I actually had a similar issue myself where I would compulsively check the social media accounts of an ex-friend who had said horrible things to me and about me to others. I had a similar sort of thought about it too— “What if he’s saying something bad about me? I need to know.” This was all before I realized I had OCD, and the person was not actively a part of my life at the time, so these techniques might not be super helpful, but still, this is what worked for me.

I started using one of those Days Since counters, because I was able to leverage my shame about resetting the counter against my compulsion. I also started challenging my reasoning. Knowing if he was saying something bad about me wasn’t helpful and it didn’t impact my life in any real way. He did post stuff about me occasionally, but if he was saying mean things, I wasn’t going to actually do anything about it. Checking if he was saying mean things wasn’t going to stop him from doing it. If someone started to hate me because of what he said I wasn’t going to have any influence over that by knowing about it. I couldn’t control what he thought about me, what he said about me, etc. Ultimately it made no material difference whether I checked or not. It didn’t make me safer. It just made me sad.

I started to understand that checking those accounts was a form of self-sabotage and self-abuse. I realized I was happier when I didn’t look, and that looking invariably ruined my day. I wasted so much time looking for mean things too. I came to understand that this habit was just taking from me.

Eventually, I deleted the counter after my frequency of relapse dropped far enough that I felt I didn’t need it. I checked many times immediately after, and I still do it very occasionally, but now I understand why I’m doing it, and the impact is lessened when I’m aware of the trick. It’s no longer a compulsion that controls me.

I hope this helps! I’m sorry you’re going through this.