Sweet Obscenities

Alternate title: "Challenging Terry Prachett for title of Most Footnotes Used in a Single Publication"

3rd Apr, 2025

CW: Detailed discussion of intrusive thoughts and mental health; non-specific mention of SH; general bummer feelings

Today we’re gonna talk about intrusive thoughts.

Yeah. Sorry ‘bout that. It’s gonna take us a while, too.

A quick google-and-wikipedia combo reveals that an intrusive thought is an “unwelcome, involuntary thought, image, or unpleasant idea that may become an obsession, is upsetting or distressing, and can feel difficult to manage or eliminate.”¹

This stands in contrast to impulsive thoughts, which are a very normal and usual version of a similar thing that everyone experiences sometimes, differentiated by being much easier to dismiss, to not dwell on or obsess over, and to not be distressed by.

Wikipedia also shares that intrusive thoughts more commonly occur at a problematic level in individuals who experience a range of other mental bees, notably OCD², PTSD and anything anxiety-related, but also some of the more generally-harmless ones like autism and ADHD.

As mentioned, experiencing these thoughts in the first place is actually pretty normal, even if it’s not polite to talk about in modern society. Surveys show that the vast majority of individuals have experienced thoughts or visualisations of some kind of violent or violence-adjacent act against others, or against themselves.

For most people it’s just once-off occurrences, or at the very least infrequently. More importantly, for most people these thoughts can be dismissed with a wave of the mental hand. Wikipedia quotes them as a “fleeting annoyance”.
So yeah, you might blink pretty hard at yourself when you get a lil too frustrated and suddenly picture yourself dropkicking that child across the public restaurant. But then you realise that's utterly ridiculous, you wouldn’t do that… and you never think about that moment ever again.

Unless it’s an intrusive thought, in which case the guilt for even involuntarily imagining that scenario will come back to haunt you for weeks, eating at you with a renewed ferocity every time anyone mentions children, or restaurants, or footballs.

…Lets be real though, I’m just procrastinating via context. Unfortunately, I suspect anyone reading this anywhere near the time of publication already knows exactly what I’m talking about.³ What I’m actually here to do is talk about is my own brand of intrusive thoughts, such as they are.⁴

So, I digress.

A lot of my days in the last few months have been good days. I’m quite grateful for this, because that’s fucking rare.

What I mean by this is that most days recently, I don’t experience the semi-constant stream of negative self-commentary. I can go about my life relatively content, not doubting myself overmuch, and enjoying my interactions with others without overthinking every single conversation and gesture.

Of course, for something to be delineated as good, there must also be a complimentary bad.⁵

A bad day is predictably the opposite. I get to enjoy the delightful company of the voices at the back of my head⁶, whispering sweet obscenities into my subconscious about how I’m just a bit of a failure of a person, aren’t I?

It’s such a foreign idea to me that the average person does in fact experience this phenomena, and yet is able to brush them away like so much unpleasant cobweb. These thoughts consume me, and they feel inescapable.

On a particularly resilient day, when well rested and supported by friends, I can sometimes look them in the eye, hold the gaze of my own demons until they slink away in shame and I am allowed to praise myself for winning another battle.

On a kind day, I can bundle them up in gauze and love and sing my own hatred to sleep, reminding them that they don't need to lash out in order to be safe. The war has passed, the threat is gone, we can rest now, I promise.

But both these acts cost me dearly. To be resilient or kind on a bad day leaves me broken and numb and tired, even with support, even when held and loved by others.

And so you can perhaps imagine what it is like to have a bad day when it is not also a resilient day, or a kind day.

The intrusive thoughts swarm like wasps and pin me to the ground, forcing me to watch as the people I love get morphed into ugly, performative, malevolent versions of themselves, determined to subtly hurt me in ways I can’t quite vocalise.

The transformation applies to myself most of all, of course. I can be ugly, performative, and malevolent alongside the best of them.

It’s all quite entertaining, from a horribly detached and clinical point of view. How on one day, I can be so certain and grounded in the love of my friends, and the next I am watching every move, every flicker of concealed glances and Discord online status patterns for the hidden detestment of me that I know must be there.

How on one day, I have all the patience and consideration in the world for those friends, and I would be willing to do anything necessary to ease an ounce of their discomfort.

On the next, I cannot sense so much as a hint of their actual emotions, blinded and deafened by the angry whining at the back of my skull.

I flicker back and forth. Yesterday I was joyous, I was pleased, I was happy in the happiness of those I love, and I adored seeing them enjoy each other’s presence and conversation.
Today I feel it like a toxic weight in my stomach, the fear that I am imminently abandoned, that I am talked about derisively behind closed doors, that the pattern is about to repeat.

Last night two of my friends kissed, and they mucked about and cuddled, and were flushed with comfort, surrounded by found family. I felt nothing in particular about this except vague contentment - I wasn’t participating, didn’t feel the need to, was at peace. I joked about it later, in the dms of a pretty girl.

This morning I thought about it and felt hot needles at the back of my neck. Jealousy does more than just rear its head. It arrives from nowhere and with snapping teeth takes a sudden chunk from my flesh, leaves a rend in my armour that has all my devotion and determination evaporating away into the fucking sunset.
I am left to grasp uselessly at the wound and smile blankly, still feigning humour while inside I am slowly burning up. I pretend I’m fooling everyone, that nobody notices that my idle questions so clearly contain barbs of self-hatred.

The whispers pool gently in my cerebral fluid. They drip over my shoulders and spine and tug at the tendons in my wrists, forming my hands into clenched fists, open, shut, open, shut. If I am not careful, I am easily convinced that there is no intrusion, no distant pressure of fingers at my ear. There’s just me, alone in my head.

If I just let myself forget the distinction, I’ll understand there’s so many solutions to this discomfort.
By degrees of severity, I can make it all go away.
All I have to do is tell a few little white lies, create a chasm where there is none, and force everyone away.
I shan’t be missed, not for long.
I’ve played my part in bringing this little family together, in some small way. I have done my service.
It is time to take the door that leads away from the stage, sit in the dark, and sob myself raw and dry and hopeless. It is time to listen to the wonderful ideas about what I could so easily do, if only I didn’t mind staining myself crimson again, just for a little while.

…But, alas!! The show must go on, and all that.⁷

Not only is this nothing new, it’s also all in my head. Don’t fucking panic, everyone. They’re just whispers. I know them, I know their origins, I know how they are just synapse connections that were reinforced one or two or a thousand too many times. They don’t really have any power over me; or else I wouldn’t be here typing this.

But… they are so, so heavy. And I am so, so tired.

And I begin to fear once again that I am not the only one.

🐝 🐝 🐝

To conclude:
This is not meant to stand as an excuse for my behaviour.
I am not here to wail and beat at the walls, tearing at my hair and pleading that it wasn’t me! I wasn’t in my right mind! I did not have control of myself! None of that is true, and frankly I wouldn’t stoop to it even if it was.

If you’ve made it this far, both in my life and with reading this excessively long and self-indulgent blog post, then you either care quite a bit about me or you’re just morbidly fucking curious to see where this goes, and whether I ever stop talking. I can respect both.

This blog post is really just that; self-indulgence. It’s also an experiment: Is this experience of constant degradation and fury in the back of my head really less common than I realised? Should I perhaps pursue that OCD diagnosis sooner rather than later? Am I meant to be on all manner of antipsychotics after all?

I guess I’ll find out.

In the meantime; I love you, I’m quite sorry for my rancid brain, and I hope I figure my shit out before I lose you. I’ve not a clue who is actually reading this, but I appreciate you all the same.

I’m gonna post this and go make some shitty coffee 💚