Many antidepressants reduce the libido : https://www.addictionhope.com/blog/sexual-addiction-and-medication/ So that should be helpful in the beginning. For me I also struggle heavily with agitation, but I believe it is mainly coming from my sex addiction. (urges/temptations) Haven't had anonymous sex in 5 years still have trouble sleeping when there is a chance or a temptation, because I'm too f*cking agitated then. It takes weeks for my brain to get used to a new situation, e.g. I get invited on my phone to a chat group for a party and there are some hot chicks in it and it makes agitated/excited. Even though I'm not doing anything. It sucks.
Status Not much news to report. I'm 221 days clean from fantasy and M. I imagined breasts today and felt my dick grow a bit. Maybe I don't have PIED anymore. I'm comfortable with my situation as it is, which may not be a good thing. It would be better if I had a drive to get married and have sex. I still hope this one lady on the internet likes me, and I still pray about marriage and sex. I'd like to have sex, a lot, in my life, but the drive is fading. I think it's mostly due to my medication, not mostly due to my age.
Status I fantasised for a few minutes with my hand on my genitals, but I stopped and let go. I put a lot of creative work into my fantasies. Silly... I've already said this, but I should put that creative energy into something constructive.... or at least, fun. But I am a little threatened by how close I came to SF and M today. I am happy that I'm clean and sober, but I still need improvements. No women I'm interested in are talking to me, I don't have a sex life, and I'm not yet making use of all this new free time. I still haven't had an NE (wet dream). I think I might be too stressed. My last two NEs were when I felt comfortable with people I trusted to keep me safe nearby. I tried some positive activities yesterday, which worked out well, but now I am tired. I think my next two things to do to quit porn is to spend a lot less time on the internet and to play chess.
Status No P or M, but I did a little SF yesterday. I kept getting tempted to M, and I did a little SF, about 10 seconds worth at a time. Maybe my sex drive returning, despite my medication. Was I in flatfline and am now coming out of it? I'm not sure. If my sex driver were to return full force I am not sure I could stay clean, at least from M. I am not sure I should get married, and I don't want to have sex outside of marriage, so I don't know what to do. I can pray about it, I guess. I've thought about Ming just to release the pressure, but I don't think I can do it without having extensive and immoral sexual fantasies that neither me nor God would approve of. Just thinking about how wrong these fantasies were is making me want to FMO. I guess if I can MO without F or P that would be okay, and I wouldn't reset my counter. Hehe, if anyone wants to get me advice on how to attract women, feel free. Edit: I SFed today, constantly stopping and starting because I thought it was wrong, but no M. I'll have to keep an eye on this for the future, and also keep an eye out for a potential marriage partner.
I would recommend to work on yourself, like doing sports, getting a decent job, taking care of your looks, being social and the more you improve the more attractive you are to most women. But since you're looking for a woman to marry and then have sex, I would guess you would most likely find those in and around church. And I would assume there are places to connect online as well for christians, which I dont know of. To a certain extend I'm more forgiving with myself about fantasies etc. because I was created that way and that's not my fault.
That's all good advice... I ought to get more fit, get a good job, get a haircut and nice clothes, and go out more. And, yeah, the best place for me to meet women would be church or some other gathering place for Christians. Thanks, @BackOnTrack! I think, after all that, that I am not ready for marriage. I might be ready to date a Christian, though. Status Still, fortunately, clean from porn and M, and I haven't had SF in a few days. Trigger warning: I talk about a somewhat sexy music video below, so if you are triggered by music videos maybe skip it. I want to talk about something that's a little hard to talk about, though I'm unsure why. Well, I am no longer tempted by internet porn, and I'm only a little tempted by SF or M or Netflix or TV nudity. I think some of it is a miracle and some of it is learning, but that's not important right now. I also think I've just been plain desensitised to standard sexuality from abusing hardcore internet porn for 20 years. I still get excited a bit by sexiness I see on TV or in music videos, but it doesn't trigger me to M or to look at P. Well, I've been watching a music video which is having an effect on me, but I think a good one. I'm not linking it, but it's Broken by Seether featuring Amy Lee. In the video Amy Lee is a young woman (about 22) and she's wearing a tank top and jeans with a sliver of stomach showing, and black angel wings. It's attractive but not very sexual. Near the beginning of the video she walks by the camera very close with the camera zoomed in to her middle. I'm finding her looks in this video, especially when she gets very close to the camera, to be extremely attractive. I am getting feelings from watching the video of being attracted to women, desiring a young woman, wanting to be affectionate and sexual with a woman, and wanting to date and marry a woman. It's all very healthy and wholesome, and not porn-related. Am I getting my original (or new, healthy) sexuality restored? It'd be really great if I was. Am I getting cured of PIED this way? I am wondering if yes, and I hope so. I hope you understand how I'm feeling, my attraction to the lady in the video is pure and not contemptibly porn-endorsed. I have put the video on a loop to see if it helps me heal. Edit: I just watched a sexy music video and the feelings of desire and sexual imagery are very different, and not wholesome at all, maybe I can do a better job of explaining it later. Edit again: I don't mean you all should go and look at sexy videos to heal PIED. I just mean this one video with the face and body of an attractive young woman in it might be healing me, after 2 years clean from P.
If I see something triggering on TV I usually just look away. Some shows are very triggering like Game Of Thrones, I stopped watching those. Also some music videos especially Rap ones are too explicit so I dont watch them. For me best way to notice if your on track is when talking to a woman and just looking in the eyes etc. and you get a tingly feeling in the stomach and can just appreciate the beauty. Or seeing a woman on the street and it's hard to look away because she's sexy.. ;-) I'm not sure how you know you have PIED if you havent been intimate with someone? After 1-3 months problem is usually solved.
Yeah, I can't watch Game of Thrones or any shows with nudity in them. Even a little tit goes a long way with me. For example, today I saw nudity in a music video where I didn't expect any (shouldn't YouTube warn for nudity?), and other boobage. Now I have to calm down and unwind and distract myself from seeing that. Well, it's been over 10 or 15 years since I got an erection without some kind of nudity or sexual fantasy. I used to get a boner over anything to do with sex. I know I'm older (and more sexually mature) now, but still, I'm sure I would get erections more often if I was healthy. I get erections while asleep (I sometimes wake up with them), so my body is physically capable of it. Hopefully my medication isn't giving me ED though.
Sounds normal to me, we're not in puberty anymore. If you get occasional morning wood that's perfect. Also I think it would be not normal to have boners without any sexual stimuli (besides morning wood), that would be dysfunctional.
Before I reply I want to note that I've passed 3 years no porn. There was a time where I couldn't even have imagined this. Is there a way to test if my erections are normal again? I don't want to have sexual activity with a real woman unless I'm married, but I shouldn't marry if I have PIED. It's been 20 years and my sexuality might not be what it was like when I last had a sexual relationship. I still think just thinking about sex for a couple minutes should give me an erection. Status Still doing mostly okay. I'm over 3 years clean from internet porn. I should buy myself a cake. I feel excellent having reached this milestone. No more graphic sexual nudity and things I don't want to see, no more binges, no more body odour making the neighbours complain, no more being in crisis after each acting out session, no more loss of sleep and self-esteem from acting out. I'm so relieved. I'm still looking at strange women sexually, usually for only a glance IRL, but I'm going to SAA meetings for that. Marriage and sex It looks like I might be attractive to women (not saying physically, but other ways like my mind or kindness), and I am thinking of putting myself out there online and IRL for dating. This seems like a real possibility at this point, again, something I couldn't imagine at points in the past. And this one woman my age on the internet I plan to ask if we can play online games together. If nothing else, I could make a friend. Edit: After writing that out I think I should not be focusing on marriage and sex, but on friendship and dating at this time.
3 years of no porn are great, most of us will never achieve that. Also participating online in SLAA, but I haven't been active for quite some time. However, I appreciate the principles and steps. And overall that is very helpful. Concerning a test I believe only the real thing may be the real indicator, but I sometimes get errections when I fantasize. (usually that happens when I lie in bed and can't fall asleep.) Fantasizing however is not recommended, it just builds up tension that wants to be released. Also if you have occasional morning wood that means your body is capable of having an errection, so that is also a strong indicator.
I woke up in the middle of the night with a hard erection. I Med with fantasy for a few seconds, before self-control took over and I stopped. (I'm not counting this against my streak since it was involuntary.) I hope we can all get clean of porn. I may have had some help most people here don't get (prescription medication, Christianity, 12 step stuff), but I was extremely addicted for years and I still recovered. Yeah, I'm thankful to know I can still get erections. I'd also like to get NEs (nocturnal emissions, wet dreams) regularly, but I haven't had one in years. To me that would be a sign my sexuality is healing. Yeah, the ideals and thinking of AA/SAA have helped me a lot. I'm still hoping for some healing to show my sexuality is normal. I should still get a cake for 3 years clean.
Status Still clean. 285 days no M, over 3 years no P. I still have the bad habit of looking at people lustfully. I also have the habit of looking up sexy music videos, or sexy pictures of celebrities. I don't do it every day and not for very long. I also don't look as lustfully at the pictures as I used to do with porn, and I don't look at it if it's too sexual and might trigger me (usually cleavage). I don't know if this habit is good or bad. Could it be renormalising my sexuality? Or is it just keeping me addicted? I should still get that 3 years clean anniversary cake.
I am just now tempted to remember porn (and imagine what I can't remember) and MO to it. I know from the Your Brain on Porn site that M to memories of porn is almost as bad as looking at porn. But the temptation is still moderately strong. I don't think I've really had this temptation since I quit P 3 years ago. I am hoping that turning down this temptation will help me rewire and recover from P. Boy, it would have been a lot better to never view that P. I'm very glad I quit. Yeah, I still feel like I haven't completely recovered. My self-control and motivation are a little better than they used to be, though. I'm finding it a little easier to control myself as far as not eating food sometimes, and to make myself do constructive things. I've also learned that low self-control might be from things other than addiction. Another symptom of addiction is a low mood (low dopamine) all the time, and I don't feel a lot improved from that (but maybe somewhat).
Hey man, nice to see you're still active on this forum after so long. You're a real inspiration to us all. I'm on this journey as well and I've had some great streaks in the past and I plan to improve upon them. Anyways, you seem to be thinking a lot about the fact that this stuff keeps coming up in your head. I think the recovery idea is kind of a misnomer. I know this is a journey I'm on, but one addiction I've dropped that is arguably nearly as difficult was my addiction to tobacco/nicotine. I downloaded the app, I got the patches, I quit that shit and I've been without it for nearly two years now... but guess what.. when I smell cigarettes smoke 9/10 times it offends me and I don't want to smell it.. but there's always that once in a blue moon where it triggers that part of my brain that was so highly addicted to it. I'm not saying this to diminish your hope or confidence in how far you've come on this journey. I just want you to know that it's normal and it may take years to go away or it may just never stop being there in the back of our minds. One thing I do know about this lingering feeling of addiction is that over time it gets easier and easier to not think about until the idea of you giving in to the temptations is absolutely laughable. Anyways thank you for continuing this thread and giving us insight in to your own journey.
Nice post @Phil , I appreciate how you paint the picture in a realistic light about how it may never go away 100%, but still you are encouraging that we can progress to a place where it doesn't control us anymore. And I agree @nuclpow , thanks for keeping on with your posting and staying the course. Good work
I woke up in the middle of the night a couple nights ago with an erection and I FMOed. I figured it was okay to MO, and it probably was. It's been about 2 days and I feel fine. I think I have to reset my counter, but I might take it off my signature since it does little now. Thanks for your posts @Phil and @Rudolf Geyse, but I can't reply at the moment.
Over 3 years clean from P, 39 days since last MO. I think I'll let my day counter run, going without M is easy for me now. Thanks @Rudolf Geyse. Thanks for your insightful comment, @Phil. Yeah, I may never be 100% over internet porn, but I'm clean now and that's what matters. It's such a relief, even if I get porn thoughts sometimes. I've had a few sexual fantasies since last post, but not long. Maybe I should pray about what I should do for romance and dating.
Thanks, Gil! I watched a movie with a lot of sex and nudity in it, almost pornography. I was hoping the nudity would be brief, and I didn't notice sex in the list of warnings about the film (maturity rating). I don't feel good now, but it's not as bad as binging on porn and Ming to it. I guess I'll have to be more careful in the future and resist temptation to look or hope for nudity. I guess I still have that temptation. Edit: I feel a little better now, but I think I should probably not watch movies or TV shows that warn about sex and nudity.
