The act of trying to suppress the thought ironically makes it worse: think of trying to sit on a spring – the more pressure applied to squish it down, the more intense the spring pops back up. What happens next is a need to suppress the thought or make it stop, or go away. Once they are in this place, they are in a heightened state – so they become more alert the next time an intrusive thought occurs, which increases the anxiety. They can then get caught up in knots about it and begin to question their morality, their sanity, their reality. The thought then that this could have come from them becomes a source of extreme distress. Often, the intrusive thought/image/urge is exactly the thing that they are totally morally opposed to, which makes it so terrifying. People tormented by intrusive thinking tend to live by a high moral code (this could be, for example, from a strict or religious upbringing, where the price for transgression or misdeeds is punishing – leading to a desire to be good, to keep in check, and a fear of mistakes for the consequences that they’ll being) and so what’s at stake for having them seems higher. The anxiety then re-triggers the thought. Even the thought of encountering a pot hole itself might trigger anxiety. Every time they see a pot hole from there on, they will do everything they can to avoid it. ![]() Even if they find a way out eventually, they are now so anxious about that happening again that they drive more cautiously – they may seek out another route, even if it means taking longer to get to the destination. The wheel of the car starts free-wheeling and they can’t get out. Someone with obsessive compulsive disorder keeps stumbling on pot holes – every now and then they get trapped in them. But they arrive safely, and the thought of pot holes on the way home doesn’t bother them. Perhaps they encounter another few potholes on their journey. The best analogy I can give for the difference between someone who doesn’t have OCD and somebody who does is to imagine driving on an open road.Įvery now and then, the car might stumble on a pot hole: this pot hole might be small and doesn’t cause too much of a problem so they drive on. ![]() I believe that if we can become more comfortable with our own intrusive thoughts, we might be in a better place to support those suffering with them. If a client is afraid of bringing their intrusive thoughts into the room, it will only perpetuate their problem. There is a misconception around obsessive compulsive disorder, which emphasises compulsions like checking and washing, without taking into account these intrusive thoughts and/or images that underlie what’s really at the heart of it. But for some people – particularly people suffering with OCD or pure obsessional OCD – intrusive thoughts are harrowing because they happen frequently and intensely, and the person starts to attach meaning and significance to them. Most of the time, they are fleeting thoughts and pass by without much concern to the person experiencing them. ![]() But there is no shame in intrusive thoughts, and it’s about time we started talking openly about them. They’re usually violent, sexual or blasphemous – naturally, people tend not to admit to having them. Intrusive thoughts and images come into our minds seemingly randomly, and they can seem out of place, bizarre, or even taboo, in their nature. These are not the same as hallucinations. Intrusive thoughts like those above are extremely common, and we can have intrusive images and intrusive urges, too. ![]() How many times have you walked along a tube platform and thought, “What if I jumped?” before thinking, “Why did I think that?” and then panicked? Or had a sudden image of kissing your own relative and then cringed?
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