For some reason I feel very vulnerable expressing anything sincere on this forum - I was almost going to ask to have my previous post deleted.

You're correct that I lack any intent to have sex with a child (as you know). I would say it is this very lack of intent (or, better still, my desire to protect them from harm) that makes me feel so "repulsed" (as Dakota puts it) by these sexual feelings.

You and Godspell of course speak sense in that feelings and actions are quite separate things - if I didn't believe that I wouldn't be alive right now. The struggle I have is that, while I understand that to be true intellectually, my emotions never quite match up. I could write extensive essays on why there is nothing inherently wrong with being a non-offending paedophile and believe every word I write, yet emotionally still suspect that something has gone fundamentally wrong in my nature that prevents me from being the "good" person I wish to be.

I'm not sure there is an answer to this problem besides continuing to remind myself that such self-loathing is unhealthy and irrational.