Is anime bad for recovery?

So lately I really have gotten caught up in an Anime called Sword Art Online. I love the concept of virtual reality and let's just say I got hooked to watching the show.

Well the first 15 episodes I really did enjoy although there was some sexual references it wasn't to the point where I couldn't handle it.

From episode 16 and later though I found it became harder and harder to not think about sex when watching the episodes. Women with big boobs revealing outfits and I found the camera would zoom in on certain sexual features like boobs and sometimes a women's butt.

On top of that it ends up becoming a light harem series as well because all the female characters have a crush on the main male character and really he's usually the only male in the episodes.(I find more and more recent anime releases are becoming like this unfortunately. )

I am not attracted to cartoon women in the slightest but found it would get me thinking about real women and then I would struggle getting those thoughts out of my head.

So I am wondering is anime bad for mental and sexual health or am I putting to much in to this?

Is this just my unique experience or are there more people just like me that have come to the same conclusion?

anyways I decided to stop my funimation subscription for the reason above.

 

I think you answered your own question!

Triggers can be enormously subjective. If birthday cakes make someone think about porn, then it is bad for recovery.

You're always best off erring on the side of caution. Every chance you have to avoid triggers, the better off you'll be.

If the thought of cutting a lot of this stuff out depresses you, don't worry. Much of it will be temporary. If you never developed a cartoon/anime/hentai fetish, then once you're well into recovery you can likely return to these shows without them being so triggering. I've been able to reintroduce a lot of things I eliminated at the peak of my reboot. Some things I didn't reintroduce, but they're largely things that are obviously triggering.

Again, subjective. I'd hesitate to call it poisonous and calling it junk food might be an exaggeration, but calling it health food would be incorrect. Anime very often exaggerates women's features ridiculously and has lots of nods and winks to porn. Average breast size for an anime character would be super rare in reality sans breast enhancement, and a lot of the female characters have a strong "nympho" vibe going on. It seems to happen even when the characters are very much under age. Maybe because Japan has so much porn. Who knows. But, like food, if it makes you feel awful, you should probably question why you're feeling awful and limit your intake.

Of course these are generalizations, and it obviously doesn't apply to every anime. It seems to me that dipping their toes into the pseudo-erotic/pornographic stuff is par for the course a lot of the time, so I wouldn't know how to know going in if a given show is going to have that content or not.

 

Yeah I think your right there. It's unfortunate because I was really getting into the story but too many sexual references is not going to help me in my porn recovery. Maybe I'll try to do a productive task instead.

That's good to know to be honest I still do think that there are a lot of good anime out their that don't over sexualise their characters but like you said I think cutting it out for now is a very important step to my recovery. Although it depresses me right now I do know it's the right thing to do.

Yes that is definitely huge in anime right now. They do revealing outfits and give their female characters unrealistic bodies to try and attract the male audience. Not all anime does this obviously but the past couple anime's I have watched have done this which is a shame because the stories are good enough that doing that is just unnecessary.

Yeah that's one of my major concerns with anime is that they sexualise under age characters way to much. I also agree on the nympho thing it really does seem like throughout the years anime has gotten a lot worse when it comes to sexualizing characters. Even North American TV is bad for that now which is why I started to avoid it.

Yeah I heard it's bad their but I have no idea if they are worse then America or better. I remember one time on a forum people where telling me to use a vpn so I can pick up Japanese porn because it's so much better so I can only imagine what kind of stuff they are making over in Japan.

Yes I also think part of the problem was I replaced my porn habit with watching anime instead. I really want to incorporate healthier habits I know for the first couple of months it might be torture because of how used to large dopamine releases that my brain has become a costumed too but I thing in the end it will help me in the future.

Not watching porn is just one of the changes I want to make.

Curiosity do you find it a bit easier to make changes when you drop some of your bad habits like porn?

That's basically it the list of non erotic anime seems to be getting shorter and shorter every year. I think the new thing is Harems in anime now because the last two shows I watched contained Harem elements to them and for a man that believes in monogamy it just really gives me a bad taste.

there really is no way of knowing most times I was three episodes in and already very into the plot before they started bringing in more sexual themes. Like I said above it's to bad because most of these shows don't need to do that the story is so compelling that people don't need the over sexualization to continue tuning in. If anything I actually think it is hurting there viewership because I have seen many people tuning out because of the harem aspect in anime.

Thanks for your post it was really helpful.

 

Right. You said it well. To walk away doesn't mean you have to say that anime is bad. I think some people hold onto things that aren't helping them because they don't want to make a moral judgment on whatever material is triggering them, but that isn't what you're doing at all. You're just making prudent decisions. I remember turning off some thoroughly G rated stuff at certain points of my own recovery, simply because a certain woman just looked a certain way... maybe just an accidental resemblance to a porn model I obsessed over. It isn't anyone's fault (except maybe my own), it just works out that way.

Regarding other habit changes, the short answer is yes... it is easier. You'd think that doing things one at a time is easier, but it doesn't always work out that way. By sheer accident I had decided to lose some weight around the same time I get extra serious about quitting porn. The new eating habits came fairly easily. I lost close to 40 pounds, and had been at my goal weight for quite some time before the porn addiction was finally under control.

Impulsivity loves company, so impulsive eating or drinking is going to want some impulsive porn watching to go with it, and vice versa. I'd say if you feel motivated to take on more than one improvement at a time, go for it. If you're not ready to go with a real plan on how to do it then maybe it'll be overwhelming to jump in, and you should take some time to get your head in the game. When you hear about people taking on too much and failing, I suspect it is because they set up their expectations way too high and weren't prepared to deal with set backs. Personally, I just wanted to be healthier and lose some chub, I wasn't trying to train for a marathon or anything, so there really wasn't anything to set myself up for disappointment.

 

Thanks for the recommendation if I ever start to watch anime again I'll give it a try.

 

I think That's what I was doing at first but I realized every time the show would zoom in on a characters breast I would still get a dopamine rush which to me meant it was still triggering the same pathway as watching a full blown porn video would.

Yeah if it effects your recovery I think it's best to switch it off. Just sucks I was really into the story I just wish the author didn't resort to sexual material when the show itself was already good. So I guess me and you are thinking the same there and looking at your counter that is a positive for me in my books.

That's good. I remember reading a book once called the power of habit and in the book it's important to change the whole habit loop not just one habit. Very interesting book if you ever get the chance to read it.

Yeah I am starting to learn when it comes to changing your my bad habits changing the one at a time is actually a lot harder. Besides even if I did only change one habit I highly doubt it would help me. If I just got rid of porn but still watched anime and played video games I feel like those compulsions would just get worse.

Curiosity how long did it take you to get serious about your porn recovery?

Wow that's impressive congratulations.

That's great so in a sense you completed multiple goals at the same time.

I unfortunately don't have much more time to waste. Pornography is my biggest but far from my only problem and I feel like if I don't start taking this seriously then I will be stuck in this never ending loop and continuously spiraling out of control. The reason why I am on here now is although there is less traffic then nofap I find the people that are on here are much more helpful and insightful then nofap. On top of that nofap just stresses me out now because of the politics I end up getting involved in which leads me to relapse more times then not.

The reason why I started doing yoga was to help lower my stress levels so I can actually function. Usually get involved in political conversations I either get so stressed that I fap and watch porn or I become suicidal and become an absolute menace for the people I love around me.

I do think I have a lot of phycological problems as well but unfortunately I am not in a position to get professional help.

So I shouldn't set the bar to high? I think you could be right I mean I am doing good right now but I am only on day 4 so I shouldn't get to far ahead of myself. I have never made it past 30 days yet so I think taking this one day at a time is important. Regardless I think the news and politics is my enemy so I am still going to avoid that with a passion.

 

Nah, set the bar as high as you want, but set it realistically, and if things happen then they happen, and get back on it as soon as possible. The high expectations are the ones that think it will all go 100% according to plan. To use a dieting analogy, if you have a bad week because you pigged out on the weekend and had fast food for lunch because of a long work day, just ignore it and start eating healthy as soon as possible. Many dieters will get permanently derailed and give up entirely. Losing 1-2 pounds a week can be infuriatingly slow when you read click bait articles about someone losing 10 pounds in a week or something. Even the guys who lose 100+ pounds, assuming no bariatric surgery was involved, usually lost it at that slow rate... it just took a year, year and a half, maybe two years. But, at the end of it they aren't kicking themselves because it took two years to get there. They're just glad they got there.

I've never wanted to be stuck in a porn addiction and long knew on some level that I was stuck. I saw the Gary Wilson video around 2011 and got pretty serious then. It validated a lot of things I suspected to be true, and put my head in the game. I hit snags, and it was a matter of sporadic attempts here and there that never amounted to much. In 2015 I started being very aware of its effects on my mental health, and it was the first time I had someone tell me (a priest in confession) that I needed to quit as soon as possible and make it a priority in my life. In 2016 I made it a major focus, and ceased to give myself little vacations... the sporadic effort became a constant effort. October of 2017 is when I finally quit for good. So, while I do wish I had quit sooner, once I had quit, I really don't find myself dwelling on the time lost all that much. I'm just that I did quit. Better late than never, and "late" might actually be "early", since in a parallel universe I may not quit until 2025 or something.