Ashamed of the content I viewed

Yeah, I can relate to that man.

I remember watching a lot of loli, and another time a lot of rape porn. I was so ashamed, still am, when I think about it. I'm a gentle soul, I would hurt no one, but still, that stuff made me feel so powerful.

I want it gone for good.

 

I watched some disgusting stuff to PMO... The weird thing is that I dont even feel ashamed about it.

I feel like it was not actually me, who watched this extreme content, but the addiction ...

 

I'm glad to have this forum. The shame certainly has kept me in the darkness. I even went to therapy three times, and while a lot of great things came of that, unfortunately I was always met with a quizzical look when I tried to explain my fap issues. Perhaps none of them were qualified or experienced enough to deal with what was happening with me. As I think about it now, the shame builds and it is able to maintain itself in that the cycle/addiction/problem is really hard for others to spot. If you're an alcoholic or a drug addict, sure you can hide it, but your rock bottom will be visible and will show that you are no longer able to function. But with what we have happening, you have no hangover, your withdrawals don't give you the shakes or a fever, your unlikely (unless you are looking for swalkers in the hood) to be in a place at a bad hour where no one in their right mind would ever go, etc.

I myself am no longer shocked by what I view. What shocks me most is that I tried to integrate it as a part of myself. It seemed to be to be something integral to what I am and almost like an identity or orientation. Indeed, many who romanticized these pleasures and who profited from them try to tell you that these interests or types of materials are deeply ingrained in you from an intimate experience in childhood. (But, I still remember the first time, well, I still have a memory of what I believe is the first time I tried cookies and loved them so much--and now I don't eat cookies, so...) For a while I was even reading radical feminist authors, intellectuals, in a reading group in order to make more intellectual sense of why some things aroused me. This type of reinforcement that it had an intellectual basis made me, say, a full-time subscriber.--Count yourself lucky that you didn't find company that would give sanctuary to what was in fact destroying you and perverting you. It sounds like something pleasant, like a community, but it, for me, was really more like finding a bunch of drunks who reinforced the reason why I went to the bar.

 

Yeah, this is called conditioning. I watched stuff that in the past I would be disgusted by.

And because of the current environment. They need to tell you these things because, if they even suggest otherwise and it goes public...your career as a professional therapist is over. These subjects are very limited to discuss. Around 5 years ago, it wasn't, now it's taboo to speak about. It's like we are going backward. Porn addiction is a new phenomenon (17 years max probably) and the porn industry pays well-known figures in the therapy scene to say good things about it. And not only these people, the media also says the same thing...,,porn is harmless even if you exaggerate a little bit''. I bet that in about 20 years things will change. Too many kids have access to it and it starts to come to the surface that something is not quite right.

 

Some of us have a much stronger reaction to P than most people. My own therapist doesn’t see anything inherently immoral with it, in fact he thinks it can be a useful tool for some (he works with LGBTQ a lot), but he knew quitting P was important to me so he casually supported it. I’ve been seeing him for about 4 years, working through depression and such. After I got about a one month streak, he was blown away by the difference. I’m virtually a different person when I don’t use P. He’s not ready to give it up himself, and he’s definitely not ready to recommend quitting to other clients. He’s a little skeptical but intrigued about the idea of the addiction escalating and artificially turning guys into sissies/trans. But, he’s totally on board that P is my personal kryptonite. The difference in me is undeniable.

 

Wherein lays his skepticism? What is he skeptical about?

 

Like I said, he works with a lot of LGBTQ clients, and between the literature & his own experience, he sees P as a tool to reveal truths about a person & their baseline sexuality. Using P as a dopamine seeking behavior to the point that it escalates into a fetish that person normally wouldn’t indulge in, hadn’t even crossed his radar before I mentioned it to him. He’d say these guys that report always being het & married to a woman but now can only have a physical reaction to TG porn were actually repressed by our heteronormative society. They were always gay/trans etc., and porn revealed a truth about them. What surprises him is that they report these feeling go away after they quit P.

He’s allowed my point that pre-Internet, the limiting factor on P addiction was on P. Now, with endless novelty and endless kink, the limiting factor is on us and our bodies. He allows that P isn’t natural, and in most cases it’s not exactly “good” for us in large quantities and certainly not good for our relationships, but he thinks for most people it’s relatively harmless and is a legitimate way to blow off steam, or whatever. Mostly I think it’s because he uses it and isn’t thrilled with the idea of trying to give it up, but that’s my perspective. In my case, though, he says the difference is unexpected but undeniable. When I use I’m depressed, I hate myself, I disassociate in stressful situations and my threshold for what is stressful is incredibly low. When I don’t use for about a month, I’m a normal, competent, confident human being. Going past three months he was talking about cutting me loose, if there wasn’t anything else I wanted to work on. Then I had a relapse and I’m back here at square friggin’ one.

 

Because he probably bases his opinions on the things learned in college and the studies from one particular source. Plus the current political environment. Probably the only thing he/she will say to you is to accept the feelings, even though the same feelings are hurting you deeply. Plus the majority of the people from this forum are way over their heads into pornography. We are not your basic porn user. Another thing is that many people kept this inside, secretly for years. We are on this forum because we cannot hide it anymore. It's affecting our lives.

This is not very well documented. Why? Because porn usage is still a taboo subject even in 2022. Many people are ashamed of talking about this.