i feel constant guilt for things i’ve done in the past. they have led up to me having this ocd. it makes me upset because the guilt is so strong. also because, one day i will have to tell a future partner about what i’ve done. and i know they will hate me for it. but i feel such a strong urge to tell them. (i’m currently single, i’m talking about the future). i don’t know what to do. am i required to tell them? i feel like if i don’t, they won’t know the “real me”, but i am not my past. but i have done some gross things. please help.

Thank you for your kind words. but that’s just the thing, if someone told me they did what i did, id be terrified. especially if they were male. if i cant accept others, i definitely cant accept myself. Funny enough, mine was that i have watched some disturbing porn, but i’ve also acted it out when i was younger, maybe 9-ish. it haunts me pretty much everyday. it’s hard to push away. knowing that i’ve done this, just in general, makes me feel worthless. i never harmed anyone. or anything. yet i feel as if i deserve life in prison. there is no cure to guilt besides forgiveness, yet i cant forgive myself. i wouldn’t expect others to either. starting to feel like if i was just aromatic or asexual i wouldn’t have to go through this whole “i need to tell my partner about this.” because in all honesty, if my male partner told me he did that, i would be scared. i guess this means i’m bad at forgiving? please respond back. you seem like such a genuine and wise person.

@AlwaysHere I wouldn't say you're bad at forgiving, you just seem to be not very experienced with compassion- and that can be hard to extend to others when we don't give it to ourselves. I used to be very argumentative and judgemental and it was mostly unconsciously because pointing the finger at other people made me feel less vulnerable about my own flaws. You seem to feel like I'm quite a safe person for you, would you truly be scared of me now if I said I've watched disturbing porn that I regret too? I have a friend who told me he watched illegal porn when he was younger to find out whether he liked it, I can say from experience that in truth when someone tells you something so personal like that voluntarily and with regret about it, damn I just thought he was brave and I was flattered that he trusted me like that. I don't care what his reasons were, I know who he is now and that really overrides anything when it comes to real people you know. I have a very close friend who killed her boyfriend's cat as a teenager because it was mean and aggressive and ruined furniture and clothes all the time and had terminal cancer but her boyfriend wouldn't get it put down and this cat was causing her a huge amount of stress and hurting the relationship. She mostly regrets it, she had and has quite severe PTSD, and was nervous about telling me. But I just don't see her any differently. She was young and didn't know how else to deal with the situation. The cat was going to die soon anyway and I feel more sorry for her having to live with that memory and irritated with her boyfriend, than I feel at all scared of her. We all have dark sides and shame and the capability for doing bad things. Jung calls it the shadow, and the only way to stop it controlling us without our awareness is by bringing it into the light through vulnerability. When I was a child, I think around 11, I encouraged my ~6 year old sister to flash her school friend, I don't know why, and I only found out recently that she ended up getting into trouble at school for flashing other kids all the time. I felt awful. She has an anxiety disorder now and I'm likely part to blame. But I apologised to her and I dont hide it from the people I love and trust. Children don't deserve judgement and blame, no matter how much of it we unfairly received as kids. I did something wrong, I feel bad about it but I can't live in shame and self hatred, it doesn't help me or anyone else. You just have to make amends where it's appropriate and carry on. It's painful but it's life. I don't think this is guilt which needs forgiveness, I think this is shame which needs compassion. As Brené Brown says in the clip below, guilt is "I did something wrong", shame is "I am something wrong". Guilt is correlated with acceptance, making amends, moving forwards, growing etc. Shame is correlated with depression, anxiety, low self worth and avoidance. You don't need to be your own judge, jury and executioner. I know that you're terrified of sharing but I have felt the same way about things and been able to share them and now share them freely, so you don't need to go right from this shame into deciding to stay single and isolated just to avoid vulnerability- and as Katie says it isn't a decision you need to make right now. Life is full of risk but in order to live at all we need to take some of those risks. As I said, you don't need to share your most private things with the world. If your alternative is to never feel connected with others again until you die alone then you have nothing to lose by taking some (measured, appropriate) risks with this fear. You have much less self-compassion than others are capable of having for you.

@AlwaysHere If self forgiveness and self love is hard right now, just try starting with self-tolerance. People are loveable, flaws and all, nobody at all is perfect. Do a bit of googling about self-compassion. It's different to self-esteem, much more robust, and much more of a place that beautiful things can grow from.

@Louw I’m speechless right now. Everything you said is completely accurate. I’m going to have to come back to this and reread it a lot. maybe even write it down. When you said you’ve watched it to, you’re right, I didn’t even care. I do lack compassion. I didn’t grow up getting hugs, or kisses from my parents. “i love you” or “you’re okay” was never said a lot. I guess I would be flattered if someone trusted me like that. Wow, that cat story just hit me hard. I cant imagine the pain she felt after doing that. I don’t blame her, nor do I shane her for that. I guess that’s a good thing on my behalf. What you said about vulnerability, you’re 100% right. I guess I am dealing with shame instead of guilt. It was guilt at first, but it has grown into shame. It’s hard to look at myself in the mirror for too long. Though, the more I think about how ashamed I am for what I’ve done as a kid, my ocd starts acting up. It starts telling me “you still like that stuff”, “you want to do that still”. it’s completely terrifying. I hate to keep rambling, but i feel as if i need to tell you what i’ve done. this is me trying to get reassurance from you, which i know i shouldn’t do. as it only makes things worse. but i truly do want to tell you, and i don’t even know you. not sure if you notice or not, but i havent told anyone about this. and not telling anyone makes me even more ashamed. i’m sorry to keep you responding, but you’re the first person who has truly given me some amazing information.

@AlwaysHere I don't mind responding at all, you don't need to apologise. Talking to other people about shame and saying these things helps to remind me of them too- I should probably get in touch with this stuff on a more regular basis than I do. I'll probably bookmark the post too. I think you were very brave for taking the risk of telling me those details which you haven't shared before, not knowing if I could potentially draw an arbitrary line and say your actions went too far to be deserving of love and kindness or understanding. The most judgemental, angry people on twitter or that you've met aren't representative of real people in the world. They're just in pain. The fact that you did share once you felt safe means you're capable of taking more baby steps towards sharing it with people you know and trust in your real life, too. You're not stuck or doomed. My parents weren't loving either, it took me a long time to build up a voice of nurturing and compassion in my head, the main things which helped were a book called "CPTSD: from surviving to thriving", and meeting a friend who is really the most compassionate person I know even if we don't always agree. For a long while I used his voice, it was my rock and his support was a huge help to me. If you like you can leave your email address here and then delete it after I heart the email comment, and I'll send you an email so we can stay in touch.

@AlwaysHere I’ve read a lot of the stuff here and all I can say to your story is same. Honestly same. Pretty much what you are feeling I have felt too for the same thing. I’m healing and learning to love and so can you. Much love

@AlwaysHere This doesn't seem that bad to me. I have also watched some disturbing porn im sure a lot of people do i wouldn't judge you no matter what porn you watched im pretty sure iv seen worse. Iv also done some messed up things as a kid and im sure a lot of people have, if what you did as a kid was make out with a girl let me tell you that's not something that i and most people would judge you for it's not a big deal as far as im concerned

@starboiklem no, that is not what i did at all. this comment gave me anxiety because it made me ruminate that i was a horrible person because i’ve done worse. thank you for the reassurance, but this hurt me.

@AlwaysHere Sorry about that, no matter what you did as a kid i wouldn't judge you iv also done bad things as a kid and im pretty sure it ain't even that bad it's just ocd making you overreact about it.

i realize, but it hurts. it feels like if i don’t tell that person, then i’m lying to them. i cant stop thinking about how i’m going to have to come clean in life about what i’ve done.

I'm dealing with a similar thing as this user. Do you have any other advice? I am scared about confessing to a future partner too but the thing is even though this decision doesn't need to be made rn, it does for me because its making me not date because I don't know if I would have to tell this person past mistakes

This clip is really good from around 9 minutes in.

@Louw could you please check my response?