ROCD Compulsions & How to Stop Them I Relationship Anxiety

Welcome. My name is Danielle Thornton, and I am a life coach and course creator. And today I want to talk about compulsions, specifically involved with relationship ocd. So a compulsion is any activity that you're doing. Sometimes you're aware of it, and sometimes you're not. But. But it's anything that you're doing that you're getting a message from your brain or an urge to do that's alleviating your anxiety. And so what happens a lot of times is when you're new to learning about relationship ocd or high anxiety in relationships, you're not really aware that you're doing these things. But once you really start to learn about OCD and what's involved, and sometimes with anxiety, you start to learn about compulsions and. And why you're doing them. So the thing about a compulsion is it's anything that you're doing that relieves your anxiety, okay? And they're really good in the short term, they're helpful and they work, which is why your brain is telling you to keep doing them. They're alleviating that anxiety in the moment. But long term, it's actually making your anxiety worse. It's just like, let's compare it to someone who has a drug addiction. They have problems in their life. They're going through things, or they're having emotions that they don't want to deal with. And so instead of actually dealing with the root of the problem, they are taking a drug because it feels good. And so that drug is really great in the moment. You feel good in the moment. It alleviates all that stress and anxiety. But what happens is you get secondary issues on top of that, and you've never really dealt with the root of the problem. And compulsions are the exact same way. And just like a drug, the more you do them, the more your mind and your body will crave them to ease the anxiety. And it's just a downward spiral. So next, let's talk about five common compulsions that you may already be doing and may not be aware of it. So the first one is checking. Checking is really common with relationship ocd. And what most people do is they check their feelings. Now, just like a drug makes you feel better in the moment, positive feelings make you feel good in the moment. So you might be checking your feelings to see, okay, do I love my partner? Do I feel good in this moment? Do I feel in love?

Am I meeting the expectation of, you know, we're out on vacation, and am I feeling the way I think I should be feeling? In this moment. Because if the answer is yes, then you're gonna feel like, okay, everything's okay in my relationship. But the problem is there's a lot of unrealistic expectations there to begin with. But also, no one ever feels wonderful all the time in their relationship, and especially depending on what point in their relationship that they're at. So if they. If you feel the positive feelings, your anxiety is gonna lower. But if you don't, and there's a lot of times that you're not going to, you're not gonna feel any better. But again, just like a drug, you're looking for those positive emotions, and when they're not there, you're gonna feel worse. And when they are there, it's gonna alleviate your anxiety. But again, the problem is it's not your feelings that are going to give you the relief. It's the underneath. The root of the problem is the fear. And that's where the relief is gonna come in, is dealing with the emotions and the fear and the expectations that you have. The second common compulsion is comparing. And while a lot of people do this from time to time, for the most part, people with relationship ocd are constantly comparing their relationship because they want to know if it's up to par, is it okay? Again, it's another anxiety alleviating habit. And sometimes you're going to find that comparing to one couple, you may feel like you are in a better situation than they are, and someone else, you may not. But comparing is really, really common. The problem with comparing is you can take a snapshot of, you know, two people walking down the street holding hands and think that they look like they have the perfect relationship, when in reality, you have no IDEA what's happening 10 minutes down the line. Or when they get home, that person might have an abusive relationship. You're just taking a snapshot of what things look like in that moment. Then, as you know, you can go down the rabbit hole of, well, they're affectionate and they look really happy, and I'm not feeling this way in the moment, and it can really spiral out of control. Number three is reassurance seeking. And this one's pretty big with relationship ocd. And reassurance seeking is any time that you are looking outside of yourself for reassurance about your relationship. And to be honest, all of these checking and comparing or somewhat reassurance seeking. But the way to explain this that a lot of people understand is you might be googling to find articles, or you might Google, you know, have I fallen out of Love with my partner. What does a good relationship look like? What is enough affection? You might Google about connection and relationships. You might ask a friend or family member about their relationship and what's normal, what they think about your relationship. Anytime you're seeking reassurance outside of yourself, this is a really big one. And you probably do this a lot more than you even realize. You are participating in a compulsion. And again, you're never going to find the answers outside of yourself, because, number one, no one else knows you like you do and what you need and what's good for you and what's not. Again, sometimes you can look for something. You can google something. Sometimes it's going to give you relief, and sometimes it's not. But again, it becomes something that you have to do over and over and over again, because a lot of times you'll end up finding something that will either relieve your anxiety, and the more you look, you're going to find something that triggers your anxiety. Number four compulsion is avoidance. And I know people with relationship ocd, and I know I did it a lot is avoiding what we're feeling. Avoiding. You might avoid spending time with your partner because you know spending time with your partner makes you anxious, especially if it's a new relationship. You might avoid watching romantic movies with them because it triggers you. Because you start comparing you. There's all kinds of things you could avoid. Because whenever we have anxiety at all, one of the things that we want to do is run away, right? And avoid the situation that's giving us anxiety. So it's really important that whatever it is is making you anxious that you actually do that thing. Because avoidance is definitely a compulsion that you don't want to do, because the more you avoid something, the more you're going to have that need to avoid. And again, you're not taking care of the problem at the root. And then the last one is ruminating. And this can feel really automatic to a lot of people and can get better with the right practices. And what ruminating means is when you're thinking about something over and over and over again. So sometimes it feels unconscious and automatic, and then sometimes you're actually doing it to try to figure something out, right? And a lot of times we think that, you know, we can figure it out on our own or we can analyze something, but it becomes a spiral that we're not able to get out of, because again, this is all coming from a place of fear within us. And a lot of people don't even realize that at first. They don't think that they have fear in relationships. They especially don't feel like they have fear bad enough to be going through what they're going through with the symptoms of relationship ocd. But it is super, super common. And again, like every single one of these compulsions, the more we do them, the more our brains are going to. It's called wire and fire. The more you participate in a behavior or an activity, you are wiring those neurons to continue to communicate that way. And when you don't participate in them, those neurons are dying, and you're gonna start wiring your brain in a different direction. So compulsions are really, really huge. And it's really the first. One of the first things that I address with clients when it comes to relationship ocd is not participating in these compulsions, because they are going to bring you more anxiety, they're going to bring you more intrusive thoughts, and they're going to make everything a lot worse in the long term, even though it feels better in the short term. So a little bit about why these compulsions happen is that this is all fear. So when it comes to relationship ocd, it's all fear. Okay. To really simplify it down. And it comes from your past experiences. Typically, you've had somebody, not always, but a lot of people have had somebody in their family, specifically a parent, that either had anxiety or was very high worry, which is really anxiety. A lot of people don't label it as that overprotective. And so when you grow up with seeing those kinds of behaviors, you are definitely developing those within yourself without even realizing it. And sometimes they don't show up for a really long time. I know for me, they didn't show up. I didn't notice them anyway. They were there, but I didn't really notice or realize that I had anxiety until my late 30s. And then your past experiences. So then you have. So you might have someone with anxiety in your family, or you experienced some sort of either physical or emotional abandonment as a child. And then you've probably had some relationship experiences that were very difficult to deal with or created some negative beliefs in your life, like, people aren't trustworthy, or I'm not good enough. And then all of a sudden, over time, you develop these beliefs and these behaviors. And then when you get into a relationship, and for a lot of people, it's when you get into a good relationship, not necessarily a bad one, because we can know subconsciously sometimes that those bad relationships aren't going to work out. It's usually when we get in a, in a better relationship for us that this stuff really kicks in, which is really interesting. But what's happening is you've built these negative beliefs and stuff over time and negative connotations around relationships. And all of a sudden your brain's trying to protect you. It's as simple as that. Your amygdala is where the fear comes from. And that's the survival part of your brain that can't rationalize anything. All it wants to do is protect you. So all it's going to do is tell you to run in a thousand different ways. So it might be telling you to run by telling you that you don't love your partner, or that this isn't the right person for you, or that this person isn't tall enough, good looking enough, smart enough, whatever. Fill in the blank. It could be any trait that your mind is trying to pick up on. It's going to give you all kinds of thoughts and feelings to try to get you to get out of the relationship because it doesn't think that this is safe. But that's only a tiny part of your brain. And what we want to learn how to do in treatment with relationship OCD is to quiet that part of your brain and really start to exercise your prefrontal cortex, which is where you can rationalize and where you can start to again, wire that part of your brain and quiet the rest of your brain so. So that you're not getting these intrusive thoughts and these messages that things aren't safe that turn into a lot of physical symptoms. Okay, so let's talk about three different ways that you can stop your compulsions that I teach with my clients and in my group coaching. So the first one is awareness. And this one is really just. It's a practice that you definitely want to get comfortable with even if you try the other ones, which is letting the anxiety come, letting the thoughts come, and just sitting and noticing when you want to do that compulsion, don't actually do it, but just sit and notice what those thoughts are that are coming from. Coming from your mind, right? So you're going to kind of recognize that it's just one part of your brain that is trying to scare you. And you're going to sit there and you're going to notice the thoughts that it's throwing at you, but you're not going to take action towards that compulsion. Okay. That one's really important that you get comfortable with. The second one is noticing and letting go. So you are going to notice that you know the compulsion is there. Your mind or your body or whatever it feels like for you is telling you that you should not spend time with your partner today or that you should break up with your partner. And you're just going to notice it, acknowledge that it's there, and you're just going to say, okay. Then you're gonna let it go. Don't give it any attention. And the third method is to distract and act. This one you want to be careful with because you don't want distraction to become a compulsion. But kind of like noticing and letting go. You're gonna notice it, okay? And you're gonna acknowledge it. But then you're gonna just take a different action. You're going to notice it and then you're gonna decide, okay, I'm gonna continue cooking dinner or I am going to go give my partner a hug or I'm going to go clean my bedroom. That action can be really important. There's a small difference between letting it go and actually taking a different action. Those are three methods that you can use to stop your compulsions. It's really, really important that if you do have relationship OCD or if you have really high anxiety around relationships, you know that you're doing some of these things. You are not going to get better until you stop doing the compulsions. So that is super duper important. If you want more support with this, I can definitely help you with that. I work with clients one on one, helping them with their relationship ocd. I've been through it before, so I completely understand where you're coming from and how difficult it is. And that's why I decided to become a life coach to help people with this kind of thing. So one on one is a great option for people who want that personalized support with me directly. The other option for you is my group coaching membership, which is called Heal youl Rocd and you'd Relationship. It's a wonderful 14 week program and I take you through all of the steps on working with your compulsions, how to do exposures. We do a partner call so that you know, I can help you strengthen your relationship with your partner and help your partner understand what you're going through. We talk about.

Developing that strong sense of self again so that you can feel comfortable in your relationship, in your decisions. You can be a lot more comfortable with your mind and your body and not feel like you don't trust yourself or your mind anymore. Because I know that confusion can be really strong among many, many other things in this course. It's not only going to help you with your relationship OCD quite a bit, it's going to help you with your current relationship to be a better partner and learn more relationship skills, but it's just going to help you in your life in general, no matter where you're at in your life. So I will put links below to this information. If you did like this video and you want more videos like this, please make sure to hit like so I know that this is something that was helpful for you. Subscribe to my channel and click that bell for notifications so you get a notification when I do a new video. I hope you enjoyed this. Please know that I'm here with you every step of the way and I hope you have a great rest of your day.