1. Welcome to NoFap! We have disabled new forum accounts from being registered for the time being. In the meantime, you can join our weekly accountability groups.
    Dismiss Notice

Why do so many 'experts' and apologists tell us to ACCEPT our fetishes as ''who we are''?

Discussion in 'Rebooting - Porn Addiction Recovery' started by therealtalker96, Oct 16, 2015.

  1. therealtalker96

    therealtalker96 Fapstronaut

    113
    93
    28
    My fetish is detailed here: http://www.yourbrainrebalanced.com/index.php?topic=31019.msg495334#msg495334

    It annoys me. I don't want to accept my fetish (which has grown from porn use) as ''part of me'' - there is absolutely no way I want wresting videos to be the only way for me to ejaculate, and not be into regular vanilla sex.

    What ever happened to grit and toughness? Fighting a problem instead of cowering behind ''accept who you are''?
     
    PotentLife likes this.
  2. PotentLife

    PotentLife Fapstronaut

    Hey, therealtalker96, great question. You're brave to put it out there. I know that in the SLAA group I attended for a couple of years, guys in the group talked about developing fetishes they never knew they had, because the nature of fantasy addiction (which I had when porn wasn't available) is developing weirder and more novel fantasies to keep stimulating the dopamine rush. It's like a needle-using heroin addict needing to find fresh veins and higher doses.

    I've been so loaded up with fetishes that it's been insane. One of them has definitely been mixed wrestling (I'm familiar with the site you mentioned) and lots of fantasizing about me being the helpless or submissive one despite the humiliation of being overpowered by a woman. The shame has been so intense that I've sometimes considered suicide. It's also been hell feeling like I'd have to confess these fetishes to different girlfriends out of an obligation of honesty in a relationship. Sometimes I felt relief confessing, but it never lasted, because I was still stuck with the urges and either wanting to involve my girlfriend in them (which could never work because they were too extreme and varied) or break up with her so I could feel free to look at porn whenever with less guilt. I have a strong feeling that this has helped sabotage just about every ambition in my life, since I'd always have that alternate persona that wanted to be helpless, weak, overcome by the problem instead of actually overcoming it myself.

    Plus, if you look at just about every self-help book written, it states that what you think about on a regular basis, especially with powerful emotions, shapes how your life turns out. My life seems to be the cycle of shame and anesthesia that indulging my sexual fantasies reinforced.

    I did seem to develop some other fetishes over the years that hadn't been there before, so it's overwhelmingly possible that fetishes are not only learned but able to be unlearned.

    I've heard the term "vanilla" for sex bandied about and I'm wondering whether you really think sex based on love and commitment, simple affection is truly "vanilla" or you are just using the term for convenience. This is an important point. I've been pretty guilty of thinking regular, missionary-style is boring, but I've come to consider that I could grow to orgasm to feelings of essentially that traditional position, being the physically stronger one, a protector to her like the roof above her, a rock for her to cling to in the whirlpool, being the man who would build a house for us, take us on expansive trips to far-away places. I could even orgasm to the idea of having children together and raising into happy, well-adjusted adults. Each of these items has its own special thrill of electricity and motivates me to grow as a person. These fantasies aren't just pragmatic dead-ends like getting head scissored, but actually take you somewhere in life that you'd presumably want to go. If you really think it's vanilla or boring, maybe you'd do well to look at the impatience that often motivates such a term and treat it like the urge to masturbate or any destructive emotion - in other words, let it pass and let a different kind of excitement come through once the urge clears. Nothing is really boring once you can learn to perceive its multifaceted potential.

    I listed my heart-fantasies in the above paragraph. What in your heart would you love to get off on if you could; if it was just as pleasurable or more than the head scissoring and wrestling fantasies?

    I think you can develop a thrill for loving, committed sex or whatever your heart is yearning for, if you practice slow persistence, like the way people can cure themselves by slowly exposing themselves to things they're phobic about. Once you can really get comfortable with it, then you can develop a stronger and stronger pleasure association to it until it's mind-blowingly orgasmic. I've been posting pictures, music videos and vivid descriptions that characterize how I'd like my sex life and my life in general to be. I've been imagining it in various ways, and it feels great! Cultivating such fantasies, I feel far more like my ideal kind of person than I did, particularly while I was masturbating to the fetish porn.

    Imagine how happy you'll be when you've climbed the Mt. Everest of your own sexuality and really feel a choice in what turns you on and what doesn't! You'll be high above all the people stuck on autopilot, never questioning the microscopic structure of their urges, blaming other people and circumstances for their problems - people who never took the time to understand their powers to the depths you did.

    Hope I didn't get on the wrong track with this. Let me know if you think what I'm saying applies to you.

    To answer your question more directly, self-change and self-acceptance are paradoxical and they both have a way of working. Carl Jung said change is only possible through acceptance. Consider also the aphorism, "What you resist persists." A guy in my SLAA group stated that his urge to masturbate left him once he stopped being ashamed of himself. So it's often when we take away the pain of being unable to accept ourselves that we no longer need the "drug" that takes away the pain.

    Oh - last thing - probably the most reassuring. I've noticed that after going 30 days without porn or fetish-fantasizing, etc, just normal women and normal sex start to turn me on. Just getting a smile or a caress from the right woman can be a sexy revelation.

    I'm really interested in how things turn out for you and any insights you get.

    Steve
     
    Last edited: Oct 21, 2015
    BlueNotes likes this.
  3. therealtalker96

    therealtalker96 Fapstronaut

    113
    93
    28
    Great answer, thanks man. And the bolded part has me excited. That's what I'm aiming for.
     
    PotentLife likes this.
  4. DogDaysOfLife

    DogDaysOfLife Fapstronaut

    192
    218
    43
    It would be worth considering where this interest came from as you seek to overcome it. Did it have its origins in early childhood or is it purely since you started using porn? Mainstream psychology says that you can overcome fetishes but that fetishists shouldn't forced to change if they aren't bothered by it.
     
    PotentLife likes this.
  5. PotentLife

    PotentLife Fapstronaut

    Fascinating article, DogDaysofLife. The material on animals developing fetishes is eye opening. You might find this interesting, too, therealtalker96! I mean, this is just basic behavioral psychology at work, here. It's kind of amusing, too.

    Rats will also develop sexual preferences for the location of their early sexual experiences, and can be conditioned to show increased arousal in the presence of objects such as a plastic toy fish.[17][29] One experiment found that rats which are made to wear a Velcro tethering jacket during their formative sexual experiences exhibit severe deficits in sexual performance when not wearing the jacket.[17] Similar sexual conditioning has been demonstrated in gouramis, marmosets and Japanese quails.[17]
    Oh, those naughty Japanese quails! They're always up to some kind of mischief! And where the hell did I put my Velcro tethering jacket? It's party time!
     
  6. therealtalker96

    therealtalker96 Fapstronaut

    113
    93
    28
    My first exposure was to a fetish video on YouTube. I don't recall any childhood experiences.
     
  7. nigelisfree

    nigelisfree Fapstronaut

    7
    11
    3
    I have largely over come my fetishes, of over 35 years, that lead to full blown fantasy addiction. i say largely as its still there simmering but 95% better...it's a tiny issue now. It has taken me 3 years of working gently on me and practicing mindfulness and learning how to let go of it with friends in SA and just me alone using everyday triggers to feel it and let go. do not fight with it but just see it, feel it and let it go. Its the exact opposite of how our brain works and how we respond normally.

    What reduces a fetish is not the drama of resisting it...or feeding it...but of making it insignificant.

    If you look up "How to let go of a lifelong fetish part 1,2, 3" it better articulates it. Good luck and great points you made.
     
    Last edited: Oct 26, 2015
    ivanhoe likes this.
  8. The Communication Kid

    The Communication Kid New Fapstronaut

    3
    0
    1
    Hey PotentLife that was a very inspiring read! This is my first day on this website and I also had those problems with fetishes too. I identify as a heterosexual. I've been in love with numerous woman. Im single right now and would love to have a girlfriend. One day I hope get married and have children.

    Porn definitely caused serious problem in many aspects of my life. I started with regular porn. But you know these porn sites have all these categories that acts like the devils play ground. I started watching more taboo porn, which consisted of hardcore acts to the degradation of the actors. You would think I'd stop there, but sadly I didn't. I started watching extremely taboo categories of pornography depicting husbands watching there wives cuckold them, sissy hypnosis, and feminization compilations. I was experiencing the cooledge effect, the human psychological process of seeking out noval and taboo and sometimes humiliating sexual experiences because they release more pleasure sensing neurotransmitters like dopamine. I may be a sadomsdocid because I always fantasize about being humiliated. And my brain tells my self to watch sissy training videos, the most taboo and humiliating pornography. And I always feel ashamed and guilty after.

    In The book a billion wicked thoughts they studied the largest collection of sexual behavior on the Internet and found a majority of heterosexual men watch transsexual pornographic materials.

    So I feel if I stay and work On what you wrote so very well,


    "This is an important point. I've been pretty guilty of thinking regular, missionary-style is boring, but I've come to consider that I could grow to orgasm to feelings of essentially that traditional position, being the physically stronger one, a protector to her like the roof above her, a rock for her to cling to in the whirlpool, being the man who would build a house for us, take us on expansive trips to far-away places. I could even orgasm to the idea of having children together and raising into happy, well-adjusted adults. Each of these items has its own special thrill of electricity and motivates me to grow as a person."


    Thanks agai! Take care. I will have 24 hours soon!
     
    Last edited: Oct 27, 2015

Share This Page