P.A.W.S. - what are they, cure, duration

Dude I saw that same podcast not 4 days ago. Andrew Huberman and that psychiatrist, correct? She has a book out--I might have to buy it. Definitely provided some good insight. But thanks for applying that insight to my current situation. You kind of turned it into something more on a spiritual level than just a scientific one.

I have these thoughts myself, and I think that's how I can justify the amount of pain I've experienced. But you've put it in a new way that helps me make sense of it even more.

I do think that kindling is kind of a cheat code where the whole pain portion of the equation amplifies to a level much, much greater than the pleasure though. Not until I started abstaining from porn for extended periods did it get to a place where my withdrawals were literally nullifying my life force. Weird, right? That's the unfair part, in my eyes. I don't feel like I owe any debts in that regard, because I was actually doing much much better when it came to indulgence. I would abstain for 200 days and relapse five times over a span of 2 days. For some reason, that was worse than just relapsing on a consistent basis. That part doesn't make sense to me, and is the reason that I've lost faith in the heavenly accounting system up in the sky. This fact, when I think about it, has kind of ruined my faith with a higher power. Kindling is unfair, and doesn't follow any sort of rule about effort and justice and repaying debts. It's just a cheat code created by natural selection, and nothing more. And, up to this point, it has robbed me of a large portion of my soul. It's still hard for me to make sense of the phenomena, but I'm still with you for the most part.

THe proof of your concept, on the other hand, comes to me in the form of dreams. Just last night I had a nightmare where I was confronted, angrily, by an ex girlfriend who I treated horribly. It was no coincidence that my porn use was at its most destructive during the end of our relationship (late HS), and I had turned into a monster seemingly overnight. Funnily enough, after I had treated her so poorly, she finally stood up for herself and began fighting back. Since I was a weak, insecure, tiny husk of a person at that point, her confidence crushed me. I remember one instance where I approached her and she literally embarrassed me verbally in front of 5 other people. That emotion that I felt back then must not have been enough, because in the dream I had to relive the feeling, and it stung pretty fucking badly.

I'm 30 years old, and only now have had a dream where I get to process those emotions. So I don't know. Kindling doesn't make sense, but having that dream last night does. Guess it doesn't matter, because I'm going to get to the finish line sooner rather than later.

Now it seems like I gotta keep on my toes when it comes to a libido: the idea of being worried about relapsing is a little terrifying. If it starts getting worrisome for me (not even close yet, my libido is fucking zilch) then I'm willing to take drastic measures. Might just live in hostels for a little bit. Hard to relapse in a crowded hostel.

I'm willing to do anything to get out of this.

 

Isn’t the fact that we can recover at all not fair in our favor? You mean to tell me I can abuse my brain for the better part of 25 years and can recover in 2 maybe 3 years. That almost seems like a miracle in itself.

 

Hey guys, this may sound really random but have any of you noticed the half-moons on your fingers (especially the non-thumb fingers) looking smaller or nonexistent since entering PAWS? I've been seeing people talk about this on social media in relation to Long Covid, but apparently it's a known thing that happens to a lot of people with ME/CFS. I've posted before about how PAWS has a lot of similarities with other mysterious chronic illnesses so I'm just curious whether this is another area where there's overlap.

For the record, I seem to have them but they're fairly small, and maybe even smaller than they used to be.

 

If you don't subscribe to my opinion then you can just ignore it. I don't feel any sort of inclination to argue my point to you, to be blunt.

My guess is that my rejection of a higher power triggered you, because that's how the overly "spiritual" folks tend to act (another reason why I'm wary of religion) and you are now choosing something I wrote to argue against. I tend to notice that cults tend to think "If you're not with us, then you're against us." The word miracle gives you away, along with a quick examination of your post history.

At this point in my recovery I don't suffer fools. Especially when I'm already feeling so down. Puttin' you on the ignore list.

Not going to wish you good luck though, because if I said that I wouldn't be acting as an authentic version of myself.

A part of me only comes on here to read Don's and Winngover's opinions on things, so maybe it's time to hang it up and just cope with the rest of my journey without this forum. It's high time I took a break from obsessively checking this thread anyways.

 

No trace of halfmoon as you can see in photo. Inexistent. Why?

 

A few days ago, I wrote here that I felt some new symptoms coming up which I didn't feel during my entire reboot period until now. So here are the details for that.

Tightness in throat, feeling of having a lump in throat followed by increased heart rate and blood pressure. Slight tremor in right hand. Feeling of numbness in tongue. Insomnia. Sleep apnea. Now, all of these symptoms are not permanent. They come and go. But whenever they come, they almost come together. I have been going through this for past 2 months now and the most weird thing is that I have not felt any of these symptoms during the entire 25 months period. Granted I have felt racing heart and blood pressure but that was when I used to have panic attack/anxiety attack due to social anxiety. I don't get that sort of panic attacks anymore since my social anxiety is much improved though not completely healed for sure.

It just really has me thinking very hard and I really wish I could point out something in particular that I have found but there is none. It makes no sense to me whatsoever to have all together a new set of symptoms at such a later stage of reboot while you are seeing a slow progress in healing of symptoms that you already had. I even decided to end my hard mode because of these new symptoms because somehow I felt that maybe I am not able to properly transmute the abundant sexual energy and relieving it may give me some relief but there was none. I have also zipped out of the flatline so raging libido and urges are going on side by side. It really is an interesting time in my recovery and I would really like anyone to speak up who share some of what I am going through. It's not that the new symptoms are not reported here. It's the shift of symptoms at such a late stage is what boggles me.

I sometimes think that maybe I am going through PTSD. My wife and daughter leaving me. Its been 6 months now. And going through PAWS on top of it for 2+ years. Maybe it has all started taking toll on me and therefore the new symptoms flaring up from sth other than PAWS. Although I do believe that PTSD comes hand in hand with long term PAWS. The shit can easily get mingled up with each other and there is no fucking way to know. I personally though don't feel that I am going through PTSD but who the heck knows. I don't have the typical PTSD symptoms but I was just thinking about it in particular because I was trying to find something/anything that could somehow give me reason for having these new symptoms. Or maybe I just need to stop fretting about it and go through this shit as part and parcel of unexpected PAWS journey.

I was reading the book "You're the placebo" where the writer state the research that 95% mind is subconscious and the real driving force behind everything you do, feel etc. So that got me thinking as to how much the whole reboot process, my marriage fiasco due to PIED, my wife and daughter leaving me, must have effected my mind subconsciously. And how it has effected me and how it will keep effecting me in the long run. What can I do to heal the damage of all that. My ego suffered a huge blow after my marriage due to PIED. I am 6 feet 2 inch tall, I have the looks and I used to be quite charismatic. I was good in sports both in school and university. I got a great job as soon as I graduated. I ditched 02 super nice girls during 4-5 years before my marriage because I could. I got married to a girl I wanted to. So yeah, you could imagine I had quite some ego or whatever word you may want to insert here. A guy like me couldn't have intercourse with a girl for one complete year. It was a complete shock. My parents were in complete shock when they found out about it about 10 months later. My first year suffering was beyond anything I could write here. More than PAWS, the inability to have sex with my newly wed wife for a complete year really broke me or I would say humbled me in many ways. I developed crippling social anxiety as well as I started having my PAWS. Even though consciously I might say today that those times are gone but I don't know if my subconscious mind thinks the same. I am still suffering today. Maybe the intensity has lowered but on a long term scale, you just want the suffering to end completely and not just give you a break for a day or two.

I miss my daughter more than I miss my wife. She is going to be 01 year old in November. I haven't seen her in 06 months. I feel so lonely as my parents and rest of the family live in a different city. I don't know when I will completely heal from PAWS. My symptoms have definitely improved but there is still quite some distance to normality. I am quite clueless regarding the proper way to settle my wife's issue. I am sort of waiting for my PAWS to get better before I give it my total focus. I somehow feel that I am better off while she is away for now because it gives me time to heal without managing her at the same time and gives me opportunity to continue hard mode. Because my flatline/hardmode was one of the core reason of her leaving me.

I deliberately skip talking about religion since it somehow just complicates a lot of things. All of us are going through a lot of things because of shit we consumed for years and sometimes we are not in the right frame of mind to process even the simplest of things let alone religion. Though the spiritual and religious aspect is indeed crucial to discuss and explore because almost all long term rebooters feel this spiritual awakening in one form or another. We all hail from different backgrounds/cultures/religions here and that is the beauty of it. We are able to set aside all differences and come together in the face of this epidemic to heal each other and most importantly give others the hope of recovery and better future.

 

Hey man I don’t think you can read this since I’m on the ignore list. I wasn’t trying to win you over to my side on anything. All I really wanted to do was get you to look on the bright side. You said it robbed you of your soul which seemed to make you sad. I was just trying to get you to look at it another way. Your stance on God doesn’t trigger me in any way. It had no bearing on my life whatsoever. I do wish you good luck and a speedy recovery though.

 

Bro, I remember PTSD being discussed here a while back but I can't recall who started it. Was it you? What are your thoughts now? Did you also have totally new and different symptoms that late in the recovery?

I also want to know how you are managing your libido/sexual drive/urges? Are you doing some sort of sexual transmutation, some energy channeling thing? Have you decided anything regarding going back to dating thing? And if you have, what about sex? There is this girl whom I dated thrice and I am sort of taking a short break from it for now. I don't know what to do about that? It is really difficult to resist a willing girl when your libido is back on and raging. I also sometimes feel it can help me from a relapse (God forbid!) Sorry for so many questions.

 

We are separated but not divorced. She didn't give up on me for the whole first year while I wasn't unable to have sex with her. When I recovered from PIED, we had our first intercourse and subsequently we started having sex. I went back into flatline after about 02 weeks so that didn't help. I was having severe PAWS all the while which further exacerbated the whole issue. Then I told her that I need to do hard mode to recover from PAWS. She asked for a timeline which I obviously couldn't give. I did say that 6-8 months of hardmode may do the thing which I highly doubted myself but I had to give her something. That time passed and I was still under PAWS and wanted to continue hardmode. I also went into a severe flatline so even if I wanted to have sex, I couldn't. So all of this started reflecting on our daily lives. And we started having arguments/fights over petty things but the core issue was our non-existent sex life. So she decided to take our daughter and leave me. I have asked her to come back and that we can resolve everything but for now, she is not willing to. We might have to do some couple therapy sessions I suppose before she might be willing to come back.

So to answer your question, my wife has always been willing to have sex but for now, she is not even willing to come back home.

 

Onestly I don't know what to do. 6 years flatline ignored (I didn't know about it continuing fapping and cum flaccid (hard flaccid) everyday. Discover nofap in October realizing I'm the worst case in internet (11 years pied 6 years flatline continuing to cum several times a day in it) and I cant surpass 1 months from October.. Today relapse 3 times in this dead dick state.. How its possible recover for me? I don't know why I relapse...if I don't go for 3 years hardmode I'll kill myself..

 

I am literally discouraged from my ignored flatline for 6 years and I cant support this dead dick realization after 6 years... I can't stop relapsing by October now.. How can you guys pass 1-2 years in this hard flaccid state without relapsing..? How can you accept this dead dick.. I don't know.. Probably I stay too much time on internet and before or after I will go to porn even in this state..

 

I'm 1 month away from hitting 36 months in deep PAWS with about a dozen relapses. Plus 4 years of errors and trials on nofap after 4 years of constant PMO.

 

It's really tough being married or in relationship when recovering.What this addiction can do and how severely it can impact,no doubts on this.Alreday we are suffering so much. Sometimes I feel scary that where I was trapped and what all it was.what I was doing over the year and wasting my time,energy and everything??Oh..disgusting!

Just I can pray that all sufferings must go and all get normal.

 

Wild, right?

 

I would suggest to start with a low dose. While excess might get secreted, it still has some effect on your kidneys. I personally experienced quite a lot of pain in my kidneys when I took a 1000mcg b12 supplement.

 

How's your digestion?

 

bro dw new symptoms coming and going is something totally common during withdrawal, its actually something good: it means that you are healing

When you start coming closer to fully healing, your body starts trying to "bargain" with you and get you hooked back on the substance in question (PMO in this case)

Around the last months of my PAWS, I started having insane stomachaches, insomnia and anxiety, even though most of my symptoms had already faded away. My theory is that this is a result of the dopamine levels in your brain getting back to normal faster than the other brain chemicals could rebalance. Actually, most "downs" I had during those 2 years were followed by improvements.

 

A quick question for @Grateful Retainer @winningover (and any others that have reached near recovery).

Can I ask what morning wood was like for you towards the end of your reboots, or the 24 month mark if you remember? I am currently trying to piece together whether morning wood truly is a factor of recovery whilst going through PAWS. So for example, did morning wood gradually return during the late PAWS phase or did it suddenly return once you felt the PAWS phase was over.

Would really appreciate your thoughts/comments. Thanks