Weird, scary thoughts
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drewscotland
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Tue Oct 06, 2009 12:20 pm
i've read on this site about other people having weird/strange thoughts possibly brought on by stress. my problem is quite a long story. I met a girl 8 months ago. She already had a child but that didn't bother me. we got on brilliantly right from the start but after a few months she realised she was pregnant. we weren't entirely sure what to do so we ended up just putting it off until she was around 18 weeks pregnant. At this point I started to get stressed out with the fact I would have to stay around and be part of a family at the age of 21. I told her I didn't want to be in a relationship but we decided to keep the baby because the thought of getting rid of it was too horrible for us to deal with. The sad news is that even though we had decided to have the baby, she went for a scan the other day and found out that the baby had no heartbeat. It had died at around 17 weeks. The stress of it all has brought on very strange, weird and scary thoughts in me though. I started thinking about her child and how horrible it would be if I felt the need to harm her and then I felt scared about if i wanted to do worse. These things make me feel sick and I think child abuse and harming children is the worst thing in the world. It's something I would never do yet I still find these thoughts creeping into my head. Sleeping has become difficult at times. When i'm with friends or occupied doing something I'm able to forget for a while but it always comes back at some point. I have even had whole days without thinking about it but then also i've had whole days of just thinking about it. The doctor reckons they have just been brought on by stress and will eventually go but I feel like there is something very wrong with me to be thinking these things. I got on brilliantly with her daughter as well for the 8 months we've known each other and never had any thoughts of these kind before all this stress.
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Guest
This is kinda long, but, I know that if you read and use these techniques, then, you will find your "scary thoughts" will dissipate!!!
This comes from Joe Barry...Here is the reading on Disturbing Thoughts...
Disturbing Thoughts
Anxiety almost always comes with a level of disturbing thoughts. You might be
driving with your children and then get a flash thought of losing control and driving
into an oncoming car. Another example is looking down from a bridge and suddenly
getting terrified by the idea that you might lose all control of your senses and jump.
If you experience such thoughts, I want to reassure you that, regardless of how
extreme, don’t worry about them. They’re the result of an active imagination
coupled with anxiety and, often, something or someone about which you care
deeply. These thoughts persist because you react so strongly to them. If you didn’t
have a strong reaction, the thoughts would never bother you.
The scary thoughts are like a small five-year-old looking for attention and targeting
something you care about to get a reaction from you. They occur to people who
would never dream of doing what they think about. It’s just the very fact of having
the thoughts that shocks people and leads them to believe they’re bad in some
way.
130
The truth is that these thoughts are the by-product of an overactive imagination
mixed with a good dollop of anxiety. It’s the anxious reaction to the thoughts that
keeps them going around and around, as if you’re tense inside and the thoughts
speed up. I’ve outlined this process in Stage 2, but here’s a quick reminder.
Visually, it’s like this. Thoughts float up in front of us all the time during our waking
day. Normally, we ignore most thoughts and continue what we’re doing. Other
times, we really get stuck into the thought and examine it in detail, such as “what I
have to do today” thoughts. When anxious thoughts enter, people generally whack
them away and try to run from them. This never works, because the energy put
into hitting away the thought instead powers it to rebound with even more force
and intensity.
For the moment, your best way to deal with this is to accept the chain of thoughts
as they happen. When “terrible idea X” enters your mind. you simply go:
There you are again! I’m getting totally bored by all this scare-
mongering. It’s not relevant to me or my life—but sure, go ahead and
tell the awful idea again if it makes you feel better.
Talk to the thoughts as if they’re visitors that have no relationship to your real self
and you’re simply being polite by letting them run. Don’t force them away—that
creates the rebound effect—but don’t feel you have to pay too much attention
either. The goal is to move your attention to what you want to focus on without
reacting to the scary thought. That way, your energy goes into what you want and
not into what you don’t want.
You know who you are and that these thoughts don’t represent you, so don’t
worry—the very fact that you get so upset by the thoughts shows how different you
are from the ideas that torment you. Another way to view the thoughts is as if they
were school bullies trying to upset you by saying awful things about, for example,
131
people close to you. If you get scared, the bully continues to taunt even more. If
you laugh and say, “Sure, whatever,” then walk away, the bully loses interest.
Acceptance is key. Getting upset by the thoughts only fuels the inner tension
further because you add more worry and stress to the problem. If you say to
yourself that this is a period you’re moving through and that it will work out fine,
you’ll move into that acceptance more easily.
“Switching off” the anxious thoughts is best achieved by saying, “Oh, very scary!
Are you done yet?” Then continuously bring yourself back to the moment or task at
hand without getting annoyed for having these thoughts. What you really need to
adopt is an attitude that all is well. And it is. These fears are just a nuisance, but
they’ll pass.
This comes from Joe Barry...Here is the reading on Disturbing Thoughts...
Disturbing Thoughts
Anxiety almost always comes with a level of disturbing thoughts. You might be
driving with your children and then get a flash thought of losing control and driving
into an oncoming car. Another example is looking down from a bridge and suddenly
getting terrified by the idea that you might lose all control of your senses and jump.
If you experience such thoughts, I want to reassure you that, regardless of how
extreme, don’t worry about them. They’re the result of an active imagination
coupled with anxiety and, often, something or someone about which you care
deeply. These thoughts persist because you react so strongly to them. If you didn’t
have a strong reaction, the thoughts would never bother you.
The scary thoughts are like a small five-year-old looking for attention and targeting
something you care about to get a reaction from you. They occur to people who
would never dream of doing what they think about. It’s just the very fact of having
the thoughts that shocks people and leads them to believe they’re bad in some
way.
130
The truth is that these thoughts are the by-product of an overactive imagination
mixed with a good dollop of anxiety. It’s the anxious reaction to the thoughts that
keeps them going around and around, as if you’re tense inside and the thoughts
speed up. I’ve outlined this process in Stage 2, but here’s a quick reminder.
Visually, it’s like this. Thoughts float up in front of us all the time during our waking
day. Normally, we ignore most thoughts and continue what we’re doing. Other
times, we really get stuck into the thought and examine it in detail, such as “what I
have to do today” thoughts. When anxious thoughts enter, people generally whack
them away and try to run from them. This never works, because the energy put
into hitting away the thought instead powers it to rebound with even more force
and intensity.
For the moment, your best way to deal with this is to accept the chain of thoughts
as they happen. When “terrible idea X” enters your mind. you simply go:
There you are again! I’m getting totally bored by all this scare-
mongering. It’s not relevant to me or my life—but sure, go ahead and
tell the awful idea again if it makes you feel better.
Talk to the thoughts as if they’re visitors that have no relationship to your real self
and you’re simply being polite by letting them run. Don’t force them away—that
creates the rebound effect—but don’t feel you have to pay too much attention
either. The goal is to move your attention to what you want to focus on without
reacting to the scary thought. That way, your energy goes into what you want and
not into what you don’t want.
You know who you are and that these thoughts don’t represent you, so don’t
worry—the very fact that you get so upset by the thoughts shows how different you
are from the ideas that torment you. Another way to view the thoughts is as if they
were school bullies trying to upset you by saying awful things about, for example,
131
people close to you. If you get scared, the bully continues to taunt even more. If
you laugh and say, “Sure, whatever,” then walk away, the bully loses interest.
Acceptance is key. Getting upset by the thoughts only fuels the inner tension
further because you add more worry and stress to the problem. If you say to
yourself that this is a period you’re moving through and that it will work out fine,
you’ll move into that acceptance more easily.
“Switching off” the anxious thoughts is best achieved by saying, “Oh, very scary!
Are you done yet?” Then continuously bring yourself back to the moment or task at
hand without getting annoyed for having these thoughts. What you really need to
adopt is an attitude that all is well. And it is. These fears are just a nuisance, but
they’ll pass.
-
Guest
thanks very much for that. it's very helpful. I can see how the stress has perhaps lead me to these thoughts and why it's made me feel them about someone I care about so much. I feel a bit more like i can bat away the feelings when they come on now and I know that i'll eventually be fine and forget about them.