Hi everyone,

This is my first time posting as I have been frequenting this site for quite sometime and I have been wanting to post for quite sometime.

I am not so familiar with the posting rules (it seems you can't post some words so I will refrain where I have seen other people do) so if someone can familiarize me with them that would be great.

Here goes:

The truth is slowly starting to sink in. What I once thought I could stop I realize now that at this point I can't.

To give you background I am in my mid 20's married with a child and a wonderful wife.

I was introduced to p*$n in my early teens via my unrestricted access to the Internet. Thinking back over the last 10 years (I can't believe I have been doing this for this long) I remember staying up till the we hours of the morning on the Internet satisfying my lust and doing what usually accompanies such activities. I would also rent and watch specific movies containing lust material. At the time I wrote it off as just my teenage hormones, thinking things would change as I got older. I was in a top competitive dorming yeshiva at the time and whenever I went home this is what would happen.

To make a long story short i spent the next 8 years playing the "that was the last time" game over and over again. I also experienced the "I am a terrible person" feelings and the depression that my addiction caused. When the time came to start dating I decided that this is not the person I want to be and was able to stop p%*n and  mas*&^^@ing through the time I dated.

I got engaged pretty quickly and continued being clean all through my first year of marriage. Slowly my past activities started occurring again. I felt extreme feelings of guilt and despair as I realized I am doing this stuff MARRIED. My wife eventually caught me (not p#$n, but obviously inappropriate movies) and I confessed everything to her. As a frum bias yaccov girl she did not really have any exposure to this stuff growing up, and she took it pretty well considering. I got Web Chaver and have been pretty good about the p$%n on my computer (I have no choice).

The problem and what causes my great despair is that I feel like we live in a world where this stuff is inescapable.Every where you turn we are surrounded by schmutz. Also, there is always a way to get what you want.

For example, even after installing web chaver I was still able to feed my addiction by going to movie sites that wouldn't show up on web chaver. Also I have come to realize that there is a whole level of stuff lower than po@n all over the Internet that could satisfy my addiction.

Then there are the cursed smartphones, I originally had a blackberry but got an iPhone because I thought it would be easier to protect (at least that is what I told myself) I installed web chaver, locked the browser and thought I was ready to go. Then I discovered the apps.

To be brief I feel like when one is desperate they are always going to find something they are looking for. Even using simple basic apps can get you what you are looking for.

I think I hit rock bottom tonight as I found a way to circumvent the protection on my Phone. I feel like this was the last bandaid on my issue and I am now off to the races with nothing to stop me! Hopeless is the right word right now.

It is now clear to me that none of these "protections" are going to work as there is always ways to find what you need. The only thing I can hope to do is learn how to be the protector of myself by myself. I am so depressed as this doesn't seem possible right now. I really don't want to live this way for the rest of my life. I want to stop this terrible habit. I see it is only going to get worse and worse. It will be a wedge between my wife and I, my children, and living a normal life. I have been getting by pretty well despite my issue until now. I am currently in a top 5 graduate school, I went to a great yeshiva, always had a good name etc., but It is starting to take its toll. The problem is I don't now how to stop.....
I have briefly read the handbook, attitude etc., have tried to take it one day at a time, tried the 90 days, but I always FAIL!! I can't say I have given it my all but I guess I just don't think its possible for me to get beyond this.......

Thank you everyone for listening and I really am desperate for all the help I can get.

You are my kinda guy!  ;D I can't say our stories are exactly the same, nor are they too different for that matter, but between the feelings you described and the way you wrote your post, I see a connection here.

Although I just got a personal message from someone, if you are looking for an accountability partner, I am at the moment also looking. I think, though, that the personal message was in response to me writing in a previous thread that I want to meet someone in person and not necessarily for accountability reasons.

Kol Tuv and hatzlacha rabbah!

Notposhut,
Welcome!
I relate to your story word for word.  Except I carried on in my addiction for 17 years of marriage before I discovered this wonderful site, and discovered I wasn't just a baal taiva, but an addict.  That meant self control wasn't going to work.  Which is why you keep falling back into it.

Filters and accountability are important, but as you discovered, they're not nearly enough.  Because they don't address YOU and your addiction.  And they can always be circumvented.

Nothing in your power has worked so far.  At least not for long.  Not for keeps.

So now you have accepted that you are powerless over lust.  Congratulations!  You've just gotten to the first of the 12 steps to recovery.

Being powerless over lust means you're going to avoid it at all costs.  Because that's all you can do.  And because you know your life has become unmanageable.  Insanity.

Take a look at the 12 steps here:

www.guardyoureyes.com/articles/12-step/item/summary-of-the-12-steps

learn about them, about how to apply them.  If you try this on your own and fail, you may want to join a live group that "works" the steps.

Here's what worked for me:

1.  Bulletproof shmiras eynayim.  No women.  Not their faces, not their polished nails, not live, not in pictures.  Turn your head away.  Turn your body away if necessary.  Pinch your inner thigh hard if you catch yourself looking.

This goes for your wife as well.  You can look at her face, but don't check her out in a way that's going to get you thinking....

2.  Guard your mind from fantasies, memories of images, thoughts about sex (even with your wife, unless it's about to happen).  When you catch your mind trying to go there, start davening immediately.  Repeat your tefilla each and every time an inappropriate thought tries to land.  As soon as you detect it.  Here's the nusach I use, based on the 12 steps:

"Ribbono Shel Olam, I am powerless over lust and my life has become unmanageable.
Only you can restore me to sanity.
I turn my life and my lust over to your care and ask you to please heal me from this illness of lust.  I don't want to lust, I only want You and a relationship  with You and Your Torah, and appropriate attraction to my wife.  Take my lust.  Please, take my lust."

Your goal is to give up lust itself.  Including in the bedroom.  Physicality with your wife is for connecting, bonding.  Not for getting high on your lust.  Get access to the baalabatim's forum and take a look at my thread there entitled "High Infidelity" to see what happens when a woman lives with a lust addict and is treated like a lust object for too many years.

Hatzlocha!
It's not poshut.  But there is a proven path to recovery.  Direct your self control to this new path, and you will see success.

Alex

Welcome notpashut!  I was addicted for about 22 years, 12 of them after marriage.  I can definitely relate to a lot of what you wrote.  Stopping forever time and time again.  The gedarim are important, but if you jump over the railing... well they really don't help.  The only reliable filter is one you don't test.

The thing that has helped me the most is admitting the truth about myself to other real recovering addicts.  It was scary for me at first, but I am able to do it more easily now.  Reading dov's stuff really opened my eyes.

Hatzlacha rabba!  We are all in this together.  Stick around.  We're here for you!

this should be enough for until someone shows up with a welcome package
www.guardyoureyes.org/forum/index.php?topic=4695.msg124072#msg124072

In response to alex- Very well said. I gained a lot of insight from your post. I have to let it simmer a bit.......

Thanks everyone for your responses. Sorry i am not responding individually......long day and I am about to call it a night.

Good clean day today.....weird.....yesterday was Teiva city......today almost nonexistent. I did talk to Hashem several times though asking him to take my oncoming thoughts away from me.

I haven't had a chance to start reading through the twelve steps. I must say I am a bit intrigued by the whole "I am powerless" idea and giving yourself over to g-d. I guess I am having trouble letting go of the "I have to just control myself" idea. I just throw my hands up and say I am addicted and I have no control?....pretty scary to me....but then again I have read some of Dov's stuff and I like the idea that whatever i have been doing or thinking until now hasn't been working and maybe I have to start doing things differently even though I don't understand how it can work. I will admit i am the control-freak/everything planned out for the next 20 years type. I just operated better that way....or maybe not. It always seemed that letting go and not being so intense seemed irresponsible and not mature. What do I know anyways.....

One of the thing that bothers me from time to time is that I sometimes justify the rotten self-feelings i have by saying that it's normal...of course if you stick a guy in front of an unrestricted computer he's going to look at P**n. Are there really guys who can just walk away from that "opportunity"? I wish I could do that....So just because I had open access to this stuff as a teen I have zero control? Seems not fair!!! I am kind of past this and recognize I am the way i am and I am taking it from there. Its just something I am curious about from time to time. Is there really  concept o a guy just walking away?

Anyways thanks everyone again.....

Heres to tom being as good as today.

notpashut wrote on 25 Jan 2012 05:53:


You do just have to control yourself.  And this will take plenty of discipline.  You're just using your self-control in a whole new way.  You're intercepting the enemy at a much earlier point.  Every time.  And it takes lots of self control to keep davening rather than just entertaining lewd thoughts.  And the important thing is that it works.  It sounds like you're already doing it and seeing some success.

notpashut wrote on 25 Jan 2012 05:53:


We're all control freaks.  You're gonna love being back in control, even if that control is just turning over control to Hashem.  He's already completely in control, no?  Besides, you can still control every thing else about your life.  Although you may learn that it's so much easier to see success when you turn things over to Hashem, you may start trying it in other areas too!

notpashut wrote on 25 Jan 2012 05:53:


I do it every day.  I work in a private office with unrestricted internet access.  It's a network computer and I can't download filters.  I don't recommend this.  But I've been doing it for close to 3 years now.  I do keep the door open, and when I close it to daven mincha, an alarm goes off in my head.  I turn off the screen as a heker that I'm in danger.  Addiction is misery on top of misery.  I'm not going back.

Good to have you here.
Keep sharing your thoughts and your journey with us.
We're all learning and getting chizuk from you.

Alex

Realizing that I am not in control was is a big part of my recovery.  I totally identify with the control thing.  We are not in control though.  The only thing we control is our ratzon.  Everything else is in Hashem's hands.  The more I let go, the better I feel, and things almost always turn out better as well.

notpashut wrote on 25 Jan 2012 05:53:


Yes, plenty people can walk away from a spreading gasoline fire or from a downed power line. They just walk away. Actually they run away frantically, really. But all we need to do here is walk calmly away. And if we really believe that we can afford to 'take the opprotunity' for the sweet lust (and it is certainly very sweet!), then we are going to.
No matter what G-d tells us to do, the rabbis tell us to do, or our mothers tell us to do. It's what we have always done and how we ended up right here in the first place.

Either it is fire to us - because it [i]is fire for us[/i] - or it is not. Just because Hashem says it is fire, means nothing at all, obviously, to an addict like me. This is far from apikorsus - for it is the truth! And Hashem loves Truth.

notpashut wrote on 25 Jan 2012 05:53:


Great posts and responses, guys. To me, at least, that's what makes it so frustrating. Sky high, I can do this and conquer anything feeling one day and the very next day...Boom! The "What's the difference between me and the lawless goy or animal" feeling the very next. That's why it's SO important to have kavana when saying, "Hamechadesh b'chol yom tamid ma'aseh breishis" (that each day EVERYTHING is recreated) and during the morning brachos when we "she'lo asani aved, isha, goy"...Why do we repeat it every morning? B'davka because one day has no bearing over the next. We could be given a goy's neshama or outlook one day, chas v'Shalom. Or worse yet, a slave :o. Or even worse yet...just kidding. I'll stop there  ;D

In all seriousness though, it's cricial to start the day off right by davening to the Ribono Shel Olam!

gibbor120 wrote on 25 Jan 2012 17:19:


I think one of my issues is right at that point
.
I can't even fathom the idea that I am not in control.
Yes i understand that when it comes to P**N etc. I can't stop...so I guess I am not in control, but I guess I am mourning that fact, and that is the hard part.

But lets take another are of life.....Parnasa etc....Yes, I believe in G-d and in reality we are not in control of what happens in the end....but there is an idea of hishtadlus and some control and thats where perfectionism kills me. I am always scared or stressed or obsessed that I am not doing enough or the best I can....Maybe I am getting off topic and the two are not related but when it comes to lust.... It kills me that I can't be in control...for me right now its all or nothing....I can't even fathom a middle ground or a somewhere in-between being in total control and being a total wreck.

I remember time periods where I am in control...no acting out. But the second thats over its chaos...until the next time that I get under control.

Is there a way for me to better understand the coexistence between "not being in control" and being a productive relevant capable person.

Alex,

Thanks for your advice so far about the bulletproof Shmiras Aiynayim.

I am in a graduate school where there is a significant female presence. Yes, they dress in certain ways that make it hard for me. Yes, I sometimes come to school on the lookout for something (I realize now I wasn't even considering them human, just objects to satisfy my lust) to "catch my eye".

But, No, I did not walk through the doors with that attitude today. I was able to interact with some classmates today w/out focusing on a physical attribute or article of clothing and just thinking that I am talking to a human being. I caught myself a couple times reverting to habit and I quickly defocused (or focused) and looked away.

Another day in the books of managing my lust.....

PS. You mentioned a ballabatim section in a previous post. Where can I find this section? I have been searching with no luck. Another area that I must admit that I am clueless in is intimacy with a wife and how it should be a bonding, friendship and love experience and not just a physical "take care of each other" activity.

Im so lost....but hopefully already on the return.

Thank you my friend.

notpashut wrote on 26 Jan 2012 04:59:

we think that being in control is what makes us
every human is relevant, we have a messed up attitude, whether because we were abused, not loved enough, or simply too introverted to notice that other people also notice [and love] you even when you're not
and we have to work on it. yes work.

notpashut wrote on 26 Jan 2012 04:59:

Yes, and a very important step in the right direction.

notpashut wrote on 26 Jan 2012 04:59:

I think they are related.  If you are obsessing over things that are not in your control - you do not beleive that Hashem is in control no matter how many times you say ani maamin.

I was just writing to someone that the mishna in kedushin says that animals have their parnassa without working.  Hashem could've done that for us humans as well.  Our parnassa can come from many places.  If we are trying to take control, we obviously don't trust Hashem to do it.  Hashem runs the entire universe.  Do you think he does not have enough bread to put on your table?  Do you think he needs your hishtadlus?

The purpose of hishtadlus is only to "cover up" for Hashem so to speak so that our parnassa does not come totally bederech nes.  To make it "look" like teva.  That is our input, and that's it.  Easier said than done.  Think about it, you might just find that you have more menuchas hanefesh.