Panicking after seeing something scary online... :(

[tantopat]

Okay, I know this was kind of my own stupid fault, but I'm feeling very panicky after seeing something rather horrible online. I was on the Encyclopedia Dramatica website (for those who haven't been on that site, it's basically a parody of Wikipedia, but with some rather unpleasant things on there. You'd think I'd know better than to look at that site, really...), and on one of the pages they had...well, let's just say that it was the typical photo you'd find on a site such as rotten.com or some other shock site. I really wish I hadn't seen it now, and I can't get that horrific image out of my head! :sad: I'm still shaking after seeing it... Does anyone here know of any way I could at least try to get over what I saw?

[Nechtan]

Hi,

I can sympathise with that as I've done it countless times. Morbid fascination is something we just struggle to escape from.

The more we repel a thought the stronger it gets and the more our mind will keep going back to it. To be honest I can't help. I have read some visualisation techniques for dealing with these things like taking the image in the mind, draining the colour from it, making it smaller and then folding it up before binning it. Hopefully someone can give some better advice.

Ultimately though I would give these kind of sites a miss in future.

[Tom_M]

Hi tantopat

You have to be careful what sites you go on or what you watch. I think I've just about seen everything on the internet that is gore. Not because I enjoy going on these sites but to immunise myself from being shocked at anything. I've also seen a lot of things in real life that as been very nasty, which is even worse. How you deal with it? Well you have to ask yourself why it bothers you so much. What you seen obviously disturbed you but it's not going to hurt you in anyway. It's just images or video images, it's not real in the sense that you where physically there. You'll get over it after awhile, just try not to think about it.

Tom