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title: When I was 16, someone who was grooming me used the threat of suicide to control me, telling me they would kill themselves if I didn't do what they wanted. Because of that, I created and shared explicit content, including sending something to a person I didn't know was underage at the time. This has been eating at me for months as I've been slowly unpacking this trauma. Does using suicide threats like that count as blackmail? ~ Our Wave Community
description: <p>Thank you for reaching out to us. I'm glad you brought this here, and I want you to know there's nothing wrong with still be untangling this months or...
url: https://community.ourwave.org/en/answer/when-it-comes-to-grooming-does-weaponizing-suicide-count-as-blackmail-in-this-situation-i-was-16-years-old-and-made-to-make-and-engage-with-very-dangerous-content-including-having-sent-something-to-so-961.md
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# When I was 16, someone who was grooming me used the threat of suicide to control me, telling me they would kill themselves if I didn't do what they wanted. Because of that, I created and shared explicit content, including sending something to a person I didn't know was underage at the time. This has been eating at me for months as I've been slowly unpacking this trauma. Does using suicide threats like that count as blackmail?

\[Image: Dr. Laura\]

Answer by **Dr. Laura**

PhD Mental Health Nurse & Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner

Topics:[Making sense of childhood experiences](/en/learn?tags=making-sense-of-childhood-experiences)

Thank you for reaching out to us. I'm glad you brought this here, and I want you to know there's nothing wrong with still be untangling this months or years later. Some things take time to see clearly, especially when they happened while you were still a kid.

Yes, threatening self-harm or suicide to force someone else's compliance is a recognized manipulation tactic called [coercion](https://community.ourwave.org/_external/link?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.loveisrespect.org%2Fresources%2Fwhat-is-sexual-coercion%2F&resourceId=non_specific&localeId=en&countryId=us&src=answer&questionId=e9d7f0a6-6f51-47bc-8872-b912181c1da6&sig=50954c31b7450a6c427d65bdaa11b3a1e9ddb802412ec8ef0278b934c12dc906). Coercion means being forced into something because the cost of saying no has been made unbearable. Suicidal threats such as what you shared can be one of the most psychologically powerful forms of coercion that exists, because it takes the thing you care about most, another person's life, and turns it into a form of control. When someone says "if you don't do this, I will kill myself," they are not making a request. They are making a threat. What makes this form of coercion particularly cruel is that it weaponizes your empathy.

What happened to you at 16 was not a series of choices you made freely. It was a series of responses to an impossible situation that someone older and more powerful deliberately built around you. [Grooming](https://community.ourwave.org/_external/link?url=https%3A%2F%2Fbravehearts.org.au%2Fabout-child-sexual-abuse%2Fwhat-is-grooming%2F&resourceId=non_specific&localeId=en&countryId=us&src=answer&questionId=e9d7f0a6-6f51-47bc-8872-b912181c1da6&sig=d9e38609b3f6045d8da8065dc843682de2088e132d6396617b64408dfb80edc2), which is the process by which an abuser slowly earns trust and breaks down boundaries over time, works precisely by eroding your sense of what is and is not a real option. By the time your groomer was threatening their own life, you had almost certainly already been shaped, over time, to feel responsible for their wellbeing in a way no 16-year-old should ever be made to feel. The responsibility for what was done to you belongs entirely to them.

To the point you mentioned about sharing something with another minor. The responsibility for any harm that reached that person belongs to the person who constructed the situation, not to you. This is not a comfortable thing to hold, because it can feel like an excuse, and you are clearly someone who takes seriously the idea that actions have consequences regardless of intent. That moral seriousness is real and worth honoring. And it is also true that culpability, meaning the degree to which a person is genuinely responsible for an outcome, depends on what they knew, what choices they actually had, and what was done to them. You were a minor yourself, being coerced through the threat of death, and you did not know the other person was a minor. All three of those things matter enormously, both ethically and legally.

As you continue working through this, a trauma-informed therapist, particularly one with experience in coercive control or grooming, would be equipped to help you hold both truths at once: that you were a victim, and that you are carrying something complicated about what happened as a result. You were 16 years old, being threatened with someone's death, and you were trying to survive. That is the truth at the center of this. What you did in that situation was survive something that was designed to trap you, and reaching out here is the kind of movement toward healing that is worth acknowledging. We are here whenever you need to come back to it, and so is a wider community of people who have walked through their own versions of this and found their way toward something steadier on the other side. Thank you for trusting us with this.

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Grounding activity

Find a comfortable place to sit. Gently close your eyes and take a couple of deep breaths - in through your nose (count to 3), out through your mouth (count of 3). Now open your eyes and look around you. Name the following out loud:

5 – things you can see (you can look within the room and out of the window)

4 – things you can feel (what is in front of you that you can touch?)

3 – things you can hear

2 – things you can smell

1 – thing you like about yourself.

Take a deep breath to end.

From where you are sitting, look around for things that have a texture or are nice or interesting to look at.

Hold an object in your hand and bring your full focus to it. Look at where shadows fall on parts of it or maybe where there are shapes that form within the object. Feel how heavy or light it is in your hand and what the surface texture feels like under your fingers (This can also be done with a pet if you have one).

Take a deep breath to end.

Ask yourself the following questions and answer them out loud:

1\. Where am I?

2\. What day of the week is today?

3\. What is today’s date?

4\. What is the current month?

5\. What is the current year?

6\. How old am I?

7\. What season is it?

Take a deep breath to end.

Put your right hand palm down on your left shoulder. Put your left hand palm down on your right shoulder. Choose a sentence that will strengthen you. For example: “I am powerful.” Say the sentence out loud first and pat your right hand on your left shoulder, then your left hand on your right shoulder.

Alternate the patting. Do ten pats altogether, five on each side, each time repeating your sentences aloud.

Take a deep breath to end.

Cross your arms in front of you and draw them towards your chest. With your right hand, hold your left upper arm. With your left hand, hold your right upper arm. Squeeze gently, and pull your arms inwards. Hold the squeeze for a little while, finding the right amount of squeeze for you in this moment. Hold the tension and release. Then squeeze for a little while again and release. Stay like that for a moment.

Take a deep breath to end.

Try another grounding activity

I feel grounded and ready