Christian Male, late 20's (newcomer)

Hi, just signed up. Definitely considered doing so previously, but I just get paranoid about privacy and managing to stay anonymous.

I'm a male Christian and I'm in my late 20's. Having grown up with the Internet at my fingertips I've been exposed to porn since probably earlier than puberty. I think the habit of PM stayed what one might call a "manageable" or infrequent habit for many years, but got worse during a rather disfunctional relationship in my late teens. When I went to uni in my early twenties I probably had my best period of abstinence, which maxed out at maybe a month and a half, and I kept that average up for a bit. Generally though, for the last few years the average has varied from 2 times a day to once every 2 or 3 weeks, and I can just never seem to shake it. I was struggling practically every day until I reached out to someone in my church - it's been helpful, and it's why the average is weekly rather than daily most of the time, but it's just not enough. I don't feel comfortable being fully open with someone I know, and that's a real blockage to recovery. Plus, I find myself wanting to avoid admitting I've "slipped up" so much that I find myself trying to achieve orgasms in ways that "don't count", so that I don't have to "check in". It's utterly ludicrous self deception, and it just leads to more shame.

Generally, in the past it's been easy to abstain from porn, but hard to kick masturbation. In recent years though it's both and I haven't been able to do a better stint of abstinence than 2 weeks for at least a year.

Although I'm not at my worst right now, I'm far from good, and generally I feel like when I do engage it becomes less pleasurable, and requires more "kinky" or depraved material - because I know I regret the action, I typically spend more time watching and delay the inevitable into the early hours of the morning - so it impacts sleep.

The 2 biggest issues I'm fighting currently as a result are:

- the fact that sex is on my mind far too often, and it causes me to look at many people in a way that is inappropriate.
- I've developed fairly bad premature ejaculation.

The latter is basically due to stuff like asmr/hypno fetishes, in order to try and achieve a release hands free. The damage its done is depressing, and even though I am perfectly capable of masturbating now (and do), it doesn't last long (if at all) and I still find myself drawn to erotic hypnos (among other things).

So why am I quiting? Well, first and foremost I'm a Christian and so my belief is that it's not God's desire for me, and it's not healthy for me spiritually/physically/mentally. And well, that last part just keeps becoming more and more obvious. It's an addiction, plain and simple, and one that is crazy to think hasn't really been broken since the day I hit puberty. I don't enjoy it, it feels like a trap. It's damaging me, robbing me of time and ladeling me with guilt. It's gone on too long.

Parameters? I'm still absorbing the way things work around here, but I'll be going PMO - or "hard mode" I think you call it. I'm not married, and I don't believe in sex before marriage, so "O" isn't really relevant for me anyway. PM is just something I want to permanently abstain from.

My current streak is 1 day (woop), and I may as well try the recommended challenge of 90 days. While my ultimate goal is to just never engage with these habits again, I recognise I need to set myself targets and give myself a sense of victory every once in a while.

So yeah. Not sure if I've left anything out? Thanks to anyone who takes the time to read, and thanks in advance for the support. Looking forward to seeing how this thing goes...

 

Also have a couple of questions... Been looking at the guide and it directs me to "reboot" section of the forum for challenges, but then the sticky post on the reboot section says not to post challenges there - and apparently there's a "challenges" section instead, but I can't see it anywhere.

How do I go about starting a challenge and where do I find them?

Thanks.