Fear of being thought of as a pedophile...

[RandomGuy3]

Hello this is my first post here!

First of all I am not a pedophile, have never harmed a child, no thoughts of harming a child, or anything like that. I have daughters and several nieces and nephews. I would in a second die for any one of them. But the problem I have is the fear that people around me are thinking I'm a pedophile. It's totally opposite. I think kids are great and I was even considering becoming a teacher until I realized this was a problem.

I have an idea of what might have caused this. Back when I was 17 I worked for a guy in my church. All his workers and him included always messed with eachother and made pretty mean jokes to eachother. They wernt mean for us we were just BSing all the time. One time I called him a pedophile and he flipped out on me saying things like "don't ever f***in say that about me again that can ruin a mans life! Blah blah blah!". Ok well no big deal but that did stick out in my mind to this day, 7 years later. Well about 2 or 3 years ago when this problem of mine started I was helping a friend with his computer. Dude had a ton of porn on there and let's just say some of the titles were kiddies this and that. He was a good friend and I knew what had happened, he just copied massive amounts of porn off of other people's hard drives. That was his explanation and I believed him cause that's how it was in our situation. The authorities were still called. Investigators were sent to my house, they took the hard drive and then went to his house and took EVERYTHING that could hold any kind of data from an apple tv down to music CDs. He was labeled a pedophile and slowly watched him suffer for something as simple as a mislabeled file. He was innocent but it was just like my boss at said some 4 years before that. He was labeled a pedophile and his life was ruined. The files were found to be falsely labeled.

I see a kid about to fall and my heart jumps a beat with fear. I see a parent being to harsh and my heart races with anger. So why is it when I am playing with any of the numerous kids in my family I can't help but think my siblings down to strangers are thinking I'm a pedophile and my heart skips a beat and races with anxiety and fear? What can I do? I like kids and I don't want to feel like I have to be scared of them, especially when its my own daughters who absolutely adore me and I them. Iv never talked about it with ANYONE out of fear that they would think what I fear. I kinda have the fear posting this here but at the same time I know this is a safe place.

Any help would be much appreciated. I wanted to teach kids cause I feel like the only way to make the world a better place is to be a positive role model for children. I can honestly say the good teachers that gave a damn were a huge positive part of my life. But they had confidence and wernt full of fear.

Thank you for taking the time to read if you did,
R. Garcia

PS and if this isn't the right place for this sorry for wasting your time.

 

[nicole1]

I think b/c it's such a bad thing, you want NO ASSOCIATION WHAT SO EVER. But being near that is scary enough, I'm sure. I can't tell you how to get rid of it but I'm sure you're not the only one to experience this. Being near the situation can make anyone paranoid of themself or of others. I today have a paranoia of men being around children b/c what was done to me at a VERY VERY young age. That and things my mom often say about men and sex and the comments she made about news stories while I was growing up.
I'm not saying I don't trust you. I don't know you. You sound like a terrific guy. But I still have a bit of fear when it comes to men and children.

 

[Kiwong]

What are the facts? You are protective of children, you have your own children, and neices and nephews. How you treat them are your real actions, you know what the truth is, the opinions of others mean zilch.

 

[Paahi]

What are the facts? You are protective of children, you have your own children, and neices and nephews. How you treat them are your real actions, you know what the truth is, the opinions of others mean zilch.

This ^
.......

 

[missjesss]

Exactly why do you care what anyone else is thinking when ur around kids???

 

[N0D]

I think in this case other peoples opinions DO matter. Not sure about other countries but here in the US there is a witch hunt for pedophiles, we have TV shows where they track them down and everyone in the country can see their face. Also I think it's common for them to be brutalized or killed in prison, so being convicted of something like that is sort of like a death sentence.

I'm not trying to play devil's advocate here or defend them, but I feel like the punishment doesn't fit the crime, or if it does I feel like other crimes I consider worse have to light a punishment.

Also like he said, his friend got a bunch of heat for some mislabeled files, the opinions or perceptions of others can have big negative effects on a mans life.

Basically I understand your fear, there are few things worse then a man having that label put on him. The only small person I go near is my 6 year old cousin cause he's cool and all.

I guess it isn't really much of a problem for me because I don't really like kids all that much, actually other then my cousin I find them dreadfully annoying and do my best to avoid them...sorry if I can't help much, but I do empathize.

 

[cosmosis]

I have heard very similar stories like this many times. It's not uncommon at all. From my experience. the more you resist a thought, the more that thought will keep coming back.

Everyone has evil cruel scary thoughts that go through their mind. Things like, am I capable of killing this person or hurting them or even raping them perhaps. What typically happens is you might indulge it for fun in your mind, you might just laugh at it, but you don't give it any weight and the thought goes away and won't stalk you. It's when you get scared of a thought that it becomes unnatural I think. When you get scared of a thought, you are actually asking your brain to fix it...and your brain is actually is trying to do you a favor by bringing that thought back and back so you can deal with it and no longer feel scared about it.

But you are not a pedophile at all, just someone who is scared of the thought because of your past. The more you allow the thought to run its course and just laugh at it, not be afraid of it, the less it will haunt you I believe.

 

[dyingtolive]

its a HUGE responsibility to teach kids.. i think all teachers/ppl who deal with children on a daily basis must know this..

if you know this deep in ur heart with conviction, it will ease the paranoia u may feel when being/dealing with children.. if you yourself trust yourself and know that you will only do good for them. you should have no fear if its genuine.

those things u mentioned could be quite traumatic. with all this trauma in your subconscious, im not surprised u feel this way.. being SA and all too, im quite a paranoid person myself..

maybe it could work in a good way.. use the fear to fuel the frailty/fragility of being with children and treating them well. Maybe physical contact is one thing that can be avoided (?) i dont know. Im not a touchy person but i know some people are. Being touchy with kids, even if innocent has more chance of being thought of as immoral. i have no idea on kids of my own though, since i dont have kids... well its very brave of u to write this and good luck and hope u can handle it easier..

btw, who called the authorities on your friend? it sucks that he had to go through that..

 

[cassiestrange]

You seem very worried about what others think of you, and because your friends life was ruined because of a simple thing like mislabeled files, you fear the same will happen to you. But if your not doing anything wrong you have nothing to worry about. You shouldn't worry so much what others think of you and if they think your a pedophile. If i was at the park and saw you with your daughters, i wouldn't think anything of it. Now if i saw some creepy 50 year old guy taking pictures of little kids at the playground, then i would think there was something very wrong with that. I understand your fear though, since pedophiles aren't welcome in society. But you cant let those negative thoughts control your life, and shouldn't let this fear hold you back from being a teacher, something you might really enjoy. I have missed out on a lot of things in my life, also because of fear of what others would think of me. And that feeling of knowing i missed out on something that could have been fun sucks. The only thing i can recommend is trying to talk to someone about this. And try to reduce the negative thoughts. i hope that helped