Can anyone relate to these fears?

[jlkltt]

I have always had anxiety since I can remember. I'm 28 yrs old female and have two children ages 9 & 3. This past Nov. I started having instrusive thoughts. Ex: "What if I hurt someone or I listen to the news and they would be talking about a crime and I would think " what if I end up doing that". Anyways, I have been going to therapy now for almost 3 months. I was on Zoloft 50mg for 1 1/2 months. I hated it! I stopped taking it a couple weeks ago. I was told that I had depression & GAD. Now I'm told that I have OCD instead of GAD. It seems like I keep coming up with new fears. I haven't been having many instrusive thoughts anymore, but now I'm constantly worried that I'm going to get amnesia or Alzehemers(?) or some form of major mental illness that I can't recover from. Why am I thinking these things? I have never questioned my mind until a couple of months ago when I had that first instrusive thought. Will this ever go away? I am a stay at home mom and would like to go to work part time, but now I'm afraid to. I'm so afraid that I will lose my mind or forget everybody. So instead I stay close to home and go to my therapist every week. I don't want this to control my life to where I can't do fun things. Does anyone else have these kind of fears? Thanks

[V for Victor]

Yes, I can relate very closely to what you're saying. I would say the OCD diagnosis is correct.

How is your therapy working out? What do you do at your therapy sessions?

[jlkltt]

For about the first two months I talked about my thoughts and kept asking for reassurance. The last couple weeks my therapist has been asking different questions and explaining why I feel this way. I'm actually not in the best relationship right now & she says that I've been emotional abused & that is why my self esteem is so low. So far we just pretty much talk about how I feel and she tells me that when I start getting the "what ifs" to replace them with positive what ifs. She keeps telling me I'm not crazy and that I will get better, but sometimes I wonder if I will. She also has told me that she can keep reassuring me that I'm not crazy , but until I believe in myself than it's not going to help. Anyways, I really like her and enjoy talking to her, but sometimes I wonder if I should see a OCD specialist.

[V for Victor]

An OCD specialist could probably help more than just an ordinary counselor.

I don't know the details of your relationship, but being in a bad one can contribute to low self esteem, but don't expect everything to become just perfect overnight be ending it. OCD is trickier than that.