Breaking Free from the Shadows: My Journey through OCD and Recovery

My name is Emily Berk, and I am a 27 year old woman with OCD. For the last 6 years I have been diagnosed with OCD, and suffered silently as a child, teen, and young adult. When I was 22, I hit my breaking point and thought death was the only way out of my brain not making sense.

From taboo intrusive thoughts, extreme paranoia, obsessive touching, counting, body tics and twitches, fear of committing crimes I don’t remember, contracting illnesses from looking at someone, picking up trash so God won’t smite me, performing compulsions and rituals obsessively so that I would survive.

I was controlled by so many behaviors and thoughts that I knew weren’t normal. Irrational fears and illogical ideas were the king of my brain. OCD is the doubting disorder where all someone wants is certainty. As we know, nothing in this life is certain.

I’ve been so blessed to have found this community to learn how to regain my life and take back all the time and opportunities I have lost to this disorder. OCD advocacy along with intense therapy, groups, and medication saved me.

One person speaking up changed the trajectory of my life, one person saying “hey, this is what I experience” is what introduced me to the idea that OCD is more than the stereotypical behaviors depicted in the media.

I’ve been silent about this out of fear of judgment, embarrassment, and vulnerability, but after meeting so many people whose lives were saved by advocacy and people spreading awareness.

I can’t selfishly keep this struggle to myself at the risk of losing more people than we already have to suicide.

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Innocence Shattered: The Origins of My OCD Battle

My story starts at 8 years old. I have two older brothers who are around 10 years older than me and they would often watch me while my parents worked.

As an 8 year old being around 17 and 18 year olds, I often heard and saw things that weren’t meant for 8 year olds to see and hear.

At some point during this time, my brothers were watching a show like Law & Order, and I heard the word rape.

I didn’t know exactly what it was, but I knew it was bad, it had to do with my private parts, and in my head, I assumed it was between an older man and a young girl.

This lead to me obsessing that I had been raped by every older man I knew, including my siblings, my neighbors, my uncles, and my father.

I avoided them at all costs. I felt dirty and wrong when I was near them because my brain was filling up with sexually intrusive thoughts at such a young age.

“I remember sitting in my third grade class wondering if all the other kids were thinking of the same thing. If the girl beside me thought that her dad might rape her too”.

It was a terrible time in my life, and I never thought it would end, but surely, it did. This OCD exhausted itself so much and it eventually morphed into confessing OCD.

I would have to admit every thought or word that came into my brain. I thought people could read my mind so if I didn’t admit to what words my brain was shouting, it felt like people would call me out on it.

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Living with the Onset of Pedophilic OCD: A Personal Struggle

My childhood was normal, with OCD thrown into the mix. I experienced normal things as every child and teen does, but it felt like life was so hard. It felt like it was more difficult than what my friends were dealing with.

I always felt like a burden, like I had some sort of issue with everything that was happening. I never felt content. I was always longing for something that I didn’t quite know. I now know that all I was longing for was peace.

By the time I hit 22, I was living away from home in a college town, with a new job and new classes. Life was looking up for me.

I have always had sexual and taboo intrusive thoughts throughout my life, but I was always able to just shrug it off as “something weird” and go about my day.

“I cannot pin point when, but one day, the pedophilic OCD intrusive thoughts started, and they never stopped. I was so scared. I thought my life was over”. 

I remember not being strong enough to stand up in the shower, so I had to sit on the floor while the water fell on my head and down my face and body, along with my tears.

I couldn’t escape these thoughts. When I say it was 24/7, I am not exaggerating. Testing myself constantly by thinking of lewd images in my head to see how it made me feel.

I couldn’t look in mirrors because I was so disgusted with myself. When I attempted to go to class, I ended up leaving having a crying fit and needing to run to the bathroom to be alone. I started to experience groinal responses. 

Understanding Groinal Responses in OCD: A Chaotic Battle Within

For those who do not know what that is, it is arousal caused by unwanted images and thoughts.

I have now learned that groinal responses are proof of nothing other than the fact that you have OCD. Think of anxiety of the groin. When I first experienced them, I thought my life was over.

THIS was my proof; I really am a pedophile. How can I go on? Who can I tell? Should I kill myself? Any joy in my life was clouded and surrounded with bad thoughts.

Everything I did went back to this. If this passage seems to be disorganized, chaotic, confusing, and all over the place, its because that’s exactly how my brain felt.

I felt paralyzed physically, yet my brain was more active than it had ever been. I started to just stay in my room. 

I couldn’t leave because everything was a trigger. I couldn’t speak. I shut down completely.

I felt undeserving of hygiene because of the thoughts.This lead to not brushing my teeth or showering or eating.

I couldn’t even look at animals because I was scared I would want to have sex with them, too. I remember my mom coming to see me because she knew something was wrong.

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Seeking Help in Silence: A Misguided Visit to the Mental Health Center

 By this point, I had rashes on my cheeks caused from the tears of crying so much. She begged me to tell her what was wrong.

She would guess so I wouldn’t have to say the words myself, but she never guessed what was going on inside of my brain. She asked if I could go to the mental health center on my college campus. 

I thought, “this can’t get any worse,” so I went. I was wrong, and it did get worse. Looking back, the person I spoke to had no idea what OCD was, and neither did I, so this caused more misunderstanding of what I was dealing with.

They asked me questions like, “so you think you are going to hurt someone? You think you are going to hurt yourself?”

I couldn’t say exactly what was happening because I was scared I would be arrested and brought to prison. I just left the health center and accepted my fate.

 That I would probably have to commit suicide to get out of this situation. My parents brought me home from school after seeing my state, and they called dozens of therapists to get me an appointment.

A Glimpse of Hope: Finding Understanding and a Second Chance

 At this point, I had given myself two options. I would either kill myself now, or kill myself as I am awaiting trial for going to prison, but going to a therapist and explaining clearly what I am dealing with could give me some relief while I was waiting to commit suicide.

So, I found a woman who agreed to see me as soon as possible. My mom explained on the phone that I needed care and that something was wrong.

This kind and gracious woman opened her doors to me without judgment when I needed it most.

I walked into her office shaking, thinking that this was the last moment I would be a free woman. I broke down and emptied my heart out for two hours. I held back nothing.

 “I was falling apart in that office, and I could feel the words and emotions just pouring out of me and they wouldn’t stop. I have been holding in this darkness with such shame and fear and I finally felt borderline safe and understood”.

By the end of those two hours, she closed her book and said, “oh, you have textbook OCD.” Just as easy as those words spilled out of her mouth, it was like I gained a second chance at life. I said to her, “so you aren’t reporting me to the police?” 

She explained to me what OCD was and how it was so much more than its stereotype. I finally had an answer. I’ll be honest, it didn’t cause the thoughts to go away and I didn’t suddenly just believe that I wasn’t a pedophile.

My mind swirled with “what if’s,” but I had some trickle of hope, and for me it was everything I needed to fight another day. I didn’t want to die, I just wanted to stop this madness in my head.

I thought death was the only escape, but I learned that isn’t the case, and it is never the only way out of our problems, no matter what they may be. 

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A Relentless Battle: Confronting OCD’s Shifting Challenges

Our fate is never sealed no matter how much our brains tell us it may be. I continued to see this woman over the next three years. She pulled me out of the trauma that POCD caused me.

After doing exposures and working hard, I overcame POCD. The experience has stuck with me in many different ways.

For example, I eventually went on to go back to school and graduate, and I remember my first day back on campus, I walked over a pothole that I use to walk over when I was in the thick of POCD, and as I remembered that pothole, I watched my feet graze over it and I felt what I felt the last time I walked these steps.

It’s funny how different things may trigger you. Pictures of myself as a child, baby wipes at the grocery store, children’s songs. The triggers were not limited. Intrusive thoughts and OCD can fool you into thinking anything about yourself.

As time went on, my OCD started to play whack-a-mole. I began an intense fear of contracting HIV.

It started being triggered when I would kiss or be intimate with someone, but it grew into not being able to use toilets or even looking at certain people I deemed HIV positive

 for no reason. My compulsion was getting tested for HIV. I wouldn’t believe the tests were correct and it would lead me to going to get tested again.

It ruined a lot of potential relationships for me because I wouldn’t be able to have a normal, healthy sex life. Even protected sex with someone who had been tested caused me to spiral.

Some of the people took it personally and left me because they couldn’t handle it. It was scary because I HAD to sit in discomfort.

Even after testing negative, I thought that perhaps the HIV has not kicked in yet and I needed to wait longer for it to show up. I lived in a constant state of fear that my life was over. 

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Facing Fears Head-On: The Healing Power of Worst-Case Scenario Script

When I finally started to see a therapist who specializes in OCD and ERP therapy, she had me write this worst case scenario script every single day. 

It was difficult and caused me so much discomfort, but it was necessary for me to overcome this fear. “I am 27 years old and am diagnosed with HIV.

I will never know for sure where I got it from but, now, I have an HIV doctor who prescribes me a nightly cocktail of medication.

Dating is a problem and I am lonely because I avoid getting close to people. My family continues to include me in their lives but I will never know 100% if they really love me the same. 

I miss out on opportunities to meet eligible men to date because of my diagnosis. If I do manage to find a partner, having a family will always be a major risk.

Having HIV will rob me of a full connected life that I want. Now I simply identify as a person with HIV.”

We created this script after listing my fears surrounding HIV. I still struggle with this, but it is a battle I am continuing to fight.

Confronting the Shadows: Battling Intrusive Thoughts and Compulsions

Another theme I am having a hard time kicking is hit and run OCD. I fear that every time I drive, I have hit a pedestrian and I do not realize it.

I think this happens when I hit a pot hole, a speed bump, when I see a pedestrian, when I blink or check my music.

I turn around and around and around to retrace my steps and that swallows me up into the OCD spiral and I cannot get out of it.

It causes me a lot of paranoia like the police are watching me or that the FBI will bust my door down.

I mainly feel unsafe because of this. I am currently trying to do the ERP therapy to overcome this, but it is a long and exhausting process!

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Embracing the Light: Triumph Over OCD and a Future of Hope

Overall, OCD is a torturous mental illness to have. It has cost me my youth, my college years, relationships, happiness, money, peace.

With all of that being said, OCD has brought me strength, empathy, resilience, knowledge, and most importantly it has brought me into an incredible community filled with people just like me, from all over the world.

If I have one piece of advice to readers, it is to share your story. Speak aloud the trauma that OCD has brought you. 

Talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly. Our stories need to be shared. It is life saving material that will help someone realize that they have OCD and help them start their journey into recovery rather than debating on whether or not they should end their life.

I have been there and hearing someone’s words explain what OCD has opened the doors for me to continue living.

For all the people out there struggling reading this right now, OCD is not the death sentence that it feels like. Recovery is possible and maintenance is key. 

Find an OCD therapist. If you do not have access to one, there are plenty of free resources online to utilize that will help you fight this.

You are not alone even though the isolation OCD causes feels so real. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, folks, and I promise you will one day reach it.