Hi there dear friends!
Just sharing a thought. I have struggled sometimes with M. Like most married men, usually when my wife was not available for medical or halachic reasons. The last time I did it I suddenly realized that the pleasure it provided did not even come close to what I was seeking, the closeness, the intimacy, the deep emotions, the whole world that is married life, it wasn't even a shadow of the real thing. It literally took away most of the desire to it, and when the fire is lower maybe we can muster enough yiras shomayim to overcome the desire. I hope this helps someone out there.

I believe that we fall to P&M because we are looking for a quick fix to our problem.
Not only doesn't it help, unfortunately it only makes things worse. 

Aside for the fact that the actual pleasure it provides doesn't measure up to the extreme desire for the pleasure.

Absolutely agree, so when we have the urge if we remember that we won't even really enjoy it, That thought helps me control myself (sometimes)

I personally don't find that this helps me. Because who are we fooling? in the moment that's what we want. Cognitive approaches to fighting urges dont work in my opinion. When we have an urge, no matter how much we scream at our brain that we dont like this urge, our brain still feels the same urge. Actually it just gets worse. This is my opinion. Feel free to argue. :-)

Human being wrote on 28 Nov 2022 03:13:

the cognitive work needs to be done before the urge comes.  If the preparation is done beforehand, then there will be strength to resist or move on from the urge.  

Vehkam wrote on 28 Nov 2022 03:24:

Any progress in anything must start cognitively. We must first recognize and understand what we are struggling for, why we are struggling, our goals etc etc. Step 1 must be cognitive, and without starting cognitively we are bound to fall through when the challenge comes our way. So i am going to agree with you 100% on that.   

What about the next step? do you agree to what i write below?↙↙↙↙↙↙↙↙↙↙⤵⤵⤵⤵⏬⏬⏬⏬⏬⏬⤵⤵⤵⤵⤵↘↘↘↘↘↘

That being said, cognitive approaches will not take away our feelings in the moment. In my opinion it will make it stronger. When we worry about our urges we are having because we don't want them, our urges get worse. And then we worry about them more. And then they get worse. And then we worry about them more. And then they get worse.................................................. This is my experience and opinion. Opinions anyone?

Human, 
I agree with you that it doesnt help me. 
I actually unfortunately enjoyed it very much, too much..... Of course afterwards i feel like crap. But in the moment, the high i get is insane. No other physical pleasure comes close.
I have tried and i was successful in part because of the techniques that ive learned here. But sometimes it gets too much like today. I cant take this anymore. Im aroused by everything and this has gotten worse since i stopped P and M. I am hyper-sensitive and i dont have the strength to keep fighting. The only reason i havnt fallen completely is i dont have strength to the  depressive feelings afterwards either............. 

I don't know if you guys are married, but at least for me, being a married guy, and doing it when my wife wasn't available as a fill in, I found that being that intimacy is so much more than physical, maybe even primarily emotional (for me it's that way), when I realized that I was seeking a substitute that was so far from the real thing it really changed my urge for it, I realized that what I was looking for would not be found there. Obviously, if you are not married, or you are but don't experience intimacy as an emotional experience, it would be hard for you to understand, and it wouldn't work for you. I was just sharing what worked for me. 

Dear Chancy, please reach out to someone. Talk it out. Having friends who care for you will help. I'm sure HHM has good ideas, and there probably others like him. Reach out to them. We all care for you! May Hashem be with you and may you feel His closeness

I think that no one approach can work for everyone. Different measures might be needed even for the same person at other times in the journey.
I see this with myself. When I started seriously working on this, it was strictly cognitive - and it worked for a while. Then, I started realizing deeper emotional issues in me, which most likely stand behind my acting out, and the cognitive solutions were (still are) out the window.

An example of something I realized is that my acting out has nothing to do with my wife being available. In fact, very often my desire to act out was/is triggered by being with her. I am essentially looking to fill an enormous hole in me. So far, all the porn I crammed in there hasn't filled it. So, with this knowledge, I should see that this is not what I need and stop, right? But, you see, this is a cognitive calculation; I'm acting out of emotion.  Emotion that I'm still learning to identify.

Oh, and to answer the question in the subject:
Sometimes.

Which is probably why I keep trying again.

Human being wrote on 28 Nov 2022 16:16:

in my experience, if you already spent time resolving to not follow your urges and anticipating the battle, you can shut them down when they come.  You can follow your plan to think about something else etc... I agree with you that you cannot do a proper risk/reward analysis or the like when you are caught up with intense urges.  see page 113 in the Battle of the Generation.  Of course this doesn't work for everyone.  There are many factors that can make it easier or more difficult.  

best regards,
vehkam

@ chany 100%  I agree with you !! i find myself in every word you wrote

I find it helpful to realize that so much of why we Act on lust— is just to numb the craving. not necessarily to receive pleasure. 
Take someone who has control over his thoughts and take someone who acts on his lust I find they’re generally both receiving the same amount of pleasure at the end of the day (obviously the one who’s controlling his thoughts lives a much better life but that’s a different topic) Because so much of acting on lust is just to satisfy the crave. 
When we find a way to get rid of the crave we will be the same satisfied as if we had masturbated 10X. 
not sure if I’m expressing myself clearly... 
hope this helps somewhat.