Addiction as a way of life

Greetings, I am 30 years old. Literally since I was 13 years old, I started watching erotic video tapes. After a few months, I got a computer and started watching porn. At the same time I was playing computer games and gambling from that age. As you understand, my whole life began to take shape "virtually". I had no emotional connection to girls, socially I didn't meet anyone, but just kept masturbating regularly to porn and playing computer/gambling. My grades at school started to drop drastically, I got sociophobic and tried to avoid school because I felt very insecure (not understanding what the problem was at the time). I spent 90% of my time at the computer. When I went to university, my life was not like regular students. I played at the casino every day and jerked off to porn all the time. Already at the age of 16-18 I was watching porn with violent scenes, which are immoral for normal people, but I was most turned on by it. Classic videos of regular sex - gave my dick almost no erection. Already in my 1st or 2nd semester, I was doing very poorly in my studies and left the institute for 1 year. All that time I was gambling a lot at the casino and jerking off. I started to have gambling problems, I was in a web of addiction daily and endlessly, being alone with myself. No, I had companions and friends, but most of my time was devoted to my "passions. When I was 25 or 26 years old, I first started watching very strange porn that didn't match my orientation and it gave me a shock because I got turned on by it. I did it for a while and felt a lot of resentment toward myself for my horrible actions. Then I started satisfying myself through my prostate. At one point, I just started sobbing and realized that I was hopeless, completely isolated from normal life. I also had a gambling problem, I was betting really big and NEVER being able to stop, ever. In real life and since I was a teenager, I always liked girls and never had an attraction to the male sex, it was repulsive to me, while at the same time, I monstrously blamed myself for masturbating to extreme types of porn. I couldn't understand then why I always had a neutral attitude towards real girls unlike other guys my age, I was stupid and didn't understand anything... For over a year now, I haven't watched hardcore porn, except for porn with girls. Now, I haven't been in gambling for over a year now, but porn has been with me the whole time. About a year ago, I started exercising, quit smoking, minimized alcohol, but I didn't understand why I want girls but I don't have an erection. For more than 10 years I have social anxiety, I avoid people. Outwardly I am a good-looking, tall man, but inside society I am very uptight, uptight and always did not understand what was going on with me. I never visited a psychiatrist because I didn't create any danger for people. I took many psychological tests and didn't see any personality disorder there, other than an exaggerated anxiety about anything. I'm 30 years old now and I really want to live a full life, I'm tired of fooling myself and giving in to the temptation to live virtually. I haven't had morning erections in over 10 years, I have them about once a month. Now, for about 2 weeks I don't watch any porn or masturbate. I have the intention to get rid of it once and for all and have a happy life. Any feedback would be appreciated...

 

Hi, thanks for the reply! I've been in 2 relationships in my life(if you can call them that) and both times I haven't had sex except for foreplay. The first time, it was at the age of 21 (after 7 years of porn) I felt pleasure from spending time with a girl, we kissed, cuddled, but I had a fear of sex, because at that time, for physiological reasons I had problems with the penis (frenulum was short and an erection pain when I exposed the foreskin), it lasted until 25 years, until I got circumcised. After that, I thought there were no more problems, but it wasn't like that and with prostitutes I started to have problems with the very fact of arousal. The fact of arousal was there at the initial stage, but when it came to the act itself, in the process my penis would drop a lot and that made me anxious. I tried 3 to 5 attempts (with different prostitutes) and the situation repeated itself. At that time I didn't know that it was a consequence of the enormous amount of porn and gambling in my life. Further on, I began to avoid any intimate contacts with women at all, so as not to cause myself moral torment. I mean, just about a month ago, I started meeting girls on social networking sites, but when it came to determination to have sex, I just merged and started ignoring them. All this literally exhausted me and I stopped any attempts completely, because - it looks like a mockery of myself and does not bring any pleasure.

 

Considering that gambling is just as serious an addiction that hits the pleasure center and destroys dopamine, I believe my dopamine is very seriously destroyed and I will need a VERY LONG reset. I'm ready for that and it's my responsibility...

p.s Every morning, for the past week, I have been exercising, taking cold showers, and doing therapeutic exercise. Soon, I will begin practicing the "sadhu board" (board with nails) as an attempt to restore myself to a basic level.

 

Hi! What kind of club membership are you talking about?

 

I have a high level of social anxiety, but thanks for the recommendation anyway. Need to socialize as much as possible

 

Thanks, I think that should help! The problem with addicts is that they are lonely and hence all the consequences...) That said, I have parents, friends, but I avoid many activities. I am studying different materials for myself, I am training, but it is not getting any easier and I have to admit, that "one is not a soldier in the field" and to act, gradually and in the long term... I think it's all about our neutrotransmitter "dopamine", it just needs peace and rest...

 

Just two years ago, I discovered the horrifying consequences of extreme porn. At one point, I went into a group with videos that included scenes of brutal violence and I got an erection. That was about 2 times and I shut those sections of videos down for good. In fact, I realized that there is absolutely no limit to destruction and degradation. I started definitely experiencing the fear that I was about to go insane and my exhausted brain with a destroyed dopamine system, just can't respond to adequate arousal stimuli anymore. These are not my thoughts, I have never in my life felt an attraction to violence or genres of porn that do not match my orientation. When I read the famous book about porn addiction, it made me feel very at ease, realizing that the problem was not my thoughts that created the "desire" for horrible content, the problem was a very serious addiction. I couldn't go on like that and started researching a lot of information regarding the problem. As I realized, my dopamine is completely destroyed and it takes a very long time to restore it.
Now I am training, have removed all alcohol, smoking, gambling, any stimulants like: coffee, mood supplements, etc. I take cold showers in the morning, stand on nails. I am determined to get rid of this crap! And I am well aware that I am the real me - a much better version of me and everything that has happened to me has been imposed from the outside.

 

How did I know that my dopamine was completely destroyed? Considering that in addition to my addiction to pornography, I had been gambling like crazy since I was a teenager, I had completely lost the pleasures of real life. If I buy a purchase, no matter how much it costs, even if I need it, I experience ABSOLUTELY no pleasure at all. My daily activity is a focus on myself, I live in my head with constantly anxious thoughts. Over the last 3-5 years, my social attention has really started to suffer, whether it's remembering streets in the city, routes, etc. If I am talking to a person and he tells me something, my brain is often foggy and at that moment, I think about my anxiety, which eventually creates a problem for me, because I do not hear the person, I live in my head (in the clouds). It can be written off as sociophobia, but the problem is not only the lack of communication with living people (I regularly communicate with friends, parents, relatives), I am just wildly uncomfortable. When I walk down the street I am always uncomfortable, I want to get away from reality, my brain is affected and very anxious, I feel that I am restless. To make you understand, only 2 weeks ago I went to a psychologist, because I have been out of gambling for more than a year, but no improvement in dopamine, probably because I forgot to get rid of the shitty porn and only now I had the sensible idea to get rid of this horror. I am very serious and want to beat this!. We went through a lot of long tests, talked to a psychologist and he said you have an "anxiety disorder" but no personality disorder, you are adequate. Your problem is avoidance of reality. But psychologists don't talk about dopamine, it seems to them that it is not the problem, they also talk about porn addiction, as if it is not the cause of the problem at all, the problem is in something else (I have doubts about it). The thing is, I understand very well that in fact the problem is exactly in the destroyed pleasure center, because my whole way of life consisted of destroying my brain (gambling, porn). This is just a thought out loud.))

 

Friends, my mental state has been changing a lot in recent days. For 2 days in a row I had confidence, I walked down the street with my shoulders squared and felt light (I'm usually very tense). In the evening, some changes occurred in the brain (unusual sensations). Today I woke up and I automatically had increased anxiety.During anxiety, my fingers and feet are always cold, they sweat. I did exercises, stood on nails and took a cold shower. Then I went outside, but it didn't help me and my anxiety remained for a couple more hours. She's retreated a bit now, but I don't understand what's going on. My sleep, my diet are about the same, there are no special changes. It happens by itself. Do you think this is related to withdrawal syndrome, during the rejection of porn and masturbation? I've gone 16 days, I don't have an erection yet in the morning, my penis is dead.

 

About a year ago, when I quit the casino, I had a desire to improve myself and become a normal person. I began to study the issue of hormones. I passed all the tests and started therapy to increase testosterone. I'm not talking about replacement therapy, but about natural ways to increase it. Bought the supplements I needed, started exercising and raised my testosterone levels to the high reference limit. Strange, but I did not understand why I do not feel the effect of an increased hormone? Asked a question to the urologist, he could not answer this question. Further, I studied this issue in more detail and voila! found a direct relationship with a low dopamine response. That is, if I have a very low sensitivity of dopamine receptors, it means that no matter what testosterone I have, it will not work properly. I was like a jerk, raising my testosterone high, going to the bathroom and masturbating hard to hard porn. I was shocked, but even then my penis did not rise normally, was sluggish and fell very quickly. This is very funny)) Fortunately, today, having studied all the information in detail, I am calmly going through the recovery program. Thank you for any reaction in my topic, it is very important and pleasant for me to communicate with people who care!

 

Thanks for the feedback! At the expense of "sex psychologist", as I understand it, you are talking about "sexologists" specialists? If so, then they support the idea of masturbation and porn Correct me if I'm wrong.