After having been caught using porn by my wife last October, I have undergone therapy and counseling and the whole nine yards. This was a big deal for me as I'd been a lifelong porn user and masturbator. The process awakened me to how toxic the porn habit was. I was a "nofapper" until last weekend. I had a relapse and looked at some porn and masturbated for about a half hour. It was intoxicating, but I also felt an intense sense of shame and regret for breaking my promise to myself and my wife. I immediately contacted her the next day to start a "reset" as a gamble that immediately coming clean was my only hope. This was coming from a lot of literature and workbooks that I did about 9 months ago to help recover from a sex addiction. In the process of working through this last Saturday morning, I came upon your website. I live in a fairly rural southern area where people typically keep all of their dysfunctions secret. Thus, i was unable to find any support groups last fall when I had my initial attempt at quitting. I felt that by joining as a "fapstronaut", I could get some help - even if it is just constantly logging in and being reminded of how important it is that I keep my focus - and I might also be able to be a help to others who have either not had as much experience or luck as I have. I have a beautiful, loving, caring and sexy wife who is not squeamish, but my porn/masturbation addiction has deeply, deeply wounded her. In addition, by backsliding last Friday/Saturday has undone most/all of the progress we had made after our initial rough patch. Not only do I want to do this for myself, but I also want to do it because I love my wife and this is a non-negotiable issue for her. My goals are the following: 1) To be a "nofapper" for the foreseeable future - the rest of my life? 2) To never look at porn again I still like, want to have, and believe that healthy sex with a real person that you like/love is ok, desirable, and wonderful - so no extreme Catholic monk type celibacy for me! I'm in. Please let me know what to do next. I'll try to monitor my account daily. Thanks for any help you can give, and let me know if I can help you. I'm about 40 and I've been up and down the pike a few times, but I still have to learn a lot as clearly, I'm still an addict/fuck-up.
Hey Js_2ndC, Welcome to Nofap! your not alone with your struggle, everyone here has similar problems to you and can offer great advice. Everyone in the community has been real helpful in the start to curbing my addiction. When ever you feel tempted come and browse the forms, read about how this addiction affected other peoples lives and their struggles with it. the stories and advice you will get here will keep you free, and if you relapse don't give up! keep getting up and trying again until it sticks. Id start my by looking around the forms and getting to know the community. posting on forms with good advice and asking questions yourself. For a good starting place id recommend checking out this form and posting in it: http://www.nofap.org/forum/showthread.php?2402-Get-educated-get-tools-and-learn-to-love-withdrawals once you get to known the website, sign up for small goals (like PMO free for 7 days or so) and gradually move on to larger goals (1400 days). Good Luck with the addiction curb, I'm rooting for you!
Thanks for the reply Abhorsen. I really appreciate the support. I was successful for months and then gradually took one tiny step at a time back toward the porn. I think the missing ingredient was real people that I could share my burden with that did nto think I was a pervert or something.
