Kinda hesitant to share this. But I had a hergesh from a current event I wanted to unload. If someone thinks this crosses into lashon hara please lmk and I'll delete.

There was a headline about a yungerman in lakewood who asked was arrested and accused of propositioning a minor. And to be clear, I firmly believe he is totally innocent and they almost certainly came down hard on him out of anti-semitism. Word has it that the lakewood police department needs to be cleaned up. That being said.

I saw the articles saying things like, "an avreich, a father of eight, his kid in the backseat, and they think he would proposition a male teenager!?!? How ridiculous!!! Anti-semitism!!"
And it made me wanna cry. I think we all know around here that being in kollel, a father of eight, and, yes, even having a your toddler in the backseat doesn't mean much to someone sick with lust. 

The slippery slope is real. Internet porn may not end up with propositioning teenaged boys in a car wash. But it could, or at least, it could end somewhere just as bad. And the time to stop is now, because at some point it really is too late. I really don't want my rock bottom to be in the back of a police car. . .   

Which makes a wonderful opportunity to bring this gem back to the forefront

OH MY LORD! I just read the link redfaced just posted back to chosemyshems old post and it is legit terrifying it really makes you think about where P could lead you. Ten points.

chosemyshem wrote on 19 Jun 2024 16:17:

Yep I definitely tasted it
Need to wash my brain out
Thanks for the mussar

And so but the funny part is despite all the inspiration I started the day with yesterday it still ended with copious amounts of porn. 

Q for the chevra:
Here I am, about three months sober from masturbation and yet for the past few weeks I've been binging pretty heavily on porn. Is it perhaps because I've been successfully staying away from masturbation the porn has gotten worse (and by worse I mean worse than at the beginning of my recent clean streak but by no means worse than it ever was)? Meaning, either because there's no natural end to the porn sesh or because I'm being moreh heter that since it won't end in ejaculation it's not so bad.
Or is it just lust doing its thing and I'm resisting partially? 

Curious to hear the velt's thoughts, opinions, and amateur Freudian psychology. It's a little bit of weird situation I find myself in. 

Shalom Shem,

I don't know if interesting is the right word, but interesting observation that it's possible that the porn watching is longer due to the absence of masturbation. 

If I decide to go on a cookie diet but 'allow' cake, I'm likely to eat more cake in lieu of said cookies. There is still some self-control in not eating both, but 'allowing' the cake makes it an 'easy' replacement for the lack of cookies. If I stop eating cake too, that makes it harder to not eat the cookies. 

You essentially have a way to cheat your diet, even if it's not with the worst thing, and this alternate indulgence is almost automatically stepping up. You'll binge on the 'heter' because you are committed to a clause of the diet more than the diet itself. I go to the gym twice a week like I said I would, but I just sit in the hot tub instead of hitting the treadmill. I made progress by getting out of the house and to the gym, but now I'm hindering that progress by avoiding the workout.

A few times in the hot tub or 'accidental' porn while not masturbating is different than consistently turning to porn and starting to lose touch with the reason you came to the gym in the first place.

As an aside - porn is a much more thorough mode of distraction / escape than masturbation, which plays out as a much harder challenge if you looking for and enjoying the distraction.


Basically, I think everything that you said is nogeah. 

Seems like the next step may need to involve some sweating,.
**edit** Just wanted to clarify that I do not mean to say CV that you are not adequately trying or making enough progress. I don't believe that at all. What I intended to convey is the mindset and pattern that I think bears being aware of and thinking about.

Hatzlacha Brother

I'll echo what ChooseShem proposed and what BenShem said in response to ChooseShem: porn is a much more thorough mode of distraction/escape than masturbation.

For a long time, up until recently, I did the same thing you described, I didn't masturbate (at least not to porn) but I found myself watching porn more often and for far longer than when masturbating to it. I think it's a direct result. Without the masturbatory release, the brain stays in a heightened state of arousal. Usually, masturbation puts an end to that, and afterwards you don't want to know that porn exists.

I'm not here to talk about the Jewish/Halachic/Kabalistic perspective, I'm also not saying this is true for everyone, but from a purely physical point of view and for me, watching porn without masturbating has greater negative effects than simple P&M.

Interesting feedback and good points. I do think I've always been more attracted to porn than masturbation and that may have something to do with it as well. Hmmm.

Said interesting feedback did nothing to stop me continuing watching some porn today. 

Boss contacted me that we got hacked. That threw me into a panic that I went on some shady porn site which infected the office network, or even if I didn't, that the investigation into what happened will turn up my porn use. That did scare me straight for the remainder of the day. . . 

Checking in quickly.

Bad week. Bad day. Bad.

Lotta porn this week. Lotta avoiding responsibilities in ways that'll hurt. 

I realized that I'm actually in a pretty bad place with lust (despite not masturbating for awhile) and need to take it seriously.

Despite that realization I still spent the whole day watching porn. Not good. In fact, I'd say bad. Very Bad.

Thank you for being so open with your struggles. Hashem should bless you this coming week with happiness and strength. Hashem should help you find ways to make more gedarim.

mountainclimb wrote on 11 Jul 2025 22:18:

More gedarim?

I have gedarim out the wazoo. I don't know if more gedarim would do much. 

Hashem should maybe help me stick to the ones I have, feel motivation or remember Him. Or maybe more gedarim would help. Who knows. Not me, that's for sure.

I guess the tefillah is Hashem should get me clean whatever it takes, give me clarity on what I need to do and the strength and presence of mind to ask Him to do what I cannot do, and should make the whole thing as pleasant as possible.

Anyway. Checking in. Two days clean. 

Legit scared of the blowback I may get at work from spending the past week on porn and distraction, and not on my work tasks. Trying to turn to bitachon to address that fear, and not lust to escape it. I guess I'll find out Monday what the consequences are.

Feels good to recognize that I need to put in the work. Like now I know what the next step is (what is the actual next step is takeh a good question. But whatever it is practically, it's gonna be putting in the work. If that didn't make sense I blame the lack of food.) Actually not feeling so down about recognizing that I'm back at square one. Because it's not really square one. I'm clean 3+ months from masturbation and that's a serious thing. Progress has been progressing. I guess I'm looking at it like I'm on square one on level 10. Not square one of level one anymore. Grateful for that.

Just wanna unload something I've been struggling hard with recently, probably for most of the time I've been in this recent slump. I accidentally (or at least 90% accidentally) caught a serious eyeful of someone through a window a few weeks ago. And since then I've been noticing that I've been looking hard through windows. I don't like it - it feels pretty sleazy and out of control - but I'm doing it a lot. And it's pretty abnormally lustful for me too I think. Though maybe I've been doing it for longer and am just noticing it more now. Either way, I'm struggling to put a stop to it. 

That's where I'm at for now. Committed to getting clean from porn/lust, and at the same time, not using the "reset" excuse to slip backwards in masturbation.

In a way you make it sound like he is guilty, but when I read the news it didn't sound like that. So yes. I think it may be lashon hara because it adds a negative spin.

Hashem should help you get completely clean of P & MM, and should give you happy happiness and strength.

Quick check in.

Clean week. By clean I mean no porn, no filter poking, no quasi (queasy?) erotic content online. Been flexing some muscles that had gotten kinda weak. Some success with street ogling*, but needs more work.

Boss is out of town (yet again!) tomorrow and Friday is anyway a tough day. Hoping for a good day, posting for accountability.  


* I feel like I need a good term for this. I'm sure the chevra here can relate to the type of thing I do sometimes. It's not just a second look at an attractive women I happen to see, it's eye-groping every woman on the street and looking around to make sure I don't miss a single one. It's definitely not stam "shemiras eynayim". But it's not porn, not erotic content, so can't call it that. Not loving ogling as a word either (and here's a fun fact. Google says the etymology of "ogle" is German and the same shoresh as "oigen". How bout that.) I'm would say "street lust" but that could mean a lot of things - and wouldn't include that one woman who likes short skirts and the elevator nearby my office. Any suggestions? 

chosemyshem wrote on 17 Jul 2025 21:10:

For what it's worth, I have a suggestion :
Stop focusing on the term and just Start keeping your head down.

From reading your posts, you seem like the type of guy I can talk to for hours.  The type that loves to psychoanalyze everything. 

After many years in this fight I'm starting to realize that our logical brain is not necessarily helping us in this area of our life. At some point you have to ask to ask yourself - Am I over analyzing this? 

I've read so many self help books and so many marriage books and I learned good stuff from many of them, but after so many years my head was spinning and I still couldn't figure out why I was failing.

I'm learning now that I have been over complicating things. It doesn't matter if my personality type clashes with my wife's personality type. It doesn't matter what happened in the past. I just have to make the right choices going forward.
To name a few- I have to stop criticizing. I have to give without expecting anything in return. I have to make sure my wife knows that she is #1. 

I recently realized that keeping my head down in the street is a huge part of making my wife #1 in my life. This has been a game changer for me. More on this later. 

Keep your head down bro. Good luck out there. 

-Diamond