Porn on my mind, help!

Hey I am right here with you man. I am on day 7 and I JUST had a CLOSE call. I used the speak feature on my phone to search porn (so embarrassing), I had a filter that stopped it thank God or I would have to reset. It takes WILL POWER to stop the intense cravings but your ability to say NO does increase over time. Just stay with this and you will get there.


RESET after day 8. Don't know why I decided it was okay. But not going to stay in this feeling for long. Time to start fresh and stronger.

 

Hold fast to the Lord and He will help.

 

Is there anything you can do right now to take your mind off porn? Exercise, go outside, call someone on the phone, play a video game. The longer you stay away from porn the easier it is to resist.

 

Who are your in person accountability partners?

I'm on Day 8 and I was feeling intense temptations, combined with nightmares of me failing.

Talk to them, there is peace in talking to them now instead of a failure.

Also, what guides you to freedom? Christ?

 

Don't allow yourself to get bored and know your triggers for porn and try to avoid them as much as possible.

 

Dude try to disassociate the urge with you. THink in your head that its the hurt portion of your brain that wants it not you. That always helps me and distracting myself that helps to. But whenever just think its not you. See whenever I thought that it was me who had the urge I would go for awhile thinking how do I stop myself from feeling this. Can't really all I can do is realize its not me who wants it. Good luck nice work on day 8-9

 

You have to go back to the basics, understand what the problem is. Porn, being actual porn, or thoughts of porn (hypersexualized thoughts) are the button we push to get the best drug in the world, dopamine. It is released in response to sexual thought--not just actual sex--not the perceived sex that is porn--but sexual thoughts themselves. This is actually a good thing, it is a mechanism that encourages us to reproduce, meaning to perpetuate the species. But we are not built (actually our brain's sexual reward center is not built) to handle the endless novelty of porn. If you have one woman in your life the urge to have sex with her will diminish over time. This by the way is no negative comment on the woman, it simply means the urgency to be with her in that way diminishes over time. This has to do with the "Coolidge effect", which is another reproduction mechanism our brain rewards--meaning our brain's reward center encourages not only having sex, having quit a bit of it, but also having it with multiple partners. I am not saying this is a good or bad thing, just pointing out that up there, between the ears, in that little reward center, we get a reward not just for the physical act of having sex, but of thinking of having sex, with multiple new partners. Thus the problem of porn--porn represents endless new partners to that part of our brain that rewards porn and hypersexualized thoughts the same or ever more so than real sex with one partner. So, understand what is going on; when you think about sex over and over you are actually giving yourself a dopamine high, over and over, and dopamine is highly addictive when it is being pumped out like that for years on end. How bad can the addiction be? Well, heroine is synthetic dopamine. If heroine is addictive, and it is not even the real thing, imagine the problem we are up against.

The main this is you must develop a method, techniques, to quit thinking about sex, porn, and having hypersexualized thoughts. You have to anticipate they will happen, and anticipate whatever distracting behaviors you will utilize to avoid them when they do. This may sound stupid, but making a little "tst" sound for me helped distract me when I was first quitting. Put your tongue to the roof of your mouth, such in while pulling it down, "tst." Then, when distracted, make sure you not around a computer or smart phone and go find something else to do. Get out in public, interact with real people. That is part of the "getting back to normal" process.

What I am about to tell you is very important to understand. If porn is the problem then you need to beat the problem by doing the opposite of the problem. what is porn? Porn is a false reality, an illusion. What is the opposite of false reality? Answer: reality. You have to get out in the world and engage with things and people you can actually interact with. There is just no way around this.

Eventually, if you stay clean and free long enough, porn and hypersexualized thoughts simply will not occur to you. Right now, it's compulsive for you (like is for all of us quitting, in the beginning) and you have to fight it ever day, but at 10 months clean, I don't have to fight it anymore. I simply move through the days unbothered by porn or hypersexualized thoughts. This does not mean that I play with my problem; porn had to completely be eliminated from my experience to get clean. I recommend you do the same. After all, what are you giving up but a false sexual thrill, a dopamine high, and the withdrawals you are currently experiencing.

Here is what I know about quitting.

http://www.nofap.org/forum/showthread.php?2402-Get-educated-get-tools-and-learn-to-love-withdrawals

Maybe it will help.

Will I AM.

Peace.