i made paper cut outs today. i laminated them afterwards, and went to cut off the excess plastic. i was in the middle of carefully cutting around the paper, when the overwhelming urge to cut up all of my hair, my skin, and my clothes came over me. nothing triggered it. just an intrusive thought. why do they have to happen, though? my mind is already so cluttered, why does my brain create more mess for me to wade through? i’ve avoided cooking for a very long time because of it.. i can’t even dice vegetables without an intrusive thought telling me to stab myself or try to split the wood cabinet with the knife. i feel ashamed of it, too. especially the kinds of thoughts i get when i’m around multiple people. it most often occurs when i’m around strangers (bonus points if they’re adult men), i just experience my brain insisting that they’re bad people and that i should kill them before they kill me.
it’s scary.
my thoughts are scary.
P.S. – a reminder to other posters:
7 comments
That sucks. A similar thing happens to me, but for some reason when I`m in public. I don`t know exactly why.
intrusive thoughts are really common in people with ADHD and OCD, even more so when depression, anxiety, or ptsd are also present.
As for why they happen, I wouldn’t know. No doubt there are deep seated traumas and life experiences at play that would best be addressed by a professional. As for the shame, I’d say don’t forget the flip side of it – so far, you haven’t acted on them. ( I assume.) That is cause for a bit of pride on exercising willpower and discretion. They sound frightening to deal with, but here you are. Congrats on finding the resolve to fight them. I’m sure you’d rather they stop, and someday they might, but at least you are aware that they are only thoughts and they don’t define what and who YOU actually are. I don’t have the courage to speak on some of the dark thoughts I deal with, they are pretty…vile, to be honest, but the victory lies in recognizing them and moving through them as best one can. You seem capable of doing that. Each thought you recognize, move past and dismiss makes you just a bit stronger.
what scares me the most is the fact that I experience homicidal ideation separate from my intrusive thoughts, and the intrusive thoughts only make it harder to deal with.
when I spoke about my H.I (homicidal ideation) in IOP (you’re supposed to tell them about your currents thoughts like self harm, suicidal ideation, etc.), there was this one girl who didn’t like me and she yelled at me for “trying to one up everyone’s trauma”. I ran out of the room crying, and two friends of mine had said that she had said “Oh god, I’m scared now” as if I was going to hurt her. It’s humiliating that even in that environment, people use those things against me
Damn. That’s harsh. Obviously she feels intimidated by you, and things would be less stressful if she could deal with it without making you feel guilty about it. Group therapy sounds beneficial, to a degree, but you never know how other personalities will react…I have to admit, hearing someone admit to homicidal ideation would catch my attention, but I’d also take it in context – you’re speaking in general terms, which she interpreted as a threat to her, unfortunately. My darker thought processes involve homicide, but are EASULY overridden by my desire to hurt/end myself before hurting anyone else, and honestly, if I were in a group session, I doubt I’d be able to admit to them because, well, you see how people might react.
but the thing about that is she knew how targeted and specific my homicidal thoughts are. it’s specific towards people who resemble an abuser I’ve had (behaviorally or physically) or strangers who make me feel unsafe for some unknown reason.
I get the same from time to time, but mostly related to self harm. I was going to point out that some pathologies make it more likely to happen but you already said it above (which is completely accurate btw). Other than that, i guess that since we’re wired to react to things (external stimulus), we’re triggered to act in the way that makes the most sense to our brains (association), which might in turn be conditioned by old trauma.
Kinda sucks since it means that i have to hide every cutting tool whenever stress hits, or i might end up bald.