A pedophiles thoughts about LTROI

[Phobos]

hi world,
I know, I should not open yet another pedo related thread, as the matter has been discussed before.
But I felt like, not expressing my feelings on LTROI will tear my soul apart, if I don´t. So please excuse this.
First, let me introduce my myself. I´m Phobos, i´m 37, I live in Germany. I´m Pedophile. And yes, i´m in voluntary treatment, as a program here in Germany exists, called “kein Täter werden” ( don´t become an offender) I have been in this program for about one and a half years, I also received medical treatment using Androcur injections. (which causes temporary castration)
It has been pointed out here before, that beeing pedophile really means feelings of sincere love. But a i fully understand that my feelings can never ever be reciprocated. This is the tragedy, that pedophile people live in. In some way like a vampire...
I fully accept, that there is absolutely no way for a relationship with a child. Living out my sexuality will cause misery, and will deeply hurt the ones that I love. So I decided that the greatest expression of my love would be indeed to never become an offender. I would happily lay down my life in order to save a child before i would offend.
I feel a great deal of empathy with Eli. All the hell that he has gone trough, all the exploitation, all the humiliation made me cry reading the book and watching the movies. I think one of the things JAL is pointing out that only in a realtionship with Oskar, Eli is in some way again allowed to be that child, he desires to be so much. I stumbeld upon LETROI by accident. This was weeks ago, and still, this is heavy on my heart. I will rember Eli saying "be me a litlle, just for a little while" until i die.
I would like to thank JAL for strengthening my will to never ever become like Hakan.

[SpartanAltego]

You've been born with a burden that many would crumble under and give into. That you have recognized the need for treatment and support to combat your affliction - for lack of a better word - and are living your life healthily and happily is genuinely impressive and admirable. I wish you the best, and find it a little uplifting that LtROI could contribute in some small way to keeping you on a good path.

[ltroifanatic]

Hi Phobos and welcome to WTI.As Spartan said you carry a burden that a lot would break under.I admire your courage and determination in recognising and then doing something about it.WTI is a wonderful place,full of beautiful people brought together from around the world by LTROI.I'm sure I speak for them all when I say that we support you in your difficult journey to wellness.

[Phobos]

Thank you for your kind words. This really means much to me. I´m so grateful that i may join you here.
I´ll hold this in high esteem. May this be the beginning of something very beneficial.

[sauvin]

Hello, Phobos, and welcome to the forum where things often go "bump" in the night! We tend to be a fairly intelligent bunch, thoughtful, educated and largely unjudgmental. We have more questions than answers, and we can be really, really wordy about how we go about poking at those questions!

As you point out, the novel exposes large rafts of Haakan's stream of consciousness in which he describes tormented conflict. Many of us consider him a monster on a par with Eli herself - or even worse, because Eli's victims don't have to live with the aftermath.

I'll offer the suspicion that more of us bear hidden burdens than people generally suspect. We've got anorectics dropping like flies left, right and centre because nobody knew they suffered eating disorders until it was too late, and teenage suicide rates have been a matter of growing concern for quite some time. Some of us have to contend with alcoholism, others with drugs, and a few of us are living out our lives with little voices in the backs of our heads whispering what worthless scum we are because this is what we were taught to believe about ourselves from a very early age.

Sometimes we're born with the burdens we have to struggle with, sometimes we acquire them through the thoughtlessness or open cruelty of others, and we often can't tell which is which.

Somebody told me a very long time ago that if you're a problem drinker, but you've not had anything to drink since "I don't know when", then you're not a problem drinker anymore, and if you're a gay person but haven't been intimate with a person of the same gender since "I don't know when", then you're not a gay person anymore. In practical terms, I'll agree to this, but it often seems to me that problem drinking is a built-in thing that never goes away, and these days it seems pointless to worry about who's gay and who isn't (you couldn't say that thirty years ago where I live), but this, too, seems to be a built-in thing for many people.

I salute anybody who has to live with such a boulder chained to his ankle because he has more strength than anybody really knows.

That said, since the word "moderator" appears under my avatar, I feel duty-bound to remind the forum membership that we've gathered to share a novel, a couple of movies and assorted other works from John Lindqvist. There's a pedophile in one of those novels, and the role he plays in it isn't tiny, but that novel isn't primarily focused on pedophilia or the man struggling with it. It's about a very lonely little boy, a little girl with a devastating illness, the relationship that grows between them and the ripple effects her presence has on the town in which the story is set.

We sometimes share personal experiences to help others understand how the novel or movies affected us, or help others to understand why we impute this character with that kind of motivation for his words or actions. Heck, we're mostly friends here, and sometimes share personal troubles "just because" - but not very often. However, we can be a bit squicky about anything that looks like it might threaten to turn the forum into a springboard for promoting this religious point of view or that matter of Social Justice (tm), and we try to refrain from turning the board into a support forum forum of any kind.

It probably doesn't have to be said, but I feel obligated to say it anyway: throughout the Anglosphere, as far as I know, pedophilia is at the centre of one of the more major contemporary moral panics. It can be very hard to mention that this condition even exists without drawing markedly hostile attention. Since a major chunk of the forum's membership was born and raised somewhere in the Anglosphere, it shouldn't be hard to imagine that discussing pedophilia out of context (of the novel) could raise some very large red flags.

I think pedophilia must be one of those things where "it takes one to know one"; a real pedophile could probably point out a few things about Haakan and his interaction with Eli that we missed. Within such scope, talking about it is directly on-topic.

With respect, I would urge caution, judgement and restraint when discussing it outside such scope.

[Phobos]

Hallo sauvin,

i´m sorry if i have gone too far. i dont´t want to annoy you with my personal problems.
Also i absolutly don´t want to draw hostile attention or disturb the peace here.

If you wish, i will leave this forum.

[sauvin]

Phobos, that post was meant as a "word to the wise" kind of thing, nothing more. Given the nature of what we're talking about here and how a great many people tend to react to it, it seemed prudent to remind the whole board that we're trying to maintain an air of civility while we engage in what is essentially an intellectual pursuit.

[Phobos]

Thanks Sauvin, i´m relieved.
I'll share my thoughts about the Hakan character here, so that this thread will be on-topic and something useful for the board.
Again sorry for the trouble that i caused,

[SpartanAltego]

Thanks Sauvin, i´m relieved.
I'll share my thoughts about the Hakan character here, so that this thread will be on-topic and something useful for the board.
Again sorry for the trouble that i caused,

No trouble that I can see. It's natural to be anxious, I would be too in your shoes. And perhaps you felt that by being direct it would save you some trouble or feel more honest than dancing around the subject. In the future, though, you might want to save such deeply personal information for after a group has gotten to know you as a person, your beliefs and attitudes, better.

[Phobos]

yes under normal circumstances, that shurly would have been the case. But while reading the book, it all came crushing down on me like beeing hit by a truck or something... Well .. like we say in germany "schwamm drüber"

Regarding Hakan there´s something that bothers me:
First: He isn´t pedophile, he is Ephebophile (means beeing atracted to teen boys or girls )
Being pedophile or Ephebophile means that you feel sincere love to a child ( at least you think so). It doesn´t mean that every pedophile will automaticly become an offender.
This also means not every offender is pedophile. So from my point of view i can´t tell if Hakan is hebephile. In the (extremly hard to bear) basement rape scene Hakan clearly acts as a pure sadist. Here he is reduced to absolute sadism.
I can´t understand what JAL is trying to say with this.
In the first few pages of the book discribing Hakan his feelings and thoughts could be credible. But it´s such strong contrast later in that basement. Can this all be explained by his infection? Has he become a brainless Zombie after his body and awareness died falling out of that hospital window? Does he still feels distress? Or is JAL pointing to the contradictions of our souls?