The Channel 4 programme Married to a Paedophile, screened earlier this week, offered a compelling insight into two men arrested for looking at sexual images of children – and the devastating impact on their families.

It was a gripping documentary, not least because it offered a rare glimpse of how two men, on the face of it living utterly unremarkable lives, could end up spending hours at a time downloading images showing the sexual abuse of children.

But for someone such as me, who has worked for 15 years to assess, treat and rehabilitate people who have sexually abused children, this is the daily reality of my working life. I’ve dealt with men from all walks of life, ranging from members of the clergy to lawyers, teachers and those who are unemployed, all of them grappling with their abusive sexual behaviour. Some of them have been single; many others have been married with children of their own.

Of course, it’s unusual work and it’s something I often have to defend when people ask what I do for a living. One common question is why we don’t just imprison anyone who has looked at indecent images of children. Others struggle to understand why the focus of my work to protect children is on the person who has abused, and not the children themselves.

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I understand their concerns. But if we are serious about protecting children then we need to prevent them from being sexually abused. With an estimated 80,000 people in the UK regularly downloading sexual images of children, and combined police and National Crime Agency activity resulting in some 400 arrests per month, it’s clear we can’t just arrest our way out of the problem. We’ll only really start to address the issue by being more open about the need to balance law enforcement with work to help people stop looking at these images in the first place. And to do that we need to work with people who abuse children online and offline, and reduce the likelihood of such abuse in the future. That means helping people who abuse to understand their behaviour, what triggers it, and the great harm it causes to the children – so they are better able to address their behaviour and reduce their risk to children. When it comes to those who look at indecent images of children, they need to understand that by choosing to download these images they are not engaging in a victimless crime. Instead, they are causing further harm to the children in the images and fuelling an even greater demand for more. One that can only be met by abusing more children.

Of course the criminal justice system has a vital role to play in punishing those who have looked at sexual images of children, as do organisations such as the NSPCC, which undertakes excellent work in helping children themselves to report abuse. But we mustn’t allow ourselves to fall into the trap of thinking child sexual abuse is inevitable. We can, and must, work with people who have sexual thoughts and behaviour towards children, including those looking at indecent images online, helping them to reduce the risk of their offending, or reoffending.

And as this programme made all too clear, we also need to support the families and loved ones of those who abuse children. All too often families are completely unaware of this behaviour until the knock on the door from the police. They are victims too, their lives turned upside down in a moment. They require huge support if they are to begin to understand what has happened.

The organisation I work for, the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, is a UK-wide child-protection charity dedicated solely to preventing child sexual abuse. For 26 years we have been working with families affected by child sexual abuse, including men and women who abuse, young people who exhibit harmful sexual behaviour towards other young people, victims of abuse and other family members. Since 2002 our anonymous and confidential Stop it Now! helpline has been available to anyone with concerns about child sexual abuse, including those with concerns about their own sexual thoughts and behaviour. In that time it has provided advice and support to more than 35,000 callers and emailers and we now receive around 750 contacts every month.

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So we understand what leads people to view sexual images of children. The reasons people start are mixed. They may do it out of a need to numb out difficult emotions, a kind of twisted escapism. Or they may have been attracted to children for many years, and have allowed themselves to explore their attraction online. Once someone understands where their desire to view these illegal images is coming from, it becomes possible to address it and work towards a solution.

But we can only use this knowledge to help people change their behaviour if they are willing to seek our help in the first place. There’s every reason for them to do so, because if they don’t the consequences are severe: likely arrest, a very public shaming and loss of friends, their family and their job, as well as being put on the sex offender register.

Together we really can make a difference by helping people to stop their abusive behaviour and live better lives. And if that prevents further abuse, surely we owe it to all our children, now and in the future, to try?

If you are concerned about what you are looking at online, or if you are concerned about someone else’s online behaviour, you can call the confidential Stop it Now! helpline on 0808 1000 900. Or visit the Stop it Now! Get Help website

• Tom Squire is the clinical manager at the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, a UK-wide charity focused solely on the prevention of child sexual abuse