You’re going about your day, maybe you’re grocery shopping, driving, or chatting with a friend when BAM, a thought strikes out of nowhere. It’s sharp, unsettling, and completely unwanted.
What if I hurt someone?
What if I hurt myself?
What if I’m a terrible person?
I’m a monster.
I’m disgusting.
I’m going to hell.
The thought, image, or urge is so intrusive it stops you in your tracks. Your heart races. You try to push it away, prove it wrong, or reason with it. But the more you try to control it, the more out of control your mind feels. Your anxiety climbs higher, things feel threatening, and catastrophic.
Sound familiar?
These are intrusive thoughts, and they are a core feature of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. They can be terrifying - not because they reflect who you are, but because they don’t.
What Are Intrusive Thoughts?
Intrusive thoughts are unwanted, distressing mental events. They might be thoughts, images, urges, or even bodily sensations. Often, they feel taboo, violent, or morally wrong. What makes them so painful is that they go directly against the person’s values.
Why Do They Happen?
Because brains think. Constantly. They scan for threats, generate possibilities, and create all kinds of noise - most of which we don’t even notice. Sometimes, especially when we’re stressed or anxious or even sleep-deprived, the brain throws out thoughts that feel threatening or bizarre.
What Do They Mean?
Absolutely nothing.
They are just thoughts - not predictions, intentions, or signs. Your brain is doing what it’s designed to do: think, problem-solve, and imagine. Sometimes, that includes throwing out false alarms. Just like a fire alarm that goes off when you burn toast.
Why Do We Become Afraid of Them?
People with OCD often assign meaning to these thoughts.
“If I thought that, what does it say about me?”
“If I can imagine it, maybe I’ll do it?”
But this is a trick OCD plays. The distress you feel is not proof that the thought is true - it's proof that the thought matters to you. And because it matters, you try to suppress it, avoid it, or make sure it’s not true.
Why Won’t They Stop?
Ironically, trying to stop a thought makes it stick around. When you label a thought as dangerous, your brain starts tracking it - like a pink elephant you’re told not to think about. The more you try to push it away, the louder it gets. This is how the OCD cycle feeds itself.
What Can Help?
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) is the gold-standard treatment for OCD. With ERP, you gently face the intrusive thought without doing the usual rituals (like checking, reassuring, avoiding, or mentally fixing). Over time, this teaches the brain:
“This thought isn’t dangerous. I don’t need to react.”
We also use tools from Cognitive Defusion (a technique from Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) to help clients see thoughts as just thoughts, not truths or commands but passing mental events.
And Finally… You're Normal!
Having intrusive thoughts does not make you broken, dangerous, or bad. It makes you human. The fact that you’re distressed by these thoughts says more about your values than it does about your character. And with the right support, you can break free from the OCD cycle.
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Our highly trained psychologists can help. Please call our team on 9882-8874 to book in with one of our team members today. Alternatively fill in our contact form here to get in touch.
To subscribe and listen to our podcast “Breaking the Rules: A Clinician’s Guide to Treating OCD”, click on the following links: Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Apple Podcasts. Episodes will be released fortnightly and will simultaneously be published on our webpage here.