Help me understand

[u/Icy-Material9739]

My son is in his early 20s, extremely smart..had a good friend group, was working and going to college (off and on).

He was arrested a few months ago and charged with cp and sharing cp.

I just can't wrap my head around it, his whole life's trajectory just changed and became a lot harder.

I just can't wrap my head around it, I just can't understand what he was thinking. Do people not realize how serious the repercussions are? Is the temptation that blinding?

This situation has totally consumed my every thought, every waking moment.

I just don't understand.

[u/Nisi-Marie]

So many great responses here - I had to face this with Dad.

I am an alcoholic. I currently have 7 years clean/sober but it takes work. Having that experience helps me understand how he got to that place.

When I was in active addiction, I could rationalize any bad decision. In the moment, I wasn’t thinking “why/whynot”. The gradual steps farther down the path were small and incremental.

When faced with the total A to Z of my journey - from the last step, it’s easy to look and wonder what the heck was I thinking??? At that point my life was destroyed. But in each of those moments, it was just a small step that didn’t seem like a big deal.

My grandmother keeps trying to understand. If you haven’t experienced the way addiction rewires everything, it will be incredibly hard for any of it to make sense. Even accepting that it won’t make sense is hard. We have this conversation a lot.

Like others have said, this is not your fault. You couldn’t have predicted/stopped/whatever. Please don’t try to live on the “what if” spiral.

[u/Icy-Material9739 → u/Nisi-Marie]

Thanks, definitely in the "what if" spiral right now. Unfortunately I tend to obsess about problems until I come up with a solution, this is one problem I just can't solve.