POCD and web history - has anyone ever got in trouble?

Yeah, I meant to make that clearer - teens and prepubescent kids are not the same, and I wouldn't use the word abhorrent in your case since you were a teen yourself.

If, say, a 25 year old man pursued a 14 year old and a 10 year old, both would be abhorrent but the 10 year old would definitely be a whole extra level of wrong. I'd also say any adult noticing the attractiveness of a 14 year old on the street or wherever would be a lot more normal than thinking a 10 year old was attractive.

I'm not an expert but it sounds like OCD is a large factor in your case. If you wouldn't actually do anything illegal or with a significant maturity/power imbalance due to an age difference, I'm sure you're okay.

nothingsperfect wrote:That's the point, classic OCD. Living with uncertainty is the point, and that's actually the title of the book:

mod edit- link removed

Seriously, get this book. It's written by the director of the OCD Treatment Center in Philadelphia and it's not expensive.

I know this is a very old thread and I should have said this a long time ago, but I wanted to acknowledge and thank the user who recommended that book to me, and recommend it to anyone else who might be going through similar things. The link has been removed now but the name of the book is "Freedom From Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: A Personalized Recovery Program for Living with Uncertainty". I have several highly recommended books about OCD now which I am in the process of reading, and so far this has been the most helpful. It has a lot of information about how to help yourself and do your own exposures for those who can't afford or access therapy.

Something I found unexpectedly reassuring is that this book actually encourages people with sexual obsessions to read graphic fiction or watch porn pertaining to whatever sexual interests they fear having, as a part of exposure therapy (obviously it states that the exception to this is looking at anything illegal, which I never did or had any intention of doing). I still struggle with a lot of guilt and shame over reading those stories all those years ago as it seems so against who I am as a person, but it turns out it can be a legitimate part of treatment by professionals. It did work in my case, since exposing myself to the fear that I might enjoy various types of material did result in the fear dissipating. My memories of that time aren't the clearest due to how severely depressed and numb I felt, and the fact that it was years ago (it was at the end of my teens and I'm now in the later half of my twenties). But I can only definitely remember maybe two occasions when I intentionally browsed around the various taboo categories on those sites (due to fearing I would discover I enjoyed something I didn't want to) which was around when I first found out that such stories existed. The few other times I saw a story with something really inappropriate were unintentionally while searching for sexual things that weren't unusual or extreme in themselves, and clicking on search results that turned out not to be what I expected. Over time I got better at knowing which sites to trust and not trust so I could avoid that kind of thing. I know I haven't seen anything like that in many years now and I hope I never do again.

I still have constant anxiety and find new things to obsess about which always feel real, and like this time it must not be OCD. But I'm feeling better than I was about these particular issues for a few reasons.
1. Lots of people have assured me that reading a few disturbing stories that I didn't even enjoy while I was still young and only just figuring out my sexuality (not to mention I was very immature and inexperienced compared to my peers at that age) is not a big deal, and my reactions to it both now and at the time show that it isn't a reflection of my character or desires. Especially as I read and enjoyed countless stories that would be considered completely normal and appropriate (maybe a little wild but nothing I'd be at all worried about people finding out) before, during and after that time.
2. I have talked to several doctors and therapists who have all confirmed that this is all down to an obvious case of OCD. I have talked to many people online who have been through very similar things, some of which initially seem more alarming than my situation, which have also been deemed OCD. I've talked to people in real life about this too, mainly my sister and a close friend but also the rest of my family and some of the people I live with, and I'm yet to find anyone who hasn't been understanding.
3. I've talked to many people about the possibility that I was sexually abused, and I have been told that some uncomfortable incidents I do clearly remember from childhood (weird interactions and attention from a relative) sound like they did cross the line into abuse even if it wasn't molestation. While this isn't exactly good to hear, it has helped to make sense of why I have so many of the common signs and problems associated with sexual abuse, whether or not there's something more that I might not be remembering.
4. This summer marks two years since the incident that first set off the fear of being arrested (a group of people I had never got along with and had argued with tried to blame me for some things they had been doing to avoid getting in trouble themselves. We were all threatened with the police a few times, but they were never called or involved in the end). This fear spiralled out of control due to spending hours reading about things like false arrests and living in a neighbourhood with a lot of crime. I wouldn't say this fear is gone, but it's not on my mind 24/7 anymore. What helped was time passing and people telling me I hadn't broken the law, and that no police would care what I had looked at years ago even if someone were to tell them. I've even heard of people with OCD confessing similar (and worse) things to the police and simply being dismissed and told to move on with their lives.

I still have issues with touch "down there" not feeling good (including when I'm doing it) and I have still never achieved orgasm. Nowadays I barely even get sexually frustrated any more since my extreme levels of fear and anxiety have killed most of the inconsistent sex drive I did have. But I would like a romantic relationship one day, and my attraction to other people (still always around my age or older) is still there.

Interestingly I keep finding more and more people with similar sexual obsessions who are also unsure if they were abused in childhood or not, and/or who struggle with sex and relationships (I have only had one relationship and that was in my teens). I'm guessing this correlation may be because both of those things make you feel there is "something wrong" and you want to find out how far that "abnormality" goes. I think that was true in my case anyway.

Although the many months where I was terrified 24/7 that I would be arrested were the scariest time of my life, this was what pushed me to find out I was suffering with OCD and start to get help, as well as finding and talking to a lot of people who had extremely similar stories. In hindsight I can see that many things I've been fixated on at different times since childhood were actually common OCD themes (although this was by far the worst and scariest I've ever experienced). Making sense of my situation and finally getting treatment is the one positive that has come from all this.

I'm supposed to be staying away from reading and posting on forums as doing so can very easily become a compulsion and a reassurance thing for me, and I've been told by a therapist to stop doing everything like that. But I still PM people on here and talk to a lot of people on various sites who have similar fears, and I want to help as many people as possible. So I wanted to emphasise that book recommendation, and say that anyone going through something similar (even if you think your case is somehow different and you're "worse" than others) should try to get therapy as soon as you can, instead of letting it escalate like I did.