11 Months Porn Free!

You made it happen. I still think about it from time to time but all of it is gone. You made the jump, though. I hope one year from now I can say the things you have about such easy erections.

You guys will be here a year from now. It is not a struggle to avoid it or anything. I used to read lots of stuff about it being tempting and stuff like that. Once you know it is the cause you avoid it at all costs. The longer you go without it the further in the back of your mind it goes. I relapsed a couple times (not within the year I was sober but before) it was only because I wasn’t completely sure the porn was the cause. Once I learned it was the porn and I was sure of it, it became a no brainer to stop immediately. None of that watch it once a week stuff, or anything I stopped cold turkey. But you have to trust that the porn is doing the damage so you don’t have second thoughts.

In a very old thread on thunders I saw someone revive I was taken back when I read my post saying that porn couldn’t cause ed. That was before it actually happened. It’s not easy to actually believe but once you start seeing improvements you will see for sure.

I hope I can do the same soon

I’m on my way! 3 weeks porn free. I used to use it every time I jelqued to maintain the right level of erection. But, as it does to most, I wasn’t getting aroused easily outside of watching it - erections sub-par with premature ejaculation. Once I quit porn it took me twice as long to finish my routine but I knew I had to get through it. I found an interesting way to maintain my erection just this week and I hope it doesn’t get old. I turn the camera on my phone to the front lens so I can watch myself jelquing, just focused on my dick as I go through my routine. I can see it expand with every stroke from different angles, seeing how big it’s going to be soon, which keeps me in the perfect arousal state - I can go 50 sometimes 60 reps without stopping to fluff back up. With porn I would maybe get 25 in. I’m 49 years old so I think I found something golden!

It’s one of the most difficult things for me to quit if not the MOST difficult. I struggle with it everyday. But I have been consuming it less and less, it used to be a daily occurrence, now it’s about once a week. I’m now 30 years old and I have been watching it since I was 12-13. I’m going to break this habit eventually, old habits do die hard.

Wow, a year without porn that’s quite the accomplishment nowadays. Porn is becoming more and more readily available making getting away from it even harder.

Thanks and you are right. It is so easy to access now. But I’m done with it for good.

I’ve discovered that I had slowly gravitated towards craigslist ads and social media chat groups which involve local women that are in my area. I was actually looking for women on craigslist and not browsing the ads for pictures. I have now learned that even dating sites can set off the triggers in those of us prone to PIED. The porn induced erectile dysfunction came back. I noticed as I was sexting that my dick would get hard and after a while would spit out a bunch of precum and started turtling. It happened the more I texted and the funny thing is I didn’t even have to see pictures during the sexting. As I always did whenever she sent me a picture I would immediately delete it.

I gave it up along with browsing Facebook about 5 days ago and already see improvements. I know now that sexting is off limits as well as looking at fully clothed pictures of women. Don’t forget even those types of pictures cause you to fixate on them which depletes dopamine the same way as watching naked women. If you are going to fixate on anything let it be real women that you can actually see that is not on screen.

I’m only two days in on my commitment to being porn free. Similarily felt it was giving me almost a kind of ED. This decision came after being with a women (who I find very attractive) and from kissing, cuddling, caressing I wasn’t getting hard. Manual stimulation can get me there but I want to get hard from more than always resorting to manual stimulation. Plus I’d like increased morning wood, easier achieved and maintained errections - basically better PI’s and I think porb has been a big cause to that since over the last few years I’ve resorted to watching alot of it!

This is really good stuff Rahman810. As a recovering sex addict, it’s interesting to see someone figuring out the basics without thousands of dollars of therapy and 12-step recovery groups. And the only thing I’d respectfully add, is that it can often help to let the appreciation of another person’s physical beauty (male or female regardless of orientation) apply as much as possible (and obviously it’s not always possible because the world is what it is) to one’s wife or significant other.

This is not to moralize (although it definitely helps to make relationships as bullet-proof as is possible in our day & age) but simply acknowledging how God or evolution set things up in our brains (basic neuroscience that is assiduously & purposefully avoided in the pursuit of our generation’s addiction to comfort & pleasure - oops, jumping off soap box but this crap nearly destroyed my life).

If I’m not careful (and yes, I do have avatars turned off in my TP profile), just reading certain threads on this site trigger me and it’s down the rabbit hole. Before I found a therapist that understood SA, one of my female counselors was (overly) fascinated that I could achieve quasi-orgasms by looking/ruminating alone - similar to what some can do with meditative practices alone, but decidedly different.

At the same time, I often had to masturbate with a limp dick which while strangely doable, was unnatural & quite frustrating. Such is the warpage (and far beyond of course) that occurs with the human sexual response and the solution for me has been to move further & further away from prurient interest in anything, any act, or anyone besides my wife.

Hats off to you and in reading this thread, I’m reminded that I need to again quit flirting with the beast and add cobwebs to the overused interstices of my neural nets where catalogs of unhelpful imagery & sexual experiences reside. I hope I can report similar progress over an 11-month period. Thanks for sharing your efforts & progress in this area.

QL

What do you mean by that looking at women in a certain way depletes dopamine?

Hadn’t seen a reply from OP but wanted to take a stab from the perspective of a recovering sex addict who’s done a lot of work on understanding what Rahman810 alludes to.

I think he was referring to the mechanism of how gazing at beautiful women (even those that are partially or fully clothed), causes our brains to release significant amounts of dopamine (which for any that don’t know, is the reward system that makes us enjoy looking at them). Over time this causes our brains to trim back our dopamine receptors in the presence of the over-abundance of dopamine should we take things too far. In turn when we look for more imagery (in person or on our phone’s screen), it’s harder to get the same feeling because the reward system is being modified & sensitized by our actions and we have to look longer or for more variety or more whatever.

The point is that all of this is causing releases of and therefore depletion of dopamine which creates and sustains an imbalance that typically drives us to want more & more which in my case, eventually wiped out normal sexual response. When this advances far enough, you’re really lucky if it doesn’t lead to an addiction escalating to constant porn use and/or crossing the flesh line which is not so good if you’re in a closed relationship.

Anyway, good luck to those that are fighting not to use porn or give into it’s cousins. I just hit the 2 week point of no-porn (and trying not to lust after every woman walking down the hall in front of me) partly in response to this great thread.

A nun once said “God wouldn’t give you a toy, then tell you not to play with it.”

I may be beyond help… I read that as flirting with the breast! :eek2:

Lol! And then paradoxically her boss says, “I’ll never let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with any temptation, will provide the way of escape that you can endure it.” Both statements contain truths that are difficult to align and while I think it’s okay to masturbate if you must (i.e. higher drive) I’ve learned for me that reducing that to its absolute minimum is most beneficial for both my sexual response and for PE gains (as many of our TP vets preach).

Unfortunately, there are no magic wands that make steering away from lust easy so I live in the place of reality where I acknowledge there are beautiful women all around me but to pursue them (in the flesh or via media) has historically not been for my good in many costly ways. However, to each his own.

Hehehe - there may indeed be no help for you my friend!