Fapstronaut wannabee

Hi all Fapstraunauts,

Let me introduce myself. I'm 35, I'm not a native english speaker (so please excuse misuse of wording and syntax...) and I just joined NoFap today, after reading a lot of stuff around here for the last three days. During this time I haven't PMOed, and I'm now accepting the challenge of leaving this 22+ year addiction behind me, and fighting to recover my own self.

Let me say first that I find the NoFap community incredible in the way support is offered and stories are listened to and understood. I've only very recently realized how big an effect P was having on my life, and I'm glad I stumbled upon all of you, struggling with the same issues, and shining with hope of recovery.

I've been a constant and heavy user since age 13 or so. That's 22 years ago. 8000 days. The youngest and most innocent years of my life. It started with phone services where actors used to tell erotic stories, followed by lots of printed publications and then late night movies and finally the grand coming of internet. That's right I was already a P user on 33.3kbps dial-up modems. Needless to say the PMO addiction got fed with more available and more "efficient" material over the years. It has grown with me and I only begin to realize that it may not be a definitive situation ; that change is possible and that circumstances and habits can be manipulated to our will.

Throughout my (not so many) relationships with women, I've always suffered from DE (not ED). Being an introvert I always thought that "it would disappear with time" and that "my timidity and general unease were causing it".

These last years have seen a lot going on that is related to my PMO addiction.

I had a girlfriend for about two years, which I deeply loved. Being with her I largely let P outside my life, partly because I had something else to do and care for, partly because my intimacy was occupied by someone else. I even deleted about a terabyte of P with the strong feeling that this was something of my past. Now that I know a bit of the theory behind it, I was definetely rebooting, and funnily enough this was still hard mode (thanks to my DE) even though I was with my girlfirend. But somehow along the way the omnipresent DE suffocated our sexual lives to the point that she cheated on me "to feel normal again" according to her own words. I was devastated.

I immediately fell in a spiral of P binge, self-depreciation, demotivation and finally depression which I've been trying to recover from for the past year or so. I also quit my job and moved away from where we lived together.

While this situation is slowly being adressed, I've build the will to focus on discovering the roots of my life's evil. I've read books and meditated and seek professional help and counsel, I've also talked a lot with my parents and family about things in my life that I had completely forgotten or misinterpreted, to the point of having a quite false image of it. Now after months of this careful introspection I came accross the YourBrainOnPorn website and the NoFap community. Reading all this material, the pieces I gathered through all this time started to fall into place. There I was, realizing that what had followed me (everywhere in the world) my whole life and that I didn't think could do me such wrong was actually an addiction. A pernicious one, that deforms reality and my own self, that went reaching into the best moments of my life and deconnected me from them, from my own life. A quite obvious explanation once you have all the facts in front of your eyes. I was astounded, and excited that maybe, just maybe, there would be a tunnel to go through. I'm not even considering the light at the end of it yet. Finding the tunnel in all that fog was difficult enough.

Here I am today with the firm determination to achieve challenge after challenge if relapse happens, because way up there after all these obstacles is my P-less life, the one I split ways with when I was 13yo.

Thanks a lot for reading up to this point another story like there seems to be so many.

While I have questions and concerns about starting this journey, I might drop them in a journal thread somewhere so as to keep stuff organized and clear. I guess that's the best option?

Have a wonderful day

 

Thanks for your welcoming @Nerdman , and for the luck as well. Though when I think about it I suppose it's less a matter of luck than self-discipline and overall strength.. Which are hard to reach and maintain... Stayin' focused for now!

Oh and nice streak, you're closing in on my personnal first goal! Keep up the fight!

 

@good looking loser Thanks! I've been very busy making these tips happen, including reading through as many journals I could, and you're right it's an amazing source of feelings and steps and thoughts we can relate to.. Unbelivable riches! While most of the journey is still ahead (isn't it always so?) I feel like I'm doing the right thing for myself, and maybe leave a useful trace is also a great feeling. Let's keep it up!