I can't enjoy anything today because I'm not only stuck in the past with things I wish didn't happen to me and that I'm having trouble being kind to myself in general. Porn destroyed my teenage years and it's affecting my young adult years now. I look back on everything and just think I'm disgusting for it. Some days like these I just can't shake the guilt or the shame. They just hit me full force.
If the actions that you feel are "disgusting" are in the past, then try to frame it as: "I used to do disgusting things," rather than "I AM disgusting." Guilt is a healthy and helpful emotion when it drives us to change our behavior or repair relationships we may have damaged. The longevity of the guilt will vary depending on the severity of the past actions, but for the most part it should greatly subside after taking positive actions. Shame is like guilt, but rather than being directed towards our actions, it's directed towards ourselves. It's rarely helpful, because it completely ignores that fact that we are constantly changing, both physically and mentally. It keeps us stuck in a mindset that something is "wrong" with us. Also just as a disclaimer, I'm not necessarily saying that you SHOULD be feeling guilt/shame for whatever your relationship with porn was/is, I'm just talking generally here. We all have our own moral standards.
Shame is much more lasting than guilt is. I can do things that are positive for me but it doesn't feel like they matter as much as the negative things I've already done. This is definitely a perspective thing and for a while I've had and I'm still trying to change it. What I did back then was disgusting. I'm not proud of the things I did when I was a teenager but I also try to remember that I was trying to learn everything that I could about sexuality and what was right and wrong. I think I've definitely learned this, but the problem is porn is still a problem that I have problem keeping myself away from. In the past I would say it was worse because I was more focused on taboo things and that gives me great shame and sometimes reinforces my POCD. It's just hard to get rid of the shame.
@BigGyro09 - I understand. We humans put significantly more weight on negatives over positives, and yes shame is a difficult emotion to navigate. My understanding is that our capacity for shame, and what triggers it, is developed at a very young age. It is driven by regions of the brain that do not have any language-processing ability, which is why you can't "talk yourself out of it," or why it doesn't really help when people try to convince you that you don't need to feel shameful. My best advice would be to allow that feeling of shame to be there, and at the same time, make a habit out of reminding yourself of positive things you have done. I don't specifically mean positive changes you've made in regards to what you're shameful about, but really anything positive at all. Times that you've helped other people, for example. When these things that you're proud of arise in your mind, try to make note of what you feel in your body. Maybe you feel generally at-ease, a warm sensation in the chest, a calmness in your muscles, etc. This will help train the mind to focus more on these positive feelings of self, because again, the regions of the brain responsible for shame speak in feelings, not language. As you continue to remind yourself of those things, get familiar with how they make you feel, and continue to gravitate towards those positive actions in the future, the feeling of shame should gradually diminish. It just takes time. Wishing you all the best. It's tough out there in this world!
@djflorio I think this would be a good thing to bring to my therapist. I have helped people on here and hoped they will thrive with therapy. I've helped my friends with things they needed help or support with. I've been nice to my friends. I suppose those are positive things. I did some exercises today, which is positive for my body. There's some things. I just overall need to work on my outlook on everything. It's just too stuck in the past. Guess I just need to process a lot of stuff. I don't know if feeling the shame helps me. I just feel enough of it and it brings me right back to the place where the shame comes from. I'm constantly reminded of the shame, but then I just go back to porn as an escape but come right back to feeling shame because no matter what I do besides go back to that, I'm feeling down and ashamed. I don't mean to throw your advice away because I don't want it, not at all. I just don't know what to do.
@djflorio Thank you very much for your help and reaching out though. I appreciate that. The reminders of positive things can help.
@BigGyro09 - Right, to clarify when I say to allow the shame to be there, I mean that more as accepting that it's there, rather than trying to actively push it away with logical thought, or arguing with thoughts. Definitely do positive things that help get your mind off of it, like working out or actively engaging in social settings, hobbies, etc. Just kind of treat it like the other emotions we deal with when addressing OCD, like anxiety. It will be there from time-to-time. But yeah I'm sure there are a lot of complications in this process, and you are better suited than I am to know what is feasible and right for you. I absolutely agree that talking to a therapist would be good for this!
@djflorio I understand now. That can be something I can practice and make apparent to myself to get through it. I truthfully think deep down all of these feelings are connected to the trauma that I faced when I was a teenager when it came to pornography in the first place. I only blame myself for it because I have no one else to blame but myself, but really, that's not a healthy way of looking at this. Unfortunately it was just a bad thing that happened, and bad things do indeed just happen to people. I still don't know how I'm going to get through these feelings with an answer that makes sense, but that's what therapy is for. Once again, thanks a lot. Seriously, this does help. Just talking about it puts things into perspective quite well. It's interesting how I can go from thinking it's all my fault in my head at one point but then go to accepting that it just happened at a time where I didn't understand sexuality but was curious about it. And that it unfortunately turned into a bad habit that's been around for almost a decade. But there's still some parts I'm having trouble with because of uncertainty because of POCD like doubting people's age in content, searching for taboos that really bother me, and actually seeing inappropriate things with underaged characters just by scrolling for videos sometimes. It's absolutely awful, but the only reason I go back is to escape. At the very least, I KNOW what keeps me coming back to it. It's because I'm not generally happy right now.
Many people have trauma in relation to this, the difference is that they forgave themselves and moved on. Besides, you were a teenager learning about what was right and wrong. think, your brain is still being formed until you are 24, imagine at 16 or even? You had access to things you regret, but don't be so hard on yourself, you were just a teenager. You are also a victim of this!
Yeah, at 24 or 25 the mind fully develops. I definitely don't think I knew the right or wrong with this kind of stuff. Especially since I didn't get the talk about sexuality whatsoever. I just had to figure it all out and it really hurt. But, I still remember times where I wasn't a teenager engaging in this and felt awful and ashamed of myself. Maybe I'm just not processing all of the trauma fully or maybe it's just OCD amplifying things.
hey i have a similar situation to u regarding like other forms of it like (reading, roleplay, etc.) it def feels so shameful to be apart of that and like you said i still deal with the effects of it, so i’m sorry you are going through that as well but know you’re not alone in this situation and i also feel the same way. we shouldn’t shame ourselves tho because here we are with a different perspective than we had during that time and that’s amazing that we changed. we have to celebrate the victories over the disappointments in situations like this growth is amazing and we all have regrets
@Godsgood and also if you still struggle with anything that doesn’t mean that you are not a changed person, your decision to try to avoid it again and again is the sign of your growth
I watched porn and i feel guilty. My brain is telling me that they could have been 18 on the dot but i still watched it bc i felt like my brain was sabotaging me. I clicked on videos with mature audiences but it tells me you scrolled through young pornstars. I feel disgusted and depressed. I honestly don’t care about living sometimes.
I got into porn when I was around 14 or 15 I think and it just got very bad for a few years and I have a lot of guilt and worry for the things that I saw and touched myself to. I came across some bad things. I stopped all of that but I can’t get over the guilt from my teenage years. It bothers me all day long and disrupts my sleep now too. It leaks into my dreams. I just woke up from a dream related to that probably because I worry all day. Life is not enjoyable anymore all I do is worry in my head and say affirmations to try to make myself feel better. Right now I’m worried about so many things but specifically I’m worried what if someone I saw in a video was way younger? I remember being on xvideos as a teen and wanting to imagine myself with other people my age and I know I’m worried what if I watched something on there where the people were younger??? I think I remember putting teens in the search bar and it scares me because even though I was a teen myself I feel like that is wrong now and I’m worried about what I may have watched. I’m giving up on myself more everyday. I know I have zero attraction to minors and I know back then as a teenager I was not attracted to anyone anyone not around my age but I worry so much about things I watched and came across. I wish I had never watched porn as a teenager it has ruined my life and it haunts me every day. And also horrible fan fiction stories and other stories people wrote online that haunt me too. I’m worried I can’t ever recover or find help and I feel like I’m going to go to jail or end up k1lling myself one day because I can’t deal with it. I worry when I’m not crying or having too much anxiety I feel like I need to constantly be in distress and I am not allowed to enjoy anything or have anything. I don’t want anything anymore. I don’t want to do anything anymore accept just sit and worry and feel myself I hate myself. I feel ashamed to be around my family and anytime they do anything for me my brain goes “they don’t know they’re hugging a monster” “they don’t know they’re supporting a monster” and I just can’t take it. I want to find joy in life again. I would do anything just to be a normal person and not have had any of this happen and not have these worries. I feel like a mess every day I look so gross and I feel so gross and I feel like nobody can help me. I’m getting help soon but I just feel like it’s too late and like I’ve ruined myself and I just don’t feel good about the future. I feel like I am going to get sent away and that will hurt my family or end myself eventually and that would hurt them. I don’t want to hurt my family or anyone. I question how I could have ever been that person and what was wrong with me. I keep thinking back to things that happened before I was a teenager and I’m like does that count as trauma or something? Could this be why?? But also I don’t want to make excuses or feel like I’m pushing the blame onto someone else. I am the only one at fault. I’m sorry I keep writing these long posts I’m just not in a good place mentally. I feel like I am really sick in the head or something and I’m starting to fear maybe I have always been that way. I just want so desperately to be good. I don’t want anything other than to be a normal good healthy minded person and be here to support my family and others. I don’t care about myself succeeding in anything other than getting better, I just want to support my family in succeeding in whatever they want. I don’t want money or anything for myself. I have more than I deserve. I just want to get better. I pray but I don’t feel like I can be forgiven
This is all probably tmi, but I’m struggling quite a bit so please bear with me. I recently cut back/quit watching mainstream porn, but the other day I was searching for a certain scene from the movie “X” to use as a… replacement. (Mia Goth is one of my biggest celebrity crushes, and I was just trying to explore alternatives to traditional porn 🤦♀️) While looking for this, I stumbled upon an explicit scene of hers from the movie “Nymphomaniac” that I used instead. I’ve never seen this movie, so I was incredibly disgusted when I found out afterward that she was 18/19 when filming this movie and that her character in the movie is SUPPOSED TO BE 15. I’m 24, so needless to say, I was a bit horrified. I had no idea she was so young in this (or that the character she played was underage), and I feel sick that I used this to pleasure myself. None of this crossed my mind beforehand considering it was a pretty explicit scene in a mainstream film. I assumed she was around my age. Even though she was technically an adult while filming this, she was still far to young for me personally and I feel deeply ashamed. This event has triggered memories from the ages 18-22 (I worry even 23) where I would search the “teen” category (18-19) on porn websites. I feel disgusting for looking at this stuff once I got out of my teen years, and even though I stopped, I feel dirty and predatory for doing this in my early 20s. Before I took a hiatus from watching this content this year, I would only watch things where I could tell the actors were my age or older. But the past is haunting me. And I just feel so gross. I should have stuck with the scene from the movie I was searching for (because she was 28/29 in that and I KNEW that), or I shouldn’t have watched anything at all. Hell, typing this out is starting to make me obsess over whether I’m disgusting or not for doing this to something that wasn’t really intended to be “porn”. I feel like I’ve violated this actress by using this film for something it wasn’t really intended for. I know I should quit all of this entirely, but my medication makes it incredibly difficult to “perform”, and imagination alone just doesn’t work for me. I’m just so frustrated and everything I do makes me hate myself more. I’m sorry for the graphic nature of this post. I was just wondering if anyone could relate or give me some advice.
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