5 Tips for Sexual Orientation OCD
It’s Pride Month.
Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD) involves intrusive, unwanted thoughts about your sexual orientation.
Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD) is not about questioning one's identity because of a genuine change or realization but rather a pattern of obsessive doubt and anxiety.
Intrusive thoughts can be distressing but are not reflective of reality. These thoughts are unwanted and cause significant stress. For example, "What if I'm gay and I don't know it?" or "What if I’m straight and I don’t love my partner?" People with SO-OCD might engage in behaviors like excessive reassurance-seeking, mental reviewing, or avoiding certain situations to ease their anxiety.
Some common misconceptions about SO-OCD:
It's Not About Choice. SO-OCD is not about your choice or your preferences. It's an intrusive pattern that goes against your values and how you see yourself.
It's Not a Moral Failing. Having SO-OCD doesn't make you a bad person. OCD attacks what you love and value the most.
If you are struggling with SO-OCD. Here are 5 practical tips for managing SO-OCD:
Avoid Reassurance Seeking. Reassurance may feel good momentarily but reinforces the OCD cycle.
No Internet Searches. Avoid browsing the internet for answers about your sexual orientation. It won't help and will likely increase your anxiety.
Do your normal thing! Don't avoid activities that might trigger intrusive thoughts. Face them head-on to diminish their power.
Use Mindfulness Techniques. Practice mindfulness to observe your thoughts without engaging with them. It helps in recognizing they are just thoughts, not truths.
Join a Support Group. Speaking openly about your concerns in a safe environment can be incredibly beneficial.
Remember, SO-OCD is tough, but with the right treatment and techniques, you can manage it effectively. You are not alone, and help is available. Thank you for reading, and stay tuned for more informative content. Happy Pride Month, and remember to be kind to yourself always. 🏳️🌈
Feel free to explore my other blogs and join me next week for a special episode on self-compassion and how to practice it. I’ll also have a sneak peek of my upcoming mindfulness podcast, "Soul Sync," debuting July 1st. Being in the present moment and observing your thoughts without judgment can help reduce the power of intrusive thoughts.
Looking forward to seeing you back here next week!
Transcript: We're partnering with NoCD to raise awareness about OCD. OCD is more than what you see on TV and in the movies. Imagine having unwanted thoughts about your relationship stuck in your head all day, no matter how hard you try to make them go away. That's Relationship OCD. It comes with unrelenting interest in images, thoughts, and urges about your partner or loved one. Breaking the OCD cycle takes effective treatment. Go to NoCD.com to get evidence-based treatment. Hey y'all, it's Pride Month. Thank you for being here to the next episode of Bossing Up Overcoming OCD. In honor of Pride Month, I'm going to be opening the month with a show about Sexual Orientation OCD. Before we get started, I want everybody to take a moment and wherever you are, I want you to stare at the ground, and well, okay, if you're driving, don't do this, all right? But if you are sitting and in a safe place, let's stare at the ground, and if you remember the movie Jumanji and how in one of the scenes there are vines, like some crazy wild vines growing out of the walls, I want you to stare at the ground and imagine those vines are coming up at you. Take a second, think about it hard, real hard. You see any vines growing yet? Anything happening? No, right? And, I don't know, I honestly can't hear you talking back to me, so maybe it did happen. Point being, if we think it, it doesn't mean it's true, and even if we feel it, it doesn't mean it's dangerous. In today's episode, I'm going to be explaining what sexual orientation OCD subtype is. We'll talk a little bit about how it's not about your choice of the LGBTQIA stuff, no. What we're here to do is talk about how OCD is going against your values, your own internal personal values, and the way that you love, and the way you see the world. Because that's what OCD does. So let me take a second and explain here. So OCD attacks the things you love most. Makes sense because it wants all your joy. It is like that growing angry vine in Jumanji that just wants to be all-consuming and take over the game. And so when we do things that are in line with our values, we call that ego-sin-tonic. But when we're thinking things that go against our values, like for example, if you believe in honesty, and integrity, and hard work, then stealing things would go against your values. Imagine the distress you would feel if you were stealing something. That's the essence of what OCD is like. Or you know what, it also reminds me of that feeling we get whenever you know that you've been speeding. And I'm not speaking from personal experience, of course not, no. But like, let's say someone's been speeding over the speed limit. You drive by a police officer and you're like, whoopsie, and they follow behind you for several miles. Yeah, that gut-sinking feeling of like, oh my, are they going to pull me over? Am I about to get a ticket? How much is this ticket going to be? So that kind of feeling, right? Like it's just that feeling of an impending bad situation. A result that we are not looking forward to. That is the feeling of what ego-dystonic is like. When something happens or something is triggered and is coming up for you that feels like it's going against who you are. Hi, I'm Erin, Licensed Clinical Mental Health Counselor and OCD Specialist. I'm also a wife, mom to three, and small business owner, helping those who are spiraling from intrusive thoughts to come out of that valley with long-term recovery and self-awareness. Preheat your coffee and pop in your AirPods to learn how to boss up to OCD. So in our discussion today, whatever your attraction is, whether that is to a man, a woman, non-binary, trans, this episode is more about how OCD interferes with your romantic life and your love life and how you see yourself. With your sexual identity, sexual orientation is that persistent pattern of attraction that you feel towards man, woman, or both. And sometimes that sexual attraction, it ranges in the continuum, meaning that some people may identify as bisexual, but may lean more towards dating men than women or vice versa. And oftentimes, OCD can come up with your sexual identity because possibly you very much value your relationship with your significant other, and therefore the OCD is trying to attack it and ruin it because it has nothing else better to do. And so sometimes as an OCD sufferer, you may find yourself doing a lot of mental obsessions and questioning similar to the relationship OCD questions like, do I love my partner? Am I attracted to my partner? Am I sure that I'm attracted to men and only men? Or am I sure that I'm attracted to only women? Like what if I am blank, whether that is homosexual, heterosexual, pansexual, there's so many identifications now and I'm not trying to be exclusive in any way, but just for conversation purposes, like the point is you are experiencing intrusive thoughts that go against who you thought you were and whatever your choice is, that is your choice. And good news is homosexuality or lesbian, gay, bisexual orientations, they are not considered mental disorders. There is no research to back up that there is any psychopathology behind your attractions to someone else. And if you are experiencing the sexual orientation OCD and in listening to the show and probably reading up with things, you know that that includes exposure exercises and that may feel scary. And what I'd like to emphasize here is that the therapy will not change your sexual orientation. In fact, it would be unethical for a therapist to try to change you from one sexual identity to the other or one sexual orientation identity to the other. And there is no, there is no research out there again, to back up the fact that changing your sexual orientation in therapy is safe or effective. So that's called conversion therapy. So that is not promoted. That is not helpful. And you have a right to your own self-determination in choosing who you want to love and who you want to be in a relationship with. Okay. So for the intrusive thoughts, again, going back to those, it's the involuntary unwanted thoughts that you're not trying to think about, and they bring you stress. And here's how we know that the thought is related to your OCD. That is if it starts with what if, because with the what ifs, that normally brings some anxiety inducing statement thereafter or anxiety inducing question thereafter. Like what if I am gay? What if I am actually straight? Or what if, what if, what if, what if? Whereas through therapy, we like, you would move closer towards what is. All right. Another common what if question that comes up with the sexual orientation OCD is what if I'm gay and I don't know it? And this can also come up if, let's say you're watching a movie and you find the actor or actress attractive and you don't identify with being attracted to that, to that sex, like that could create some distress and maybe that could lead you down the path of, of second guessing yourself and thinking, I just thought about that actor as being attractive or beautiful or sexy. Does that mean, does that mean I'm gay? And why would I, why would I find them attractive if I'm not gay or if I, or if I am straight or you know, whatever, or it could be a question of what if I'm actually straight and I don't love my partner? Another obsession that I've heard is what if I get married and then later find out that I'm bisexual, would that ruin my marriage? Would my spouse stay with me if they found out I was blank, right? And how could I show up in my religious community if, if I'm actually, if I'm actually gay? Or it could be one of those situations of, I feel more comfortable around men versus hanging out with women. So does that mean I'm gay? Or you could be worried about being completely wrong about your sexuality. And then your OCD will be like, well, you never know. You could be, you could have been lying to your significant other for the past 15 years because you know that you're actually gay or you're straight or whatever. And with these obsessions, they are repetitive and they lead you to feel an urge to do something about it, to do something, to give yourself reassurance. So in the reassurance piece of it, you may be hyper aware about your physical reactions and then you're going to reassure yourself like, ha, see, I was aroused for that, for that person. So that must mean I am homosexual or heterosexual, right? Or you may compulsively watch porn as a way to reassure yourself about your sexual orientation because you're trying to disprove your doubts. And don't you know, there's a lot of mental review and double checking where you may think back to previous relationships about how, well, I did really love my ex-girlfriend at that time, or so I'm pretty sure I'm straight. I don't think I could love, like you're doing the mental review of like, I don't think I could love, I don't think I could love a woman any more than I love my partner. This could also show up in your dating relationships where you will compulsively date people to reassure yourself that you are lesbian or gay or straight, what have you. Because in this dating relationship, you're trying to prove to yourself that you're enjoying the date, that you actually enjoy the person you're with, and you feel an attraction to the person that you're going on a date with. It could also be a possibility that you are avoiding people, places, or situations where you may be triggered by these intrusive thoughts. So for example, there are a lot of people that go to a gym. When you go to a gym, people are normally wearing tight clothing. I mean, that's just like what's safe, you know, around the workout equipment. You don't want your clothes getting snagged on the treadmill or anything. So just saying, people are wearing their tight clothes and you may not go to the gym because you're afraid of being attracted or looking at someone for too long that makes you second guess your sexual orientation. I mean, so it could be as simple as avoiding the gym, or it could go as far as avoiding sexual activity with your partner or your significant other because you have fears or doubts that you don't want to experience, especially it would feel like the wrong place. You know what I'm saying? Let's say you are a heterosexual woman, you are attracted to men, and you are concerned about having sex with your partner because you're afraid that you may experience sexual images about a woman while you're having sex. And so normally OCD, well, you worry to try to take control of the situation. And with the sexual activity, it feels like you won't have that control and like you can't keep your mind on lock. And so you will avoid being intimate with your partner because of the fears of having those obsessions and intrusive thoughts. So avoidance is a compulsion. Another compulsion is when you are repeating things to yourself, maybe that's a mantra you have, or just that self-talk where you're repeating over and over and over again to reassure yourself like, I'm not gay, or I'm not straight, or I am lesbian. And that's where it becomes a ritual. You may even have to say it a certain number of times in order for it to feel quote unquote right. And the sexual orientation OCD not only crosses with the relationship OCD, but also the religious Because sometimes people have their religious concerns and will pray to excess. They will pray constantly. They will pray a lot, maybe dozens or even hundreds of times or have to say the prayer a certain way to get clarity and ask God about revealing signs of if they're gay or straight or bisexual or what have you, whatever that looks like. So they may ask for clarification from God, or they may ask for forgiveness from God. Like please forgive me for my sins of being gay or liking another man or whatever that could be. Going back to the avoidance, the other compulsive avoidance is that let's say you have a coworker who is attractive and you are a, you are a homosexual male, but there's an attractive female at your office. So you may avoid talking to that female. If you're at a meeting, sitting across the table, you're not giving them eye contact because you don't want to get caught up in any inkling that you're not homosexual. It's almost like you don't want to even play with that fire. So you're going to avoid that person at work. Now in moving towards the treatment of sexual orientation, OCD, and what those exercises may look like, what you will do is you will start to change the way you think about these intrusive thoughts, like starting to recognize that these thoughts are not your thoughts. These are your worry bully or the OCD monster. And if you went. a therapist who did not understand OCD and how to treat it, they may accidentally give you reassurance. And we need to move away from the reassurance seeking because the reassurance seeking only feeds the fear. Like you may say, oh I've been married for nine years to my wife. I'm so worried that I'm gay. Like what would this do to my marriage and my kids and all the things? And the therapist would say, you're not gay. It's okay. You're happily married. Just tell yourself that you're happily married. That only reinforces the fear, makes you more nervous, and it doesn't actually solve the problem. And so what we will do is when, first of all, I wouldn't give you reassurance. I'm gonna say, okay well you might be gay. Or we'll see what happens. We're gonna let it be. So we're gonna not give reassurance. And next thing, it's going to be very important for you to not research on the internet. You don't need to research, am I gay? How why am I so gay? Or how gay am I? None of that. We're not researching it. You will be asked to not do that compulsive dating. You don't need to go out on a date to prove to yourself that you're one sexual orientation or another. If you want to go on a date because you're looking for that romantic partner and that companionship, yes. That's a different story. Okay and the other piece may be looking at pictures of attractive people that would normally create distress for you. So we're going to be in that space, allow your anxiety level to rise, and wait until it comes down by half. So the common themes are that you are heterosexual but you fear that you're homosexual or vice versa. That you identify as homosexual but you're worried that you are heterosexual. The exercises will help you change the relationship with doubt. Even when doubt creeps in, you will no longer be overwhelmed by it and you will no longer be controlled by your intrusive thoughts. In the sexual orientation OCD, it's important to remember here that these intrusive thoughts are unwanted. They create stress. If you are experiencing a thought that you weren't trying to think about and you're getting stressed out by it, that is likely going against who you are and how you identify with your sexual orientation. Alright so it could, like I was saying, include looking at pictures or maybe you are that person who's in the workplace and you're avoiding someone. You would be encouraged to give them eye contact, to talk with them, and again we're going to be doing normal day-to-day things to help you move through your life in a way that feels like you're at ease and you're no longer avoiding things because of the anxiety. Anxiety will no longer take center stage. Okay a couple of other ways we could create some exposures are reading about these other sexual orientations. You may read books or articles either about the sexual orientation or maybe the author identifies as something that you're afraid of being and you will avoid getting reassurance during these readings and you're no longer going to be asking your friends and family what they think about your sexual orientation. We may also watch TV shows or movies that include couples of the sexual orientation that you're afraid of becoming and we are going to mindfully be in that space and as best as we can we are not going to overanalyze your feelings about the show and we're not going to analyze your attractiveness to the actors, actresses, etc. And the way we do that is like with mindfulness we would be watching the show and you would be pointing out just the facts about what you're seeing and being in the present moment and if you notice that the intrusive thoughts are trying to come in you're going to gently bring your focus and attention back to the show that you're watching. We could also do that script writing where we're writing down that worst-case scenario and with that worst-case scenario you're going to write it out very detailed and as you read it aloud take note of your anxiety level. It's also helpful if you record it because then you can see for yourself that first recording probably have a hard time reading through it and you're going to continue to read that story that narrative out loud repeatedly until your stress comes down by half and you're going to resist the urge to try to distract yourself from the story reading. You need to bring your mind fully into that moment as you read this narrative even if you're stressed out you can handle this. Another exposure exercise could look like having open conversations with your friends or going to a support group about sexual identity and you're not going to ask for reassurance about your own identity during these conversations and let's say you are that heterosexual person who is worried about becoming bisexual or homosexual your exposure may look like visiting an LGBTQIA plus dedicated space whether that is a community center or an event and you would put yourself in that scenario and talk to the members that are at this event, engage with them, have a conversation and the goal is that you can walk away knowing that you are who you are whatever thoughts are coming they can pass they will pass and overall you may have noticed the mindful approaches being invited into all of these exercises because with mindfulness you are looking at your thoughts feelings and behaviors without judgment nothing is good or bad or right or wrong it just is what it is so you're not going to try to distract yourself from the thoughts or you're not going to try to suppress them or force them somewhere else you're going to notice them you're going to observe them overall we're recognizing that our thoughts are just thoughts. We're partnering with NoCD to raise awareness about OCD. OCD is more than what you see on TV and in the movies imagine having unwanted thoughts about your relationship stuck in your head all day no matter how hard you try to make them go away that's relationship OCD. It comes with unrelenting intrusive images thoughts and urges about your partner or loved one. Breaking the OCD cycle takes effective treatment. Go to NoCD.com to get evidence-based treatment. In speaking of mindfulness I have a mindfulness podcast coming out that is a members only podcast. With this members only podcast it's going to include in total 17 to 20 episodes where I will be teaching you how to apply mindfulness and the mindfulness strategies in these podcast episodes are geared towards busy humans. In one research study mindfulness was shown to be more effective than Prozac so I really stand behind mindfulness and I know myself once upon a time I thought mindfulness was very woo-woo and hippy-dippy and so that's why I created these episodes to help you gain more self-awareness help you lower your stress and so many benefits so many benefits. This mindfulness podcast is called Soul Sync and on Soul Sync you'll see its debut its birthday will be July 1st. As a special bonus for you guys you can go to my website at ValueDrivenTherapy.com and find an early bird discount for Soul Sync. You can get this members only podcast for special pricing if you go on the website and make your purchase within the next two weeks. This price is only good for today through the next two weeks because once I get closer to Soul Sync's birthday the price is going to go up. Come back next week to hear an episode about self-compassion. We typically are our own worst enemy and so this episode is for those of you that have a really hard time talking nice to yourself. So we're going to learn about self-compassion and I'll also drop a sneak peek preview to one episode from Soul Sync and I look forward to seeing you back here next week. Thank you for listening to another episode of Bossing Up Overcoming OCD. This information is intended to be helpful and not a substitute for professional counseling. If you're struggling with any mental health challenges I encourage you to seek help from a qualified therapist or health care professional. If you enjoyed today's episode please take a moment to rate and review the show. Your feedback helps us reach more listeners and don't forget to check out the affiliate links in the show notes for hand-picked recommendations that can brighten your day. Your support through these links helps keep the show running and provide valuable content. You're not alone in your journey. Stay strong, stay resilient and keep bossing up. See you next time.
