Memories Fuel OCD

I have written before, but I find myself struggling a lot with POCD or scrupulosity OCD and memories. The fact that I have more than one memory that relates to my worries sometimes convinces me of their importance.

For example, I remember years ago, on two separate occasions, masturbating to photo of a television actress, who unbeknownst to me was 15 or 16 in the photos. I had no idea, and this happened when I was anywhere between 16-20 but I just can’t recall. This has been really distressing me lately.

I also had a similar incident with a Japanese model who was 17 in a photo I had of her in a bathing suit, and I assumed she was 18. I was 23-24 at the time but I didn’t find out until like years later. I am 36 now but I still think about it.

I am a father and this makes me feel like I don’t deserve to be one. Sometimes I’ll remember the checking rituals I had when I was first hit with POCD at 29, like looking at kids in bathing suits and gauging my reactions, sometimes even hoping to find something disturbing so I would know I hated it. Or testing my reactions to disturbing manga. These things too make me feel ashamed. Sometimes I worry that I will never escape the shame. How can I get away from these things? How can I forgive myself? I feel like I don’t deserve the love of my children.

I don't think you need to feel ashamed, but yeah testing is bad- I notice you talk about checking in the past tense. Checking is bad, bad bad bad because I don't think it tells a person with an obsessional fear a darn thing. But checking is also something that seems to be just about universal with folks in this forum that have sexual anxiety issues.

Seems like you are on an OCD spiral. I was there about a month ago. This is going to hard to do, but you have to stop digging in your past. Dig in your past and you will find stuff. There's a reason before this you had completely forgotten about it.

What helped me dig my way out of it wasn't actually ERP, it was the self compassion work I did in therapy. I see that you say

I feel like I don’t deserve the love of my children.

How can you rephrase that in a more self compassionate way? Think about how you would respond to your spouse or children if they said the same thing to you.

For me, I felt shame for every taboo thought I have ever had. Now, I treat those thoughts as normal experimentation that every human does.

To feel like you don't deserve love because of this is so so incredibly cruel to yourself.
To be honest, some women at that age look older, and the age of consent in much of the world is 16. There's a common Hollywood trope of a guy initially interested in a woman he later finds out to be too young for a reason. It's hard to tell sometimes. I would guess that the majority of men worldwide have experienced this at some point.
You need to stop thinking of these events as meaning anything about yourself and start thinking of this as an OCD issue. It's likely even that if you do manage to stop ruminating on this you will then turn to something else to ruminate over. OCD doubt can infect your mind to the point where you don't feel like you deserve love. You absolutely must put OCD in check, ride out the anxiety and refuse to ruminate on something you recognize as a rumination. It's very difficult but you owe it to yourself and your loved ones.