If I can quit porn, is it possible to go back to being straight?

Looks like you don't understand the basics of porn addiction with that response...

 

I gave an honest answer to a question. I'm not questioning the suffering he's experiencing at the moment.

And to be honest i don't regret that answer. Millions of people use porn, there's a reason if only some of them end up acting gay stuff.

 

You're right there is a reason. Majority of these people experience insane levels of low self worth and inferiority which is amplified by constant destructive porn use. Its almost like they are punishing themselves by watching gay stuff, which in turn produces a pornographic shock within their brain as its something taboo and extreme for these people, and the cycle reinforces itself. Pair that with mental issues such as OCD, and you're in for a shit show. But are these people actually gay? Of course not. If they were then they wouldn't be watching gay stuff as a punishment, which is what the majority of people are doing. Mental illnesses, a destructive porn addiction and rock bottom self esteem can convince someone that they define as their illness.

(mind you, I am not talking about people who genuinely watch gay porn and enjoy it, but don't want to admit that they enjoy it, I am specifically talking about people who forced themselves to escalate to more and more shocking material, and now are having to pay the price for it.)

 

You know, it's very easy to talk on the internet and saying things, but you'll probably never experience what this man feels right now. And a few words might ,,change'' the way he's seeing these things and all of this might end in a very bad way and you'll never know that.

I'm in the same situation but much, much worse. I've watched many types of porn including trans/gay stuff, but in the end I never felt an attraction to a man in reality, it was just porn. And I will NEVER do something with a man in reality and I don't feel like doing something with a man in reality. To be honest I've watched even much worse stuff like g**e and s***f porn and the worst of all ,,c'' porn. You will ask me to accept who I am because of porn? Good. Then I'm a gay/bisexual guy with murderer instincts and at top of all, a pedophile. I never act out in reality because of this types of porn, NEVER, and I'll never do.

Well, something changed when I've seen a video on Youtube a few months back with a guy who was bisexual. I was struck by the question if I am gay/bisexual and the all nightmare began. Anxiety, depression, paranoia. Looking for reassurance online, for answers, videos on Youtube....a total mess. I was now paying attention to the way I walk, talk or behave in general. Analyzing my past actions towards guys from years and years back.


Then I tried to accept the thing, like you 2 said: Accept what you feel! Well I tried to do that. What happened? Well, I attempted suicide a month ago because when I tried to accept that I might be bisexual/gay it felt like a lie, like a virus in my head. It felt unnatural, like someone was trying to force that idea in my head. I didn't know who I was anymore.

I'm not against gay people, but many who are active online are jerks and very easily offended by simple things. When I tried to talk with some of them, they insulted me in a very bad way and said that I'm homophobic and should die. I just asked that: ,,Does watching x type of porn means that you are x sexuality or it's just a fetish/escalation on porn?'' And they started the insults. Yeah, very encouraging. There was a few who PM me and told what they think about it, civilized and very good intended and I respect them for this, but the majority...yeah, not so much. I left those groups and I never intend to join them again.

I got in some groups with people from the LGBTQ+ community (another advice from people on the internet) and after I've seen what they posted there and the way they behave...I felt very, very uncomfortable. Just because of some posts online. Now imagine if I tried to meet a gay guy in real life for sex or something else.

I had a mental breakdown and swallowed a lot of pills. My mother found me and I was rushed to hospital and ,,saved''. After 1.5 months, I still have strong suicidal thoughts. I feel broken, lost all my motivation and I still don't see the point on living. And all of this because of porn and past insecurities, which porn ,,comforted'' over the years until I escalated too far.

Even now I search for hours on the internet to find some ,,clues'' of who I am. It's easy to say ,,just accept it man''. It doesn't work like that at all for the majority of people. There are people who said that if you want to find out, you need to have sex with a guy. Very good idea, some people who tried that were so mentally scarred by the experience, became even more confused, got into a deep depression and sadly for some ended with suicide.

 

"but..but..you are what you watch in porn because thats what the pride agenda says, and if you oppose their views then you are a bigot and get cancelled." You have to accept that your life's purpose is to be a porn addicted slave, otherwise you offend people.

Seriously, though...what you are experiencing is 110% real and valid, and 1000% curable. It sounds like you very much have OCD surrounding the idea of whether or not you are gay, which is fuelling that irrational doubt that you have. The fact that it feels unnatural, and especially the fact that it feels forced are 2 incredibly huge indicators that this is definitely not who you are. You'll heal if you stay away from porn, and trust yourself enough to disregard your irrational thoughts. If you believe that you have OCD and need help, message me and I can link you a youtube channel that completely cured me from everything you are experiencing.

 

It's 110% curable.

 

bro believe it or not there IS actually an insane amount of bad advice floating around..I kind of shed a tear reading this... let me ask you something... do you consider yourself an empath?.. (if not you should strive to become one).. have you ever watched porn WITHOUT jerking off?? but just thinking about wat your actually watching it and wondering wat the other person is thinking? and both parties are enjoying themselves /acting/just doing it for money/hurting etc.? (I used to and still do watch movies on silent and would still understand the plot of the movie and could often predict wat happens by mannerisms)... humans are complex.. it's easy to get confused or swayed by words even if they aren't true.. it's why ppl change their e mind so often or are emotional example. someone tells you they love you and they won't do said regression again but they constantly do it.. why? sometimes I don't think they kno.. it's all confusing right??.. just know we all have choices and we all have battles to fight, when someone said we are our own worst enemy they meant it.. until you can figure out the source of your pain/addictions/what makes you tick then you can honestly master yourself and be your own best friend and be comfortable in your skin like it was intended.. nobody said it would be easy or I may be a liar but I want to message me I have a story to share I believe could help

 

Thanks! No, every time I've watched porn I would masturbate to it. I didn't care about the persons in videos because I had always this mentality of ,,it's just porn, I don't care about the type of it, it doesn't represent me''. Well, this was the norm until a couple of months ago when the ,,big question'' rose in my head.

Every time I ,,test'' myself with pictures of girls and guys, well, I feel a normal and natural attraction to girls, but with guys the only thing that I feel is anxiety. Because of anxiety I think automatically of that porn I've watched and feel some groinal response which gives me much more anxiety. In reality I don't really feel anything if I don't think about it. If I'm distracted from these thoughts, I feel a little bit ,,free''.

I even like a girl from my group at college, I wanted to ask her out, but after the incident of a few months back I started questioning my attraction to her and women in general. I feel like my level of attraction towards them decreased. So yeah, I don't like in what state I'm now, but believe me when I say that....I really don't have the power to push forward. I want my life back from a few months ago with porn or without porn.

I was finally ready to have my first real relationship and now this happened. Yeah...it's a total mess.

 

it's all in the mind man you have to psych yourself out, have you heard of positive affirmations? there's some to look for that will help you its like alpha male lady's love you your confident in your own skin you love beautiful women type stuff that we should all be telling ourselves anyways.. check those out on YouTube

 

To add to this, in my own experience the more I railed against my sexuality and still indulged in lesbian porn the more distressing and consuming it was. For me coming out as Bi took a lot of pressure off of me and my marriage. It strangely didn’t really change my porn viewing habits but the day to day guilt and shame were gone almost immediately. Being bi doesn’t mean you’re going to go out and sleep with someone of your gender unless that’s something that’s within the boundaries of your marriage; it just means that you feel attraction to more than one gender and it shouldn’t feel threatening to you or your spouse since you’re committed to a relationship already. Coming out actually is part of why I am doing NoFap, I don’t feel the shame of being closeted anymore and now I’d like to not feel the shame of giving up so much of my time and energy to PMO when I have so many better things in life. Also, even just discussing if you might be bi with your wife might help reduce your anxiety. I felt like it was the elephant in the room before I came out, my family always accused me of being gay as an adolescent and when I realized I was, but not a lesbian, I felt like everyone could tell and it was obvious I was closeted. Come to find out, my husband wasn’t surprised but didn’t think I was actually bi and that it didn’t change anything in our marriage because we value monogamy in our marriage. I have no idea if this helps or not but I hope you find some peace.

 

so you're certain it wasn't escalation along hocd from porn over use?

 

I don’t have a great understanding of HOCD but I’ve never been afraid of being bi or even lesbian, I just really disliked that my family was labeling me before I could figure myself out fully. Plus I had some fear around coming out, not being bi but coming out, as bi because my family is in the LGBTQIA community. I’ve got a gay parent, but I also heard so much biphopia growing up that I was really scared to acknowledge it. I heard family members call bi people immature, selfish, attention whores, and that they should be able to “pick a side”. I’ve always had attraction to more than one gender, for as long as I remember though so I don’t think it is a case of HOCD.

 

So, from what you say, you knew from a young age that you are attracted to more than one gender and suppressed that feeling because you were afraid of coming out and biphobia. Well, in my case and other cases on this forum, it's not this. It's the pure fear of being gay/bisexual or x sexuality than one that you know you are. Think about that I liked women, I had crushes on them, wanted to have relationships with them and after a few days you started to question yourself that if this is a lie and you hid your true self for many years. I know I'm not gay/bisexual or x sexuality. I know I like women but this questioning and paranoia combined with anxiety, depression it will break down every person.

I'll tell you in my case what is happening, I was not and I'm not attracted to more than one gender, I'm only into females, but after many years of heavy, I mean HEAVY porn use (every day/multiple times per day for 9 years) I got into some types of porn which I didn't have the urge to pursue in reality. In the last years (mid 2019 - 20 years old) I started to watch more trans porn and in the end I started to watch gay porn which I didn't like before, it was disgusting even to think about it. I started to question why do I watch this type of porn and the all hell began. Until then I didn't even got a flinch of doubt about my sexuality, now I check myself every time and the anxiety is killing me inside. I even tried to accept that I might be bisexual. The only thing that this did it was to push me to the boundaries of death and despair.

It's very easy to say: Accept this, accept that. But, you know, we are different, different lifestyles, different mentality, different stories how we got into this. Combine all of this mess with a person like me who is very paranoid and overthinks everything and you'll get something worse than a depressed guy.

 

Good point! Like I said I don’t know that much about HOCD, but I do know that OCD and related disorders (like HOCD) are treatable and that would lead me to think that yes, you can “go back to straight” with treatment since you’re correct about it being fear based and not desire based. If I remember correctly from grad school there is even a version of this with people having OCD around their fear of being a pedophile and I know I’ve read about treatment for that. I hope if it’s right for you and it may or may not be, you seek some additional support and treatment. I’m wishing you good luck in your journey dude.

 

ever had a thought like I could snap your neck right now and thought where did that come from or why did I think that? (or a thought of the like if possibly not that extreme) we can call them accidental thoughts for a lack of better word.. are you guys aware that every thought that we think for the most part should go through a correction faze(imo) unless you know 100% that this thought is undeniably the truth... it's a reason why we have parents, to correct our attitudes and behaviors(granted most don't know its their jobs and let the children decide on their own).. it's the reason why we have killers, rapist, cleptos, pyros, liers, the obese, zoophiles, pedophiles and even gays(impo) from confused mindstates that were left to linger uncorrected on there own for to long.. the longer it goes to harder it is to reverse... it's a shame that most ppl don't have good support systems, parents or mentors.. not watching porn at all would be a good start for everyone if you plan on changing anything but then there's the suggestive content we sorround ourselves with day to day from music to visual media(TV phones) its hard to avoid temptations. but you have to psych the source meditate affirmation positive self talk and almost a shcitzo like fight with any negative thought or visual in your mind imagine you know your always gonna win

 

Ok….. this is a lot of nonsense. I’m sorry, but you’re lumping a lot of things together that aren’t really connected. Correlation doesn’t equal causation. I’m sure you have your reasons for your beliefs, but as someone with a master’s degree in counseling you don’t have to keep thinking like this. Intrusive thoughts are not the cause of rapists. There isn’t some moral failing or lack of personal willpower that causes someone to have them. It’s a combination of a lot factors. Similarly, no amount of great parenting can prevent them, or any major mental health disorder. It’s way more complicated than that. That said, mindfulness and positive self talk do help, but they aren’t a cure-all and require other supports.

 

Also, an edit, I am not providing health advice just adding my perspective as someone in the mental health field.

 

I had/have an addiction to PMO despite good parenting and cultural pressure against it. Raised in the church, strongly encouraged not to objectify women, but seeing women exposing and posing, and thinking about women wanting S, made me feel too good. I wanted it and hated it, repented of it then did it again. I wanted to correct the thoughts, but they relentlessly returned.
It probably had something to do with ADHD. It's an excess of adrenaline at the expense of dopamine. When I first started NoFap years ago, I found the strategies presented helped a lot more than the vague advice offered by the church. I successfully quit P and M for some 80 days, but I still had a dopamine deficiency that P had been supplementing. My suicidal ideation spiked. On recommendation from my therapist, I dropped NoFap so I could concentrate on not feeling like a shitheel, but being addicted to P is one of the things that makes me feel like a shitheel so I returned a couple months ago. I am now on medication, and seeking out dopamine through positive behaviors, and quitting P has on the whole been easier. Not easy. Easier.

My wife had eating disorders, which was in part due to bad parenting. It was also due in part to a slow thyroid. We're talking mental health, an area we've barely begun to understand. The way the body and the mind interact, in combination with cultural pressures to produce coping mechanisms, it's incredibly complicated. One thing we do know, though, is every single thought we have is not automatically good. I'll have a vision of plunging a steak knife into my carotid artery, snapping my neck on the end of a noose, or imagine the sensation of a long freefall and wonder if I could override that pesky survivor's instinct and tilt myself headfirst in time. In more maudlin moments I'll simply want to turn the car on in a closed garage and go to sleep. The thing is leaving a body, though. Nobody wants to discover a dead body. That's traumatizing. So pull a Virginia Woolf. Find a large body of water and weight myself, that could work, but when people know someone has offed themselves the perverse fuckers look for the body. Search parties, dragnets, divers, it's a massive expense. My final act in my wretched, self centered life would be a wretched, self centered death, so I'd have to make them think I haven't committed suicide, just abandoned them forever which I kind of have, but in a good way? They won't see it that way. They'll need loads of therapy to get over it, they'll need loads of therapy from living with me. What results in the least amount of therapy? Me getting better. So I have to shoulder the load. That's the logical conclusion.
The point of this is that I have thought a lot about suicide. It's persistent. It's not entirely unwanted. And yet, I am not told to identify as a suicidal person and I am not told to act on it. Accepting it, going with it, is so patently obviously bad advice, it's almost comical. If you're into dark comedy. If not it's so callous, twistedly nihilistic, and counter intuitive, it beggars the imagination.

We have some people saying they have homosexual urges, and that absolutely does not work for them. We have others saying they have homosexual urges, and it didn't work for them for a while but then it did. The issue is muddied because it all goes back to homosexuality, repressed sexuality, homophobia, self acceptance, and a whole lot of other factors we clearly do not understand. It's not so simple as rejecting bad thoughts, though that's certainly something we need to do because some thoughts are objectively bad. We're not speaking against homosexuality, though. At least I'm not. I'm speaking against the logic presented. It doesn't stand.

Who is truly gay is too complicated an issue for me. I'm not particularly smart and I don't have an abundance of education, especially in the field of mental health. I do understand one clear thing; porn isn't good for humans. It's a superstimulation that artificially boosts dopamine. A lot of people can handle it, like a lot of people can handle gluten or lactose or refined sugar. A lot of people can't, though. We have some preexisting condition that makes us vulnerable to porn, we're porn intolerant, it breaks something in us. One of the ways it breaks some people is by escalating novelty seeking, leading to desires and urges they previously didn't have. The appropriate response, then, is not to say if you currently abuse a certain variety of porn then you must be that thing, even if greater culture finds that thing totally acceptable and you yourself are that thing. The appropriate response is, work on yourself, quit abusing porn, and see where you are after that.

 

... I like how you summarized it at the end... but you at the same time you made it sound much easier than it actually is lol.. it's obvious most, if not all of us on this site, have tried to give up some form of addiction or destructive behavior but for reasons that's difficult for even the most educated ppl to understand, have come back to it..

your thoughts of suicide seem to persist yet you say they aren't always unwanted (mental fatigue possibly?) life stresses could and often do make one less inclined to want to live.. but being brave and looking into the bright future ahead of you may help you refute or fight off these thoughts. they say we are our own worst enemy and you seem to have a tough opponent on your hands but it seems he may be trying to stop YOU before you hurt anybody else..
my advice (if you care to except it} would be to get yourself under control.. think more positive, watch more hero based movies even if their anti heroes I would like to hear that you've become rich one day and helped as many ppl as possible but ultimately find love.. if you had someone to protect you would never want to leave them behind in this cruel world.. suicide just seems selfish to me..

church your parents or really much else can't stop porn ultimately if you don't want to change yourself(which goes back to everything we think isn't right}.. it's all in the mind.. we need to be taught how to use our minds which is what your parents and church's should of taught you and also to not masturbate because it'll stunt your growth

 

so you agree but you don't agree lol??