Moral OCD 101: Why Your Brain Keeps Accusing You of Being a Bad Person
You’re probably here because you’ve been trying to understand why your brain is so determined to paint you as a bad person. And while you’re 99% sure that you’re not a totally bad person, it’s hard to shake the feeling that maybe you are and you just don’t want to admit it.
Let’s start with some background on OCD
OCD involves patterns of obsessive thoughts or images, and compulsions. Obsessions can be about literally anything in the world. As long as they cause distress and they’re hard to just “drop,” they can participate in an obsessive-compulsive pattern. Compulsions are all the behaviours you might do to ease the distress caused by the obsession. Compulsions can also be anything, as long as they are things that you feel like you must do to ease the anxiety and discomfort caused by the thoughts.
Examples:
Obsession: what if the chicken is undercooked and I get salmonella?
Compulsions: checking the temperature of the chicken, inspecting it closely for colour and texture, googling “how to tell if chicken is cooked,” asking someone else to check the chicken, paying extra attention to the taste and texture while eating, telling yourself “nothing bad is going to happen,” sniffing the chicken, praying, being hyperaware of your stomach after to see if you feel sick, etc.
Obsession: what if I got aids from shaking their hand?
Compulsions: googling to see if that has ever happened to someone, checking your hands for sores where the virus could get into your blood, googling “how to get aids,” or “how much contact time is required to get aids,” asking friends or family if they think you might have aids, praying, watching for symptoms, going to your doctor, etc.
Obsession: intrusive image of a loved one in a serious accident.
Compulsions: contacting your loved one to make sure they’re okay, trying to “figure out” what this thought means, distracting yourself from the thought, thinking “happy” thoughts, reassuring yourself that the chances something bad has happened are slim, etc.
You get the picture. Intrusive thought appears, distress spikes, and compulsions ease that discomfort until the thought comes back and the cycle repeats.
Obsessions in moral OCD involve worry that you’re a bad or immoral person
Moral OCD thoughts have no limit to their creativity:
“What if every kind thing I’ve ever done was actually an act of manipulation so I could get what I wanted?”
“What if I’m actually racist/transphobic/ableist and everything I do is just performative so that I look good?”
“What if I’m a narcissist and I’m constantly centering myself without realizing?”
“If that apology made me feel relieved after, maybe I only did it because I wanted to ease my own guilt, not because I’m truly sorry.”
They’re thoughts that come out of nowhere, questioning your character and values. They push you to doubt what you know to be true about yourself. They ask you: “what kind of person would you most hate to become?” and then suggest that maybe you actually are your worst nightmare. Maybe you are the kind of person who talks about themself all the time, and never seems to care about anyone else. Maybe you are the kind of person who is willing to oppress others to maintain your privilege. Maybe you are the kind of person who would use other people for their own personal benefit/success.
Since being this type of person would be your worst nightmare, it’s no wonder that you’re willing to dedicate considerable time and energy to making sure this doesn’t happen.
When we’re struggling with such distressing thoughts, we do what any 21st century human would do: we google like it’s our day job.
Compulsions in moral OCD are often an attempt to “figure out” whether you’re actually bad and/or make sure you never become “bad”
Mental compulsions are a HUGE part of moral OCD. Mental compulsions are the kind of compulsions that are done completely in your mind. It could be things like:
replaying a conversation to see if you said something offensive,
checking to see if you feel “bad enough” when you’ve done something wrong,
reviewing old memories to see if your intentions weren’t actually as pure as you had originally thought,
not allowing yourself to stop thinking about something you did because stopping makes it feel like you don’t actually care.
It can feel productive or like the “right thing to do” to keep reviewing, analyzing, and trying to get to the bottom of whether or not you’re a bad person.
Other compulsive behaviours that might show up in moral OCD include:
seeking reassurance from people: asking friends and family if they think you’re a good person, venting in hopes that the other person will confirm that you did nothing wrong, etc.
seeking reassurance from the internet, like completing quizzes online to see if you’re a narcissist or a psychopath,
repeatedly confessing perceived wrongdoings,
asking people if they’re mad at you.
People struggling with moral OCD might also struggle with comorbid depression
It’s not uncommon for someone with these kinds of intrusive thoughts to feel down or depressed. Especially when they start to believe that the intrusive thoughts might be telling the truth. OCD is an incredible liar and can convince people that they have selfish ulterior motives for everything they do. People with moral OCD can often be self-critical, feel like they don’t measure up to ideals of what a good person “should” be, and question whether their friends and family truly want them around.
What’s the difference between Moral OCD and being highly conscientious and responsible?
Highly conscientious people act from their values and not their fears. When a responsible, conscientious person makes a mistake, they lean into the guilt and/or shame, decide how to move forward and correct any wrongdoings, and then move on with their day. They trust their values to guide them to make the best decisions they can with the information they have available to them in that moment. And lastly, if they can’t correct a wrongdoing, they are usually able to accept that, and use the mistake as an opportunity for growth and learning.
Conscientiousness becomes an obsessive-compulsive pattern when:
you experience intrusive thoughts about your character and values that are hard to ignore (even in the absence of an actual mistake/wrongdoing),
the distress is really high (almost like a panic),
attempts to use logic and reason fail - your brain has unlimited “reasons” why you’re a bad person, so the doubt just keeps coming back,
you are engaging in compulsions,
the worry doesn’t go away, even if you’ve corrected the wrongdoing.
This is the hardest part of OCD therapy for so many people: that continuously thinking about something and feeling uncomfortable emotions about it doesn’t make us more responsible. While this is true for all OCD subtypes, people with moral OCD are especially concerned that letting go or moving on “too quickly” is a sign that they don’t actually care. This makes sense because OCD is screaming “we need to do everything we can to make sure you’re not a bad person!” and if you’re not ruminating, then, from OCD’s perspective, you’re not doing everything you can.
This is a great time to ask yourself at what point does thinking about a situation go from “problem solving” to “ruminating” for you? Problem solving makes us responsible. Rumination makes us feel unnecessarily bad.
Moral OCD can make it harder to actually live according to the values that we deem “good". Let me explain…
For a while, I experienced intrusive thoughts that I had maybe said something racist/homophobic/transphobic/ableist after an otherwise nice social interaction. As someone who cares deeply about social justice, the fear that I had said something offensive or discriminatory was quite distressing. So it pulled me into loops that would last hours and sometimes days. I’d review the conversation over and over again, tearing apart every single thing I had said, and trying to remember how others had reacted for signs that I had said something wrong.
If I found something that seemed like it had potential to be offensive, I would google it or ask my husband if he thought it was offensive. But nothing would fully convince me that I hadn’t said something wrong.
But something changed for me shortly after the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. I followed a lot of accounts and had near-daily conversations with friends and colleagues, not just about racism, but about privilege and systemic oppression as a whole. I started to realize that whenever I was spending my time trying to figure out if I was a “good” ally or just pretending to care, that I was centering myself. I also learned (and accepted) that in order to be a “good” ally, you need to be open to making mistakes and being called out. If you are so scared to make a mistake that you stay silent, you are not a “good” ally.
I knew that in order to become the person I claimed to be, I needed to act according to my values, and not according to my fear of being a bad person. So I did.
What is the recommended treatment for moral OCD?
Finally, the thing that brought you to this blog post!
Moral OCD, like all OCD, is highly treatable. The recommended first-line treatment for OCD is Exposure and Response Prevention therapy (ERP). The goal of ERP is to gradually face triggering situations, while refraining from compulsions. We start with something small and manageable and work our way up.
Now, you might be thinking “will I have to do something immoral or bad in ERP?”
No, you will not. Good ERP will combine conversations about what it means to be a good person, with real life exposures (ie. natural triggers that occur throughout your day or week), and imaginal exposures (ie. imagining the worst-case scenario that OCD throws at you, without doing compulsions, until that scenario is no longer distressing).
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a widely-used second-line treatment for OCD. The goal of ACT is to practice accepting thoughts and feelings as they are, without needing to “fix” or “solve” them. This work focuses on 6 key processes:
Acceptance: making space for uncomfortable thoughts/feelings to exist.
Cognitive defusion: separating thoughts from the self and seeing them as just thoughts/feelings rather than absolute truths.
Being present: remaining grounded in the current moment rather than being pulled into our mind with “what ifs.”
Self as context: seeing yourself as the observer of your thoughts, like witnessing traffic passing by on a highway.
Values: becoming clear on your values and using them to guide you.
Committed action: taking intentional steps in line with your values, even when anxiety shows up.
In other words: stop doing compulsions and practice co-existing with doubt, uncertainty, and distress!!!
Some compulsions can be sneaky, so I recommend working with a therapist trained in ERP! You can book a free, no-commitment consultation with me below, or use resources like Psychology Today to find an ERP-trained therapist near you.
All OCD subtypes can be terrifying and distressing, but moral OCD can be especially difficult because it attacks your character and causes you to doubt the incredible, kind person that you are. But, by intentionally refraining from compulsions and focusing instead on what matters most to you, you can become less susceptible to being pulled into OCD’s loops and rabbit holes.
