My Story, My Spiral, My Way Forward
I’m sharing my story as part of my own recovery, but also because it’s incredibly hard to find and connect with people who experience the same OCD theme as I do. In my opinion, one of the most challenging and painful OCD themes: Real Event OCD.
I've had OCD for as long as I can remember. Looking back, I can see signs as early as age five. I had confessional OCD. I’d tell my mum about dreams she appeared in, especially the ones that felt intimate or inappropriate. I felt disgusted with myself and believed that confessing was the only way to make things right.
I’d confess when swear words came into my mind. I’d check the taps over and over before bed. I’d pray repeatedly for my family, and then again for anyone I’d accidentally left out. These rituals gave me brief relief, but the anxiety always returned.
As a teenager and young adult, my obsessions shifted. I struggled with SO-OCD, POCD, ROCD, and intense fears around contracting HIV in all kinds of implausible ways.
Eventually, these themes faded.
Until OCD locked onto the one thing I’ll never have certainty about: a real event from my past.
I want to share the details because I know how isolating this disorder can be and how much more isolating it feels when you can't find stories from others who share your exact theme. OCD thrives in silence. Knowing someone else has lived through your version of it can be deeply healing.
So here’s mine.
When I was around 15, I dared my cousin to put a traffic cone in the middle of a busy freeway (cars travelling 60–80 km/h). He did and we hid. Not long after, we heard a loud bang — but we stayed hidden. Fifteen or twenty minutes later, we went back to check. We saw what may have been the remains of the cone scattered across the road, but nothing else that I can recall.
At the time, it didn’t feel like a big deal. But years later, OCD twisted that memory into an endless spiral of what-ifs.
What if someone died?
What if a car braked suddenly and unrestrained passengers flew forward and were killed?
What if someone had a heart attack later as a result?
What if they were stopped on the road, waiting for an ambulance?
What if a child… a pregnant woman… a baby… was injured or killed?
My cousin recalls a car being stopped, but I don’t remember that. And because I can’t be sure, OCD won’t let it go. I’m plagued by images, by uncertainty, by shame, by guilt.
This is the spiral I’m in now. Even though I’ve successfully navigated Real Event OCD with Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) many times before, relapse makes everything feel hopeless again. And yet, I know the path. I know ERP has helped me and I believe it will help me again.
I don’t know where this journey is taking me. Recovery has not been linear or easy. But I hope that by sharing this, I can find others who understand and maybe help someone else feel less alone.
Please, if you’re struggling with a similar theme: keep hope.
ERP is hard. But it works.
It’s a long road, but I just have to keep moving forward.
— Kajal