Identifying and addressing triggers and danger zones is an important part of recovery for anyone struggling with pornography addiction. Examining them can help you identify the root causes of his pornography use.
I think that's where we want to get, where an unavoidable exposure doesn't lead to oblivion. Well said, Mr. T.
Thanks, guys. Even you, Gandalf. I do feel some sense of accomplishment at pulling away from the temptation, but it's tempered pretty heavily by the fact that my visit to image-land was self propelled, not accidental. I'm reminded by something I read by someone recently that it would be one thing - quite normal in fact - if viewing 2D images of women was controllable for us, and that after a quick gander we could just move on to another activity and not dwell on an image or two. Or 1,000. But that ship sailed so long ago. I don't think I've ever been able to do that. I remember vividly being in a friend's tree house when I was 15 or so and being awed by the centerfold wallpaper he had adorned the interior with. It was like I had laid eyes on the Holy Grail. Even years before, when I was barely old enough to coax some activity out of the little guy, being fascinated by National Geographics, the ads in the back of the mags my mom had, anything at all that hinted at nudity. I'm still that little boy. And the other night he reminded me that he's still alive and kicking. I'm sure we've all read this story over and over again in so many journals as I have. I'm no different. We're hardwired to want real women, but we're also very visual creatures. We've all heard how much more visual we are than the fairer sex. A woman can get off just as easily, and very often more easily, when the lights are off and they're enjoying the sensations, the verbalizations, the non-visual aspects of lovemaking. Not usually the case with us. So as unnatural as it is sometimes said for us to be drawn to 2D depictions of women, men lusted after paintings of babes before photography. Gronk was probably jerkin' it to cave paintings 20,000 years ago. The abstraction of visualizing a woman versus experiencing her in reality can be fuzzy sometimes. A day after you've made love to a woman and you're away from her, and still smell her, feel her, hear her, it's pretty damned stimulating. But she's not there. She's in your head. So too are pictures. I'm hopeful that it won't be too long before I am better equipped to avoid forays like the one I allowed the other night. I put some images back in my brain, and though it could have been much, much worse, I still feel that it was a step backward. I've been fighting the urge to do it again, so I'm on guard. Thanks again, fellas. You are a very important source of strength to me at this difficult stage in my life.
My God this post resonated with me. I think we might be twins separated at birth... Even before I knew what sex was as a little kid, I remember looking up the miniskirts of the mannequins I'd see at the mall when my mom was lugging me around. Underwear and lingerie spreads in women's clothing store mail-outs, a stack of found Playboys in the woods, some highball glasses my dad had been given as a novelty gift printed with scantily clad women on the sides whose scanty coverings disappeared when you added ice to the drink, if by some magic.....I was titillated by all of these things deeply and profoundly. It's like I never even had a chance to not be addicted to some kind of visual stimulus. I was screwed from the moment the starting pistol went off. I read an interview of a guy in his late 60s who recently traversed Africa by foot - alone. It took the better part of a year if memory serves. The interviewer asked him how he stayed motivated to keep going despite the rough and frequent impassable terrain. He commented that prior to hitting his 60s, he'd never have been able to make it - not because of some kind of physical inability, but because he would have gotten too lonely without some kind of female companionship. He said that the physiologic drop in his testosterone levels as he hit his late 60's was a hidden blessing because it finally cleared his mind and let him truly focus. He wondered if this is how some castrated monks felt and why they could be so focused and prolific in teachings or creations of immense illuminated texts. I don't want to know what that feels like, honestly. I'll take the haze of testosterone as long as I can manage it better than the little kid sitting in the woods with the July 1985 edition of Playboy....
Hey Mozenjo, looks like you've been doing some great work here - keep on doing what you're doing!!! Have a terrific day
Yeah, there is definitely an appeal to being completely asexual. We'd probably get 10 times as much done. Whenever I've had women problems, I've joked that it's time to head to the Himalayas and contemplate my navel for a few years...but how much fun would that be? I'm with you. Better to get control of our libidos and use them for the forces of good. Like making a good woman happy.
Yeah, there is definitely an appeal to being completely asexual. We'd probably get 10 times as much done. Whenever I've had women problems, I've joked that it's time to head to the Himalayas and contemplate my navel for a few years...but how much fun would that be? I'm with you. Better to get control of our libidos and use them for the forces of good. Like making a good woman happy. [/quote] Ha! I remember being bored as a little kid during the summer, driving my mother nuts and her telling me to go outside and contemplate my naval for a while. I never got it. And you know - it was fond memories of finding that stack of 70's and 80's Playboys in the woods as a kid that got me re-hooked on P as an adult when I found I could track all those photos down again online. I guess most things introduced to us as kids had the potential of leaving powerful impressions.
thanks moz and mr t for your posts. lets move past being those little boys and man up...even if we have to be monks for a while.
Hey Bob, I'm thinking having a gonad-ectomy may be the best thing for me at this point. You're right; it's time to man up. More below...
Well, here's the good news. I've gone 27 days without an orgasm, approaching my last high of 32. The bad news is that, after much gnashing of teeth, I still must do the right thing and reset. After almost 4 months into it here, I've had plenty of experience testing out my reset threshold, and honing it into what it is now: no tolerance for P. Wednesday night I had a short viewing session, a bit more daring than Sunday night's taste, then Thursday let it go for about an hour before pulling away and going to bed. My punishment was not allowing myself to O either time. So I went from tiptoeing around the line last weekend to clearly falling over it a few days later. I was thinking about justifying the whole thing in a tortured and mixed metaphor about nearly falling off the speeding wagon, hanging on for dear life as it was careening out of control and heading for a cliff. Nice try. Back to the starting line. After reading many journals, I've learned that there is a quite a range within the reset spectrum. What constitutes "pure" for me may not meet someone else's definition. It's a very personal thing. I'm more and more confident in my ability to abstain from MO. And I don't necessarily think I'll need a reset if I do MO. But viewing P of any kind demands that I start the clock again. For me, it just has to. Uncomfortable truth #627: My reset buzzer sometimes consists of an odd sensation in the area of my head a couple of inches above my right ear. I've dealt with this for almost 2 years now, after an "episode" during an orgasm where I experienced a very unnatural feeling, like a strong vibration in that part of my brain. Things haven't been quite the same since. Heavy stress, lifting weights without breathing properly, sleep deprivation, and of course, dopamine rushes from viewing images, can all bring on an uncomfortable feeling of "fullness" in that region. I had an MRI done after it first happened, since I was worried that I maybe I had suffered a mild stroke or something. Thankfully, everything came back positive, but it also indicated to me how imperfect our technology still is. Something clearly happened, but it doesn't show up in a scan. My doctor thought it might be a "sexual headache", but after reading up on the symptoms, I'm not so sure. The brain is such a tender and complicated organ, it regularly defies simple diagnoses. Not sure if anyone here has dealt with this unusual problem, but for me it's just another reason to abstain. Anyway, if I get too stimulated looking at pictures, this very real warning signal goes off in my head like a roman candle. A blessing in disguise? Only if I get the hint and stop the activities that bring it on. I'm starting to feel like that woman in the TV commercial with the tracheotomy who smokes through the whole in her throat. When seeing that for the first time, I thought, Wow! that's really eff'd up. How can people let themselves go like that? Hmm. Stay strong, brothers. I so want to be an example for others to follow, and not be a perpetual study in relapse.
good to know your triggers, moz. i know when i open the though door an inch that the addiction will take a yard. onward.
When the addict inside gets outside to play, it's a no-brainer, literally A work in progress, as they say
My 17 year old just left to go spend the day with his girlfriend. Good for him. He's already on his second GF, and has had one since he was in 8th grade, with a few month break between them. He's wiring his brain the way it's supposed to be wired; being in the presence of real women; having relationships with them. Though he's shy, as I was at that age (still am to a certain extent), he is still light years ahead of where I was with women when I was 17. I was 20 before I was in a relationship, and prior to that had done very little dating, with years of PMO under my belt already. Luckily, at age 20, ED wasn't a worry for me yet. And the internet was far off in the future. My youngest is sleeping in a bit too long. I'll go roust him in a few. He's entered that phase where he stays up very late and gets up late. His body is changing, and he needs lots of sleep. He's more gregarious than his older brother, and my ex and I are preparing for a tougher time with him as he goes through his teen years. Porn is omnipresent; even in middle school, references to it are everywhere. It's a click away for them just as it is for us. I'm a little more worried for him. And then there's me. Bob, you said it. I can't open the door one iota. I felt like I was gaining momentum; I WAS gaining momentum. I was exercising the Just Say No muscle; everything was going great. Then I opened that door just a little bit. That will always be a mistake. Right now I feel like I'm starting from scratch; I mean I really feel down today, but I know I'm actually starting over from a better place than when I came here in May. Restarting the counter is a painful experience for me. I don't want to do it again. I let myself down, and I'm sorry if I let any of you down. Yes, NCB. A work in progress alright. But I'm ready to carry on.
Moz, you're one of the most helpful, positive people on here. You've not let anyone down, and you're not starting from scratch. We started around the same time, and you are *definitely* starting from a better place. There's momentum there, even if you don't see it. Keep up the good fight. My 18-year-old son is exactly the opposite of yours. I'm not exactly Cassanova or anything, but he has no experience at all, as far as I know, not even a date to get ice cream or something. He seems to have some girl "friends," nice, smart kid, but too heavy, completely unathletic and uninterested in exercise, and kind of a negative personality. (How that came out of two extrovert parents, I have no idea.) I'm doing what I can to add some game to his game, but it is a struggle. On a positive note, he just got a job at a local restaurant, and will be attending a local community college next week, so I'm hoping that hanging out with older, more mature people than high school will help. Anyway, none of this stuff was in the parents manuals that I read!
i second syd's comments, moz. you have made great progress. sure there may be a slip once in a while, but its never back to square one. i think its good to kerp in mind that you are doing this for your kids too.
Thanks so much, gentlemen. Your support means a lot to me! I just dropped the little one off at his mom's. Thankfully she and I get along OK now. The first year after the divorce was tough on all of us. Even worse was the 7 months during the actual proceedings, since we were still in the same house the whole time. I wouldn't wish that kind of stress on anyone. It probably took 5 years off my life. And I lost a lot of hair too, dammit I know, that was going to happen anyway. Syd, 18 is still so very young. Moving on to college and a job, and getting away from the high school crowd, may be just what the doctor ordered for your son. One of my work colleagues once told me that being a parent is kind of like watching a large boulder roll down a hill. Sure, you might be able to change their trajectory (behavior and/or personality) a bit, but it takes a huge effort, and may not produce the desired result. For the most part, I agree with his premise that our personalities are determined at conception. But having considered the nature vs. nurture debate throughout my years as a parent, it's also obvious to me that raising your children in a loving environment and to the very best of your abilities makes a huge difference in what they do with their natural traits. It's funny; I've bought some books on raising sons, but those "owner's manuals" aren't customized to our actual kids. They were somewhat helpful, but so much of it has to be made up as you go along. My sons are very different from one another. And Bob, you're so right; I am going through this process for them, too. Their mom started dating before the divorce was final, and after a couple of short-lived relationships, found her current husband within a year after the ink was dry. I've only introduced my boys to one of the people I was dating, and only once at that, since she was also fresh off a divorce and not interested in jumping right back into another relationship. Wise woman. But five years later, they're no doubt wondering when dad's gonna settle down again, or at least have a steady girlfriend. I'm wondering that myself. I think my boys kind of like coming over here and not having to deal with their stepsister and whatever family drama may be playing out at any given time at the other house. Over here, it's just me, a dog, and two cats (my pals inherited from the divorce). Part of me loves being single and free of the emotional ups and downs of a relationship. The loner in me relishes that freedom. But there's quite a tug of war going on with the other part of me that needs steady female companionship. I've never been good at casual dating. When I find one I really like, I latch on and don't want to let go. My post-divorce experiences with ED were devastating to me. I know there are no guarantees that giving up porn will magically solve that problem, but that's not the only reason I'm doing this. I've pissed away far too much of my life on this addiction. Even if I have to work on other potential causes for the ED, if I'm able to give up the P, only good will follow. Have a great week, guys.
that was a great post, moz. dont jump too soon. this is a time to work on yourself. enjoy that. do the hard work thats required to really be at one with your feelings. have fun, but dont jump at the first person who offers you some kindness. you are in a very vulnerable position. i always felt that anyone who liked me must be "the one". that was just bad self esteem. get yourself strong, man! this time alone is a gift.
Wonderful advice, Bob. You're the bomb, man. And it looks good to see that big green check mark after your goal! Cheers!
I'm back after a week of no-posting. Had another setback and reset. I can attribute this lapse to any number of things, but suffice to say I'm having a really hard time shaking the old patterns as I'm chained to my computer again. Now I'm re-entering that mode where I'm in front of the computer every spare moment, and I'm constantly fighting the temptation to take a break and "relax" in the way I've done my whole career. You know, thrashin' the johnson. I'm finding that procrastination is the enemy not only of productivity, but also of my self control, and therefore, self esteem. When I need to buckle down and concentrate for hours on end, which for the side jobs is during nights and weekends, it's far too easy to click onto the 'net and find endless ways of straying from work. The problem of losing self discipline is a two-headed hydra for me: a) I stop working when I can't really afford to, and b) I visit inappropriate sites for very long stretches. Porn is the obvious culprit, but getting lost in music and book searches can also take me away for hours. And there's less guilt involved in those latter distractions, so they're very dangerous as well. Being a porn addict can really help turn you into an internet addict. Or vice versa. Having some successes over the last several months (short-lived though they may have been) has given me the opportunity to experience a new way of living my life. I really like that new way. Sure, having my dick disappear wasn't a thrill, but it wasn't so bad either. Having the little fellow go into hibernation has been a blessing, actually. He's not always out and demanding attention. So I can focus on more important things, like learning to control the urges that have kept him so busy for so long. I need to keep posting, even for brief entries, just to keep my focus on the goal. That has to be the new way of relaxing as I take a break from work. And deep breathing/meditating. I haven't let that become a habit yet, and I think it can really help. I've heard so many people say it works for them. Time to hit the hay and start again tomorrow.
