Hi everyone,
I am brand new here. I want to beat this addiction more than anything. I know as long as I can break free from this, I can reach all of my other life goals. And If I cant, I can kiss them all goodbye. I am on my 5th attempt in 4 months to break free, and currently 21 days fully clean. I am joining this forum as a preventative measure and pray it can work for me. If it does I really want to give back as well.
I was unaware that this was an addiction until very recently. Yet it began about 20 years ago! 4 months ago I was browsing the internet and I stumbled across an ebook entitled something to the effect of “30 days of discipline” or something like that. One of the things was no masterbation or pornography for 30 days. The task was daunting but I wanted to do something Id never done before to build stronger will power. I am in commission sales and try to do whatever I can to have an edge, failing miserably a lot of the time haha. Little did I know how much of a challenge this would be.
My longest streak was 34 days. And the things that helped me then and are helping me this time around as well, are:
1. Scheduled Cold showers
2. Scheduled Meditation/deep breathing exercises (and conscious deep slow breathing throughout the day). I do the Wim Hof Method if anyone wants to research it. Its incredible.
3. Scheduled time to workout.
4. Reading posts on Nofap/Reddit/Yourbrainonporn.com for motivation
These things helped a lot and obviously are goals in and of themselves to support the life I want to have. But they have not been enough to keep me clean! I am fed up. Day 21 today was really hard. I’m struggling financially, there are serious problems in my family, and of course I had more urges then the previous 20 days combined. So while I am stressed, a little depressed, and emotionally exhausted, The fact that I didnt cave in, and was lucky enough to find this community is giving me more hope. Man I needed it!
I dont want to objectify women anymore. I didnt even know I was doing that until a couple months ago when I realized the damage porn and prostitues have done to my brain. While the prostitute addiction came after a few failed relationships, it still feels just as damaging if not more than pornography. No wonder my relationships failed in the end. I realize now that ultimately I was too selfish to be able to care for them. And funny enough I also realize the best I could have cared for them was to cut things off way sooner. I stayed in the relationships way too long because the sex was great. Other than that, not so good. And I am ashamed to say it now that I fully understand what I did. Up until recently I all but gave up on the idea of marriage and having a family, and I’m still not sure.
But from what ive gathered over the past few months, a full brain reboot of 90 days of abstinence can reverse a lot of physical, emotional, and psychological problems. I have grown a lot, but I have a whole lot more growing to do. I pray this community is the link I have been missing. I know how important this is and I promise to do everything I can to contribute and implement your advice. God Bless.
PS - I dont know if I need to include this but I have not been a practicing Jew since my Bar Mitsvah. I am 33 years old now. My immediate family was never very observant. However I am considering taking another look but I have no idea where to start. I dont understand a lot of the Hebrew terminology on this site. Does anyone know if there is a glossary of terms? Thank you.
Lots of Love Yankel
