I'm probably going to get a lot of hate for this, but I've seen a lot of artist profiles on DeviantArt with a stamp in the bio that says "my OCs are my children", oftentimes right next to another that says "I love torturing my OCs". That's honestly a "bruh" moment. (lord, I can't believe I just said that…) No offense intended, but It sounds like they're calling themselves a child abuser.
It's different for me; when my characters hurt, I hurt too, because I know how it feels as someone that went through what they're going through in my art; brute-forcing that feeling out helps me to get rid of it. I don't make them suffer because I actually want them to suffer, they suffer because it's just an unfortunate fact of my life that I would use them as an outlet to vent to about, because nobody I know likes to listen to me vent to them about it. They just say I'm stuck in the past and that I need to let it go, because they don't understand that it's a lasting scar on my psyche that I can't get rid of, and I get that. So, I think it's better to use art as a way to cope than bother people who don't understand how I'm feeling. The world isn't all sunshine and rainbows and Kipper The Dog like I thought it was when I was a kid. It may be in early childhood, provided you're actually raised in a loving and nurturing environment, but the moment we grow up, that picture normally warps into something more twisted.
That's why I get pissy when someone calls artists attention whores for posting their vent art online. More often than not, they decided to share it because they were proud of how it turned out, not because they want to showcase how depressed, angry, or afraid they are. Besides, it's art, if they want to share it, then it should be up to them, not us.