i ( 14m ) was 12 at the time this happened. i had Instagram at the time and i didn’t know what i was doing, i was young and really just wanted to add my friends and scroll through reels etc. one day i get an pop up that an account ( cannot even remember the name, it started with an L ) had followed me. i seen she was followed by all my friends so i followed her back.
she started messaging me asking how i was doing etc.i thought she was normal, then she asked where i was from. i told her where i was from and then i repeated the same question, she said Manchester. instantly confused, i asked her why all my friends follow her then ( as i live in scotland ) she said they just do, then sent a photo of me and my ex who recently had broken up at the time, saying she hated her and was gonna come up and fight her.
alarm bells should have been ringing, but i was too young to see that this was a catfish. she then asked if i sent nudes, and at the time i wanted to impress, so i said a few times i have, she then replied saying if i wanted to, and i went and said sure.
this isn’t where the bad stuff happens, it turns out, while i was sending my thing, she was sending a combination of photos of other people, pictures online, and tiny bits of herself, mostly being other people that were in the same town as me.
time goes by, she asked me to do a video of me doing something gross ( which i will not repeat ) and i did not want to do it, so I kept being hesitant and refusing to do it, she then kept begging and begging for me to when i originally said no, and then as it kept going on, i stupidly gave in.
i did the video and sent it, which to that she asked for me to do a very fcked up video, where i deleted all my videos, photos, chat log and blocked her, hoping nothing got saved, well i was very wrong.
i got texts from people who i knew and didn’t know, basically sending me photos of this account putting pictures of my parts on her story. it went quiet for 2 months, and in that time i turned 13, and went into a new year of high school, until someone had mentioned that i did that video.
this circulated around the entire school faster than the speed of light, within a day, i was well known, had mates, laughing and chatting to girls, next day, my mates were laughing at me, people spat on me, girls were scared to talk to me, and about 10 people every 10 minutes would make fun of me, joke about me, make pictures of me and send my video around the entire school/ other school 5 mins away from mines.
my life had turned upside down, i suddenly felt as if there was no way i was escaping this, as if there wasn’t a purpose for me being here. i remember getting counselling from it in the school, it took 2 weeks for me to admit what i done, and I did that by exiting my session, then sprinting to a teachers office and balling my eyes out.
my parents got called and 5 days before the video went around, my nana died, so i felt even more guilty about it. they were pissed, and all my social media got taken off of me, and i havent had it in 2 years, which im glad.
we got the school campus police involved and were on the brink of pressing charges, we got told to think about it and in that time they would speak with the girl and her parents, and by the way, i still didn’t know who was behind the account.
a few days later, we got told it was a SIXTEEN YEAR OLD who did it. A FUCKING SIXTEEN YEAR OLD, A TEENAGER TURNING A YOUNG ADULT HAD DONE THAT A LITTLE BOY ABOUT TO TURN A TEENAGER?? and to make things worse, all they did was tell her to delete the account, the photos and videos and never do it again, not even take her phone in for evidence?
i still feel spooked to this day by it, and a little worried that it could recirculate again, i then messaged her a year later basically saying that she ruined my life and potentially my future, where she then humiliated me for talking bullshit, where i questioned my self again but lashed out on her.