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

Haha, thanks. I honestly think this is a negative and somewhat narcissistic trait of mine rather than a positive one right now. My posts should be more concise, especially on a forum where a lot of us might be dealing with a short attention span and cognitive problems. I think the main reason my posts look like that is because I want to prove to the world that I'm not the mental handicap that I feel every day. Maybe some of the people in my life who judged me unfairly or at face value might stumble upon my writing and see that there is more to me than the cheap image of the lazy academic reject they made up in their heads, and I'll be vindicated. That's the feeling, anyway. It is definitely a painful feeling I have to process in a healthier way.

 

Hey, I am sorry u felt that way, u were just doing what I sometimes do but on my notebooks, I just write anything rationally tought out to feel better especially when the day starts badly like after wet dreams, compelled to work on screen late night and wake up dead battery, etc.. Also I read therapeutic books and sometimes everything goes out of my mind, I then write the summary what I just read, that way, I stay grounded... Otherwise, I may go to spiral down thunking, oh my gosh this is end of the world especially me.. Lol.. I hope u get the point here.. I didn't mean to be mean.. I also sometimes just rant here..
And to the 'prove' u want the world to see, mate, dont prove to the world.. Take my advice, prove yourself and just do this all ur life cuz even if the world sees ur post they wont even know it was from the 'real named you'. Just as u finish proving them one point they will expect u did something else, then when u finished proving this too, even then they will say ''I expected this from u''..

 

Now I see, it does feel sarcastic after considering ur pov, at the time of writing I was just thinking u were jounaling the points made in your words, like u were preparing for a school debate or a speech competition lol... mind it as just a friendly chat

 

Has anyone tried this method
https://www.burgeonbook.org/brute
??

 

You are being to hard on yourself. It doesn't matter if your post aren't perfect. The idea is to get the general point across, but sometimes that doesnt happen. This is ok and its why we are on this forum in the first place. I have tonnes of posts in my journal on here that make no sense or is just ramblings of how i feel.

I get the same sinking feeling when out in the real world. Nobody wants to look stupid and believe me i always look stupid because my brain cannot function correctly. Its one of the hardest things to deal with, knowing that you are capable of more and not living up to it. But its ok, try to be patient with yourself. Eventually we will get there.

 

I feel you bro. It must be a withdrawal symptom. The last few weeks, I've had many pmo dreams. A ton more than I have had in the previous five months. I also had a pretty crazy vivid wet dream in the morning this morning. In the dream, I compromised and gave in to lust. I've noticed when wet dreams occur, I am feeling the dopamine rushes from them more since they have become more vivid. We must endure. It's part of the process. My ocd gets pretty bad sometimes after wet dreams thinking I relapsed and whatnot.

 

I too have been struggling to get out of bed. This is a daily occurrence, and I often wake just before I have to leave to work (and sometimes I'm even late getting there). Every day seems like I'm dragging my feet through thick mud. Hopelessness and despair are both withdrawal symptoms, hang in there man. It's as if our reality is distorted by a foggy lens, we can't think or see straight. We can have hope staring us right in the face and not see it. Just realize that the worst of paws symptoms is 1000 times better than being stuck in the cycle of the darkness of pmo. As bad as paws is, let's not forget where we are coming from. Pmo is literal hell on earth.

I remember biking down a trail one day and having a conversation with myself. In it, I said to myself if abstinence offered no benefits for the rest of my life and I'd be stuck in these paws symptoms for the rest of my life, would I still do it? It was a good question because it challenged my motives. I paused and answered with conviction heck yes. I'd rather go through hell, living a life of honor and integrity and suffer for it than an easy, comfortable, and compromising life full of the devil's pleasures. I had a serious conversation about it doesn't matter how long this takes. It can take four-five years, and I have to be ok with that. I have to accept that reality. Things like wet dreams gets me overthinking because I don't want anything to hinder recovery. And that might be a healthy fear. But I have to realize that I'm in this for the long-run. Say the accumulation of pmo dreams/wet dreams have a slight effect of the speediness of recovery, does it really matter at the end of the day if we plan to abstain from pmo forever and live a life of honor? We will all make it either way, whether it takes two years for some and four years for others. I ask this question more for myself because I fall too much into the little things. Hang in there bro. You are inspiration to me and I'm sure to many others on this paws forum.

 

Absolutely 100% right, it just takes abstinence time to get better, sometimes I become so aware and conscious that I forget I have paws, but other times I m like meh! what in the hell am I doing? I cant feel shit about my passions, my commitments, my goals, life purposes, etc, thats right lets not forget where we are coming from, the road is tough but the end goal is something to be proud of.

Same bro, every single time I had wet dreams during this latest streak, I felt like I relapsed, it feels like 80% of how I feel after relapsing to pmo, it sucks.. Motivation at some time during the day and suddenly feeling foggy and lathargic in other times...just sucks!

 

Guys, who is registered on the reboot nation forum? They have closed the possibility of registering new participants. Please write down who is registered there

 

Thank you for the kind words. As of yesterday that misery ended. You could call it a flatline inside of paws that makes everything unbearable. Now i can at least function to the point where i can go to work and complete daily tasks.

My advice is dont worry at all about wet dreams. Even though they may feel intense it doesnt impact recovery in the long run. They can send you into a flatline or break you out of one or even have no effect at all. I had 2 last night, but they havent impacted me at all today.

 

It gets better from here. Congratulations. Just stay on course and you should be good to go.

 

Yes it does get better, after a point wet dreams don't have considerable impact on the days that follow. Idk for some reason i had wet dreams on 3 consecutive days, but i didn't feel the symptoms to an extent that it bothers me.

 

I'm doing better abstaining from relapsing. Hopefully I can get through this. I'm gonna fight till the end! Thanks all of you for your immense support, really if I didn't know about paws I don't know how this would've ended..

 

Hey are you guys having a problem with lust? I can't look at women properly without lusting after them. I just lower my gaze but sometimes I accidentally lust. Anyone else experiencing this?

 

Yo man my dreams have been visiting better times in my life, when my addiction only had a tenuous grasp on my psyche. Sad that high school happens to be the era I'm alluding to. It was when I still had the magnetism that leads to natural relationships with women. I was, without question, at my most successful with the opposite sex because I didn't even have to think about it. I flirted because that's what I felt like doing at the time. I gravitated and girls gravitated and life was good. I love women, yet I've spent years and years having to force things with them. Of course there were some outlier experiences, but I spent the majority of the time in a stasis. Especially once my addiction got kindled into oblivion. My aura, or energy, or whatever you like to call it turned sour. I think sometimes it was downright creepy. Voyeurism will do that to a person, especially when the things I was viewing turned ugly and morally repugnant.

Dreams, to me, are a major indicator of recovery. I view it as where some of the major recovery takes place. My brain had/still has files upon files of historic data to process.

Thank god bodybuilding is back in my life, because it gives me something to focus on rather than constantly obsessing over timelines and symptoms. I think that a lot of people in this forum are looking forward to when their nervous systems allow lifting once again. It's a pretty involved hobby.

What I've noticed is that when I do the heavier, more compound lifts flatline symptoms return briefly. Deadlifts and sprints seem to be the main culprits. Goes to show that I'm still not at 100%, plus the fact that my body seems to take longer to recover than the average lifter. Yes, I'm getting older, but my gut is telling me that my body's energy is divided between addiction recovery and bodily rejuvenation.

I'm more vociferous lately because I'm leaving the flatline I've been in. It lasted around 45 days. Not bad for me, but still a pretty decent chunk of time.

Godspeed out there to yall. PAWs are an otherworldy, nigh unfathomable experience.

Massive addition to earlier post:

Going to enroll in two undergraduate English courses this fall. Already sent in the initial application.

I'm about to be 32 years old, and as Andy Dufresne from Shawshank said, get busy livin' or get busy dyin'.

Once I complete the trial run, I plan on enrolling in the local college's master's in literature program. I can teach composition classes and have it be fully paid for.

My sleep has been regular, which was the biggest barrier to me enrolling for the past 3+ years. But for the past ~4 months it's been nigh perfect.

I already told my closest friends/family about the decision, and will not turn back no matter what.

I'm so unbelievably excited by this new path I'm taking that I'll be able to weather whatever storms lie ahead. I just love having a firm direction, and this one feels perfect for me. No more dawdling and vacillating. It's the right decision and the right time. Can't wait to show up to parties and get-togethers and have my head hang just a little bit higher. I deserve this shit dawg. 3+ years of bullshit is finally starting to pay off.

 

Thank you and yes it certainly does get better without relapse. 12 months pmo free is when recovery takes off for me