34 weeks pregnant and freaking out that I cheated on my boyfriend

[Theworriedpregnancy]

I’m not sure what to do or how to feel. I can’t sleep at night as I am being woken up by these intrusive thoughts. I have always suffered from anxiety and can obsess over stupid thoughts sometimes but it’s never been quiet this bad.

Last year when I conceived my partner worked long and late hours and I was terrified to be home alone so I would often go out without him. For a little bit I indulged in lots of drinking and other substances I would tell my partner everything and I always messaged him letting him know where I was and when I got home. Then one night I got really drunk and remember pretty much everything except a small part. My friends were sitting outside and I said I was going to the bathroom- I didn’t mind going alone as I often went galavanting on my own with no issue as I entered the bar I saw another friend who said let’s have a shot with these guys at the bar I said sure even though I knew that I had had enough. I remember having the shot and then I go a little blank. Next I remember standing at the entrance hall of the bathroom area and I was against the wall but feeling happy and fine thinking oh let me go back outside and then saying woow hold on I don’t even think I used the toilet so as I turn around to walk up the stairs to the bathroom(I remember feeling a little clumsy) a guy(who I didn’t recognize at all came out the ladies bathroom). I thought this was strange as I then expected to see a woman follow him or something but no it was just him. He didn’t engage with me or anything we kind of just smiled and walked past each other. Then I went into the first cubicle and realized that I hadn’t actually peed yet then I wondered but why was I at the entrance to the bathroom area. I washed up went outside and my friend asked where I had been and I thought this was strange as I didn’t feel like I had been gone long and said the bathroom and she gasped and said for so long and I said yes well I saw our other fiend at the bar and had a shot then went to the toilet(I had no idea how long I had been gone for and I don’t know if they even knew because they were also very drunk). I then started to panic that I had done something to hurt my boyfriend. I waited a bit- didn’t drink anymore and then told everyone I had to go home- I was feeling kind of panicked. I don’t remember the ride home or getting into bed. But the next morning I woke up with a headache my boyfriend had obviously got back from work as he was there sleeping. I walked to bathroom nothing out of the ordinary I was in Pjs and had brushed teeth and all. Then as I used the toilet I thought what happened last night and then the first thought to enter my head was gasp did I cheat. I checked my panties but they were as clean as clean could be. I tried hard to recall if I had gone to the bathroom with someone or gone to someone’s car but couldn’t recall anything like that but remembered everything up until the shot and then again at the bathroom entrance. This has completely freaked me out as I love my boyfriend and would never do anything to hurt him but then I started to worry that what if I blacked out and hurt him. I managed to calm myself down as I said I would never do that I love him more than anything and my panties were clean so it didn’t look like there was any evidence? I have also never had a one night stand and have only had sex with people I have been in a relationship with and so I thought that this was an extreme and unrealistic thought.
During this time my boyfriend and I had been having a lot of sex like pretty much everyday for about roughly 3 weeks.

A couple weeks we found out that I was pregnant and I was okay then a couple weeks after that I started to think about that night and trying to piece whether I had done something and I wasn’t carrying my boyfriends child. I managed to control the intrusive thoughts as I pieced together the time and the conception date and saw that although it was within the two weeks it wasn’t on the day the doctor told us we conceived so I managed to put it aside.

Now I am home and not working and in the past week these thoughts have come up again. I keep thinking maybe I did do something or that the conception date is wrong or something. It’s haunting me and I am now crying over it and just want the pregnancy to be over so I can know for sure.

Even writing this makes me think I’m crazy because it goes against my complete nature and I completely adore and love this boyfriend of mine.

Please can someone give me advice on how to deal with this? I keep reading about horrible things you can do when you get blackout drunk but have also seen a lot of statements that people’s characters don’t usually change so then would mine.

[Paxiled]

You might think about posting on the anxiety forum, as you say you're an anxiety sufferer.  This isn't OCD.  Obsessive thinking is found in all cases of anxiety and depression or they wouldn't exist.  While nobody here was there so we don't know what happened, it doesn't sound like you had sex with anyone.  You would have known.  It was a public place.  You'd know.  If you found yourself on a bed in someone's bedroom, well, you might have some reason, but not in a bathroom in what sounds like a crowded bar.  Again, not only you but everyone there would know.  But that doesn't deal with your anxiety problem.  Is it like this often?  Because if it is, are you in treatment for it, in therapy?  Also, not to scold, but you're pregnant now, you can't escape by drinking yourself to a stupor anymore.  If that's one of your coping mechanisms, you have to find an alternative.  Let us know what you're doing to stop thinking like this, and again, there is an anxiety forum that has more traffic than the OCD forum usually and you aren't describing OCD.  All the best.

[specialmom]

Intrusive thoughts can be ocd and do not 'always' have rituals so we don't know if you do or don't have ocd and can't say one way or another.  That's between you and a doctor.   My 2 to 25 cents on that matter.  However, I agree that this sounds like an anxiety issue.  You perhaps have an obsessive thought process?  Is that what you are referring to?  

First, honey.  You need to address your life style. I know I'm not saying anything you probably don't know but getting so drunk and high?  Just not safe or healthy.  If you are not in control of yourself, you shouldn't be out in public.  Period. We don't live in a super safe world where being at a bar out of your mind drunk is Coolio.  So, really, no more of that.  And are you trying to get pregnant?  Maybe that is no big deal to you?  But in general, a thoughtful approach to starting a family and using birth control until you think it is a good time often works out best for everyone.  This is NOT a lecture but girl to girl advice. Nothing has changed the trajectory of my life more than having kids.  It's HUGE.

Now, to your concerns.  I just doubt it. Of course, I don't know.  But I sincerely doubt it.  Unless you have some reason to suspect after the baby is born, I would not bring this up to your boyfriend.  And I would work hard to address your anxiety.  since you are pregnant, I'd avoid medication now (but you may need to circle back to that after you give birth as that actually for a lot of women is a very anxious time and post partum is a real situation (and can be dangerous)--  keep in good communication with your ob/gyn about that but you may consider counseling.  They even do online counseling now which can be more economical (done via skype or platforms like that).  But I'd go ahead and talk it out.  Your fears sound slightly irrational to be honest which is often the hallmark of anxiety.  hugs

[Paxiled]

I'll just add one and a half cents.  Although docs have put into their diagnostic manual lots and lots of different types of OCD, that doesn't make them OCD.  It does make them candidates for medication approved to treat OCD, which is why the diagnoses have been added.  The reason I always say certain behaviors aren't OCD is if someone wants to consider therapy instead of meds.  Because the meds approved to treat OCD are also some of the more difficult ones side effect-wise (see clomipramine) but have no actual proof they work any better than any other med used to treat anxiety, getting a diagnosis of OCD can make life more, rather than less, difficult.  Been there, done that.  It's also treated very differently in therapy than other anxiety disorders.  So yes, I know, the diagnostic manual disagrees with me and therefore when you Google obsessive thoughts you will run into all kinds of things labeled OCD, but know that that manual is extremely controversial among psychologists and psychiatrists.  So I have my reasons for trying to ease people's minds about having OCD when it appears they have a different anxiety problem so they don't get labeled and start to believe the label and end up on a treadmill running in place.  Peace, Mom.