Irrational fear that husband might molest my son. Am I messed up or is my fear legit considering there are many pedophiles out there?
I've been with my husband since 2020, married for almost 2 years now. I never wanted children because my father was abusive (physically and mentally). I was married before and divorced because the ex was a liar and a serial cheater. My husband is the complete opposite. I fell in love with him for his character. He's honest, loyal and has integrity. He comes from a close-knitted family. His parents are lovely and his father is a great father. He's also a great father to our son.
However, since the stupid Epstein thing came out, I started getting paranoid about pedophiles. I cannot get it out of my head that there are people who would hurt children. Then the french case of husband drugging, raping and letting other men rape his wife also got to my head. How do you trust anyone? She was married to him for years! And from what I know, many rapists and molesters are family members too. Cases of grandfathers and fathers raping their granddaughters or daughters. All that doesn't exactly inspire trust in me.
My baby had rashes on his bum recently and it was red. I panicked and I explained to my husband my fear. He's hurt but understands where it came from. He says he'll try to not take it personally. We're going to see a psychologist for this. Edit: this fear is almost ocd-like. When the intrusive thought comes into my head, I start to spiral. My mind is bombarded with fearful thoughts and won't calm down immediately until I distract myself, with my phone usually. This is also the reason I came here and wrote this post.
Anyway, I'll share 2 big incidences for background. I think they're related and I wanted to know if you think they link to this:
(1) I don't have actual memories of being SA'd by my father but I have a memory of feeling afraid I was molested by him in the middle of the night. I remember I would be so fearful if I woke up accidentally at night. One specific memory was from when I was about 11 yo. I woke up in the the middle of the night, afraid, and I looked through my bedroom door into my parents' bedroom (both doors opened) and thought that I saw or imagined the dark outline of my father sitting on the couch in their room. I couldn't make whether it was a person or a stack of folded clothes. I wondered if it was him and was so scared that he'd molested me, specifically touched my breasts. I mean why would I even have such fear of my father at that age?
(2) When I was about 10 yo, I once missed my school bus intentionally and walked back home from school so that I could skip the evening tuition. I thought that was the only way I could skip it because that way I'd miss the evening bus. I really wanted to play with my neighbour after school instead. My parents were really strict. When they found out I skipped school that day, they asked me what happened. I told them I missed the bus and walked home. The school was really far from our house and they asked me where I walked. There was a shortcut that sometimes my parents take (with a car) which goes through a forest. The forest was being cleared for a development project so there were workers there with their tractors and machineries. I remember feeling scared passing through there and some workers were staring at me. My parents were furious that I walked through that area. They started scaring me saying that I could have been raped. They showed me news clippings of rape cases. I remember feeling horrified. I could not be alone since then. I was scared when my parents were not around, even when my younger siblings were with me. I would ask them to make noise so that I don't feel as scared.
So I thought incident (2) was the reason I experience (1). I have a strange relationship with my father. My parents are divorced now but I keep a civilised relationship with him. I know I probably shouldn't have any contact with him but I feel sorry for him. He's old now and he's changed a lot. I did a lot of work on my mental health and wrote a letter to him about how he's affected me. Since then he became a better father to my youngest sister. My siblings have a relationship with him. I live abroad and he came to visit me last year for 2 weeks. I noticed I was always tense around him. One night I was sleeping and my husband came into the room. I screamed telling him to get out. It was reflex, I thought it was my dad who came into the room. I also have 2 nieces and once at lunch my dad brought bananas for the 2 yo niece. He watched her eat it. I saw joy on his face and I freaked out. On one hand, it could be an innocent joy of watching your granddaughter, on the other he could be a pedo! Why bananas? He said she likes bananas. Idk, I find it strange. But it could be my paranoia.
Am I going insane? A therapist said that maybe to protect myself my brain could have erased the memory that my father did Indeed molest me. I'm not sure if she was a good therapist because that planted the idea in my head that he did and that could be the reason I'm all paranoid now. I asked my sister if she had any memories like that but she said no. She only remembers that she'd wake up naked in our parents shower because she used to sleepwalk as a child. To me, that's also a really strange memory. Why naked? She doesn't have an answer to it. What if it was my dad?
Please share your thoughts. Thank you.