Hi,

I'm new here. Can go clean for months at a time, but then overwhelmed and relapse. Can use specific advice.

Thanks,

mclean

Dear Mclean,

I am the admin of this forum. Welcome to our community!

Scientific studies have shown that it takes 90 days to change a neural thought pattern that was ingrained in the brain through addictive behaviors. Did you join the 90 day chart on-line? Sign up over here...

Make sure to install a strong filter. It will be almost impossible to break free of this while having all the garbage within a mouse click away. See this page for one good filter option, along with instructions on how to install it best - and give away the password to our "filter Gabai"... See this page for another 20 (or so) filter ideas and information...

We get cries for help every day, by e-mail and on the forum. Tzuras Rabim Chatzi Nechama    And that is why we created the GYE handbooks (links below). If you read them well, from beginning to end, slowly, and try to implement what you read, you will find the answers within them to enable you to completely turn your life around. You're worth it.

Also, join the daily Chizuk e-mail lists to get fresh chizuk every day, and post away on this forum. You will get tons of daily Chizuk and support. This disease can't be beat alone. It works best when you get out of isolation!

GuardYourEyes also offers various free anonymous phone conferences, where you can join a group of other frum Yidden, along with an experienced sponsor. See this page for four different options. Our conferences are taking place daily, throughout the week... This would be a tremendous step in the right direction for you and help you learn freedom from this addiction. Not only will you learn the secret of the 12-Steps - which is known to be the world's most powerful program for beating addiction having helped millions world wide, but joining the group will be another way of GETTING OUT OF ISOLATION and connecting with others who are going through what you are.

One of our goals on GYE is to help people "hit bottom while still on top" so they will take recovery seriously. To explain better what I mean, please see this page. If you're here, it means you're already taking serious steps in recovery, so keep up the good work!

Let me tell you a little about the two GuardYourEyes handbooks. The lay down the cornerstone of all our work at GuardYourEyes. Before the GYE handbook people would often get "lost" when coming to our website, not knowing what tips and techniques to try. For example, someone with a low level addiction wouldn't jump straight into therapy or 12-Step groups, while someone whose addiction was more advanced wouldn't be helped by the standard tips of "making fences", putting in filters etc... For the first time ever, this handbook details all the techniques and tools dealing with this addiction in progressive order. Now, anyone can read it through and see what steps they've tried already, and if those steps haven't worked, they can continue on through the handbook to the next tools, as the suggestions become progressively more "addiction-oriented".

We suggest printing out the handbooks and reading it them at least once. Then, we suggest going back and reading them again slowly on the computer, and this time pressing on the many links that are found in the different articles.

And the second handbook, called the "Attitude" handbook, can also help anyone, no matter what level of addiction they may have. Often people write in to us saying that had they only known the proper outlook & attitude that we try and share on the GuardYourEyes network when they were younger, they would have never fallen into an addiction in the first place! So we hope that through this handbook, many addictions will be prevented.

The handbooks are PDF files, set up as eBooks, and they have bookmarks and hyper-links in the Index, to make them easy to navigate.

Right click on the links below and select "Save Link/Target As" to download the handbooks to your computer.

1) The GuardYourEyes Handbook
This Handbook details 18 suggested tools and techniques, in progressive order, beginning with the most basic and fundamental approaches to dealing with this addiction, and continuing down through increasingly earnest and powerful methods. For the first time, we can gauge our level of addiction and find the appropriate tools for our particular situation. And no matter what level our addiction may have advanced to, we will be able to find the right tools to break free in this handbook!

2) The GuardYourEyes Attitude
The Attitude Handbook details 30 basic principles to help us maintain the proper attitude and perspective on this struggle. Here are some examples: Understanding what we are up against, what it is that Hashem wants from us, how we can use this struggle for tremendous growth, how we can deal with bad thoughts, discovering how to redirect the power of our souls, understanding that every little bit counts, learning how to bounce back up after a fall, and so on and so forth...

May Hashem be with you!

Hi Mr. Clean,
What do you think causes the 'down' episodes?
k

thanks guarduryeyes. I've signed up for 90 days, installed K9, and so far so good, but still worried. I find since connecting with GYE that topic is on my mind much more than ever before and fighting myself constantly. phone conferences sounds interesting, but I see there's nothing in Israel yet.

kutan: I think 'down' episodes are combination of boredom, frustration, and some trigger or triggers that get me going. From reading the site material, nothing out of the ordinary.

You are right friend. If you are trying to control it  things will get worse now. We have to learn how to let go and let god.
The smarter members of this forum can explain this more.

Frumfiend the star is being humble as usual.  If you feel comfortable sharing a little about yourself and your situation, I think we might be able to help out with some specific suggestions about things that have worked for us that you might want to consider. 

Sounds like you've made a gigantic start.  Congratulations!

A suggestion:  If it's on your mind a lot ever since connecting with GYE, that's my guess would be there's an important reason that's happening.  Maybe you could daven a little, have a little talk with Hashem, and ask Him what's up with this stuff being on your mind so much ever since connecting with GYE.  I find that sometimes when I start dwelling on things (like the IRS audit notice I just got) that I'm thinking (and feeling scared) that I've got to roll my sleeves up and make this thing come out right.  What I am slowly learning from doing my work here on the site and elsewhere is that FIRST I have to remember, in a really felt kind of way, and keep reminding myself over and over, that this is all Hashem's doing.  This is His world, His universe.  THEN I can roll my sleeves up and do my little bit of work.  The outcomes I'm not in charge of.

Hope that somehow relates to what you're dealing with.  Sometimes I just ramble away and start talking to myself. 

Please stay in touch.  You sobriety matters very much to all of us.

May Hashem make known to you everything you need to know, and no more. 

The phone conferences work for Israelis too... as long as you speak English.

They really teach you to understand your frustrations and fears, and give real tools to working them out.

B'hatzlacha,

k

thanks for the feedback and support. It's appreciated.

I guess that in the past I would have stretches of time where the issue didn't bother me and I didn't think about it and I thought myself a tzaddik and that I had overcome the issue/temptation. But then something would trigger the urge and no matter how hard I fought or resisted, I eventually gave in, getting relief from the release, then feeling horrible and promising never to do it again only to fall again months later. This cycle has persisted for some time.

This time however, since my last fall, I'm much more conscious of the issue. I installed a filter, which I'm feeling good about. I signed up for all the emails and joined the 90-day chart and am reading from the handbook, attitude and additional material from the site. I don't recall who suggested it, but I'm trying the "eye bounce" strategy with I think decent results. So besides the overall feeling of chizuk and practical restraint, it does add up to being on my mind much more. I do find myself davening with more kavana and generally happier, but I think I have a long way to go.

way to go!
your story is common on GYE, which is why we appreciate the resource. We are no longer alone, and don't have to grope in the dark dealing with this issue.
You alone will find what works best for you, and never stop monitoring the situation!
kutan

You are doing all the right things.  Great to hear about your kavanah.  this is good news indeed.  KUTGW

mclean wrote on 23 Oct 2010 19:30:

what mclean wrote , about thinking about the whole thing much more is a good point that bothered me too , did a/o else experience such  a thing  and have any   thoughts on the matter?

ieeyc wrote on 14 Jan 2018 20:48:

I B"H don't have this issue. However I think it has to do with that fact that you are focusing on the topic. For example when someone tells you not to think of a pink elephant, that will be the only thing the person will think about.

I think there are 2 kinds of people 
1. People who maybe once or twice a month struggle with shmiras einayim those should come to the site once to see that if they don't take care of their problem it could lead to addiction, install filters and continue their life....
2. And then the ones that struggle non stop with masturbation or pornography (whether you want to call him an addict or not) usually the reason why a lot of us are constantly on this site is because we belong to this group.

And you are right it might cause us to think about sexuality more but the goal is to shift and think about healthy sexuality and what it should really be and why Porn is soo bad for us and causes such deep fake beliefs on sexuality and i think one of the reason's we constantly fall is because we try too hard to not think about sexuality something that unfortunately we cannot control so i don't think there is a problem of thinking too much about it we just have too change from thinking about lusting all the time too thinking all the time about how terrible this addiction is. Do you dear friends agree or did i miss the boat?

Just my 2 Cents
 Love Yankel

I hear what you and lion king have to say, and well put,  I have no regret joining ,but ,if I can explain it well, before I got into gye,i had a life with learning Torah ,Chesed, a regular yeshivash life, PLUS, i had an issue with lust ,mast******n,but now after I was getting more into  gye ,I feel  these lust things have become more of an issue and now I had an esek with lust,PLUS I learn TorahChesed etc..could be because im more aware that the issue that I had before could develop  into a fullblown addiction .not clear.

Before I joined my view on pornography was that it's a good thing but I'm not allowed to do it. I don't know if I'm thinking about it now more than before, but that's for sure that now sometimes when I'm thinking about it I think of it in such a negative way... So it's actually a good thing that I'm thinking about it... I'm looking on it as it is a bad bad ugly thing that my body is addicted to. Just like drugs. So I think to myself, "are you really going to give in to that ugly thing?? You're smarter than that!". Obviously this is not always the case, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.
Besides, I think there must be a difference between thinking about women and all porn (aka ****) concepts, and thinking / talking about pornography & masturbation. When you mb you're not thinking about masturbation... When you watch porn you're not thinking about porn, you focus on what you see (yes you do...).