Doubt: not as simple as you think

The topic of this post is doubt. Doubt is pretty much the cause of OCD symptoms such as anxiety, stress, and panic.

What is doubt? One might say that it is simply not believing in something, but for somebody with OCD, it is much more complex than that. Somebody with OCD will doubt even what they used to KNOW is true before their symptoms started showing. For example, lately I have been doubting things as small as disbelieving that I even have anxiety to begin with and that my worries are completely legitimate. Or for a more unusual example, how about getting good grades and getting your work done for school yet doubting that you are really a good student? Even though I am not a true psychiatrist, I as a sufferer know more about the disorder than those who are unaffected (except for, of course, people with a degree in this field), so all of this knowledge comes mainly from personal experience and a tad bit from what I read online.

One thing that has been happening to me lately is the doubt that, if I have never seen it in real life, then it doesn't exist. For example, if an OCD sufferer reads about the Yellowstone Supervolcano on Wikipedia but has never actually been to Yellowstone, they will occasionally doubt that the volcano even exists unless they have actually seen it. This can also be associated with knowledge; something that you KNEW before your OCD symptoms showed up (which happened to me. In recent years my symptoms have exploded) will often be doubted by a sufferer as true. For example, if somebody learns that the word "fish" is a noun in school, they may clench their forehead later from sheer doubt that it is a true notion.

The main summary of doubt relating to OCD is a lot like what you would normally think of when you hear the term, only it is much more severe. Doubt from OCD will commonly be much more intense as well as be caused by more mellow things that shouldn't stress somebody out.

It may sounds confusing to non-sufferers, but in truth this is what I have been experiencing for an entire year so far. OCD sufferers who have experienced a lot of doubt should be able to connect with me here; and for you non-sufferers, I am hoping that you guys can learn about some horrible things about what you are luckily missing out on. I usually update this blog whenever I am having an anxiety attack, otherwise I do not have the motivation to update it because I think to myself "why should I?". So stay tuned for more OCD posts coming soon!