How likely is it that staying away from PMO will reduce my social anxiety/depression?

Yep. Part of why I quit is how bad my depression was getting, I'm on day 16 and my mood has picked up these past few days, feeling the best I've done in a while.

Can't speak in depth about social anxiety but it will definitely help. Addiction creates shame and you feel bad about yourself, it becomes hard to talk to people because you feel they won't like you because you don't like yourself whilst you're addicted - but then that's usually part of why you are addicted. This is what I find anyway.

Stay strong and keep going, you can definitely get past 7 days and beyond!

 

Nofap is a good step 1, but to reduce social anxiety you have to put yourself in social situations. I know this may be extremely difficult because the anxiety is preventing you from being social in the first place. But becoming a more social person will help you with social anxiety significantly more than just doing nofap

 

Yes it's a commonly reported benefit, less anxiety and depression is to be expected.

Just over 6 years ago I had terrible anxiety. Looking at a shop assistant in the eyes was a struggle at the time. Now I regularly give presentations to groups as part of my studies, and can have conversations with strangers. Those things would have put me into a panic mode before...

And depression starts to lift away too. But you have to start fixing the things in your life that you're not happy with before it really goes away.

Leaving PMO alone gives you the extra time and energy to fix these things. Even if it starts at just 1 week at a time. That's still a great way to go. Try for 2 weeks. Get used to that. Then try for more!


Disclaimer:

During the reboot process, at any time, for any duration, anxiety and depression can come back.

This means you're still healing and it is part of the 'flatline'.

If you get through it however, anxiety and depression typically occur much less frequently than ever. You start to reach the normal brain chemical balance from before you ever got into this stuff.

 

Because of nofap, you will face your emotions, instead of running from them. You will have time, to feel, to analyse your behaviours. It takes some, but never give up, you will be free someday.
Good luck on your journey to overcome social anxiety!