Does anyone else get haunted by movies scenes for years?

[Knit Hat]

I struggle a lot with graphic scenes in movies, especially anything having to do with SA, or just graphic violence, to the point where I fly into a rage, and can't get over it for long periods of time, even years later cropping back up in my mind. Basically, anything depicting horrible human behavior, that could easily happen in real life triggers me beyond belief, and ruminating on the fact that people who perpetrate this crap never get a proportionate punishment? I'm sorry to go on such a random tangent, but I've been struggling with this for years. Sometimes it goes away, but now it came back, and I'm just tired of not knowing how to, or where to get help for this.

 

[Crossbreed]

I won't watch shows that are rated-R or TV-MA for gore or explicit sex just because I cannot unsee it. (That lessens the choice of the streaming shows that I am willing to consider.)

I will watch shows where those elements are less explicit, if the story is worthwhile.

 

[Luca]

Yes! I have actually posted about this before. There are movies that have legitimately traumatized me that I will never unsee.

 

[HenleyMae]

I have had similar thoughts in the past, not movie specific, but things like "Your sister is hurt and dying right now." when there was no reason to think anything of the sort. My therapist tells me that these kinds of thoughts fall into the "Obsessive" category of obsessive compulsive. Wellbutrin (anti anxiety med) really helped me out with those kinds of thoughts.

Also, try writing it down. For some reason, when I have terrible things stuck in my head and I write them down, my brain settles down. It's like I know that the paper will hold on to those things, so my brain doesn't have to.

 

[Lysholm]

You know those scenes where a blessed or traumatic event has just happened, or maybe startling news has just been delivered at an emotional climax...and then, oh dear...

*shudder*

Noooooo! STOP! Don't do it!

Spoiler

People start touching each other!

Oh, the humanity!

Patting, petting, rubbing, hugging, kissing...I can't take the forced, coercive bonding. So ritualistic, so invasive, so opportunistic.

There oughta be a law against such graphic portrayals of psychological violence.

 

[Misery]

I'm surprised this hasnt been mentioned yet. Allow me to present you with a potentially useful site:

DoesTheDogDie.com

Crowdsourced emotional spoilers for movies, tv, books and more.

www.doesthedogdie.com

Basically, it allows you to search up a given movie/whatever, and see if certain triggers are in said movie, without getting the whole bloody thing spoiled. So you can go "okay, is there any scenes of abuse in here", scroll down to that, and be like "okay, nope, that isnt in this movie". This is of course assuming that the movie in question was properly entered into the database.

Now something seems to have gone horribly wrong with the site's formatting since I last was there, or my browser has gone insane, but it's useful for anyone who finds that they can get a bit traumatized in any way by certain types of content.


Now in my case personally? Dogs/cats getting hurt or killed is the main thing that'll set me off. Dont even bother trying to get me to watch something where THAT happens. No, I wont "power through it", but I will likely go after whoever put me through it afterwards.

Beyond that... gore overload. I can handle some gore... I'm a horror fan, of course I can see some blood and such... but there's certain times when something takes it a bit too far, or does it in such a way that just seems too realistic.

Though this can seriously be all over the place for me. Like, someone getting a finger cut off slowly and it's all extremely realistic and such? ugh. UGH. No, just no. Someone's head just freaking bursting or splattering and bloody bits flying all over the place? LOL.

Look, I never said it made any sense, that's just how I am with that. I will say though, I overall prefer my horror stuff without blood/gore. I'm more a fan of things like cosmic horror and things that go with that type of theme, rather than slasher horror (which can be kinda dull, honestly)


I do think some things should be labelled/rated/whatever beyond just movies though. Youtube in particular could use some on certain things. There's one series in particular that stands out to me, a series called "Dont Hug Me, I'm Scared". If you were to see it, it LOOKS like a show for kids. Everything's fuzzy and there's Muppet-like characters and whatnot. Many clips and screenshots will be just fine. There's singing and everything. But then you get to certain scenes, and... yeah. I adore the series, absolutely freaking love it, but kids seeing it while expecting happy fuzzy fun are going to have nightmares for the next decade. There's no warnings on it though, no indication that it has those elements until they pop up, and they pop up *very* abruptly. Particularly in episode 5 of the original web series. Even I was a bit bothered by... that. For your sakes I wont describe what "that" was.

I will say this though, for any parents: For the love of puppies, check out things your kids are going to watch BEFORE you let them watch those things. Sometimes a show or whatever isnt what it first appears to be.

 

[Aspychata]

I am haunted by this song.

 

[Rodafina]

I am haunted by this song.

Why would you do that to us??? (just kidding around)
I couldn’t resist but hit play. Now I too am haunted.

 

[Slime_Punk]

Though this can seriously be all over the place for me. Like, someone getting a finger cut off slowly and it's all extremely realistic and such? ugh. UGH. No, just no. Someone's head just freaking bursting or splattering and bloody bits flying all over the place? LOL.

That's the only time when I can actually handle some gore. If it's completely over the top, made to be almost humorous and the scenes cut away quickly and move on, it's pretty doable, especially if the good guy is mowing down a bunch of bad guys really fast. Like the exact opposite of surgery.

I also just realized this thread exists twice, I thought my earlier post was deleted or something

 

[Rodafina]

That's the only time when I can actually handle some gore. If it's completely over the top, made to be almost humorous and the scenes cut away quickly and move on, it's pretty doable, especially if the good guy is mowing down a bunch of bad guys really fast. Like the exact opposite of surgery.

I also just realized this thread exists twice, I thought my earlier post was deleted or something

I agree with both points…

Thread 'Does anyone else have this problem???'
https://www.autismforums.com/threads/does-anyone-else-have-this-problem.42245/

 

[Fino]

I rarely watch movies, but unfortunately I watched the Joker. The scene where he goes into the refrigerator has haunted me ever since.

 

[Aspychata]

That's the only time when I can actually handle some gore. If it's completely over the top, made to be almost humorous and the scenes cut away quickly and move on, it's pretty doable, especially if the good guy is mowing down a bunch of bad guys really fast. Like the exact opposite of surgery.

I also just realized this thread exists twice, I thought my earlier post was deleted or something

Oh, that explains it. I thought it was a software horror bug.

 

[Hylian]

There's definitely some more violent/gorey/distressing scenes from movies and other things that have really stuck with me, or had a lasting effect on me even if I forgot about them. Recently I realized while watching movies with my friend that I had somehow watched Saw 3 when I was a little kid, and that there's scenes that I had forgot about until then, yet still vividly remembered because they distressed me so much. I've had an avoidance of horror movies up until my friend got me into them recently, and that + a few other movies I watched as a kid might be why.

 

[Outdated]

I'm not overly disturbed by a lot of the violence we see in movies but the horror/terror genre just never interested me. I found them to be very thin on actual story. For years a friend recommended that I watch the Dexter series and I resisted, when I did finally watch it it wasn't at all what I was expecting and I really enjoyed it.

It's an entirely different situation with love stories for me. I don't care about sex scenes in movies but where they try to portray emotional love I get upset and can't watch. Some movies are OK but in most of them the body language doesn't fit the facial expressions or the dialogue and I find it extremely disturbing and macabre.