The roast has been eaten...

If you’ve read my previous blog post, you’ll already know what this follow-up is about—and what dilemma I was facing.

So, how did I approach it?

Well, first of all, I resisted doing any rituals beforehand. OCD has a sneaky way of confusing you, making you doubt yourself, and constantly moving the goalposts, which I’ll come back to later in this post.

Then comes the moment of actually sitting there, trying not to overthink or stare at the food for too long.

Here’s a first-person view:

My roast dinner.

That first bite was horrible.

Anyone who suffers from Anxiety or OCD will know that feeling—that stomach-churning fear that you've just done something wrong. But once I took that bite, my thought process was:

“Well, it’s done now. I’ve started—so finishing it won’t make any difference.”

And that’s when the part I mentioned earlier kicked in: OCD moving the goalposts.

I genuinely couldn’t finish the meal—I was full. At that point, I’d just be forcing food down, and that’s when OCD chimed in:

OCD: “So… are you going against me by not eating it all? Or are you complying by not eating it all?”

Me: “I’m genuinely full. I’m just being a normal person and doing what anyone else would do—stop when they’re full.”

OCD: “But are you? Or are you just using that as an excuse to comply with me by not finishing it?”

Me: “But I thought the issue was eating it at all, not necessarily all of it?”

This is classic OCD—changing the rules, twisting logic, and making you second-guess your own choices.

In moments like these, the best question to ask yourself is:

“What would a normal person do in this situation?”

And for me, the answer was: if someone’s full, they stop eating.

Of course, what follows is the emotional fallout: anxiety, self-doubt, low mood, and the resurgence of intrusive thoughts.

But I’ll save that part for a future post.