Suicidal pedophile with extreme OCD and anxiety?

Hello,

Thank you for taking the time to hear my story. I would really appreciate some advice as I'm really struggling at the moment. I'm an 18 year old male and am attracted to other boys aged between 11-14. I know the technical term for this is 'hebephilia' but society labels anyone like me a pedophile and the word itself scares the hell out of me due to the nature it's thrown around in the media. I have always suffered from mental health issues. The main ones being OCD and a severe anxiety disorder. Both are closely linked and it's the OCD which fuels my anxiety. I have had both of these disorders all my life, particularly the OCD. When I was younger, I had a ritual which took about 30 minutes every night before I went to sleep. I had the ensure the curtain was in exactly the right way, I had to say to my dad goodnight exactly 32 times etc...it just drove me crazy One day, my parents shouted at me until I cried and I never did it again. This was when I was about 10, now I'm 18, I think my OCD has come back with a vengeance. My mind never seems to stop racing any more, and I'm always anxious about something and searching online for hours on end to find the answer which is my OCD kicking in. For example, over the last few months I have been working in a large department store in the UK which I absolutely hated. I have now left as my contract has ended and I will be going to University at the end of the month. I used to dread every day I had to go to work, if I had work at 6pm, I felt like I couldn't do anything in the day as I worried about it too much. If I dealt with a horrible customer, I'd come home and search all night on the internet about it to try and make myself feel better, only it made me feel worse. I was once scared I was going to be sacked and one night I looked online for answers from about 11pm until about 4am. It drove me absolutely crazy, but there was no way I was going to get to sleep until I found something about it online. I have always had anxiety, when I was about 8 I played for the school football team and I used to get extremely anxious and nervous before the game, whereas all of my mates were looking forward to it.

Every day I wake up, I always feel really nervous for no reason. After about 20 minutes of reminding myself that there's nothing to be nervous about, I calm down. However, it's when I'm calm I am vulnerable to my mind beating me up over the thing I'm suicidal about...the fear of being a pedophile :'( It's killing me and if I continue to be this stressed and breathe heavily, I think I could have a heart attack by the time I'm 25. It seems like if there's nothing else to be worried about/obsessing over, then my mind resorts back to the fear of being a pedophile. I would never do anything to harm children, I know that and I promise myself that. I work with children at the moment in a sports summer camp and have never had any disturbing thoughts and have never had any urges to do anything wrong. I only seem to have the thoughts at home or whatever. I'm not sure if I'm even a pedophile.

Could it be POCD as I do have OCD? I admit, I'm primarily attracted to older children/teenagers. I do find adults attractive too although I find children more attractive than adults, but have never in my life had any desire to have sex with one. I've never had a desire to have sex with adults, either. I think I could actually be asexual in a way. I'm a virgin and could happily die a virgin, it would not bother me. The only thing I do 'sexually' is masturbate, other than that, I have no desire for sex at all. Is this unusual? Am I a pedophile if I'm physically and emotionally attracted but have never had any sexual thoughts? Like, I like the naked body, but only in appropriate settings like at the beach and not in a sexual manner? I'm feeling so depressed over all of this, it's going to kill me I've also been struggling to concentrate lately, for example, I was on YouTube and was watching a video and thought to myself to search for something but by the end of the video, I couldn't remember what I was going to search for. This has happened alot...am I going mad? I could never go and see a professional over this, ever. So I'm looking to one of you guys for some help/advice/give me some peace of mind. The reason I couldn't see a professional is if I told one everything, my OCD would kick in and I would be scared that they have told the police or something. I know there are limits to the advice you can give on here, but please, give me some advice, I'm desperate How can I live my whole life like this, it can't be healthy

Thanks alot,

Kyle

Dear Kyle,

I am certain that you have OCD (POCD) as you are obsessing whether you are a pedophile or not. Are you seeing a psychologist/psychiatrist?

Things will get better

Thank you very much for the reply. Appreciate it.

I do hope so, they certainly can't get any worse! I do think I could have POCD as I have the fear of being a pedophile. However, I am actually attracted to children so surely I can't have POCD? I do search about it every day though, as a form of 'checking' so that is my OCD right?

Thanks, and any other replies much appreciated.