Hey Wrat , how u doing. I relapsed myself after 5 weeks hardmode. No binge but three says of individual one hour sessions. I am back on the horse today..i had my momen of despair but now strangely i feel strong again (although a bit shaken up) . I cant understand my feelings but i draw confort on ine thing, i am trying and I have this community. How are you brother?
So I'm back after being away for nine months. Many thanks to those who have checked in on me. Here's hoping 2017 will be the year I lose this monkey.
Wrat, Great to hear that you are doing well. It's been a long time friend, I have been off the board for a long time but I am back this time for victory! Indeed 2017 will be a great year for all of us! A year of VICTORY! Rex ..
Thanks Rex & William. It is good to be back. I threw in the towel a while back and I so regret it. I want to break this cycle and I can't do it alone.
Thanks 40New30. I'm already feeling much calmer. That is one of the good things I experience when rebooting.
Hi Wrat, A few years ago I was pretty regular on here and posted on your journal. I had got to about 1000 days of no PMO and for a variety of reasons decided to close the account and I stopped posting. Happily I am still PMO free but about 18 months ago I fell back into another sexually compulsive behaviour which pre-dated my PMO and which in my darkest days ran parallel to it ; massage parlours and the like. Looking back about 20 months ago I had a big loss of a friend who had helped me a lot with my emotional issues and although I shrugged it off inside I saw it as yet another abandonment and within months sex was knocking at my door and has been on and off ever since. No PMO which I don't quite understand but am grateful for but I came back here because all the compulsive energy is exactly the same as PMO and all the associated feelings of shame , self-hatred , sadness and anxiety are there in just the same way. So like you I am hoping that this year gets me back on track and that this time I will have learnt something more about the dangers of cockiness and the enduring nature of addiction as a shield from emotional pain. Wishing you every success.
Endeavour, Welcome back, you make some very wise and insightful points. You have done the right thing by coming back to the board and realizing the start of your slide back to addiction, even if it's another similar addiction. You can bounce back, the positive is you have been free from PMO for the last few years. You have a majority of the battle won by realizing that these sexual addictions are caused by using these addictions as a crutch to deal with the emotional issues you face. I have finally realized that was my main culprit in falling to PMO was using PMO as a crutch to deal with loneliness, fear, stress, setbacks, etc. Since you were on this board a few years ago, you probably remember LTE who was a great inspiration to many of us and is one of this board's many success stories. LTE recommended this excellent book which is written for sex, porn, and masturbation addicts, I am reading this book and it does such a great job showing how all these addictions are interconnected and how to beat these addictions. LTE said this book helped him greatly in his recovery. The book is "Breaking the Cycle: Free Yourself from Sex Addiction, Porn Obsession, and Shame by George Collins MA: https://www.amazon.com/Breaking-Cyc...0831/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1483895551&sr=8-1 Good luck with your battle, you can do it, we are all here for you! Rex
All is well; feeling really good. When I started in 2013 I was PMOing almost daily. I've managed to cut back to a couple of times per month. There are definitely benefits of cutting back but I want to quit all together. I was 8 months clean one time and felt like a champion.
Thanks SOJ. Today, I'm home alone so I need to find a way to keep busy. Too much idle time is not good for me.
The unfortunate reality of being an addict is the 2 PMO sessions a month will completely rewire the brain to PMO again (all those years and years of wiring gets plugged right back in) and you lose all the benefits of having a non-active-addict-brain. You're going to make it this year, WRAT.
40New30, Thanks for the great post! You describe me perfectly in your post. When I was free from PMO for 23 days back in early-2014 when I was participating in this forum board, it only took one fall and I went into a massive PMO marathon. I tried to recover and get back on my feet for the last 3 years, the longest run I had PMO free since then was 6 days. And even then I still couldn't wait until I could PMO again. I am just realizing, and you have been a big help for me, that just one fall to PMO causes the brain to revert back to full PMO no matter how long it's been since the last PMO. This has been my big problem I have always rationalized the fall before I fall as just one infraction that I can easily bounce back from. One of my problems is that I am looking at PMO the same way I looked at smoking cigarettes years ago. I used to smoke on a regular basis, I was never a heavy smoker. I was more of a social smoker. When I started to notice I was smoking more and more, I just dropped my smoking to rare occasions and eventually I was smoking once every 2 months and then I stopped and haven't smoked a cigarette in 15 years. In other words for me I can't ween myself off PMO like I did cigarettes by gradually decreasing the dosage until I quit entirely for good. This is why quitting PMO cold turkey is the only way that works. Rex >>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Thanks 40New30 and Rex. I managed to stay clean last Friday while home alone. These small victories are awesome.
