When I was growing up I met a friend. We weren’t close until middle school and then became best friends. I went away to yeshiva and we kept in touch. When I went home we would always meet up and hang out. We were the ultimate best friends.

Throughout my childhood there were ppl that thought that my friend was a bad influence and would warn me to stay away. I even noticed some strange things but wrote them off as a weird quirk and accepted him. This made our friendship grow even more as I accepted his flaws for these quirks that outsiders just couldn’t understand because they didn’t know him like I did.

As things progressed I went to Israel but again we met and hung out whenever possible. His actions got worse and worse over the years and I accepted more and more until eventually I woke up. I realized that the things I accepted as being him actually affected me and how I acted with not only him but throughout my life. This was not an easy thing to realize but I started to put barriers in place to distance myself from him.

I started to act more busy, stopped answering phone calls, and would try to not have the ability to hang out. Unfortunately he was still my friend and we had such a close relationship so my barriers were weak. I was having some small success until I came back from Israel.

Back home we started to hang out more. I started to rationalize my concerns and would just disregard them. I got to such a low point before I realize that I was slowly falling back into the trap that I started to climb out of.

It took over a year but I eventually deleted his number and stopped answering the phone. When I saw him or something that we used to do together, I would try to avoid it. Unfortunately its not so easy to throw away something that’s been with you since your childhood. I never told anyone about this because they would never understand. They would just ridicule and judge me for not noticing how bad the things me and my friend were doing and not just stop doing them. They wouldn’t understand the feeling of having to break away from your closest of friends because of the realization that that friend was never truly your friend but actually your enemy.

This “friend” is not a real person, but for some it may also be a real person. This friend is the y’h and for me in particular porn and masturbation. The most important realization for us all is to know that this friend was never our friend but actually our enemy. This type of enemy is the hardest to fight, the enemy that was once a friend.

Much Hatzlacha to you all and may you find success in this battle.