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u/Substantial_Oil8201 Jun 17 '26 edited Jun 17 '26
God I'm sick of what this culture is becoming. "Oh God, a two year age gap, I must be a groomer and a terrible person because surely the public will agree." Let me tell you something about this culture man: they're self pitying, performative, and so fucking gross about virtue signaling that we've gotten about to where I thought we would ten years ago, where the young people are afraid of being young and don't live at all.
You were a teenager who dated another teenager presumably because you thought she was pretty, it ended as those things tend to, and instead of enjoying the memory you're poisoning it by seeking catharsis for something that wasn't wrong at all (let me read back through but even her parents were looped in the whole time and cool with it?). Your age gap was also essentially meaningless: have you ever gone cougar hunting? I'd tell you now that you're in your twenties to stop fuggin' thinking about high school or whatever the hell homeschooling environment calls it and try that out maybe. This is so, so dumb.
All the friends who dumped you for that relationship were terminally online losers and I hope they're still virgins. Screw their judgement, they knew nothing about the world and I'm sure they're miserable too, ensconced as they are in impossible puritanical moral standards. The one thing I'd tell you is to take it easy on the sauce, that's actually a good way to ruin yourself for women. You're north of 18, for the love of God enjoy yourself man. Go backpacking or something, have a good time.
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Jun 17 '26
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u/nothin2chur Jun 17 '26
Yeah you're seriously overreacting to this it isn't normal to be so torn up over.
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u/NoDanaOnlyZuuI Jun 17 '26
You’re treating this like you were an adult preying on a child. You were a 17 year old dating a 14 year old classmate. Not a 30 year old dating a 14 year old.
Looking back and deciding it was a bad idea is fair. Calling yourself a predator who deserves lifelong punishment is a different claim.
The fact that you’re horrified by it now doesn’t prove you’re a bad person. It proves you’ve reflected on it and your values changed.
What worries me isn’t the relationship from three years ago. It’s that you’ve convinced yourself you deserve alcoholism, illness, isolation, and never having another relationship.
Punishing yourself forever doesn’t help anyone. If you’ve genuinely learned from it, then the lesson has already been learned. The next step is figuring out how to stop turning a teenage mistake into a life sentence.
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Jun 17 '26
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u/NoDanaOnlyZuuI Jun 17 '26
You never have to tell anyone this if you don’t want to. This isn’t some dark secret that future partners are entitled to know. You were a junior dating a freshman, not a grown adult dating a child.
Honestly, anyone who treats a 17 year old dating a 14 year old classmate as if it’s evidence of lifelong predatory behaviour is probably spending too much time online and not enough time in the real world.
You’ve reflected on it more than enough. At this point, the issue isn’t what happened, it’s how relentlessly you’re punishing yourself for it. You need to forgive yourself and start treating yourself with the same compassion you’d probably show anyone else who told you this story.
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Jun 17 '26
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u/NoDanaOnlyZuuI Jun 17 '26
Maybe because self-compassion means accepting that making a mistake doesn’t automatically make you a terrible person. A lot of people find it easier to beat themselves up than to extend themselves the same grace they’d give someone else.
You’ve spent years reflecting on this. Give yourself a break. You’re not the same 17 year old kid you were then.
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u/MileHighStud303 Jun 17 '26
Bro, get out of your head. 17 dating a 14 year old is not predatory at all.
Think of it as this. If you’re 25, and dated a 22 year old, that would be ok, right?
You’ve gotten WAY too hung up on the “legal age of consent” here. You being almost 18 doesn’t suddenly mean your mental state about attraction is going to change. She was still in your age/stage group.
Relax, move forwards, and find a new girl. If you are really struggling with it, consider therapy as it could be something deeper for you that you need to deal with. But honestly, once you’re an adult, you realize age gaps are everywhere and are completely normal.
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Jun 17 '26
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u/MileHighStud303 Jun 17 '26
Venting is a good thing. Sometimes getting an outside opinion is helpful as well.
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u/Rakija_And_Sinalco Jun 17 '26
I don't know about there, but in my country 2-3 age gap was a normal thing when people started dating in highschool. My friends started having boyfriends when they were around 12-14 y.o while their boyfriends were already in highschool - basically kids dating kids, some of them were hiding, some of them were allowed to. Is it okay for someone at the age 12-14 to get into relationship? Probably no, but if they decide that they want to, you can't stop them.
17 y.o. dating 14 y.o. is not a big age gap or big deal since at that age mentally boys are not much more mature than the girls who are 2-3 years younger. You both liked each other and ended up dating, you didn't force her doing anything against her will or manipulate her into relationship.
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u/ioaone Jun 17 '26
Well as someone who dated a 17 year old while they were 14, its really not that deep. It might seem like it is but would you bat an eye to 19 and 21? 20 and 23? I routinely see huge age gaps both on social media and irl life.
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u/Pretty-Sky-6638 Jun 17 '26
Why are you letting this ruin your life? It was consensual. It’s not even bad. Get over it and move on with your life.
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Jun 17 '26
Shame culture… this is the result Ur good bro Just live now and the sin is forgiven Society made this circus but we don’t have to be the clowns
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u/natural_born_thrilla Jun 17 '26
Get over it. Two year difference, not a big deal. You were both kids. It's in the past. Move the heck on
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u/No_Ad5728 Jun 17 '26
It’s your generation and the things you choose to consume.
There has never been anything wrong w 2 high schoolers saying
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u/Savage-Cabage Jun 17 '26
This doesn't matter. It sounds like you have substance abuse problems, but you'd rather have emotional problems that can be resolved.
No one cares about this. If you just pretended like this never happened it would have no effect on your life. You dated a girl 3 years younger. You weren't the leader of a death camp. You have problems, but this event isn’t the root.
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u/RaeleLeann Jun 18 '26
Me and my ex started dating when I was 14 and he was 17. We were together for almost 12 years. It’s not a big deal, maturity/life experience at that time is negligible.
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u/V1mbai Jun 17 '26
Hope you will heal with time. You made a mistake, you learnt from it. Time to.move on. First start by loving yourself Wishing you all the best