I Got Catfished

This is why I don’t think gen z will ever let there young kids have access to the internet. It’s not for children

Restrictive households made grooming so much easier back then. The worst thing you could do to an early teenage girl was restrict access to real life socialization and barr them from healthy co-ed relationships. Teenagers crave connections. You take away their access to healthy connections and they'll go find unhealthy connections elsewhere

It's crazy how much your childhood/relationship with your parents can effect you in the long run.

Looking back, there were definitely some creeps on club penguin.

Y'all don't realize the Internet was so fresh back then it was hard to monitor or even know if it's happening

When she said imvu all these events flooded through my mind. I was 9 flirting with 25+ men. They would’ve known my age by the way I talked.

The only person that can resolve this is Nev from MTV catfish 🙌🏽😩

I’ve never been catfished, but I totally relate to relying on secret online relationships for companionship in a strict household. I did the same thing, and as a teenager, those relationships felt extremely important and real for me.

The memories of imvu… that and Kik were breeding grounds for all types of groooming…

I would chat with old men in Yahoo chat rooms as a kid, started off innocently playing Yahoo card or pool games. I still feel sick thinking about the things they’d tell me whilst knowing I was 12.

I never take the time to comment on videos, but when she was talking about how she always listened to her parents fighting, usually about the same thing over and over again, while her brothers went to their rooms and listened to music - i’ve never felt so seen. I grew up with two older brothers and the second conflict occurred, they’d be in their rooms with their headphones on, but I’d listen to every word my parents were saying.

Yall remember Stardoll?

The fact so many of us were 10-13 years old when family computers were a thing is scary. There was no such thing as a kids friendly mode back then, the internet was literally a free for all. No wonder so many of us were groomed 😢

This one hits close to home :( imvu, movie star planet, and kik were infested with grooming behaviors

Im not gonna lie, i think most of us young girls were victims of some kind of grooming when the Internet first came about. I had an internet boyfriend that ALSO had a sister and we were in a group chat together. Found them i assume on habbo hotel. Msn chat rooms were a mess! So many of them were labbeled 18+ or girl looking for guy and vice versa. 🤔 YIKES the 00's were a different time.

A very similar situation happened with my best friend! In 2017 she started messaging a guy from the UK named “Cal” that she met on tumblr. Cal had very convincing social media profiles. He was a dark haired, blue eyed, somewhat alt guy and consistently messaged my best friend very sweet things. They would also talk on the phone and Skype too. Cal even sent her his hoodies with his cologne sprayed on it. My best friend found it odd though, that Cal’s voice seemed much higher pitched than most teenage boys. And Cal would only ever Skype her in dark rooms and would always whisper. He said it was because he shared a room with his sibling and couldn’t leave the lights on/talk loudly. They dated for a long time too. Well, in 2020, one of my best friend’s friends messaged her a picture of an instagram account that had pictures of Cal all over it. Only the name was NOT Cal. It was Michael. And he wasn’t from the UK, he was from Michigan. My best friend messaged Michael and asked him why he was catfishing her boyfriend. Michael was very confused, and denied everything. Long story short, they ended up video chatting and sure enough, Michael was the real one, not Cal. My best friend called Cal and confronted him about it, and Cal broke down. Turns out, Cal is a lesbian from the same school that Michael went to. Her real name was Aubrey, and she had apparently been cat fishing other alt girls for quite sometime before meeting my best friend. She said that she was embarrassed to be a lesbian and that she thought that she would get more attention being a guy. My best friend was really hurt by all of this, and she blocked Aubrey immediately. The ironic part is, my best friend is bisexual and doesn’t even have a preference for guys 😂

This was a great listen. I’m 26 and relate heavily to a lot of these experiences!

Her story is VERY relatable‼️

Please bring back the chapters so I know what to expect and select what part I wanna hear

Her laugh is so cute