The past is gone. Young people do crazy things, older people do crazy things. The thing to do is move on, and if you feel you need to make up for it, do something good for animals. You don't need to feel guilty, it's worthless; you need to be positive now because now is still happening.
Appreciate the reply. I know the past cannot be undone which bothers me the most because if i knew back then the difference between right/wrong i'd never have done it. I think my problem at this present is i'm thinking into it all very negative and i feel like there is no hope for what i've done and move forward despite how hard i try. i wish the memory can be released because i'm not a bad person. I really can't understand how people can harm animals especially when they know better (like i do now) but then i feel like a hypocrite because of my past. I really want to enjoy life to the full without worrying and one day i'd like to have a family of my own. But my past keeps telling me in my head i don't deserve it and I've blown my chance and if i did meet the love of my life is it wrong to be with them? is this the case?
We have all done things in our past that we are not proud of, things that when we reflect, we cringe from guilt and pain. I had a friend and he always told me "guilt is like a ton of bricks...all you have to do is put it down instead of allowing it to weigh you down." It is so true. You are older and wiser and you will still make mistakes, even now. As we move from stage to stage, we grow and develop. Do not dwell on things you did in the past. It will make you go mad. Just continue to improve on yourself and be a good person.
Please and Love,
Anna
Try to forgive yourself and don't listen to your head when it tells you negative things. The negative stuff occupies our headspace until we can learn to free this space up with relaxing meditation or deep breathing exercises.
What you did as a young boy is normal and natural and nothing to be ashamed of. If more people were honest, like you, they would admit they ALSO experimented sexually with friends of the same sex. I know I did.
Dry humping your dog, while perhaps SLIGHTLY out of the norm, does NOT make you a monster. (I will assume that dry humping WAS the total extent of this experience)
I agree with everyone who has written that what happened was so long ago........something from your childhood that you need to let go of now. No harm was done. As someone else on this thread wrote you need to let the past go and lay that heavy load down.
I don't think you have OCD, I think you're carrying around a lot of unnecessary guilt that is keeping you from living a fulfilling life. If you can't seem to do this on your own, which many of us can't, consider talking with a therapist who uses CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) to help you get past the guilt and other negative feelings you have about yourself. You deserve to be happy and have what you want.........a family, kids, friends AND a couple of goofy mutts.............(rescued of course!)
You just gotta reach out for some help. You've made an excellent start by writing to us.
RubyWitch
I just reread your post and believe I missed a very important piece of information.
You wrote.........."My parents use to argue a lot and I witnessed a lot of physical violence for many years through out all this."
I'm not trying to come off like I'm a psychiatrist, because I most certainly am NOT.......but I can't help wondering if your masturbation was not your way of dealing with what was going on in your home. You were a young boy living in a very emotionally unhealthy environment! Parents that argue a lot can be extremely disturbing to young people, but witnessing physical violence is horrifying!
At that age you probably felt helpless to do anything about it. Perhaps you had even been threatened to never say anything............
Now, at the age of 26, you say "I feel a heavy weight in my head of guilt and depression and worry."
I don't think those feelings come from your youthful (and normal) experimentation with sex/masturbation........but more from all the fighting and physical violence you were exposed to.
You've said that you've had sexual relationships with women but they don't last "because of what has happened." Again, youthful sexual experimentation (including using your dog as a warm "pillow") and masturbation would not cause you to leave these relationships, but maybe not knowing how to have a "normal" relationship would. You grew up with angry and violent role models..........perhaps you are afraid you will repeat that?
I'm going to stop because I could be so far off base about all of this that I'm only making things worse. But maybe, just maybe, it might be something you could think about?
I hope there is a way for you to talk to a good professional therapist about this.
Wherever this weight around your neck came from, you deserve to be free of it and happy.
I am sorry if I've offended you in any way.
I hope someday you find the peace you deserve
RubyWitch
Ruby gave you excellent advice, she always does.
Many times parents don't realize what they're doing to their children when they fight. Yes! It can indeed effect a child.
Ruby talked to you about therapy. I agree with her because I think you'll get a lot out of it. You need to move past this guilt and get on with your life. A therapist can help you do this.
Another thing that I believe will help you is to get a place of your own. You've lived with your parents fighting all of your life. It's time to get away from it.
Hi,
I have experienced something similar as a child. My rabbit dry humped everything and I wanted to know how it felt if it would dry hump me so I put it between my legs (full clothes on) to see how it would feel just out of curiosity and this makes me feeel very ashamed and guilty I don’t know how to deal with this. I appreciate any answer!
I'm assuming you're not a child anymore, though you don't mention your age. Guilt is there to teach humans how to stay alive -- it's a survival mechanism to teach us what not to do again. Guilt can also be imposed on us by outside forces trying to exert power over us by making us feel bad about things that aren't actually bad, but that's a different form of guilt. In your case, if you were a kid, kids do a lot of odd things growing up. They make good stories later on, but that's about it. Once you've learned whatever there is to learn from feeling guilty, holding onto the guilt isn't useful, but it is painful. Some of us just hold onto things, but it's not a beneficial thing to do. At some point you internalize any lessons there are to be learned and move on to new mistakes as humans are pretty much mistake machines. Now, in your case, I'm not sure anything particularly bad was done unless you caused harm to the animal, which it doesn't appear you did. The rabbit had no idea what you were doing or thinking and just did its thing. You learned, hopefully, that animals in our care have to be treated as we'd like to be treated, but holding onto that guilt isn't useful. Shame is a different thing, almost always that's from values imposed on us by outside forces. You might independently agree or disagree with those forces but letting them harm your life for years is useless. I know this is easy for me to say and I don't pretend to be able to forget things but life is a lot better if you do learn to do that as much as possible and live in the present, not the past. If this is something you do a lot and it gets in the way of your life, you might consider talking to someone about it and getting it out of your system, but the important thing is, again, learn from guilt but don't let it destroy the rest of your life. Move on, especially since this was such a little thing -- I mean, you didn't kill anyone, right? Live and learn. Peace.