am i really such a bad person?

I speak from significant experience. I know what you are going through.

1 Please pray. God will help you. He has helped me thousands upon thousands of times. I will pray for you too.

2 The fact that you care about the bird is good. But it is long ago, and the situation can not be changed, whatever happened back then. As for the NOW; open your hands, load all of the stress, anxiety, worries, apologies, and especially the event itself into your hands (using your mind). Then seal it by making a little sign of the Cross over it, and hand it to God. Leave it there.

3 Whenever something bothers you, take the steps in #2. The sooner you do it, and the more you leave it with Him, the better. Every time you trust God with something, He will help you. He will not fail you. Sometimes seen, sometimes unseen. For me it is very seen, for my wife much less so (though at times more). If more unseen for you, consider yourself more blessed as God is calling you to something higher. If more seen for you, consider yourself blessed He is helping you so much in every step of the way. In any case; seek Him.

4 I would consider starting to research supplements. If you do so, I would highly recommend starting to read (or listen on Audible) two books;

A. Nutrient Power by Dr. William J Walsh B. Why Isn't My Brain Working? And you may find examine . com also interesting for supplement research. One should go VERY slow with supplements in the beginning (think at least 1 year period to sort things out) as your body is likely loaded with copper and histamine. You may find from book A that you are under-methylated, high in histamine, and have pyrrole disorder (get your tests done with a doctor trained by Dr. Walsh, you can find a list on his website). You may find from book B that you diet needs changing and that there are many other areas to address like glucose, oxygen (to brain and body), etc. Once you put your OCD to really researching your health and being serious about wanting to fix it, things change.

5 As already suggested in #4, use your OCD. Start tracking each day how you feel. Make a list which at least contains daily ratings for OCD, Anxiety, Hyper-{anything} (hyperfocus, hyperactivity,...), Feeling, Connection with God, Connection with others around you. You can use a scale from 0-100 or from 0-5 or even smilies happy/sad. The more granular scales (i.e. 0-100) allow you to put things into some spreadsheet, graph it, and track your progress over weeks. This would help one who is trying various supplements too.

6 One can do 5-10 minute exercise daily first thing to raise eNOS - push yourself just a little harder when you want to stop, but DO NOT overdo. Like running up a hill, or whatever gets your system working. Read book B (search for eNOS) and you'll understand.

Disclaimer; While I am not a doctor, I have lived this. Do your research. Get started today, it makes the road to recovery, which takes a while, shorter. Ping me if you have questions.

/r/OCD Thread