Looking for a new start with others

Hello everybody. I am so glad to find this forum. I now know I am not alone and readying your stories is inspiring. Here is mine:

At the age of 11 I accidentaly found porn in my house?s computer while searching photos of my favorite movie actress. Since that, I have PMO all these years.

I am 30 now. I married at 24 and totally love my wife. I could never have a better wife ever, she is my best friend, my partner in everything but my porn activity is a total secret for her. I can wait until she sleeps to get out of the bed, get the cellphone, go to the bathroom and PMO. 

My biggest problem is that almost every girl outside is a trigger for me because I use to watch voyeour or hidden camera porn, and even I have made my own videos myself... so everytime I see a girl with a short skirt, everything jumps inside my to take a video with my cellphone. I got caught once, but I managed to run away. That really scared me and I thought it was the end, but it wasn?t. Now the adrenaline of not getting caught is really stronger, plus the masturbation with the video I take. My biggest problem is that these videos are not just pixels, but people I know like friends, coleagues from work or any girl in the street.

Besides that I use to watch regular porn. It does not matter how tired I am, when watching porn I get energy from nowhere to stay awake until I find something that makes me come. Sometimes I even wake up during the night thinking of the exact video I want to watch and simply go for it.

I hate porn and now, after investigating, know how useless and damaging it is. I feel terribly guilty everytime I masturbate and then got to bed and huge my wife. I just feel like the worse man ever.

I am looking for a new beggining, I have hove to just love my wife, enjoy my sex activities exclusively with her, enjoy my sleep and take off my all these images that make me feel guilty. Thanks in advance for all your support!

This is day 1!!!

Stick with it man its tough but it will get easier. Your not alone in it

Thanks Ryan, it is so grateful to know I am not alone.

Today I went out to the city and had a good experience I would like  to share.

The only fact of telling my story to all of you, partners in this race of quiting porn, helped me today to at least, run away from my main trigger: short skirts. I feel like now I am commited not only to myself, but also to a community of people like me.

So my plan for my trigger is just to look away and think or sing something in my mind while in the bus or walking. Not thinking, not struggling, just look away INMEDIATELY!!! It worked today!

Ok, I know this is just my second day, it will be hard, but I really want to do this.

So, this is the start of my day 2!!!!

Welcome. It takes awareness, a conscious effort and persistence to overcome this. We're literally retraining our brains.

Thank you all.

So my third day was ok. Went out to the street again and to the doctor. At the doctor?s office was a trigger (a girl with skirt) who allowed me to practice a lot my plan. I could not go away because I was waiting for my doctor, so I decided to read, just read, non-stop. I kept doing it the whole hour I waited there and think it was good. To have my brain really busy helps a lot. I won?t say I did not peek two times because I did, but to have a goal to achieve is really good help. This also helps when suddenly I get a flash in my mind on some memory of porn. I feel I just need to be busy and fill all those spaces with something that satisfies me besides porn and short-skirt girls.

I also downloaded a counter app. It is really simple. You just add one number after the other. Today the number is 4, my 4th day!!! It may seem simple but to keep a track of my improvement is helping me.

Thanks all for the support.

Day 5

Today is happening something outstanding. I am totally alone at home with high speed internet... the perfect opportunity to PMO all I want but guess what... I am here, at the forum, writing in my journal that I simply don?t want to.

Today I traveled so was really tired. We they left me alone, I felt my being jumping like ?yeah, let?s go for it, this is it?. But I rememebed my goal, no virtual stimulation at all if I really want to leave my addiction.

So I?ll find something interesting to do while my wife gets back home... as I said before, I think what really helps me is to be really busy, no time to even consider or fight the feeling of PMO. I tell myself: Just get to do something that rewards you... porn does not reward, just makes you feel miserable and guilty...

So I fulfilled a whole week!!!! That is great!

Today is my 9th day. I was surfing the web searching for something my wife?s and saw it: a trigger. This is terrible... it seems this world is flooded with triggers. I am having a hard time on this one.

T3b4n said:

So I fulfilled a whole week!!!! That is great!

Today is my 9th day. I was surfing the web searching for something my wife?s and saw it: a trigger. This is terrible... it seems this world is flooded with triggers. I am having a hard time on this one.

Click to expand...

Awareness is good. Sometimes we can't avoid these things but being aware and having the awareness to not going down that road we've traveled so many times is the goal

Thank you. Awareness, I am practicing it and want to te?l you something.

So here I am to tell you I masturbated today but no porn or fantasy. This was different because I did not let myself think of any porn I have watched in the past. So I do not knoe if this is a RELAPSE but I did it because I was heavily triggered and I decided to release my energy by masturbating thinking on my satisfaction rather than watching somebody?s satisfaction on pixels on a screen.

Either way, I did not eatch porn nor tought of it. It is a great improvement for me. Still counting, 9 days without porn.

So yesterday and today I relapsed miserably!!! I am so angry at myself!!

It began like this: there is a girl in a group I assist every week... she is so cute and dresses so sexy that I cannot handle it... I feel the urges to take a upskirt video of her... since I couldn?t, I went to the internet to find these videos and PMO. She has this power to get me so horny I cannot stand it.

Today I was taking a nap and just woke up with the urges to PMO... went to the bathroom and you know the rest of the story...

She is such a trigger for me... I cannot avoid the group where I see her. I don?t know what to do... I guess I just need to run away from her, to not be close to her and keep my cellphone away from me when she is around... I could mess everything (my life and marriage) up.

And as for the urges while I am sleeping... it is incredible... it has such a power to wake me up and obligate me to go for it... it is so strong...

Ok, I did 13 days. I know I can better than that. That was my first serious try after many many years of whatching this crap...

Tomorrow is, once again, day 1.

What do you all think about this? I greatly appreciate all your feedback, I know I am not alone.

I recommend just one trick out of my trick book I call it slowing down. It has to be done early, when the trigger happens.

1. recognise your mind is racing (you are loosing control of your thoughts, anxieties, horniness etc.)
2. instead of running away accept this but in broader context. Take a deep breath and remember what day it is, what do you plan to do later, what have you already done and in this context admit whats your brain is doing. You end up with stuff like "it's tuesday, I need to get groceries in the evening, and here I am obsessing over a skirt". What it does is it exposes you to yourself, and shows how ridiculous some things are.
3. I also like to just take a deep breath, shut the world out and ask myself deep down. "Do I want this?" I always arrive with "no". And it sort of sets me free. But this only works after you've already slowed down.

I like this approach because honestly I don't like to be slave to anything. I don't want to indulge, but I don't want to run away either. I am all for finding that deep, slow spot in my head that just puts everything in it's place. Very often when I do this I end up  being amused by the ridiculousness of triggers, I smile to myself and I'm feeling not only free but happy.

she doesnt have power over you, only you have power over you.

you make the decisions dont you?

and  you gotta stop wanting to take upskirt videos of women and recording videos of people. thats not okay, & will get you in a lot of trouble.

make yourself accountable for your actions. be the better man.

Hello. Thank you very much for your replies.

I enojyed the phrase ?how ridiculous some things are?. They really are... I am getting obsesed over a piece of cloth... that is just so stupid.

Today I saw her again in a meeting and thought as you said ?do I want this??  And effectively, the answer was ?not at all?. I did ok... I could even talk to her without thinking any of this things...

This is not worth it. I could lose soooo much... things and people that really make my life shine like my wife and family. I am tired of wasting energy and enjoyable moments just to try to take a shot or watch all this crap that polutes my mind.

Regarding my practices, I am tying to fill more my daily schedule with this I really want to do. There are some books I REALLY want to finish and enjoy... I want to perfect my german and start making exercises. Yesterday I found a ?open-sky? gym was installed in my neighborhood. I want to use it, I want to walk with my wife, I want to lose some weight. These things are worthy of spending time, energy and illusion.

Thanks again for the replies. I really appreciate them. And this is how I start my day 2.

Day 2

It was a pretty busy day. I went to the doctor for a check... everything seems generally fine. I have to lose some weight so that is a new goal. I am also achieving my reading daily goals which is great. No urges at all. Just a couple of quick peaking at a girl but rapidly remembered everything we?ve shared here so I did well.

Once again, I can see that being busy really helps a lot.

Day 3

Today was a really busy day. Went out to make a lot of things with my wife. As usual, the shopping mall is filled with triggers but I did ok.

The mayor point today was that we met by chance that girl I have told you about dressing with her sexys outfits... it was a great change to practice the last we shared here... ok, she is just a friend, a girl who deserves my respect, and she is just wearing a short piece of cloth... is this what I want? Eat her in mind mine and get back home to watch porn? Definetively not. I have not read my second chapter of today, I have dinner tonight with others... so it is not worth it think about all this, about her and watching porn... I have much better to do.

Hello everyone,

I am deeply sorry to write again a story full of failures during the last days. I have relapsed over and over again... it seems like the more I want to quit, the more I feel the urges and the easier I fall.

Today I was searching the web about a disease and found this innocent picture of this girl making yoga... that was it. I can't believe how easily I fall again and again with such light and stupid triggers.

I feel I am lacking of awareness. I feel good with PMO but when I finish, I feel like a just woke up and realize: "oh c'mon man, this is not what you want, you are trying to reboot, why did you do this? Did you forget it?" I must confess, when I am triggered, I totally forget my aim.

This is so frustrating for me and has been my life story since I was a young 11 y.o. boy... this is a nightmare. 19 years of my life watching this crap.

I really don't know what to do... start again? Sure! But what am I going to do different this time? I have tried all your advice and I keep failing. I am 30, I don't want to reach 60, 50, 40 or even 31 like this. THIS MUST STOP!!!

By the way... I have not posted recently because I was ashamed of doing so... I read a lot of success stories and I find mine really depressing, feeling like I will dissapoint all of you... I know you'll say I won't, but that is how I feel... I just feel the need to be open and be what I am and what I want to be with no judgement from others...

hey man,

I know how it feels after you relapse. I know this question when you begin again "what will I do different this time?".
And nobody other than you has the answers. Every situation is different. But you are who you are. You feel ashamed? Good, that is your own assessment of things. Make your own plan. Fight it the way you want to fight it.

Good luck with whatever you want.

Hey man, I know this reply will be more than a year after the last post and I really hope that you've become successful in conquering your demons.  I would just like to ask you for a status update since you and I both have the same type of extreme PMO problem.  Seems like the voyeurism/upskirt fetish is like a level deeper than being addicted to porn, and I've been trying for the past year to cut down but it hasn't worked that well for me.  Currently I'm on a 25 day streak of no PMO, but thoughts still come to my mind when I see a pretty lady in a short skirt outside (especially now that it's getting warmer).

Hoping it gets better soon for the both of us.