Hi laruf,

“struggling both with on-and-off anxiety”
“more intense anxiety stemming from violent intrusive thoughts”

“I’ve looked around quite a bit, and found some different recommendations for how to handle everything, but sometimes it still seems a lot heavier than something I can handle”

Can you tell what you have looked at so nobody suggests you a same advice.

“violent intrusive thoughts….doing horrible and repulsive things to people I know and love, my pets, strangers”
“intentionally trying to think up the worst things that I could do to someone, or the most terrible outcomes of a situation”

If comfortable can you elaborate these things that keep coming to your mind.

Thanks
VJ.

• This reply was modified 8 years, 2 months ago by VJ.

Hi laruf,

Do not worry about how you may sound as gradually this place will seem safe for you.

I have a known person (a relative) who is in a similar situation to yours. Along with the thoughts and images you mentioned he also gets involuntary thoughts such as he may go and press a female’s navel. Although he does not do that but the thoughts are bothersome. I guess you can relate to that.

You have mentioned that things are better than earlier. So how intense are they currently? In a week (or a month) how many times do you get those troublesome thoughts?

VJ.

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

Hi Laruf

You done great by taking the first most important step whenever something dark within us creeps up. That is of acknowledgement.

Hence, you were able to be aware of it and I can see that you are fighting it now. I was however, repeatedly, told not to suppress it, chase it out of our minds like we will do to houseflies but to acknowledge the existence of the intrusive thought and lead it back to rest. Let Lil’Intrusive know you will holler when needed.

I am 38 this year and its only recent 2 years I start to learn and try to cope with deep set emotional baggage accumulated through the years.. can you imagine the clean up. Gosh! ..and those who i drove away ….Sigh!

Sorry back to you, never ever blame or lower your self worth just because you have such thoughts in your head. Believe it or not, all of us have those thoughts in our heads too, we too project NSFW / Violent thoughts in our brains. So it should not make you any less of Laruf at all. in fact, its the chance for a better Laruf, once you make sense out of this. Hope its easier for you to come to terms with your violent thoughts – its the way your mind is trying to use to alert you of a message. Do you think if your mind activated Happy Thoughts to alert you, you will think so much about it?

I shall not deviate too far off, learn to also acknowledge all your dark thoughts, let the image manifest, and let go. Breathe and have some ice cream or whatever makes you happy, because theres more for you work on!

Once you slowly cut down thinking less of yourself, you will be much stronger for one of the best ride of your life:

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I have suggested earlier on for you to acknowledge the existence of your intrusive thoughts. These thoughts or memories are all part of us, whether they are happy or sad, or if you like it or not. Fighting them or shunning them away like houseflies, will cause other deficiencies to manifest. How you will feel, if your mum chases you out of the house instead of asking you to stay for dinner?

IDENTIFY TRIGGER
We gotta learn to listen to our body, mind and soul. Their only purpose is to remind us where its faulty, or at times they will handle repairs themselves even without you realising, hence, at times when we forget they exist and the harm we are doing to them , they will just raise a riot.
So try have a note book with you and jot down anything you can recall. If you can, whenever the thought hits you, write down any possible triggers there and then.

If obvious areas gives no clues, try thinking deeper for any hidden resentment for whatever you are going right now? or certain frustrations you refuse to acknowledge .like your anxiety

You might have images of violent acts done to your loved ones? See if you observe any triggers when this happens? and the correlation of the trigger with every details of your violent thoughts, the people involved, subject matter, environment etc.

LEARN CONTROL

If you could recall, I mentioned about asking you to tell Lil’Intrusive to rest and only wake up when you holler? Since you already acknowledge Instrusive as part of you, it deserves every respect of its existence as much as you do. So don’t let intrusive thoughts control your emotions or way of life, its just a response like when you sneeze to dust and pepper, your intrusive thought is hence the response to the triggers which you need to know, in order to know whats next for you.

HEAL
If at times, from now till you know what were the triggers, you feel overwhelmed and is still trying to cope with acknowledging it, try to heal yourself from the damage it would have caused you.

One of the ways could be to draw them out, as violent as it may be, let your creativity and aesthetic sense out to play with your intrusive thought, see what happens after they finish dancing.

Even if your drawing sucks, its ok. You are not trying to be Van Gogh, or maybe you are the talented artist you never knew you were. You need not showcase your drawings if you dont want to, its your choice. You can also express it through writing a story, through music, a digital art form, whatever your creativity leads you to.

When we start to embrace the existence of certain malfunctions or differences in our lives, other parts of us have the courage to appear. Since you can acknowledge and embrace Instrusive, am sure you can handle yourself as an Abstract Artists, Guitarist, Food Sculptor, just a few examples of possible hidden talents or interests that you might not realise or suppressed due to certain reasons.

HELP OTHERS
The compassion we have inside can do wonders. Its that very compassion you have that alerted you Intrusive is out at stray, please do something. Hence, you could respond by seeking help here. Hope you could relate to this – the harmful one is not Intrusive cos its just a thought, its you who will become the harmful

Just like what I am doing now talking to you. Nurture that compassion into an intent to help anyone go through this easier than you did.But embark on helping others only when you are able to cope with facing your own dark side without being drained by it

and then remember to cry, if you need to.

Pardon the long story.

Laruf, I hope it helps somehow. I am no expert but nor am I a professional in this, its just painful enough for me not to let anyone go through what I did, at least lesser.

There are also certain reasons why a good person have violent thoughts, the other implications should this persist on areas to be mindful of, factors to consider, while going through this.

Feel free to contact me if what I shared forms a chord with you.

Well Laruf, its a bewildering learning process, i know. we need to go through now in order to be who we were meant to be tomorrowLive well. Its your life – your gift 🙂