A Happy Medium

[Broadfield78]

Hi all, I was last active here in the summer (uk) when I attempted a reboot. I had some success with it and slipped back a couple of times. My problem is that every time I slip I do so HARD. It’s almost as though every time I try a reboot, the impact of failure gets worse. A couple of times since the summer I went on binges for a couple of days - skipping work etc. Not good.

I’ve come here today in a good place. Around 6 weeks ago I told myself that maybe I should just accept who I am and what I enjoy, but to do so in moderation. The same applies to drinking, eating, everything. Since then I limit myself to one PMO Session a week and I think I have found the outcome I was after. I look forward to it and enjoy it, then switch off for 7 days. Ok so I am not clean, but I am happy, it’s under control, and it no longer dominates my life.

I didn’t know if this story was ok to post, so if it is not I apologise and please delete. But I wanted to give others hope that there is ‘another way’

All the best

[Nikola Numez]

you have PIED?

I didn’t know if this story was ok to post

of course its not okay to promote porn use.

[NewVerse]

As long as it works for you and is not affecting your life or those around you in a negative way, or you are not telling others this should the answer for them, I see no issue with it. Everyone's course is different.
Personally if it wasn't for PIED I would never want to quit. Beating that is my primary goal. However I will say there have been many other positives that came out of staying clean that I was unaware of.

[30yearsgone]

Agree with NewVerse.  Well said.

[Nikola Numez]

Cant agree with NewVerse because IT IS affecting people here in a very negative way. this is porn addict forum, anything that suggests porn in moderation is okay is very harmful to addicts whole life because if they dont quit porn they cant have a truly happy life.

[Rex]

Cant agree with NewVerse because IT IS affecting people here in a very negative way. this is porn addict forum, anything that suggests porn in moderation is okay is very harmful to addicts whole life because if they dont quit porn they cant have a truly happy life.

I would have to agree 100% with you that there's no happy medium with porn.  I found this out the hard way.  I tried all sorts of happy medium approaches, even tried kicking down my PMO to 2 to 4 times a week from the normal 10 or more.  I even believed I could gently step down like I did with cigarettes many years ago (which led me to quit cigarettes).  No go with PMO, the happy medium would always lead back to a PMO marathon. PMO is like heroin, there's no happy medium.  One either stops the PMO or his/her life continues to dive further down the drain.  Cold turkey is the only way to go, and then staying away from it permanently. The hardest part in my reboot process was deleting 20 years of porn on backup drives and old computers. I did this about 60 days into my reboot, in the back of my mind I still wanted to have that entrance way back to look at those old pictures. In the past I would delete the porn on my current computer but I wouldn't touch the archived stuff because down deep I really didn't want to let go of porn.  This time I deleted it all, all 20 years and it felt great. It was a big weight off my shoulders.  I never did this before during my previous reboots, I always said I'll never look at again what does it matter, but in the back of the mind I always rationalized I could go back at any time and look at these pictures and vids. For the first time in my life I am not kidding myself, I am done with PMO.