Peace through living

Goodmorning everyone,

I am an 37 year old male from the Netherlands.
The reason I started this journal is that I want to try a new approach to end my use of porn. I have tried to quit porn for about 8 or 9 years now and although I have had periods of 3 or 4 months without watchin porn. There always seems to be a moment when I end up with my iPhone in bed, my earbuds in my ears and watching porn...
I have thougth for years, that this beahviour would vanish if I would get a more healthy and active lifestyle. But somehow that doesn't seem to be the case.
Right now I am recovering from a burn-out that started about a year ago. Due to the burn-out I suffered from severe memory problems and for a while that helped me with the porn behaviour. I was so scared that my brain was damaged by porn that I was afraid to watch it and I ended with a period of 3 months without watching. After that the feeling disapeared and I went back to watching porn again. Not as frequent as I used to, but for two nights in a row every two or three weeks.

I have had a smoking and alcohol addiction in the past and strangely to break with those habits was not as hard as breaking with this one. When I decided to quit alcohol I did it beacause I wanted to be a happy with myself without the alcohol. I wanted to find out who I was, what I really liked and to connect with people. These reasons made it fairly easy to quit and never drink again.
Quitting alchol has changed my life in a dramatic way. So has the discovery of meditation and spirituality. I joined a sangha and i started to open up to others. I made new friends that suited my new lifestyle in a great way. I continued to change and grow as a person and I can say that there are a lot of sides to myself that I started to embrace. My life has changed in a very positive way. But there is still this porn use I struggle with.


Porn use has been one of the reasons my 9 year long relationship with an amazing girl ended. I was obsessed with sex back then and I also visited a prostitute. I told her of my behaviour and the relationship collapsed. Of course there were other problems involved but porn has been a great one of them.

I started wathing porn when I was around the age of 13, 14. I was a very shy kid who had trouble coping in high school. I was a very sensitive kid and puberty was tough as hell. I was too afraid to talk to girls so I discovered there was another way to look at women and sex. That was the beginning of the addiction. The constant abuse of dopamine through porn, beer and sometimes drugs turned me into someone who was not happy with himself or his surroundings. This continued until I met my ex-girlfriend, who really liked me for who I was. I really wanted to change my porn behaviour for her, but I failed trying.  :'(
The fact that I hurt her so much with my beahaviour, made me decide to quit forever. I got really good streaks for about 3 to 4 months, but like I already said, there always seems to be a point when the old behaviour kicks in and I return to the old behaviour.

Last week the same thing happened and eventually last night I binged two times in a row....
That was the moment I decided that maybe I should try another approach. I always wanted to do this by myself but now I want to open up about it. Perhaps this gives new energy and insights that I need. I never talked to anyone about it, because I am ashamed of my behaviour.

What worries me, is that through mindfulness and meditation practice I learned to be the observer of thoughts and emotions and not to identify with them.
There are periods of time that there are no thoughts or worries in my mind. When I am scared or have intense emotions I can observe them and eventually they go away. Or I can just let them be. So when I start craving porn and eventually start watching, I observe my emotions, thoughts etc. but they are so intense that they won't go away. Therefore I need a different approach to these situations.
My question therefore is, what do others do when the cravings come and stay there for hours.....

I read some of the other journals and I learned that it is important to know triggers that set you back.
I have been thinking about this and I guess that there a multiple things that can trigger the addiction.
- when I am happy, exited.
- when i am having trouble trying to sleep
- when I am agitated
- I havea tight pants fetish and sometimes I see someone who acitvates cravings.
- when the need to sex returns after a flatline period.


My porn fetishes have changed to femdom, Joi, Cei... and sometimes hypnosis.  :'(

This turnes out to be quite a long story, but it feels good to be open about it. I think I will talk to a friend about it in real life as well....
I am very gratefull for this possibility to talk about porn use in this forum!

Hey Frergstroh,

Welcome (of Welkom in het Nederlands ) to this forum!

I think that you have made a solid start by coming on here. As your post indicated, you have battled with porn for a long time and from what I can read, your fetishes have shifted somewhat from femdom to Joi, Cei and hypnosis (i honestly have no clue what Joi, Cei and hypnosis are, but I will refrain from googling them) and I think it's safe to assume that these forms of porn are far from your natural cravings.. That is how messed up porn can be..

You also indicate that mindfulness has not helped you in dealing with the cravings.. I think we as a forum have cooked up a nice little something, just for that.
You indicate that you are mindful of your thoughts and emotions when you have cravings or watch porn.. But maybe, rather than observing what happens during, observe what the reason is for your cravings. Mindfulness is a great technique to prevent yourself for relapsing. And a couple of us have come up with what we call the Six Point Plan or 6PP. I think you will recognize some of the actions, but specifically point 3 and 4 can be of great help if I read your question correctly:

1. Recognize that you have an urge
2. Allow the urge to be there. You cannot will it away, just let it be
3. Find out why the urge is there. Is there something inside of you that makes you want to resort to PMO
4. Recognize that the urge is only temporary. If you switch your focus to something else, the urge will subside eventually
5. Remember the feeling of emptiness after a PMO wank.
6. (Optional if the urge is really strong) Resort to a sort of emergency activity that is anti-sexual. The dishes, ironing your clothes, some chore around the house, working out.. stuff like that.

In closing I want to say that you have taken an important step by coming on to here and be a member of this comunity. I hope to read more of your journey. And please, also read other peoples journeys. They can be insightful, educational or just a reminder that you are not alone.

Stay safe my friend

Hi,

Wow, thank you so much (of dankjewel  ) for your reaction and your great advice.
The fetishes I have developed are so messed up and so far away from "normal' sex in daily life that I was also ashamed to name them in my post. But I really believe that it is time to be open about everything and search for help.
Your tips are great and I will let them sink in and see how I can use them in my every day life.
Also I will read other journals and see if I can help other people on this forum.

Day 2:

This morning I sent an e-mail to my psychologist and I told her about my struggle with porn. This felt so strange, to mention this part of my life to someone. I think it is because I always thought of porn use as something very private and shamefull too.To talk about it in public feels really strange.
But it also feels as something that needed to happen.
I hope she can provide some help.

Hey Frergstroh,

I do recognize the weird feeling of telling people about the addiction, but in all honesty it was also very much so relieving.
And, I think that your fetishes are not something that has not been encountered on this forum before, so no shame in that. You are a victim of the high speed porn industry.

Actually, to really be fully committed to recovery you need to be open. Because if you're not open to yourself you cannot be open to others. So being open to others therefore must mean that you are open to yourself. And that is one of the key ingredients to a full recovery.


Stay safe my friend, I am rooting for you

Hi, Frergstroh. Wish you all the best on your journey.

FWIW I have similar fetishes. I have a theory that femdom might have something to do with the relationship with one's mother. Misandry, also if father is away, the mother might compensate for the missing father. It results in what I view as inverted female energy which turns out to be some fake male energies that cause a lot of troubles. Maybe something to look into - the relationship with the mother. I think for porn the relationship with the mother has more to do with it than the father.

I view the "tabula rasa" theory as incorrect. We inherit a lot of "garbage" from our parents. Like my father was an alcoholic, and I have some misandry energy coming from my mother. Only a few months back did I think of exploring what I inherited from my father and the mother. This is quite a substantial influence of my life. When factoring this in, why my life turned out the way it did makes a lot more sense.

EW

Day 4:

Thank you very much for your help and support

That is an interesting theory about the relationship with a mother.
I do know that until a few years ago I did not have a femdom fetish.
It somehow feels that it developed through the porn use and also through the online erotic hypnosis vids that also aim a lot at submisiveness.
I often think that those actually changed my brain and preferences.

But there is also good news and that is is I contacted professional help for addiction today and that I am getting an intake in two weeks from now.
Opening up about it still feels strange but also good indeed.
Accepting that there are things I cannot do on my own also feels good.

Welcome to the forum Frergstroh!

It sounds like you're off to a great start and you've made some valuable insights already. One thing that I feel is very important to re-iterate in a discussion like this is, although it is important to understand underlying causes for our addiction, identifying fetishes too much with a part of your personality, your upbringing or identity gives them a power that over you that they should not have.

Though there may be an aspect of your personality that makes you more prone to enjoying them over other specific fetishes. Most of us would not have any of these fetishes were it not for the desensitisation effects and escalating of our PMO habit. Reflect on it but don't over think it too much, these fetishes are a symptom of our addiction and they'll weaken the more we stay away.

Keep up the good work & stay strong!

Welcome Frergstroh,

it's good to have you here.
The forum, the exchange with people who suffer the exact same problem has become very important for me, because i don't have to explain and no one gives me a creep look for what i'm saying. Therefore shame is not needed here and you sound like you are learning how to talk about porn with others without being ashamed. As a result, shame fades - good thing.

To respond to your question and the cravings.
For sure is, the cravings will drop after a period of not PMO. This you know because you experienced flatline before. When the flatline ends you have to be aware of triggers and learn about urge control, like 6PP. To stay away from PMO or 'the addicion' it is very helpful to talk to a psychiatrist and have a peer group like us. This will help you gain awareness of the problem in general. Like childhood, lack of emotions and purpose, bad habits, lifestyle - and i think this is the biggest part, when we discover all the branches of the addiction in every direction. Therefore, i or we are happy to be with you on that journey.

Imsor