Major trigger warning: This will be a post recounting my experience with POCD so far and what led to it. It will not be explicit. Suicide and self harm will be mentioned. I was able to track down the date of when the POCD theme began by looking through the images in my gallery. I am currently in a headspace where I am able to ask, just how are our minds capable of spiraling so quickly? One intrusive image has been enough to cause me 2 months worth of hell. Before this single image, I had I never in my life thought of children in a sexual manner, but one image was enough to start something horrifying I was not aware the human mind was capable of creating. At the time of the image, I was able to look past it. But I fell into a trap; I ruminated. A majority of us are stuck at home at the moment which means we have a lot of time to think. After the image occured, I was unable to get it out of my mind. Why had it happened? It occured in the midst of an innocent conversation with a child. What does this say about me? Do I want to do these things to children? Am I a pedophile? Google search: intrusive thoughts Google search: ocd symptoms Google search: ocd subtypes I begun to internally investigate every memory involving children. What had been my thoughts and intentions? Where had I looked when interacting with them? Had I ever done something to my younger sibling? The list goes on. Then began the intrusions. Intrusive thoughts, images and finally, the sensations. They all revolved around sex and children, two concepts I had never wanted to have intersect in my mind. I began to avoid looking at children, real or fictional. On tv, social media, youtube videos. Whenever I did look I would check for signs of arousal. Intrusive images would occur. There would be reactions at times. Checking does not accomplish anything but I did it regardless. I had to know and needed to prove or disprove the worst. Checking and testing and ruminating and researching. A cycle I kept up with in a desperate hope that I would finally be able to come up with solid proof. I never did. I have experienced so much dread, self hatred, anger, disgust, confusion, and most of all, doubt. I spent many nights pacing around my living room convinced that I was enjoying these thoughts and that I had become a sexually depraved monster, that I was becoming one, or would eventually be one. I planned out my entire new life where I would not be able to hurt children. I would have to change my career path, buy a house in an isolated area where I wouldn't have to interact with anyone. Marriage and children were no longer an option. At several points I had accepted this to be who I was now, a newly awoken pedophile. But I could not "accept" this. Because it was simply not the truth. I isolated myself and punished myself. I would purposefully imagine self mutilation and myself dying. I felt a sense of bliss from the idea of death. I deserved it because I am becoming a monster. Notes were mentally written and tears were shed. There is so much more I could say. So much I have pushed out of my mind as a result from just how stressful and maybe even traumatic this has been. I am currently at a stage where I still feel the intrusions but they are not causing as much distress which is upsetting in of itself. I have reached the lowest of lows, and am slowly, but surely recovering little by little. I am hoping this will all be in the past some day and that I am able to forgive myself. Thank you for taking the time to read.