PLEASE respond I’m worried I did something bad

After I was abused as a kid I developed a habit where I had to masturbate sometimes to go to sleep.When I got in a relationship at 15-17 we fell asleep on the phone some nights.From 17-19 we were in a talking stage somewhat and still fell asleep otp.From 19-21 we were together in person.A while after moving in I worried after seeing things online if I could be doing something wrong.I haven’t realized since I move to the other side of the bed and don’t include her or want to and I wanted to go to sleep.I asked her about it and she said it was okay.I also told her at this time I’ve been doing it since I was a kid.Since we went back to long distance and were friends with benefits and fall asleep on the phone I worried this was wrong.I asked her and she said it’s okay but I said I’m going to stop doing it regardless.Ive read that someone’s boyfriend did that and everyone said she should break up with him and I also read that it’s sexual harassment I think she’s getting annoyed because I keep asking her:( I read that retrospective consent isn’t actual consent because it’s been given after therefore those situations required consent and it wasn’t given.I never wanted to involve her or hurt her or make her uncomfortable and even though she says I didn’t I’ve done something wrong multiple times before knowing it was wrong and I feel disgusted :( I’m not in therapy at the moment but I hope to be soon

Eclipse_xx

Date posted: 19h

I don't want to feed too deeply into reassurance but this is an extremely common thing for people to do, I've done this myself in the past, and if she's said it's okay, believe her! People on the Internet will have inflammatory and over-the-top opinions about everything, nothing is ever that black and white.

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx I can’t stop crying I feel bad for crying otp with her about it I don’t want her to feel bad for how I feel about my shame because it’s not her responsibility at all I’m so incredibly sorry I can’t believe I didn’t know it was wrong people said it’s sexual harassment and i feel so sick I haven’t been able to stop crying and talking to ai and there’s no words for how sorry I am regardless if I hurt her I did something wrong:(

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx When doing research it said doing that otp is harassment even if I don’t want to involve her.Ive never wanted to hurt her ever I can’t believe I didn’t know this was wrong I feel like I don’t deserve to eat or enjoy anything anymore:(

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx I’ve also seen people say in retrospect consent they can feel pressured to say it was okay she said she doesn’t but I’m so scared to make her feel pressured to say it’s okay because I’m so proud of her when she speaks up if someone does something wrong and I’d be just as proud if it was me.Ive apologized and she still says it’s okay but I just want to be sure because according to Google it’s harassment:(

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx Thank you so much for responding it means a lot really this is one of the worst things my ocd has latched on to :(

Eclipse_xx

Date posted: 19h

@tryingtoheal7 Researching this is a compulsion, and your brain is going to automatically latch onto the worst case scenario and the most angry opinions you can find. I promise you OCD is making this feel much worse than it is. A lot of people have done exactly what you've done. I've had friends do it on call with each other and only tell each other and laugh about it afterwards. It CAN be harassment, but harassment is an active action, where it's intended for another individual to be involved and the individual is made aware of it in a way that makes them uncomfortable. None of that happened. You deserve good things, and again, she's said it's okay. All you can do is trust that she means it.

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx I’ve seen people get called creeps for it I don’t want to be a creep at all:( can you tell me what makes this not harassment? I did in silence I didn’t make her aware or want her to join or anything I just wanted to gts.

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 19h

@Eclipse_xx What way did you friends do it that makes it not harassment? Did they tell each other before? She didn’t know before because I didn’t know I needed to tell her and i was already very ashamed of the fact I need to do it to sleep.I experience hyper sexuality and I just want to get the feeling away so I can sleep

Eclipse_xx

Date posted: 7h

@tryingtoheal7 It's a private activity and it remained a private activity, you didn't do it with the intention of exploiting her, you didn't make her uncomfortable, she wasn't even aware of it and she didn't need to be aware of it because the activity wasn't to do with her. It's okay to look back on this and think "maybe I wouldn't do this again in the future, it could be seen as creepy, etc", but in that timeframe, you had no reason to involve her nor ask for her consent. My friends didn't let each other know beforehand, and they don't feel exploited or uncomfortable by it after because they'd known each other for long enough and were comfortable enough with each other that they just didn't care. It was seen as funny. You were also a teenager, teenagers are hormonal, teenagers do stuff that when they reflect on it, they might regret. You didn't do it with the intention of hurting someone nor making someone uncomfortable at all. This isn't a black and white situation at all, google will always spit out the worst case scenario for your brain to latch onto. I can't reassure you anymore but take care of yourself even if you feel like you don't deserve it, and I highly recommend putting timers on apps like Google if you're spending a lot of time on there because for real event ocd specifically, it can really feed the guilt spiral. I hope you feel lighter soon

tryingtoheal7

Date posted: 2h

@Eclipse_xx Thank you so much:( sadly ocd has now latched on to things I’ve said and done in 2021-2023 when I was a pathological liar and very mean and pushy and now I’m image searching the chat ss.Im questioning if I checked in with her when we had sexual convos and asked if she was okay enough and I can’t remember.It makes me question if it’s ocd or just reasonable guilt.I feel like I can’t enjoy anything or be happy:(

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