I've spent 23 years more or less edging to PMO, so, not to make excuses for not going all-in, but I think divorcing my brain from a) the dopamine bath of edging and b) combining P, M, and O together, would do me enormous good. My goal, of course, is to abstain entirely. But I'm finding 100% abstinence challenging. Sometimes my brain wants to peek at a photo for two seconds and its satisfied. Which, yes, is cheating, but it's .01% of what I used to spend on this sh*t. Also, I've found myself craving a particular video and can't necessarily stop it, but I can control how far I go in responding to it. All these years, I approached watching P like a real sexual experience, in that I edged in detail to every minute of the video without skipping ahead. I've found that I can hack my brain's craving by opening said video, quickly dragging the slider all the way to the end without really watching it, and doing so totally ruins the video in my mind. My brain no longer wants it, and I immediately delete it without even thinking twice about hanging on to it for later. Again, it's cheating (for 2-3 seconds), but it quells the craving for another 2, 3, 4 days, and it's a sustainable hack that works for my own personal situation. Fortunately, at my age, the need to MO isn't really strong, unless I combine it with P, as they are chemically linked. I feel as though my end-game is unlinking them, and the desire for P will probably subside since there's no "good" feeling that goes with it anymore. I could be wrong, but we'll see. But, is a few seconds here and there really going to stunt my brain from healing itself? In a way, I see this as a means of hacking my way to the goal of total recovery, whereas going all-in might just result in cravings so intense that I inevitably fail.
cheating would only weaken recovery, avoid porn and masturbate only when you need to as for this, i'll explain the pink elephant theory. if i tell you to not think of a pink elephant, your brain is automatically going to think about one and the image of a pink elephant would probably stick into your mind. the same applies for that video; you keep telling yourself not to watch that video but that constant reminder infact has an opposite effect. i suggest just doing pushups every time you think of that video or simply taking a shower. anything that diverts your mind from the moment will be beneficial. remember, urges only last 5 or 10 minutes. it's not worth damaging your streak and hurting your recovery
5-10 minutes would be great, but mine last until I either satisfy them or hijack them, as with the scenario above. They'll last for days until I do.
well isn't that what we come here to fix? controling our desires. i strongly suggest you try monk mode
I had the same issue early in my reboot. After 2 months of Hard mode and concentrating on other things I overcame it. Just remember that if u feed something it will always remain alive, If u starve something it will die out, eventually.