Dear "I will win the battle"
I just signed up a few days ago with GYE and I feel like I can completely relate to your situation. Maybe we can give each other chizuk. I've been married for several years and have a wonderful family, and I also learned in kollel for several years. Many people look up to me as a "role model" in the community, and I really do strive to be one. I work now, but I have regular learning sedarim, lein in shul, etc. I was always ashamed of the issues I have. I had a "clean" period from a few months before I got married until about two years later, thinking I grew out of it and that marriage would solve it (even though I had heard the advice that it doesn't solve it). But then I let my guard down a bit, and it spiraled downwards. It always seems to come back like an "old friend" (but really like an "old enemy"!). Always feels like - yeah this is what I always used to enjoy... Tried many times to stop, often successful for a few weeks or months. Tried kabalos, pledging to tzedakah, but nothing ever really worked long-term, and I always kind of felt like, well this is just who I'm going to be for the rest of my life. But recently reading the GYE material made me finally realize I have a problem and I must get a handle on it now. I want to not feel like I'm keeping secrets from my wife, I want to be able to have conversations with my kids when they're older about these types of things without secretly feeling ashamed and hypocritical. And I want to stop feeling like I'm living a double standard! it's such a terrible feeling! I also very much want to tell this all to my wife but I've been advised to wait until I have a good amount of time "clean" under my belt. Let's keep in touch here - are you maybe even interested in the 'partner' program? The more I think about it, the more I realize how good it would be for me to have someone I can talk to and confide in and feel like I can call for chizuk when I'm feeling strong urges. I'm not sure myself yet though - but think about it

I will win the battle wrote:

I don't think so. Was it a show for the year before you fell?
We frum Jews make a big mistake that the Y"H takes full advantage of.
We think that the REAL ME is whatever I'm up to that's ossur.
We let our aveiros define us. (I used to call myself an evil bastard who's going to hell.)

Remember the basics? Our goal is to make tocho k'baro -- the inside like the outside. We perfect ourselves from the outside in. The chitzonios is meoreres the pnimius. Right? I didn't make that up.

It's not a show. It's what you really want to be. If you want to know who a man is, ask him who he admires. Because that's who he strives to be.

I know, I know. We sex and lust addicts think we really want to be doing even worse things, the things we fantasize about and look at (and some of us do).

But that's just the addict inside us looking for a steady supply of his stuff.
He's with us for life. Our only hope is to keep him starved and daven a lot for syata dishmaya.

I will win the battle wrote:

Keep putting one foot in front of the other. Stay clean one day at a time.

Think about doing more than just avoiding lust and masturbation. Take your recovery further. Look into what recovery means. You can start by reading about the 12 Steps to Recovery.

Hatzlocha and welcome!

Alex

Just to update, things are on the up BH. When its all going bad the YH is really great at making you feeling that you are a nothing, once your are here 'chap arein', only once more etc etc, but once back on track, it suddenly doesn't seem so bad. And anyway it's all history, there aint nothing you can do about it. No chiddushim here - just wanted to speak it out......but no complacency, one day at a time....

WELCOME bentorahyy! It's nice to have you with us. yes, many of us are "model" students, bnaei torah, balei batim... This addiction spares no one (aiyn aputrapus l'arayos). We are all in the same boat. Mazal Tov on opening up and having the courage to face this difficult problem! Keep us posted on your journey.

I will win the battle wrote:

I see the chevra has addressed it already, but I agree. Yes, even if you "hold back" for a year. There is an AA story about someone who decided that being a drunk was ruining his career. He swore off alcohol for 25 years and remained sober. Once he retired, he thought he could have a drink - he ended up a drunk again (and I think he may have even died from it). It's like riding a bike, once you learn, you don't forget.

I have no doubt that should I fall c'v, I would be back exactly where I left off and probably much worse. That is one of my biggest motivations to stay clean. It's a slippery slope and a deep hole. I don't want to have to climb out of it again.

Hey, buddy.

Obviously whatever you were doing before didn't work and it won't work again. As Dov once told me: "You will not find a solution in the comfort of your living room." You have to decide what is more important for you: your "comfort level" or your very life.

You need to take action: put some SERIOUS gedorim around yourself and your internet, start participating in GYE phone-calls, find a sponsor that you can talk on the phone with. Yes, talk on the phone - don't worry no one will know who you are. Maybe you think you are "private person" and can't talk on the phone, but it's all an excuse to act out again in the future.

It's time to take action, buddy! No other way about it. Simply davening and hoping for the best doesn't work with our addiction.

Keep it up. Get out of your comfort zone and take new steps. Hatzlocho!

InternalControl wrote:
I like your view, besides for whats quoted above.
What 'I was doing before' worked great for a year. Shmiras einayim, limited i/net use with a filter of course, davening , keeping myself busy etc. ye, the yh 'got me' - he is doing 'his job' and I will now change tactics ADDING on to previous ones.
my fall led me to GYE which has been a huge help...

Yes, I did not mean that you should stop doing what you were doing. I meant that you need to do more. YH is surprisingly good at his job - always evolving. Always getting smarter and wiser. We need to keep up the pace with this menuval.

Any practical tips on shmiras eynayim? I am struggling with that majorly.

Hi!
I am feeling your pain. I remember from R' Wolbe that he write about times of Yiush(abandonment), but that this is a feeling that should pass, and to just keep doing what you are doing!
I heard a story about a chassid, who after going into business started to drop his chassidish livush at work. At first it was just at work, but then he dropped it when he was on his way to work. Over time, he dropped it on weekdays. After that he dropped it on Shabbos as well. Finally it reached a point that he was only wearing his livush when he went to visit the Rebbe. He felt like a hypocrite, and wore regular clothes to see his Rebbe. The Rebbe started crying.
"Why are you crying, this is what I wear all the time, and I felt like I was trying to fool the Rebbe, wearing the livush just when I came here?"
The Rebbe replied, "All this time I thought that when you wore your livush just to me, you were tryingto fool everyone else but you were real with me. Now I know that you were fooling me and being real with everyone else."

I think the lesson from the story is that we need to continue to do the right things, even if we have no interest and no cheshek, because that is where we WANT to be! Just keep plugging and it time the cheshek will return and blossom again!

Hatzlocho!

Hey, I will win. How are things going for you? Please update on your progress.

It's been a while since I have updated... but don't worry, thats because bh things are going great. Spending time in the mountains with the family - now thats called real enjoyment. Not having my computer with me - and yes I survived - now thats called real enjoyment. I managed to start afresh and so far I am clean - since R.c. Ellul. Thank you guys for giving me this 'push-start'...ye ye I know, day by day...

Great to hear from you especially with such good news.

Thanks for the update! Glad to hear things are good.

Any practical tips on shmiras eynayim? I am struggling with that majorly.[/quote]

guardyoureyes.com/component/zoo/item/windows-of-the-soul-group?category_id=159

hatzloche
a ksive wechasime toive

I am a competitive guy by nature, and I have been finding that keeping score/track as to how many times and the percentages that I can avoid the "second look" has been helping greatly. it makes me very aware of what I am doing wrong/right. It might need to go in tandem with a serious commitment of improving, which is done like people say on this site, to open up to a live person what you are struggling with, to realize that if we are addicted, we are unable ourselves to overcome this yetzer, to seriously connect with God and His love for us, etc., and together with that, perhaps it will help.

I am now 48 for 70, and I think the last 20+ times that I had a tayvah to take that "second look," I was koveish. This helps me throughout the day. Later, I can say to myself, "Why would I want to go to that site, or to think of that image; I have been so clean, etc."

This has been working for me. To conclude, I have been majorly nichshal in this area, and I thought that I would never ever be good at it, but meanwhile, I am on a mehalech.

b'hatzlachah