Hi everyone! Just wanted to get out there and post some of my progress, be mishtatef with the tzibbur, strengthen and be strengthened.

I'm at day 13 right now, a pivotal point in time. For the last few years I've usually been able to go for about 2, some rarer cars three weeks...and then I fall. I promptly pick myself up, mechazek myself, get all inspired... and then get duped into thinking that I'm all better. Of course once that happens I usually fall 2 weeks later again. I made a resolve to take the 90 day challenge, and especially now. Because the 90 days ends right at my next birthday ( which is a big one for me). And I need to be in a better place before I hit the next decade of my life. 

So anyway, there are 2 things that I wanted to mention that I know are major pain points and yesodos in my personal recovery.
The first is getting to sleep on time at night. This has dogged me for years as I can't seem to ever get to bed at a healthy normal hour. Part of the problem (a huge part) is that my wife usually goes to sleep really early which leaves me lonely, stressed and of course bored. This is the time when I'm tired and stressed, my body is crying for rest but I refuse to give it what it needs. Naturally, the body starts craving all sorts of chemicals to override the stress hormones and reset back to calm levels. So at night I crave to eat junk food and of course to browse the web. I usually am just browsing benign sites but at some point it turns towards the darker places. I cannot stress enough the importance of getting to bed on time at night. First of all, this leaves you feeling healthier, with more energy and less stress on the body and less need to act out to bring you back to normal equilibrium. Second, it greatly minimizes the opportunity of the yetzer since all that alone time is no longer there.

The second thing is, I made a kabalah not to bring my phone into the bathroom with me, or if at work, not to take it out of my pocket... Not even to check emails. Once you're alone with the phone in the bathroom, it's too easy to end up in the wrong places. So, no phone in the bathroom, I'll leave it on the table or elsewhere and I find that I've discovered so much extra time since my bathroom trips are so short!!
i wish everyone hatzlocha and would love to hear from you all!!

You collect rare cars? Cool
Mater ones too?
My "good night unfiltered device calendar" may interest you

Click on the word "restrictions" below for more

I don't know if I welcomed you, so WELCOME!

It sounds like you are focused on the "gedarim" part of recovery.  Do you think that going to bed earlier and making the gedarim with your phone are long-term solutions?

Thank you Gibbor!

I would have to say that this is by no means the only thing that I am focusing on - rather these are just some tools or strategies that I am trying to implement to help along with the fight. Aside from all the other good tools mentioned here on GYE, I find that it helps me to find an area which is small enough to take on, and make a kabbalah on that small thing. So something like not bringing my phone to the bathroom is a small act which is mostly controllable and yet has a large impact on prevention. I have found myself in the past getting triggered there and I wanted to prevent that from happening again. The fact is that for me, it is not a large nisayon to leave the phone outside, and it is rather a large nisayon to not see anything that would trigger me. By not bringing it in I have easily prevented getting into any situations with the added benefit of feeling much hatzlocha. 
A person can feel real positive progress and growth when he is able to conquer even a tiny little area consistently. When he knows that he trusts himself in this area, because of a healthy habit that he worked on, there is tremendous joy and hope that there is a way out of this, eventually.

Besides, if we don't implement some type of manageable and reasonable gedarim we are still left in the ring with the yetzer harah. What better way of developing healthy habits than by limiting our nisayon where possible. The trick is that these 2 areas that I mentioned were areas that I could control before the nisayon took place, rather than being with the nisayon and relying on an emergency email or a heartfelt tefillah to get me out of the hole.
As far as being long term, the truth is that the getting to bed early is actually not easy for me to do consistently, though I know it will help if I do, however the other geder I mentioned - I accepted upon myself to give a small knas to tzedaka if I look at my phone in the bathroom, and so far so good....!

I felt the same way about the small nightly restriction I mentioned, that it impacts other areas and times

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B'h 21 days!

26 days B'h!
Today was the first day that I had to fight my desire. I have been doing very well B'h since I joined here 26 days ago, not really struggling much. However over the last few days I have been feeling a slowly growing feeling of complacency, perhaps the initial momentum and excitement of being part of the program is beginning to wane just a bit. I also had an emotionally draining night as my wife and I exchanged some tense words during a stressful homework/bedtime routine for the kids. This always puts me into a bad mood and I wait for everyone to go to sleep so that I can have some peace and quiet. However tonight I felt the old nagging feeling coming from some familiar but dark place to go check out the news sites and whatnot. I usually recognize that when this happens, deep down I am hoping that I happen upon some exciting picture. This is a psychological ploy that I must use to trick myself into getting deeper in without willingly putting myself in harms way. I think it's a rationalization to protect myself so that I will feel that it was somewhat of an oness. Kind of like the nachash and Chava - just touch the eitz hadaas and you'll see nothing will happen to you.
Usually I would have fallen right in but tonight I had the presence of mind to quickly log into gye and B'h I was nischazek. So far, just being on this site has worked wonders and it really resets my mind in ways that I cannot do just by myself.
That being said, my question is, will I be resigned to logging on to gye nightly for the rest of my life or will I eventually come to some sort of position of strength? Will I fail miserably the moment I leave the safe haven of gye or will something actually change in my brain? I know that I am an addict but I hate feeling that I will need a daily treatment of gye for the rest of my entire life. Is there really a hope of true recovery or addicts don't ever recover, they just learn to cope with the new reality? If there is no real recovery, won't we will eventually fall?
I'm not intimating that I am not willing to put in the hard work, I am just disheartened when I think that maybe I will never really recover from this if all it takes is one bad mood and one bad picture...

Good going.
It all depends, and there can be many factors.

I think that everyone agrees that with time it gets easier. How long and how much easier....that depends.

Additionally, there are people that need to root out the cause for this behavior, not just the behavior itself.

B'hatzlachah to you

Holy Levi,

For me this Forum although anonymous helps me communicate with others.  

What cords said is 100% true. Now if you are like me and socializing on Gye keeps you sober, then you will and should continue doing that biz 120



We are social butterflies whether we like it :-) or not :-/



Most and I think 99% of GYE members that achieved true sobriety ODAAT (i.e. No white knuckling), need to graduate the forum to socialize with real people (although often may need more than that).



לתאוה יבקש נפרד

As long as we remain נפרד, we will seek תאוה, when there's actually something more enjoyable than illicit תאוה, and that is living life to its fullest



Youre doing great!!



KEEP ON TRUCKING

Most people who recover are not even on GYE anymore.  GYE is not magic.  Solid relationships.  Coping skills.  Healthy trust that Hashem loves you, cares for you, is there for you even in your darkest moments.  These are all components.

Don't worry about the future too much.  Worry about what you can do to stay sober each day.

Incidentally, worrying about the future was one of the ways I would act out.  "It's too hard.  I can't keep this up forever.  Might as well act out now."  Worrying about the future is usually counterproductive.

Thanks Cordnoy, I'm sure it gets easier but I wonder if you are still always treading upon thin ice. Based on past experience I know that the pain of failure is very great after a significant period of sobriety and a person needs tremendous strength not to fall into a depression which will cause a nose dive. Do people find it easier to get up after a fall and forgive oneself?
As far as rooting out the underlying cause, that it perhaps the most important thing and the hardest of all. Unfortunately I don't think gye is enough to treat the root cause 

Thanks Markz. I was never a social butterfly but I may just want to become one now

Gibbor, I guess I'm just concerned that I don't really have a good approach to truly correcting the underlying causes of the behavior. I feel like in many ways many of us need a dedicated therapist to help us unlearn the negative behaviors and then work on replacing them with healthy thought patterns. This is essentially trying to modify your middos which is a serious project that takes constant work and growth. Is "one day at a time" enough for this?

You raised a lot of good points, I want to comment on the last one

White knuckling is not a ODAAT program. Rather, if you have a plan in place then you can apply it ODAAT. 

GOTIT?

Have you tried dovs phone conference?  Any phone conference?

I'm not sure you have to "modify your middos" to get better.  Certain attitudes can be practiced without professional help.

Trust Hashem to run your life.  Know that he loves you and is there for you.  Give up your will to do His will.

Make sure you have healthy social outlets.  Excercise can be a big help.  Music.  Kosher reading material.

Use all the tools you can.  You have been doing great.  Review what you can do to keep it up and do even better.

Just some random thoughts.