I'm really upset because my aunt sent me a tiktok video on whatsapp which I found really innapropriate and I deleted it immediately. But i keep having intrusive thoughts that it's still somewhere on my device and I'll get into trouble for it! She didn't think it was innapropriate, but I found it innapropriate:( she sent it to lots of people including my mum, but still, idk intrusive thoughts are taking hold :( Obv I cannot control what I get sent from other people, and I guess that's the same for everyone but I just feel disturbed.

You've shared this story multiple times ☺. A detail that's different is mentioning you're afraid you'll get in trouble for having it on your device. What do you think is happening right now?

As for the "what if it's a real worry" thing: all worries are real worries. Some worries are more rational than others. Your question is really: what if this is a rational concern? I dont recommend self reassurance that the police will have no reason to look at your phone or that they can't arrest everyone who shared a viral video etc, that'll just lead to a spiralling obsession. What I do recommend is noticing one thing: if a scary scenario came true where you faced criticism or judgment, you would HANDLE IT. Better than you think. You HAVE the ability to argue your own case. You HAVE other people in your life who would support you. You don't need to run through an imagined future scenario. You can, genuinely, cross that bridge if and when you come to it. The correct answer to your "what if" is "seems unlikely, but I'd deal with it", and then no more rumination. Even a 'realistic' worry is very rarely worth spending your free time ruminating on, since worrying doesn't actually make you any safer OR any more resilient to bad things. You can become more resilient to bad things (and improve your confidence in your ability to handle them) by reducing perfectionism as much as possible.

You've already told us about this. As you know, intrusive thoughts get even more persistent when you resist them and when you perform rumination compulsions. Intrusive thoughts pop up and they want you to spend time thinking about it. Your job is to not do so. It doesn't matter whether the compulsion involves repeating to yourself mentally that you believe it's immoral and therefore aren't a bad person, or thinking about how you would justify it being on your phone to the police, or imagining being confronted about it, or anything else related to the situation you've described. Compulsions don't help your OCD, they just feel good temporarily. You don't have to respond to the intrusive thoughts of "what if you get in trouble from having been sent it" or "what if you actually liked it and you're a terrible person" by finding ways to make the ideas feel temporarily less threatening. That usually just makes them come back even stronger once they find holes in the mental defence you created (e.g. "but what if they don't care that someone sent it to me?" or "but what if I'm just trying to act like a good person?". For what it's worth, I do think your moral OCD is kinda corroding your personality and that you really should try ASAP to consistently identify and resist doing mental compulsions. You don't want to turn into someone whose main personality feature is pointing out things they think are inappropriate, like all those aunts on Facebook who wander into groups and try to tell off grown adults for swearing or telling rude jokes. That's not a fun person to be, it's lonely. It seems like you hyper focus on the morality obsession and relate everything back to it, so when something comes up that most people don't think even has a moral element (or might wonder that for a second and then easily dismiss it as unlikely and unimportant), but something in it triggers an intrusive thought for you, you feel that you need to assert against your anxiety in as many ways as possible that you don't approve, otherwise there could be something morally defunct about you. You're right about not being able to control the world to avoid triggers. But I wonder if it could also be useful to try to seperate out your personality from your judging response. I doubt that the judging response is actually who you are, it's just a part of you who wants things to be in clear boxes so you can't be tainted, and you'll put as much in the "immoral box" as it takes to ensure that you feel clean and pure. I mean, the reality is that none of us are perfectly moral, we don't even know what that would be, opinions always differ. It's a bit like you don't want to expose yourself to potential criticism from other people or from the perfectionistic, shaming voice in your head, so instead of building trust with yourself and other people that they won't bully you, or improving your ability to handle shame, criticism or judgment, you're just trying your best to control situations and obey all the rules which minimise the possibility of any criticism. Your brain got you whipped. Something triggering discomfort in you isn't the same thing as you genuinely thinking it's immoral or inappropriate, and there's really no need to double down on the idea that it is. Same thing as reporting the erotica- I don't think your real personality genuinely finds stuff in it inappropriate, you just get an intrusive thought from a slightly triggering sentence or element of it (e.g. the ages weren't described and this was written by a teenager, hence these fictional characters sound like teenagers and they could be intended as being underage") and then you respond to the story as if it's *the same thing* as your intrusive thought, just in case it is. I think the same thing is happening here- you might have felt shocked and suddenly very uncomfortable at being suddenly sent it, but that's about being sent something you found triggering, not necessarily about the video itself. You CAN see perfectly way that it was of a cute baby doing cute things and that there's nothing objectively wrong with nudity. You're having intrusive thoughts which cause anxiety and discomfort and guilt, and trying to neutralise to those ideas and emotions via the compulsion of putting the video in the Immoral box. The video itself as far as the vast majority of the world (and likely also you minus OCD) is concerned is extremely innocent, probably very cute, and belongs in the Wholesome box. Your OCD ideas about the video based on triggered emotions and worries are getting you to put it in the Immoral box, to put as much distance between yourself and the threat as possible. But your worst interpretations are not the same thing as the reality of what the video (or erotica) is, you know? You can't keep yourself perfectly safe from judgment or criticism or threat in life via judging and criticising anything which might potentially not be perfect, in somebody's eyes or in some particular imagined scenario.

I'm honestly still having intrusive thoughts about this even though I'm trying so hard to not think about it. I know it's not my fault what I was sent but I literally feel like what if no one believes me!! ☹ that's obv supposing something bad even happens in the first place which is unlikely but its honestly stopping me from being able to be happy

"I'm trying so hard to not think about it" This may be your problem. In the ancient book The Art of War, Sun Tzu says "To fight and conquer in all our battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting." This seems to align with ERP therapy. Instead of fighting, let them be ☺.