How do I know if it is safe to have children with him?

I am in a committed long term relationship with a 35yr old man.

When we started becoming serious he confessed to me that he is sexually attracted to young children. He said he had not told anyone before and that he wanted to confide in me. As difficult as it is for me to put myself in his shoes, I fully understand he has no control over who he is attracted to and I am eternally grateful that he trusted me enough to tell me. He is also sexually attracted to adult women too and sees ultimate happiness with someone the same age as him (which I am).

I am at the stage in my life where I would like to have children and I am now faced with looking at the man I love and then also at the secret he has told me. How do I know if it will be ok for us to have children together?

He says the thought of actually following through on his thoughts haunts him and that he would never ever want to hurt anyone. He said the main reason that he told me was to 'keep himself in check' in a way as he wants to be more open about it.

His attraction started around the age of 20. He has had sexual relations with younger teens he met on the internet when he was in his 20s but feels ashamed about that now and does not maintain any profile online where he talks to any female of any age. He has admitted watching more serious material but said he has stopped himself since he met me and does not ever want to look at that material again. He has voluntarily deleted a collection of pictures of children on his latop (fully clothed) and has told me he wants to see if he can cut down on the amount of times he looks at such photos online (currently now twice a week). He says he does not experience any of these thoughts in real life and has had normal interactions wih any children he has been in company with. He even specifically mentioned a time when a child accidently touched him inappropriately and how he was able to immediately correct the situation. He does not work with children or seek to surround himself by them in real life. He has had one or two sexual encounters with men in the past and considers himself pansexual in a way but ultimately only being satisfied by an adult straight relationship.

He feels guilty for having his thoughts but understands it is a part of him. He says he wishes he could make my life easier and flick a switch and not feel this way. He says he never wants to hurt anyone and believes he never will as he is aware of the consequences and also that it goes against his own sense of right and wrong.

He would like a family one day though. He says he does not believe this will be a problem. He has offered to go talk to someone if he felt uncomfortable at any point. He has offered to come with me if I need to talk to someone about this.

So my question is, how many of you out there can relate to this man I love and what do you advise me to do? Is it possible to have a healthy family situation in this scenario? Could he be a good father and keep this part of his life separate from any children?

Please help. I understand his thoughts. I truly feel for his situation. He is a great partner and I love his openness. I am just terrified as I do not know who to talk to about this and I don't want my love for him to cloud the seriousness of my potential decision taking.

Thanks in advance,

S.

Difficult to answer honestly, you know him better than any of us do.

But by what he has said it would worry even me how truthful he is being, he could just be exactly that and it could all be fine but I would not like to say one way or the other, it's a choice you will ultimately have to make.

I would suggest going as far to suggest he gets rid of any hard drives of even clothed pictures by smashing them to pieces in front of you to show how serious he is and let you monitor his PC usage to help him stop it for good, if he really is truly serious then that in my eyes is a reasonable request.

Even an amount of clothed pictures can be classed as illegal material if you have no particular reason to have them.

All I'm saying is you have to be sure he is being 100% truthful to you but good on you for not ditching him when he told you, most people would run a mile.

I would hate for another person to go through what I have gone through recently and will do in the near future whilst my future is very uncertain.

Sometimes you need to look past one aspect of someone's life and look at the person they truly are but sometimes you need to really look at the situation too and even ask yourself if this ever came out could you handle it then as you are now? Hopefully it will never come to that and hopefully he will never act on these thoughts or fellings.

Sorry I can't really be any help but these are just my thoughts, I want nothing to do with my previous part of my life that was taken up with CP, I am putting it behind me and I feel so much better every day and pleased with myself for making progress, each day just feels so much better not looking at such things and stopping the thoughts when they enter my head, I do anything to think about something more healthy now.

Hi, Sandra.

His openness with you is a positive sign, I think. A potential abuser probably wouldn't behave anything like that. I'm also encouraged by his efforts to wean himself off of porn, which is as addictive as any drug to some blokes.

I can't, from here, say with 100% certainty that it's completely safe to have kids with this guy, but most people have a natural aversion to anything sexual with their own flesh and blood, and it does sound to me like he's got a good sense of right and wrong.

One thing to remember is that attractions alone do not make an individual inclined to abuse. From what you've said, he doesn't sound to me like an abusive character.

This is something that you and him should be discussing. Me and my partner had this exact discussing when I opened up to him about my paedophilia and that I struggle to find him sexually attractive at times. He was very understanding. I love him more because of this.

Not sure about your husband, but I DO have a track record of physical and verbal abusiveness. I myself believe that I should not be allowed to have children of my own until I am certain I am emotionally stable and situated with my attractions. Me and him agree with this.

Your husband seems like a good guy from what I've read in your OP. Take your time with this though.

Thanks so much for the replies.

I have literally been sitting here on the forum clicking refresh. It's on my mind a lot and I have no one to talk to about it.

Yes, he is extremely honest. I believe that this is more down to me than him. In previous relationships partners have always commented on how easy I am to confide in. I do always like to create an open environment and I hate the idea of anyone dealing with things in their head alone as we all have our own issues.

He keeps asking me what he can do to make me feel more at ease with the situation. I never know quite what to say. I tell him I don't want to push him so far that he has no outlet for this area of his life and it all backfires.

He offered to delete the folder on his laptop of images. When I saw him sitting in front of the computer an hour later he turned immediately and told me had deleted the folder. I asked how he felt and he said relief and also he admitted that there were more images in the folder than he had remembered.

He has only ever taken one picture of a young girl fully clothed in a natural setting. He took pictures of teens he met with when he was younger. All fully clothed natural photos. He feels bad about that.

He said if he had kids and someone ever took a picture of his children he would would not be able to control himself. He says when he was younger a man looked at his step sister in a shopping mall and it disgusted him. He says he reads about child abuse and he is horrified and feels bad for the children and has no sympathy for the abusers as they had no self-control.

At the moment he is voluntarily offering to try not look at any pictures of underage children in any setting for a month to see how he copes.

When I ask him why it is important to have children to him he mentions that, although it is not necessary, he always wanted a family and feels he would regret it later in life if he didn't as he would not feel complete.

He promises me that we can talk as much as I like about this area of his life and that he will try reassure me as best he can.

Telling me seems to have brought him huge relief.

It is a huge huge responsibility for me as a woman to make a decision to have a child with someone who has these thoughts.

If anyone has children I would really appreciate how they felt (on either side of the equation) as they saw their children grow up.

Thanks so much. I am so glad this forum exists.

This forum is a godsend there is no doubt about that.

I hope you can find a balance and peaceful life with this situation.

I hate people who deliberately hurt children just to have sex with them, I hate anyone who murders anyone children or adults, but yet I still had thoughts of what it would be like to have in my mind at least loving sex with younger boys, if I said otherwise I would be a liar. I still watched some of the awful things I did, regardless of whether it looked like they were enjoying it they were children being abused even if they consented to the situation.

There are so many things people do I despise yet I still did what I did. It just seems illogical to be so against stuff but then do what I did.

Thanks.

I am struggling to find peace with it. I am suffering huge anxiety at been thrown into a world that I would rather be naive and pretend does not exist. I find it hard to work sometimes.

He is very supportive.

He describes that sense of relief you did at being able to control his desire to look at pictures on the internet.

I just don't know if that is a viable longterm solution or if he will inevitably return to looking at it again some time in the future?

As a male pedophile with an attraction to women my age too, I chose to answer.
I don't have any children myself, but I know my own body's limits. Incest is very far from pedophilia, at least in my eyes. I know that I could never be attracted to my own child, pedophile or not.

Again, thanks to everyone who replies. it is really helping me to be able to talk this out online. I really appreciate it and hope it's not triggering or stressful for you all in any way that I talk about this.

zoegapresso wrote:As a male pedophile with an attraction to women my age too, I chose to answer.
I don't have any children myself, but I know my own body's limits. Incest is very far from pedophilia, at least in my eyes. I know that I could never be attracted to my own child, pedophile or not.

This is exactly how he expresses it to me. I do believe that this is how he feels.

I worry about the subtleties of the situation.

I have no experience of growing up being aware of being in the company of adults who were attracted to children. I never was alone with men my parents were not familiar with and I never sensed my Father had anything but an attraction to adult women.

Now we have the internet, I worry kids will find something on a laptop that he might try to hide. I worry that they may 'sense' something is different in their interactions with him as a Father even if he never does anything wrong. I also worry a lot that, if I had kids, that their friends will pick up the 'vibe' from him somehow and that my kids may end up suffering.

It's just healthy worry and anticipating scenarios.

He does not have the classic 'abuser' personality. By that I mean he has no history of violence towards anyone, he is extremely measured and respectful in his interactions with me and he has an extremely close family (who are unaware of his pedophilia thoughts). He does not seek out the company of children. He is not manipulative in any way. He describes it as more being 'inside his head' now despite a brief history of meeting teens a few years ago (never younger).

I just feel so unsettled. I love him a lot and he has never given me any other reason in my time with him to doubt our future together. He keeps saying he wants us to work and that he loves me so much.

I know it's a continuum. It's so hard not to always see worst case scenario.

Are you worried about him having underaged affairs, or of having incestuous relationships with your own kids? How incest is reacted to depends on how it's presented. If it's the worst thing ever, those in such relationships with regard it colored by that presentation. If sex is simply the best thing human beings can do with one another, and far preferable to hurting or murdering each other, then sex becomes a natural positive thing. But our culture and time often makes sex sinful and dirty and so what should be natural and wonderful is construed as horrible.

*mod edit - the rest is off-topic and promotes incest, in violation of site rules*