# Hyperresponsibility OCD



## popeet (Dec 8, 2005)

Do u think u got it?

It's when you think you are responsible for things you're definitely not responsible for. The primary feelings are flashes of guilt, anxiety, and endless self-doubt. And you may perform mental or physical checking behaviors to relieve your anxiety.

I have had a thing where I think I'm responsible for the suffering of others or at least for preventing/fixing/changing it. Boundaries are difficult to concieve of in the context of hyper-responsibility OCD. Once, a severely depressed family member who knew this about me called me and said "if I kill myself, it will be your fault" just to see what would happen. What happened is that I was so angry at her that she set me free, to see that I wasn't responsible for her. She told me I "wasn't the garbage can for the world" yet I continue to place myself into situations and mental states where I am constantly self-doubting and feel responsible for things I am not remotely responsible for.

When people blame me for things, I tend to have a paradoxical reaction toward them: I feel like they're being toxic. Because I _know_ now how scrupulous I am when it comes to worrying about the world, about peoples' welfare and feeling the suffering of others. I've come a long way since feeling like if I didn't pick up something off the ground and put it in the right place would cause a chain of events that would cause someone to get harmed. Yet, my responsibility OCD has transferred to different situations/areas. I tend to place myself in places and situations where it will be reinforced by attitudes and people around me, along with rejection.


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## popeet (Dec 8, 2005)

bump. wondering if anyone has this.


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## Under the Radar (Jan 5, 2013)

I can't say I relate 100% with you but often times I find myself in those kind of situations. I think it's a low self-esteem thing, I noticed how confident people always know exactly where that boundary is and they manage not to give a f**k if the situation is out of their control or has nothing to do with them.


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## popeet (Dec 8, 2005)

Under the Radar said:


> I can't say I relate 100% with you but often times I find myself in those kind of situations. I think it's a low self-esteem thing, I noticed how confident people always know exactly where that boundary is and they manage not to give a f**k if the situation is out of their control or has nothing to do with them.


Yes, totally.

If I didn't have OCD I'd still have that. But if I had good self-esteem/no self-disgust I might not have OCD.


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## wrongnumber (May 24, 2009)

Actually, one of the main ways my OCD manifests is I have to knock on wood, or say a phrase to myself to ward off harm occurring to myself or certain other people. Is that what you sort of mean? This started for me when I was 10 but isn't nearly as bad now as it was then (back then I had to pray to prevent danger/misfortune). It doesn't tend to trigger guilt much though, just anticipatory anxiety. On one level I know it's superstitions ocd bs, but on another level I need to do it for the relief.

Unrelated to OCD (I think) - I have had times where I felt excessive guilt for things that I knew were beyond my control. Like my uncle's driver (3rd world country, so it's normal to have one) used to have to drive me to this college I was attending, and one time he crashed the car. After that he was fired. I don't obsess but I felt like I was responsible for him losing his job since I set off the chain of events that led him to crash. Though in truth he was a bit of a careless driver and my uncle was annoyed that he had damaged the car while parking beforehand. But still.. There have been other things but that was one of the more salient ones where I knew it wasn't really my fault but I still feel sad and bad about it when I think of it to this day.


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## popeet (Dec 8, 2005)

wrongnumber said:


> Actually, one of the main ways my OCD manifests is I have to knock on wood, or say a phrase to myself to ward off harm occurring to myself or certain other people. Is that what you sort of mean? This started for me when I was 10 but isn't nearly as bad now as it was then (back then I had to pray to prevent danger/misfortune). It doesn't tend to trigger guilt much though, just anticipatory anxiety. On one level I know it's superstitions ocd bs, but on another level I need to do it for the relief.
> 
> Unrelated to OCD (I think) - I have had times where I felt excessive guilt for things that I knew were beyond my control. Like my uncle's driver (3rd world country, so it's normal to have one) used to have to drive me to this college I was attending, and one time he crashed the car. After that he was fired. I don't obsess but I felt like I was responsible for him losing his job since I set off the chain of events that led him to crash. Though in truth he was a bit of a careless driver and my uncle was annoyed that he had damaged the car while parking beforehand. But still.. There have been other things but that was one of the more salient ones where I knew it wasn't really my fault but I still feel sad and bad about it when I think of it to this day.


Yes. I think that the "warding off harm" is the primary form of Responsibility OCD and apparently in many cases it doesn't come with guilt. Just anxiety if you don't do something to prevent the feared consequence. I had this much worse when I was younger also. But I have the guilt kind. I think it's Intention Checking (mental checking behavior), Moral Scrupulosity OCD all mashed together with Responsibility OCD.

Like you, I've always felt kind of guilty or responsible for things that weren't my fault. I remember my brother getting into a car accident on a day I bugged him about something. When I got to the (quite serious, the woman in the other car died-- but the accident was her fault, she was on cocaine) accident site, I asked him if he was mad at me. I told him I was sorry, I felt I'd caused the accident.

I don't know when the OCD began to draw in guilt. I think I've always felt guilty and 'in trouble' and OCD itself is caused by a "something is wrong" alarm in the brain, so it kind of just mutated into an "I've done something wrong" feelings.

Responsibility OCD descriptions (they mention guilt as a consequence of not being able to address the anxiety, or perhaps guilt as a form of anxiety):

http://www.ocd-plus.com/ocd_hyper_responsibility_and_morality.htm

http://www.ocdonline.com/articlephillipson2.php

And checking rituals, particularly mental checking ones (may or may not be Responsibility OCD... I have other kinds of OCD as well):

http://www.steveseay.com/mental-checking-ocd/


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## JustRachel (May 22, 2013)

I also have this. Its common in the thought side of OCD my counsellor said.
I blame myself for my grandad dying - even though it wasn't my fault.
All because a few weeks before his death his voice was starting to really get on my nerves.. I feel like he got took away to punish me for thinking bad things of him. Whereas I know deep down I wasn't responsible but it doesn't help because I still FEEL responsible.
My counsellor actually told me the change in his voice was most likely because of leading up to the stroke he had which killed him. Only made me feel worse about myself mind. Now I feel like I was thinking bad things off a poorly man -.-


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## Pseudo Lone Wolf (Jun 14, 2013)

I have a severe case of this too, or I used to. It also prevents you from saying no to people's requests. I realized some people abuse this in all sorts of way. From parents trying to make you feel guilty when you reject their request and try to make your stand to friends trying to push their worldview/anti-something obsession on you by making you feel guilty for hunger in Africa or the problems of the country etc. Or people trying to get you do their chore because they know you can not say no and feel guilty/responsible for everything.


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## ToucanSam (Mar 22, 2012)

popeet said:


> Once, a severely depressed family member who knew this about me called me and said "if I kill myself, it will be your fault" just to see what would happen. What happened is that I was so angry at her that she set me free, to see that I wasn't responsible for her.


omg  - is she the world's biggest psycho??! or was she actually trying to help you (albeit in some totally inappropriate and risky manner)??



wrongnumber said:


> Actually, one of the main ways my OCD manifests is I have to knock on wood, or say a phrase to myself to ward off harm occurring to myself or certain other people.


ah yes, sounds familiar. Although in my case, the response was to say a prayer; failing to do so was inviting harm to them (and punishment to me). Thank God for borderline-OCD/God-fearing parents.


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