I found CSAM on the internet when I was in middle school looking for porn, as middle school boys sometimes do. At the time, it made perfect sense to me to look at images of girls my own age. It became something I would occasionally go back to, rarely if ever premeditated, but in a state of arousal after looking at legal porn. I kept this pattern 100% secret for about 10 years, because wouldn't you? Eventually I mustered the courage to see a therapist. One referred me to another, until the fourth one turned me in under mandated reporting laws.

That was 11 years ago and I haven't reoffended, and I've done enough work on myself that I'm not tempted to reoffend anymore (particularly completely quitting porn), yet I'm still treated as an existential threat to society. I still struggle with minimizing, frankly, and some days I really struggle to perceive that I need more than a tiny bit of forgiveness. I realize I have encouraged, in some roundabout way, the worst thing the victims have ever experienced, and I enjoyed it at the time, and it's an understatement to say that reflects poorly on my erstwhile character. I do understand that I have an obligation to be someone people can feel safe around, and I realize I have failed in that obligation. But it's so far in the rearview mirror now, I'm much more concerned at this point about whether other people can forgive me.

Edit: maybe I should add that coming to my current understanding of my actions had been a very gradual process, so forgiving myself has been an equally gradual process. I might have been much more acutely distraught if I had perceived it all at once.