Hello, this is my first post and in the past 2 days, I've read all the introductory material. I've discovered that pornography use is something that I'm finally ready to give up. I don't like the way it has re-written my neural brainwaves. It's destroying my relationship with my wife and my daughters. My wife knows when I've been viewing she says because she notices an increase in complaining and irritability from me. I try to stay kind but it's true, I do become annoyed with all people (not just my family) when I've been using. I hope the rebooting process will help me to become human again and start to appreciate and love others more.
Hello sir and welcome to NoFap! For your question, no, not for me. Since you've read all the introductory material, all I will say is that I wish NoFap changes you from a porn addict to the man you desire to be. Stay clean! Good luck!
Hey @JarvisCooper , I'm just a normal ordinary member. No moderator super powers and no special insite. I share my ESH (Experience, Strength and Hope) of what works for me. Just another warm welcome and a heart felt hello. This community has helped me so much. What worked for me was "working" it. It took hard work for me to complete a hard reboot (No pmo) for 120 days, then move into a Sex Positive mode. First, reading the literature published by NoFap itself along with reading journals. Then, doing the work. Writing in my journal and replying to introductions and other's journals. Finally, but not least, getting involved with the fellowship. I found it on the forums, but also in people's profiles. The forums tend to be longer posts, where the profiles tend to be more "conversational". That is what has worked for me. I like to remind myself that this community was here waiting for me with the lights on when I arrived. Now, I have to do my best to be there when someone comes to the community. --- One of the ways I got involved with the fellowship was by reading some really great journals. Reading other's stories with their victories and even defeats is a big part of my program. Here are just a few journals to start with, you'll find more I'm sure: @Iron Patience - https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/155794/ --- @ludwig525 - https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/155658/ --- @Mr.Imperfect - https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/164547/ --- @GeeWhizz - https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/152127/ --- @Sunshadow - https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/75108/ --- I've found that the bricks that hold this community together are cemented with the support of the members of the fellowship. @Mr.Imperfect @Toughboy @romlel @LeoJohn So, if you would have found more profiles yourself, why suggest these particular ones as a start? Those relationships started with just saying hello. So, my ESH is that saying hello has kept the fellowship alive for myself. Looking forward to your success and in seeing you say hello on these profiles, --> L
Thanks for the welcome, @StopTheMusic ! I appreciate you pointing me in the right direction. I will definitely read the journals you posted and look forward to getting involved in the process and "working" it. It's been a tough time trying to kick this habit and I feel like I've tried most everything under the sun. I realize now that I must have strong relationships with others and reach out for help to remain strong and win this battle. I can't do it alone...
Hi to everyone. I'm new too and I'll be looking at the previous links posted. I've never used forum platforms like this and even gave up on Facebook over a year ago so it will be a little practice to learn the functionality of the site ... but if it can help me control my urges (... AND practice english at the same time!) ... that's what I'm here for. Feel free to give me additional advice. As for the main question, I think everyone is different and your reaction is yours. My health background is a chronic and severe post-traumatic syndrome and I realized PMO is a way for me to escape reality. I don't get irritated by others because PMO leads me to isolation... which is not better. Maybe just an extreme (opposite?) way to deal with the PMO addiction. An interesting thing though is I've read many stories about guys getting back better social skills by nofap so even if our situation are different, a similar solution might lead us to good things. I hope the best for us all!
Thanks for sharing! Interesting that we all have different ways of responding after we've fallen. I wondered if that would be the case. Yes, I have come partially clean before and have definitely noticed greater social skills. I seem to click better with others and have more compassion and interest in other's lives when I'm clean for a while. Pressing on!
Oh sometimes, Life makes things in a way... I've recently passed a roommate that was hiding an addiction... One day, I opened his bedroom door and he had a crack pipe in his mouth... He later told me he had accepted temporarily to "do a run" (sell) just the time he gets back on his feet.... So I gave him the chance to walk the talk... And I observed him... struggling with his addiction, isolation, even paranoïa... while sinking himself in contradictions... The worst lies are those who come to believe they're own lies... Still, he stayed at my apartment for 3 months... He was always paying what he had... but it came where we had to part ways. I threw him out... but I had too. It was draining me too much. Like I told him: I did it for me rather than "against him"... And he understood. All this to say... I'm not the worst, but I've seen my little share of shit with addiction. This is just a story among other and I wrote it to express that I don't lie to myself. I think this will help me. That kind of lucidity can be hard to bear sometimes, but I've seen enough people literally going crazy.... literally losing their mind... because of addiction. I heard things like " I feel I'm wasting my whole life because I can't control me..." These are serious things to say... Also, I am really happy I subscribed yesterday and already have a little feedback. Just that. Just your little presence, like and comment .... It made me feel stronger. NNNOOTT AALLOONNEEE in this struggle. Isolation is a cause and an effect. I am here to break patterns and make better ones. I'll try to use what I've seen as a motivation to help myself and to realize more of my potential... A potential I KNOW I have. I want to help me to help others.... and your presence give me even more determination. Also, I thought that emergency link was a good help for breaking the "minding" when I'm on my computer. I've put the link in my favorites and I have already used it a few times AND IT WORKED FOR ME! AS MUCH AS I'M NEAR ANY PORN SITE... I'M NOW JUST A CLIC AWAY FROM GETTING BACK MY FOCUS! What a great idea and tool!
Yes and naturally it should. With porn everything is instant and you're in control of everything but real life isn't like that. After using I get annoyed quickly with people and I want everything to go my way. But when I'm using and doing more positive things I am more patient with people.
I've been reading a lot of posts from people at all different levels (5, 35, 605 days) talking about how nofap has made them realize how lonely they are, how much they were just filling "the void" with porn, and how they feel great about quitting but are struggling with this crippling emptiness leftover. I just wanted to clarify something for everyone in nofap: you are the strongest people on the planet. That isn't just an attempt at woowoo motivation whatever- it's the truth. You see, everyone has their own way to fill the void. Your friends who watch porn, or go out all the time, compulsively hook up with girls, complain about their spouse, do drugs or drink or binge eat, or are constantly chugging coffee, they are all filling the void with these things, and they aren't even aware of it. When I was 17, I got addicted to cigarettes and cocaine. I quit coke a year later and smoking about three years later. My point here is that porn is no different than drinking, or binge eating, or snorting coke every night: it's extremely addictive. The difference between those people and you is that you are quitting cold turkey. Alcoholics have aa, druggies have rehab, smokers have patches, but all you have is a website and your own willpower. You are literally willing yourself out of an addiction, without all this weak whiny shit about meetings, holding hands, therapy or whatever the fuck. And as someone who quit coke and drinking without rehab, I mean that as offensively as possible. You guys are the real fucking winners of the world. No one else is capable of what you are doing. Try asking an alcoholic about his or her struggle- it'll include interventions, family drama, meetings, and countless relapses. They ran out of money, but you will never run out of internet. Druggies might break their entire hormone system forever, but you will never run out of dopamine. Smokers will sit around wearing patches hoping their addiction will go away, but you are sitting around willing your addiction away. You are the strongest people I've ever heard of. The difference between every other zombie out there and you is that you aren't battling some random foreign chemical that was introduced to your systems- you are literally battling yourself, every morning and every night. There is nothing harder than what you are doing on the entire planet. So of course there's going to be a void leftover. You're quitting an addiction with no help at all. By quitting, your brain thinks that it just physically lost part of itself. The trick is to slowly realize that there is no void- this is life. What you are doing at that exact moment is what your entire life is about. Driving, walking, working, staring into space- if it's what you're doing at that moment, it's what your life is about. It's up to you to appreciate it and love it for what it is. And three years down the road, or ten years down the road, when you look around at everyone wandering and scrambling with their random pathetic problems, you'll look back on nofap, sit back, and enjoy the moment for what it is, because you already figured it out.
Hi to you all. It's been already - and only...- two days and I almost failed today. I managed to get back to my calm, but only came back to resolution after an almost complete edging session. A good thing is that I was able to pass through it but that made me think and realize things I would like to share with you. By the way, as I told you in a previous message, maybe this exact thread is not the good place to do so, so could someone maybe help me by pointing where and how I could start a thread like a little journal of my evolution? By observing my behaviour today, I realized that the emergency link could be helpful, but it might not be enough. That's why I want to exchange with others. Tell my stories and have a feedback. That 's the involvement of accountability I guess. I want to make this additional step further in this community, avoid some illusions I could build up to remain alone and break a little more my isolation. I read also the nofap introduction stuff and some journals but I want to get more active in the process. Specifically, can someone please help me further the accountability partnership. I am really a newbie on forums.
So 2 days ago, my wife tells me that she is leaving me. She can't stand all the negativity and God told her to leave so she could have a chance to heal. It doesn't mean our marriage is over. It's just she wants me to have time alone to figure this out and for her to get her thoughts together. I was so distressed that night that I looked at porn again and today am feeling remorse over that decision. It only further pushed me away from her. I so want to be done with this and know that I just need to quit and follow after God and renew my mind daily. I was studying the Word this morning and Jesus spoke about how if you knock, seek and ask, you will receive. I asked God to take away this feeling of "false intimacy" that I have and that He would be enough. My wife can't give me enough and therefore I make her feel like she's not enough...
Well this looks like a last chance with her. She's NOT gone but her message is clear. If there is no change, she goes. I'm not giving you a lesson but this could be a good opportunity to get motivation toward whatever which option you CHOOSE. Some choices are harder than others. Religion seems to have an important place in your life so maybe try to get support from there. People from your/other community. People from here also. Get involved and distracted from fapping at the same time. I tell you this because being distracted from porn is a way for me that works. I recently came to understand that even the slightest temptation could lead to orgasm and relapse sooo easily so I try to avoid it the best I can. I read in your text that you have remorse over that DECISION.... I think that word is well chosen... You were tempted but it all came back to your decision. All is not over with your wife if that's what you want. Several people noticed changes in behaviour after only a month. Tell her maybe? If you get there, you might even like it and want to push further. Don't try it. Do it! And maybe share some details with your wife about you situation. I'd even go and show her the date you subscribed to this forum... to show here you concern and awareness toward this situation... and her... Hoping the best for you.
You might also tell her you need her especially in these hard moments... and even play the religious card that you two married before god for the better and the worse and all is not always easy in a marriage. Does she knows you need help? Did you tell her?
Yes, she knows that I joined this forum and in fact, was encouraged by another brother (friend of ours) to join (he is also on here). I met with him today and he told me also the same thing: "this could be your LAST chance with her and it all rests on your decision." It truly is all about choices. You are right when you say "don't try". There is no try. I intend to make the right choice and be healed of this addiction. It will no longer control how I treat my wife and I will battle with all my strength against it till I win. Thanks for your words!
The best feedback I had was from people that told me not always what I wanted to hear... but was true... Because of this, here are my feelings. Maybe: think less about her.... "controlling her"... For now, it's you you must think about... and control YOU. Don't intend to BE healed... Take a more active position in this and HEAL yourself... If that make sense... ? Then if she has to come back to you, she will do it by herself.
Hey, and I was thinking about this... If porn is too tempting, buy yourself a "parental controlling" software to help you. Do it! Not a free download... Buy one, and a good one. Show your wife it's price and ask her to set it up with you! Her being the only one to have to password. ... Her being noticed if you go look for porn... it could be the best motivation you could ever find, all categories included!!! As an additional positive factor, that will also put her in the first place to notice your progresses! She might even end being proud of you, as she notice your change of behaviour because of nofap ;-) Humbly, this seems like a very good recovery plan in every way I look at it. Don't sacrifice your wedding for porn and your addiction!!!
God helps those who help themselves..... BUY YOURSELF A BLOCKING SOFTWARE AND HELP YOURSELF. DO IT! =Save your marriage. =Get yourself back! =Get your wife back. =Be happy. =WIN
Oh and by the way... Sorry for "overreacting".... but I was trained a lifeguard and nursing... And I know an emergency when I see one.
