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Ocd Quotes

Browse 107 quotes about Ocd.

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Ocd Quotes

“It (trying to keep the law) grants you the power to judge others and feel superior to them. You believe you are living to a higher standard than those you judge. Enforcing rules, especially in its more subtle expressions like responsibility and expectation, is a vain attempt to create certainty out of uncertainty. And contrary to what you might think, I have a great fondness for uncertainty. Rules cannot bring freedom; they only have the power to accuse.”

“So what came first, do you reckon, the horrible thoughts forcing you to carry out rituals like a junkie, or the need to make people laugh? Or maybe they’re two sides of the same coin. The vivid imagination causing thoughts which make you want to cry is the same imagination that can find humour in situations other people would call ‘mundane’…” “It’s occurred to me, yes.” “Oh, it’s more than occurred to you, Nicky boy. You’re an intelligent man who has an affliction which affects your mind, so you’ve definitely thought about it. A lot, I bet. I’d like to tell you something Nicky, but I want to make sure I’ve got your full attention. Do I?” “Yes,” I replied in spite of myself. He leaned even closer, as if we were either co-conspirators in some scheme or lovers about to kiss. “We’re all victims. All of us. Victims of our own minds...”

“It is hard to overstate the biological significance of obsessions, compulsions and the psychological mechanisms that produce them. On the one hand, compulsions bear striking similarities to various repetitive, ritualized behaviors observed in other animals --including self-grooming, food inspection and washing, and checking for predators. On the other hand, cultural rituals --which also share several features with OCD symptoms-- perform a range of important functions in human societies, from group coordination in social and religious ceremonies to the transmission of knowledge between generations.”

“Beliefs about overimportance of thoughts and thought control are more frequent in highly religious people and mediate the observed association between religiosity and OCD. Thought-action fusion overlaps with magical thinking and is associated with religiosity, paranormal beliefs, and positive schizotypy. most likely, thought-action fusion plays a significant role in the etiology of autogenous obsessions.”

“Sometimes your belief system is really your fears attached to rules.”

“The second I get into a car and we start driving, I imagine a fatal crash to the last detail. When I’m in the liquor store, I imagine a robbery by the time the cashier tells me the total. Every plane ride is an 8-hour movie in my head of me planning what I would say to the stranger on my right if the pilot announced the plane was crashing. I always imagine these scenarios. Family dying. Earthquakes. The earth suddenly falling because gravity left the party. It’s exhausting. Yesterday someone was afraid of me. I was bicycling with Austin and we saw a dead deer on the road. It was so large. Austin nearly fell off his bike when he saw it. Then he looked over at me confused. He asked why I didn't react to it. I told him it was because I’d already imagined one six miles back. There are always two worlds playing in my head at once: what’s in front of me and what could be.”

“I’ve gotten really good at reading Kara’s face over the years. and I know what that expression means. It’s disappointment. Here she is trying to find me a perfect boyfriend, yet I can’t keep my neuroses in check long enough to keep them from running away. I can’t bring myself to care. If a guy runs from something as small as this, they are in no way, shape, or form able to handle me anyway.”

“The good part about having a mental disorder is having a valid reason for all the stupid things we do because of a damaged prefrontal cortex. However, the best part is seeing someone completely sane do the exact same things, without a valid excuse. This is the great equalizer of God and his little gift for all us crazy people to enjoy.”

“When I am fully immersed in my work of nourishing humanity, it fills my head with all kinds of feel-good chemicals, such as endorphins, serotonin and dopamine. Problems occur during the brief intervals between the finishing of one work and the beginning of another. During these intervals, my biology starts to get filled with stress hormones cortisol and adrenalin, that worsens my OCD. That is why, I can’t sit still even a day after I finish writing a book. Because if I do, my OCD begins to suffocate me inside my head. Hence, as soon as I deliver a work, I have to start working on my next scientific literature.”

“I realized that I was okay with myself. I was quirky and withdrawn and loud, but I liked that. I smiled at strangers without thinking they were going to attack me and drag me into their cars. I went to doctors’ offices and touched magazines that had been touched by sick people.”

“Ginny told me that, like Dr. Wisner's patients, her problem was not so much that she had an urge to kill her grandchildren, but rather a fear that she might somehow lose control of her senses. She put it this way: "The fear is not that in my current state I could do these things, but that I might slip into a state where I could do it. Right now, when I am thinking about it, I know it won't happen. But still it festers, it festers and lingers, and it keeps beating on you and beating on - like it's the villain, the enemy, the monster, the demon - it's a faceless devil." With my encouragement, Ginny told her husband about the thoughts. She was relieved that his reaction was "he just couldn't even believe what he was hearing - he knew I'd never do these things, they were just bad thoughts." When I asked Ginny why she thought he has so much faith in her, she replied, "Because he sees me with people daily. He said he fell in love with me because I am kind. For example, he reminded me of a time when we were together in a cabin, and I noticed a bee trapped behind a screen and I told him I didn't want the bee to die, so he spent the first hour of our first weekend together undoing the screen to free the bee. He asked me, does that sound like someone who would kill her grandchildren? He also reminded me that I am soft and warm and very loving, and he would never worry about me doing the awful things I was thinking of." Needless to say, Ginny was relieved by her husband's reaction, since she had feared he would think she was crazy.”

“I had to stop him from arresting an old lady who let her dog urinate against the fire hydrant that was in front of Burgerville headquarters. "You'll blow our cover." "But what if there is a fire?" "The fire department will come and put it out," I said. "With what?" "Water," I said. "Not from that hydrant," Monk said. "It's inoperable." "No, it's not," I said. "It can still be used." "There is urine all over it," Monk said. "no fireman would dare touch it, nor would any other human being." "Firefighters run into burning buildings," I said."They aren't going to care about some dog pee on a fire hydrant." "They would if they knew," Monk said. "We should call and warn them. Call Joe right now. He can get the word out faster than we can." "Every fire hydrant in the city has dog pee on it, Mr. Monk. It's how dogs mark their territory. I can guarantee you that every male dog that has passed that hydrant has pissed on it." He looked at me, wide eyed, "No." "It's what dogs do," I said. "The firefighters knows this." Monk swallowed hard. "And they still use the hydrants?" "Of course they do." "They are the bravest men on earth," Monk said solemnly.”

“Sometimes my thoughts were hard to digest. Sometimes my brain would get stuck on a concept that troubled me and would create endless rabbit holes in my head. It seemed like the more I tried to find an answer, the more complicated it would become. And sometimes unsettling images would randomly flash into my head. I didn’t want to describe what they were. I knew the images weren’t true, but they often made me feel uneasy.”

“The Price I Pay (The Sonnet) I spent my life in the depth of heart, So my social skills are a little lacking. Either they want me to be deep always, Or they simply call me rather cheesy. Whenever I try small talking as human, I fail and fail again most spectacularly. That's the price I pay for being your rock, A timeless pillar unfit for warmth and amity. Mine is not to ask why, mine is to do or die, A path in which I turned my life into an idea. Still it'd be nice to be treated as a human, It'd be nice to feel the gentleness of another. There is no greatness without weakness. Greats must persevere no matter the coldness.”

“Effort in the Calvinist doctrine had still another psychological meaning. The fact that one did not tire in that unceasing effort and that one succeeded in one's moral as well as one's secular work was a more or less distinct sign of being one of the chosen ones. The irrationality of such compulsive effort is that the activity is not meant to create a desired end but serves to indicate whether or not something will occur which has been determined beforehand, independent of one's own activity or control. This mechanism is a well-known feature of compulsive neurotics. Such persons when afraid of the outcome of an important undertaking may, while awaiting an answer, count the windows of houses or trees on the street. If the number is even, a person feels that things will be alright; if it is uneven, it is a sign that he will fail. Frequently this doubt does not refer to a specific instance but to a person's whole life, and the compulsion to look for "signs" will pervade it accordingly. Often the connection between counting stones, playing solitaire, gambling, and so on, and anxiety and doubt, is not conscious. A person may play solitaire out of a vague feeling of restlessness and only an analysis might uncover the hidden function of his activity: to reveal the future. In Calvinism this meaning of effort was part of the religious doctrine. Originally it referred essentially to moral effort, but later on the emphasis was more and more on effort in one's occupation and on the results of this effort; that is, success or failure in business. Success became the sign of God's grace; failure, the sign of damnation.”

“You can't compare men or women with mental disorders to the normal expectations of men and women in without mental orders. Your dealing with symptoms and until you understand that you will always try to find sane explanations among insane behaviors. You will always have unreachable standards and disappointments. If you want to survive in a marriage to someone that has a disorder you have to judge their actions from a place of realistic expectations in regards to that person's upbringing and diagnosis.”

“The tight ball of muck inside me—I opened it. I opened the shame, and it crumbled next to yours. This connection—the one I didn’t think we were going to have—let some of my muck go. And when it left my body, it evaporated into nothing. It had been living in me, but as soon as it was exposed, it disappeared.”

“[I]f he had to guess, he would say that the reason he doesn't want to loan the book out, to Ethan or anyone else, is because of the part of his personality that is one gigantic record-keeping system, a complex sifting and filing scheme that dictates what goes here and what goes there, turning his life into so many marks on a tablet. His mind would busy itself with the book's whereabouts every second it was away. He knows it would.”

“I knew I could get help and, more importantly, get better. Because suddenly I wasn’t bad, it was bad. It was no longer me, it was something else. I wasn’t schizophrenic, or psychotic, or any of the other things I thought I was. I had Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, or OCD. In that unforgettable moment, I took back some of my power – chunks of it flooding into my psyche, called in from afar, returning home to me.”

“At the Chinese restaurant, I stared out the window overlooking a tranquil garden with water features, ponds covered in lily pads, and koi fish. Amid the serenity and smell of dumplings, I struggled to breathe. It seemed the walls were closing in, and everyone was looking at me. Words danced around on the menu. I didn’t want the waiter near us. I wanted to shrink until I popped and disappeared.”

“In only a few months, I acquired an arsenal of weapons to help me combat my OCD. I became a strong opponent against the enemy. Some days, I was still left bruised and bloodied on the battlefield. But other times, I was victorious, guns blazing, blowing heads off, brains splattered across the sky.”