I've found over many years of trying that throwing away my stash only results in a fresh new stash a few weeks later.
Yeah, ask me. I'm the wife that found her husband's porn addiction *After* he died and so much more...so very, very, very much more.
I no longer have any physical media with porn on it. I haven't for a long time. All "my" porn is online. I have accounts on some of the major sites and have favorited lots of porn. But I sympathize with the OP who doesn't throw out his stash. Even though I am working on quitting porn, with some pretty good success (at least relative to the past), I don't delete those accounts. I've done it before, but like the OP, eventually I just end up recreating my stash. I just open new accounts. Part of my goal in NoFap is in fact to cut down on the amount of time I waste. And my experience tells me that recreating my accounts is the biggest waste of time there is. Finding the vids I've watched before, etc. is time consuming. And I become a bit obsessed with building back up my collection. The period of time after I create new accounts is actually when I'm most obsessed with porn. I'm sort of compelled to put in the time to recreate what I got rid of. So, I find it is better just to leave the accounts alone instead. In any case, my goal in recovery is to avoid ALL porn. It's not like deleting my online accounts actually makes porn less accessible. It's everywhere on the net, and one doesn't need an account to access it. So it's more important to me figure out how to avoid all porn, whether it's saved in my accounts or not.
Sorry to hear that. I have thought about that at times with COVID and the possibility of car accidents and so forth. I would rather that nobody finds my stash, because I think it would sadden and disgust them. I'm not married, so it would be my mother or my siblings.
I used to have a magazine and dvd but I threw them out a long time ago. Then I sadly began to remember most of the names of my favorite stars, trying to block out now though.
That’s called relapse. So you’re saying an alcoholic trying to go sober shouldn’t waste his time and money tossing his shelves of booze into a dumpster because he’ll just go back to drinking again anyway?
Throwing away your booze isn't going to help you kick alcohol. If you can't resist alcohol, dumping it all in a dumpster isn't going to solve your problem. You'll just end up at the corner liquor store anyway. You need to build the skills to resist drinking.
You are correct, of course, on the point of developing skills to go sober. The downside, though, of keeping your drug stash - porn, booze or whatever - is that it’s there to easily tempt you. The upside is…?
I got rid of all my stash. It was the most liberating thing I have ever done. I've found that I can't straddle the fence so it had to go because I wanted to be free from PM. Think about the money you would typically spend on P and determine what you would really like to spend your money on instead.
Trouble for me is that I will simply replace what I throw away eventually, so I buy the same DVDs two or three times. I admire your steadfastness, but I know from past experience how it goes for me. It is better for me to merely put them away rather than throwing them away entirely
Just relapsed, so I’m an expert at nothing. Except maybe failure. Sounds like you’re planning and preparing yourself for that quite well, so you don’t need my advice.
This is your addict talking. You are not working recovery, you are trying to white knuckle, and you’re right, you will always relapse doing that. Keep throwing it out and maybe your rock bottom will be the realization of “ what a huge waste of money”. Seriously, until your addiction hurts more than being in recovery you will continue being addicted. That’s fine, why quit if it’s not hurting anyone but yourself? However, since you are hurting yourself don’t you think you are worth the pain to get clean and free?
i am in the same boat as you, i keep my stash and just don't think about it otherwise i will try to replace it; as for what my family will think of me well i used to care but i will be dead so what does it matter? if god exist i will have more pressing things to think about anyways.