link that helped me so much
it is a video of a psycologist talking about these kinds of thoughts
http://www.vimeo.com/1120239
take care
Eddy J
I have had the thoughts of hurting others too. But they went away. Not with medication or anything( althought that can help) but simply understanding what the thoughts are and why they are not the problem. The problem is the response to the thoughts. Everyone has weird thoughts, but not everyone dwells on them like we do. You clearly are scared of the thoughts and that is because you are not the kind of person that would hurt someone. But even someone without anxiety disorder would be shocked about such thoughts, so don;t worry because you are not alone.
Understand a couple of things that will help you as they have helped most of us including myself:
1- the thought is not the problem it is what you tell yourself about the thought
example - " omg what if i hurt someone i loved"
reaction = omg why did i think that? am i the type of person that wold do that? why am i having this thought?
what you and all of us do is called ruminate. We entertain the thought as if it has some kind of importance. But it does not. These thoughts come from the some kind of part of our brain that reminds of of certain things like, the lyrics to a song. You ever get asked a question or try and figure out " what was the name of the bad guy in that movie?... but it wont come to you.." its on the tip of my tongue....
These intrusive scary thoughts come from that part of the brain. The problem is not the thought but the anxiety and fear after it.
a better response is - That is an odd thought, but it is only anxiety and i will move on.
The reason the thoughts keep coming is because you told your brain that it is significant because of the emotional response ( fear, anxiety)
You are probably like all of us who deal with this a kind and generous and loving person. Don't forget who you are. remember thoughts are only thoughts. they are random and often have no meaning. They say nothing about who we are.
Carolyn dickman the director here at the Stress once gave a great example
" if i am thinking of winning the lottery, does that make me a millionaire?
so if you are having thoughts of hurting others that does not mean you are someone who wants to harm others.
have you ever talked to someone about the thoughts?
It helped me a lot. before i went to see a specialist and got diagnosed with OCD pure-o, i use to share the thoughts with loved ones like my family and friends and girlfriend. I found out they had thoughts just like me, but they were not concerned about them and would not respond with such high emotion like fear so the thoughts don;t continue to pop up. Estinguish the emotional response and the thoughts go away.
another thing that helps me is, keeping busy. when i have the thoughts but i let them sit there and say something like " this is my ocd and nothing more, i give it no power i will not feed it fear or doubt" then i keep doing what i am doing.
what does not help is sitting there and doing nothing. when i get bored i can obsess. keep busy. do the normal things. spend time with your family, friends, go to school do homework, go to the mall. stick to your routine despite the thoughts. over time they go away on their own when you don't feed it fear.
I hope this helps
here is a link that helped me so much
it is a video of a psycologist talking about these kinds of thoughts
http://www.vimeo.com/1120239
take care
Eddy J
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Guest
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Guest