I Believe I have severe PIED. Feeling desperate.

This post will be long, but I appreciate anyone who reads it and shares their thoughts about whether recovery is possible. After several months of reading about NoFap, Rebooting, and PIED I’ve decided to share my own story. I’m writing this out of desperation because I feel like I’m a more extreme example. I’m 31 with very little experience. Like many of you I began PMO in my early teens and this has continued up until now. I got into some fetish stuff as well which seems to be bad news for the recovery process based on the research I’ve done. I first began noticing erection problems in high school. I wondered if I caused some sort of physical damage with my fapping techniques. On a couple occasions, I went to a doctor and was told everything was okay. I’ve always been extremely anxious, had poor self esteem, and a bit of a hypochondriac, so I listened to them despite my erection quality getting weaker and my morning woods declining (more on morning wood later).


In my early 20s I again attempted to go to the doctor, had testing done which cleared. Was then sent to a urologist who also didn’t believe anything was wrong physically. At this time I still had weak morning wood but at times I struggled to get it up even with porn. He gave me two ED pills to try out and said if they worked it was likely that it was only in my head. I was single and had no confidence to date at the time, so I took them and watched porn, still completely unaware that this could be the problem. They worked fairly well and my concerns went away. I continued my bad habits.


As my 20s came and went, my morning wood became non existent and my erections we’re about the same. Not very strong and I had even seemed to train myself to have PE because of the porn. To this day it doesn’t take me to get off once I start tapping. I feel like I also lost some sensitivity. A few relationship opportunities came by as well, but I ultimately ended things early because of the elephant in the room. I was scared to death of being unable to perform. STILL completely unaware that porn could be the issue. I just thought I was a freak and I was broken (and my fear is that I am by now). I would hold almost need to hold a kegel to keep my erection at a “level” angle to prevent it from hanging. I would occasionally take breaks from fapping that would last maybe 2-3 weeks, but I was still watching porn. Sometimes this would slightly improve my erection quality, but not much and still no morning wood. And for the most part, I spent these years still edging away and feeling hopeless but somehow delusional enough to believe everything would be okay at the same time.


Fast forward to this past summer. The person who raised me got very sick and it sent me into a period of reflection. I decided to research my problem again which is when I FINALLY discovered this community. I was determined to reboot. During this time, I met the perfect girl. We got along so well and she was extremely hot. If you saw her you’d never guess she’d be with a person like me- writing this type of post and in this situation. She was aggressive about wanting to date me. I tried to juggle rebooting with delaying things with her. I made it to 40 days Nofap (30 without viewing porn at all). Right before our first real date, my parents condition worsened and I relapsed out of anxiety/depression. The next night we had our date and it was perfect. My penis even showed a little life when we kissed. She sat across from me at a booth and put her legs on my lap and I felt a slight reaction. Suddenly I didn’t feel so bad about relapsing. A watched porn maybe one more time in the following days because I’m an idiot, but we hung out again a week later. Then, twice that week, I actually woke up with morning wood. Still pretty weak , but the first time in forever I can remember having morning wood. This gave me hope and confidence. Things with her were going well- relationships never held my interest but this was so much different. I’d never felt anything like this. Another week went by without any morning wood and I started feeling anxious, so my like a moron I decided to test my erection with porn. Which led to edging and while I didn’t fap, this probably set me back.


Then my parent passed away. This lead to more relapsing. I knew I had probably reset the clock on any progress I made and I wouldn’t be ready for her anytime soon. Opportunities for sex came and I had to find ways to avoid it. One night we had drinks and came back to my place. She changed into some of my clothes and I saw her perfect body, and we kissed, touched, etc and I had no reaction. Luckily she was very drunk so I was able to play things off a bit and suggest we wait without it getting awkward. But my inability to get an erection in that moment crushed me. Performance anxiety is undoubtedly a factor as well because I knew I had relapsed too often to be ready. I remember my heart racing because I was worried about being embarrassed and letting her down. But I should have been able to get hard. She ended up barely remembering this night, but I felt like things were never the same. We ended up going out separate ways for other reasons early last month, but I can’t help but assume this also played a role. She probably thought I was lame.


Since then I’ve relapsed a few more times. I always end up getting extreme anxiety over whether or not recovery is possible, even though I’ve come nowhere near 90 days. The anxiety seems to cause me to relapse more than anything. Or I’ll think of her and get sad and feel hopeless. I’m on day 4 nofap. Last night I was feeling optimistic and reading through Reboot Nation, looking for success stories from people as bad as me when I came across a post from someone saying that we’re delusional to think recovery is possible for everyone. The post had examples of people who have been in hard mode for years with no success. A wave of doubt came over me and I watched porn again. Although I turned away and didn’t fap, I consider this a relapse because it seems you can’t expect results if you are viewing porn - fapping or not. I barely slept last night and made the decision to finally share my story. Somehow I’m certain I won’t relapse again. I’ve hit the lowest point imaginable.


Obviously my first question is, do you think recovery is possible?


I’ve come across a few examples of people like me (limited experience, long term use) where they saw morning wood return after years. I’ve also seen examples of people going years with no progress despite not even peaking. They have no morning wood. This is honestly my biggest way of measuring progress. I can’t date anytime soon because I’m still recovering from the events of the last few months. I think a return of MW will help my confidence tremendously. I should add that I’m actually pretty fit and workout often. Obviously staying away from porn is the key, but I’m considering taking supplements to help speed things up a bit. (Saw Palmetto, L-Arg, Ginko, Ginseng, And Maca all seem to be common suggestions.


I’ve also researched hard flaccid and believe I may have this, so I’ve been doing some exercises centered around improving pelvic floor function just to be safe.


I go back and forth between optimism and doubt. My few episodes of morning wood after my 30 day streak ended are what gave me some hope. And when I returned to porn initially I actually felt that my erection quality was improving a bit, although not consistently.


Needless to say I feel pretty pathetic and it took a lot for me to finally post this, so I appreciate any feedback you’d be willing to provide and I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have for me.

 

Yes, I have desires for PMO. But I don’t know if that really counts as libido. Sometimes I feel “horny” and want to masturbate. I’ve only had morning wood once in the last month (since the signs of life I began to show shortly after relapsing after my 30 day streak. ) Like I said morning wood was very rare before this.

 

Also wanted to add the few morning woods I had were nothing special. Not very strong and didn’t last too long, but it gave me hope since it had been so long.

 

I appreciate the response. So more or less I’m on day 1 since I peaked, but that’s how I’ve been judging myself anyway. I’m aware that my case may take longer, but just getting a weak morning wood after relapsing after 30 days gave me hope. So I’m hopeful I could see some great progress at 90 days. I’m prepared to go longer. The waiting seems to create anxiety which creates hopelessness and leads to a relapse / peak and resetting of the clock. You say I’m young but I actually feel so old suddenly. Losing my girl really destroyed the motivation I had to overcome this and I’m slowly trying to get it back, but it’s been pretty tough. New Years will be about 45 days, so I’ll maybe I’ll start a journal and plan on documenting any potential progress. Thanks again brother.

 

Thanks man. This is actually the first website I found over the summer. It’s almost sickening to think it could take so long to recover. I think that’s the part I’m having the hardest time with. I already lost one person I loved because of this and if it takes 2 years to recover then I feel like I’m missing out on so much (not that I already haven’t). I’ve read a few examples of people my age where daily morning wood returned within 3 months, even one who was a virgin. So I’m hoping I can be one of those people and not on the opposite end of the recovery timeline.

 

I’m trying to be optimistic. Im hoping I’ll see great progress sooner but still worried that it could take awhile given how long I’ve had these symptoms and issues and like I said before, not much experience at all with the real thing sadly. It’s interesting that morning wood didn’t return when you were recovered. I’ve always been under the impression that everyone should get MW if everything is functioning properly. I’m more certain than ever that I’m done looking at porn and I know that’s the key, but did you take any supplements when rebooting? I’ve seen people recommend maca and L-Argentine, ginseng, etc.

Again I really appreciate the feedback man.

 

Thanks for the information man. I always took morning wood vanishing as my first sign that something was really going wrong. As I said before I’m not very experienced so that sort of feeds my fear that my reboot could be longer, but others on here seem to think I’m in better shape to recover than they are. Glad to hear you were able to recover though. Were you as bad as me? I feel like it took me way too long to discover this community and realize porn could be the problem, which makes me pretty mad at myself. After the doctors couldn’t help I just sort of gave up hope for the longest time and thought something was wrong physically.

 

Thanks, but I didn’t have much of a choice. I knew I wouldn’t have been able to perform, which is sad because she’s as hot as can be. The night we messed around a bit and I had no reaction (despite being pretty nervous because I was already aware of the issue) was a huge wake up call that I need a lot more time to recover. And now I’m disgusted with myself since things ended and I never got a chance to make it right. If you are dating someone, married, or whatever, focus on that person every time you get the urge to watch porn. That’s all I can suggest. I think about what I lost and it helps me. I’m more confident than ever that I’ll never watch again. I just pray that I get lucky and have a fast recovery. Wishing the same to you as well.

 

Appreciate the supportive words man! I wanted to post a follow up because tomorrow will be 21 days and I had a question about the flatline. Are you able to get any sort of erection at all when in the flatline? I ask because although I haven’t looked at any porn and avoided arousing images as much a possible, I’ve still managed to get a few semi-erections over the last few weeks. They are still very very weak and nothing to be happy about. My ex and I were texting and she sent me a picture and while it wasn’t a nude, it was obvious she was topless. I made sure not to look at it once I realized what it was. But later I found my memory drifting to the last time we hung out and were making out and I got a slight erection. I guess this made me question if I’ve entered a flatline yet. Which also makes me question if I have PIED or something else, but that’s likely my anxiety and doubt creeping in. I was just under the impression my penis would be completely dead at this point. And for how weak the erection was it might as well be, but I guess I’m just a bit confused and seeking the advice of someone who has been down this road before.

 

Just to reiterate - even with porn my erections haven’t been great for a very long time. More recently, prior to starting this new streak, I could occasionally get a better than usual erection with porn, but still not consistently. I tend to get myself worked up thinking about this and it creates doubt and anxiety about having a more serious problem. But as I said in my original post, I did get checked out in my 20s and was told nothing was wrong. I’ve gone down the “venous leak” rabbit hole which is terrifying as well.