I watched child porn 10 years ago and it hit me now...

I need HELP! I am 27 years old and when I was 17 I watched child porn someone gave me. It involved a very young girl around 5. I stopped watching it after a while and totally blocked it out and was in denial. recently for the last year or so the memory came back to haunt me and I have severe paranoia and guilt and suicidal tendencies. I almost jumped infront of the train tracks twice. i have this constant physical pain in my whole body because of it too. I stay in bed all day in pain and paranoid thoughts and voices. I m not a pedophile though. I m just obsessed with the thought that I contributed to her exploitation and keep thinking about it. Its been a long time but in my mind I m living it like it happened now. I go to a psychiatrist that gives me lorazepam and risperdal. Still the pain and paranoia is severe. before I admitted it to myself and broke down I suffered from delusions and grandiosity butthat stopped after I admitted it to myself.. I need a way to forgive myself and cope with it. Give me your advice or share your experiences with watching such things..

What's done is done and I totally see the severity of you situation. Though, you can't un-watch the things you've seen. Work on accepting that with yourself and perhaps guide your self-forgiveness on, using some counter-actions?

Maybe make a donation to a child-protection organization like UNICEF? Do some volountary work with some children that need a happy moment or perhaps take an active part in your local community in making a more child-friendly environment?

I have tried doing some things to ease my mind of actions that I have done and it worked for me. What I've done can't be forgiven, but I still believe I can do good, based on what I've done. I'm a paying member in UNICEF and I'm doing some non-paid work for the local office in my town, this makes me feel better, maybe it would you too?

But remember, what you did is pretty much as 'innocent' as it gets, you should forgive yourself in the sense that you made a mistake and you have the option to try and atone for it, such that your paranoia disappears. It's not like you directly harmed anyone

Good luck buddy! I wish you all the best and I know you can fight through it all.

/inh

Indeed as ineedhope says you can't change the past and what you have done, I know that all too well, you can feel guilty forever or you can try to make amends where possible and make the future a better place for everyone. I can't un-watch the things I viewed either but I can accept that I should never have been a part of that and try and move on with my life, I am trying to make amends where I can as part of giving something back for the bad things I viewed, it helps me sleep at night knowing I am clean from that stuff now for just over 12 months.

You can change the future but not the past, living in the past makes no sense, I have done that for so many years trying to love in the past, it just does not work, you have to learn to live for the future.

That's a bit of an overreaction don't you think? I've seen horrible things in pictures or videos. Many people have. It is not healthy to still be thinking this way 10 years later. The fact that you experience such severe guilt over watching a video that you were not involved in the making of is a sign that you are not thinking straight.

I'm inclined to agree with sprooglestrewft. You didn't molest those kids. You don't have psychic powers that transmit your thoughts to the kids in those images and further abuse them. You didn't pay for the images so the abusers didn't benefit from you seeing them.

I know there's a ton of propaganda telling us to be ashamed of ourselves, and that's hard to break through, but you didn't harm anyone, and this guilt isn't healthy for you. Any competent therapist will tell you the same.

I agree with the two posters above that you were not involved in making the things you saw and you should only feel guilt for looking at them when you should not have done it. But you cant feel guilty about it forever as it will just tear you apart.

Sadly in the law you will be treated like you were actively encouraging the molestation or involved in it, i know from first hand experience with comments like "if it wasn't for people like you watching these things these people would not make child porn" "by downloading the images you were you were actively encouraging the makers to make a distribute child porn" and both of them were from the judge.

Personally I feel both comments were unfair as I was only downloading stuff that someone had made regardless of who was viewing it and likely would continue to make and or abuse children because they wanted to. Yes downloading it is a crime and I should not have done, but again even if no one viewed it or even paid for it like some people do these people would still continue doing it.

Again in the law every child I come in contact with is automatically vulnerable as I obviously want to molest every child I come in to contact with apparently, the fact that I have never molested a child in my life is apparently irrelevant.

You have to learn to try and live with what you did and ensure you do not ever get involved with that stuff again, you also have to learn to forgive yourself and try and move on with your life. That is exactly what I am doing, forgiving and moving on.

thanks for all the replys guys! I know I dodnt directly harm them but the image of me masturbating to it like it was nothing keeps haunting me. I cant get out of it and am scared to talk to a psychologist about this. I suffer everyday, its hell. I think it also triggers psychological problems that I already have. It even affects my body, the whole thing hurts like it stings everywhere and I get these pains in my heart too.. I dont know what to do

I know how you feel. I watched it when I was 10 years old. I've never forgiven myself.

10?? how and where did you find it? I d like to know about it

Iwatchedit wrote:10?? how and where did you find it? I d like to know about it

It was on accident at first. I was trying to download some videos of Kazaa that ended up being child porn. After that I started looking up more videos. I still remember them 14 years later.