I came across this website about 2 weeks ago and I wanted to introduce myself to my fellow soldiers. I have been fighting a battle for about 10 years now. I have davened 3x a day, everyday, to overcome this war and although I know my tefillos were certainly heard I have yet to find a way out. Although BH I am married with a child I have felt very alone. For years I felt like an evil sinner and I thought I was battling by myself.
But B'chasdei Hashem I think I finally found some help. I found you guys! After reading the blogs, emails, etc. for the last 2 weeks it was very clear that with the achdus that is felt on this site I dont have to feel so alone anymore. I can go to battle now knowing that I have others behind me. Others that were there and succeeded. I hope you guys will be behind me and iy"H I hope to be able to do the same for others in the future.
As many might know, the first 3-7 days are the most difficult. I am starting day 2 and hope to be starting a new life as well.
Thank you.
Your new Chaver,
Gam Zu

Welcome to the family! Looking forward to sharing and growing together.

You can do it, one day at a time.

Welcome Gam Zu!

Thanks for introducing yourself. We are thrilled to have you join our ranks. Have a great day 2!

Struggle

Welcome Gam Zu - LETOVA!! One day you will THANK HASHEM for your addiction. Because through it you will learn how to give Hashem your heart and use this struggle as a ladder to climb straight up to the Kisai Hakavod!

The countless Teffilos you have davened over the years are never lost. But Hashem doesn't always answer us on OUR time line. He answers on HIS time-line. And that's why you found us!

The Gemara says: "Habah letaher misaayen lo – He who comes to be purified, they help him", and Chazal also say: "Biderech she'adom rotzeh leilech molichin osoh – in the way a person wants to go, they lead him". Why does the Gemara speak always in plural form: “they help him”, and “they lead him”? The Maharsha explains that every resolution and every effort a person makes creates an angel. And when the army of angels gets large enough, it has the power to help one overcome all the obstacles and lead him to where he wants to get.

Anyway, welcome to our community. Once you've arrived, there's no turning back. Everyone here will just grab a hold of you and pull you up, up, up!

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...

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.

Let me tell you a little about the two GuardYourEyes handbooks. They lay down the cornerstone and foundation of our work, and they make our network much more effective and helpful for people.

You see, until now, people would often get "lost" when coming to our website, not knowing what tips and techniques to try. For example, a beginner wouldn't jump straight into therapy or 12-Step groups, while on the other hand, someone whose addiction was more advanced wouldn't be helped by the standard tips of "making fences" putting in "filters" etc... So it was essential to develop a handbook which details all the techniques and tools to dealing with this addiction in progressive order. Now with these handbooks, anyone can read through and see what steps they've tried already, and if those steps haven't worked, they can continue on through the handbook where the steps become progressively more powerful and "addiction-oriented".

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.

Note: You might want to print them out to read away from the computer. Keep in mind though, that if you do this, you won't be able to click on the many web links in the articles. But you can always come back to them later. The truth is, it's anyway good to go through the whole handbook once without clicking on links, just to get an overview of all the tools available. Once you did that, you can start again from tool #1 and read each tool through more carefully, click the links and study each technique and assess whether you have tried it fully yet or not...

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!

gam zu, im as new as you - welcome aboard, these guys really do make a difference...its hard to stop marching in this parade...the daily emails are also pretty solid...good luck!

Well done on making the first step to breaking free..hope we can help and strengthen each other

Welcome GamZu!! You are not alone anymore in your fight. You are now part of GYE. As long as you stay with us we will never let go. The trick is to keep on posting. It works wonders in battling the y"h.

WELCOME HIELIGEH GAMZU

RESOLVE TO TO DO 90

EASIER SAID THAN DONE

UNSAID IT WILL NOT GET DONE

WE ARE HERE 4 YOU

bardichev

P.S.READ MY POST

BARDICHEVS BATTLE

OR ANYTHING DOV EVER WROTE

Thank you all for responding and welcoming me in. It is so special to be welcomed in and appreciated. It reminds me of the story (I apologize if I butcher it, but I think youll get my point) of a certain Rav who went to an office building one very cold day. The building was scheduled to close for the night at 11:00 and they would shut the heat and lock everything in at that time. For some reason the Rav lost track of time and at 12:00 am he ran to the exit to try to catch the guards from locking him in for the cold night. When he got to the front desk, more than an hour after the building was supposed to close, he was surprised to see the guard sitting there patiently waiting for him. He profusely apologized and asked the guard, "You let in thousands of people into this building everyday, how did you know to wait for me?" To which the guard responded, "When you came in this morning you gave me such a warm greeting that I knew you would have done the same before you left. You made me feel appreciated, which does not frequently happen at this job, so I was more than happy to wait for you to finish up." This story shows the importance of greeting another individual. As I am now on the receiving end of that welcome, I thank you!
It is extremely difficult to go thru this alone. For years I thought I had an uncurable addiction. I would fight my yetzer everyday and on the days that I unfortunately fell, my y''h would tell me "youre different than everyone else! You have an addiction. Dont make it into such a big deal." But now that I found this website and have already made a kesher with such tzaddikim who have gone thru it, I understand that I am not different and I am in a battle which many others are fighting as well. It changes everything to know that I am like everyone else. It gives me no reason to think that I can fall and let it go beacause of a problem that only I have. This gives me an undescribable amount of strength.
B"H day 2 was a success in shmiras habris but I have such a long way to go. I caught myself staring at women on the street, at the office, etc. an uncomfortable amount of times. I have a way to go to fully excell in shmiras aynayim. But in the meantime, I am on to day 3 and like I have read over and over on this site: I need to take it a day at a time.

Gam Zu,

you are very welcome to the welcome.
did you sign up yet for the chart?
and like you said...
one day at a time...

I also felt this way when I started to pay attention. You should be proud of yourself for feeling it. that shows that you are becoming sensitive to and in touch with the way the lust affects you. This is the first step on the road to eliminating it's control over you.

Chazak V'ematz

Welcome Gam Zu,

You are not like everyone else!

You are now ahead of everyone else out there that have not yet discoverd GYE!

We are unfortionatly a small percent of frum Yidden out there that are finally on the way to recovery.

This is a Tzoras Rabim only some of us were zoiche to come across GYE.

Hashem did listen to our prayers & sent us Rabeinu Guard to help us out.

So I wish you lots of luck & a full recovery as well as I ask Hashem to open up the eyes to so many other Yidden that are struggling with this Menuval to join the GYE family that will ultimatly bring Moshiach.

Hashem, just take a look at your children!

Retsoineinu Lasois Retsoinecho! Please help us all to be zoche with Kirvas Elokim.

Yoh Yoh
Efshar Letaken

Warmest hugs and  welcome to a tzadik nistar who goes by the name GamZu,

Chazak! Chazak! V'Nischaziek! Your strength gives us all strength

The holy chevra on this site are all truly beautiful,  glad. That you chose to join!

POst away!

Love and respect to a brother warrior
Noorah from the house of Amram

GAMZUU WE ARE WAITING TO HEAR FROM YOU

I fell......... I can't believe it............... I had to remove my filter late Thursday nt as there was a gliche in the program and boom 30 min of using the filter-free internet turned into browsing and eventually uncontrollable searching. I was so furious with myself. I had an opportunity for a mere 30 min and fell. I felt like such an animal. Like a true behama that immediately gives into my yetzer. I was so upset over shabbos. I kept thinking how can this be? How can I join a forum, post about how strong I am going to be, how excited I am to start anew and within 30 min fall? I felt like such a hypocrite: Here I am in shul davening to Hashem, singing along with the kehillah during keddusha and just yesterday  I fell. It affected me so much I did not turn on the computer till Monday and immediately reinstalled the filter. So far I have been pretty strong since, but still absolutely furious with myself that it actually happened. But the weirdest part was that I felt not only was I letting myself, my family, and HKB"H down; but also my new friends on this forum. This forum really came to mind when the regret hit. I find that remarkable and it shows what an affect you all have on a very new member. But in the meantime, I was just wondering how you guys dealt with the regret that immediately follows after a fall? Let me know what you guys think and how you coped.
All the best,
GZ