Dear laruf:

I read all of your original post. I have suffered from anxiety and OCD since five or six years old. I learned a lot about the nature of anxiety and OCD in the last five years or so and still learning.

We are thinking beings, unlike animals- and as OCD goes, it is not a blessing. We can imagine anything at all, images and words. That core issue, the excessive, ongoing fear since childhood circulates in the brain and … bumps into thoughts, attaches itself to this or that thought or group of thoughts, like harming others.

Over time you can learn that these thoughts are short term mental events that happen all day long. You learn to not get scared by the thoughts: “these are only thoughts…”

Thoughts don’t have power outside the distance in between your ears: for example, you can think: “I am an elephant”- but the thought doesn’t make you an elephant. You are still human.

With Harm OCD you are afraid that if you can imagine harming another, then you might. But you have self control, you evaluate people and situations and will not harm people except for self defense, except if the situation calls for it. Over time you learn to trust your self control.

There is more, of course. Let me know if you’d like more of my input.

anita