Are you Porn Addicted or Porn Afflicted??

Let me first apologize for this long post. But, I feel it may be a worthwhile read for anyone on the NoFap site.

Are you Porn Addicted or Porn Afflicted??

Which are you??

Because from what I have gathered people fall into either one of those categories. Knowing and being honest with yourself about which one you fall into can be a huge key into unlocking your recovery. Let me explain each:

Porn Addicted: You may be the person that watches porn several times a day. You fell you need it. When someone says you can never watch porn you get nervous. You don't want to stop. Not thinking about ever watching it again makes you feel sick. You may need porn to get aroused. Real women don't do it for you. You need porn before arousal when it should be the other way around. You might have erectile dysfunction. You might have severe premature ejaculation. You might routinely choose porn over actual sex. You want nothing to do with real physical intimacy or contact with any woman. Your brain craves porn and nothing else gives it that fix. Are you porn addicted??

Porn Afflicted: You're the person who doesn't like porn. Maybe you enjoy it a little bit. But, you don't throw up at the thought of the never watching it again. You can live without porn. You don't need it. What you do need or crave is the sex and release it gives. You crave the orgasm. You crave the sexual satisfaction. You still see women as attractive. You still get aroused by them. You still get erections during sex. You still perform well. You'll choose sex over porn any day. Maybe you don't objectify women all the time. Maybe you still seek intimacy and closeness with women. You just see porn as an outlet when sex isn't available and you need that release. Are you porn afflicted??

Ladies and gentlemen, which are you?? Because knowing where you fall is key. Some points as to why I phrase this question:

1.) I see so many people try to kill their sex drives or wish they could somehow because it'll make winning this battle easier. You shouldn't want to kill your drive. You want to manage it. You should never ever want to take away something that's a part of you. I feel so many people go about NoFap with the intent and goal to kill and cut out all sex driven intent from their lives and that is wrong. It's a gift from God or a natural given instinct. Why kill it?

2.) Many people feel going cold turkey and cutting off all sexual contact and activities immediately is the way to go. I personally don't feel so. You need to wean yourself off of this terrible lifestyle and habit. Think about it, if it were cigarettes could you quit cold turkey?? HELL NO!!!! You'd have to slowly reduce until the urge to smoke was gone. Same with alcohol. In fact, if an alcoholic tries to quit cold turkey it can kill them!!! Yes, it can kill them. The shock is too much. So should you maybe develop a plan to wean yourself off of your bad habits??

3.) Many people give the same advice about beating PMO so I won't repeat them. But, the one bit of advice I will say that no one has mentioned from what I can tell is how much PMO spoils you. What I mean is PMO tells us we can get pleasure any time, any place, when we want to!! If you want a happy, healthy marriage/relationship and sex life you have to condition yourself to not be selfish and accept that you can't pleasure yourself all the time when you want. Even the happiest of couples with healthy "in tune" sex lives have instances when one partner will not want sex when the other does. So, you must condition yourself to accept that will happen and to let it happen.

My personal take:

I am a person that falls into the Porn Afflicted side of the spectrum. And I'm not just saying that, I know. How?? Because I can easily go a week without PMO. I do not want to watch porn. Never watching again porn does not bother me. I enjoy porn when I watch it, but I want to quit more than keep doing it. I think everyone enjoys it, just not what it does to them. I don't fight urges to watch porn specifically. I still get aroused by women. I'm still get very erect during sexual activities. I still seek intimacy and closeness in relationships. I know the difference between porn sex and real sex. I don't have a constant need or urge to fap or look at porn. If anything, I view my sex drive in my singleness as an "control mindset" not a "pleasure mindset."

But, porn is an outlet I use when I am severely aroused from a build up of testosterone after a week plus of NoFap. I would still have sex over porn. The problem is I don't have a girl to do that with. I don't date unless it's serious. I don't sleep around with girls. So my mind can drift to porn as a filler. So my challenge isn't to constantly fight porn urges. My challenge is to find better ways to control my natural urges without porn. The urges are for sex, which is how they are supposed to be, not for porn.

My plan going forward is to level myself and taper off of PMO. (Let me say that I am not saying NoFap is bullshit and doesn't work or anything. I'm saying that MANY people cannot quit anything cold turkey. They need to wean and slowly taper off to victory. This takes more time and isn't a quick fix, but it's more effective. Porn is definitely bad. MO with the right mindset is not in my opinion. My goal is still to not need any PMO. But, baby steps.) Porn is going to go. I'm going to go at least a week before doing anything sexual because I know from NoFap I can go a week. I'm still going to go as long as possible because I want to eventually get to no p or m or o of any kind!! I will continue to gradually increase the time between events without porn until I do not feel a need for it at all. I feel this approach will work because I have gotten real with myself about two big things that need to be stated:

1.) I've treated my sex drive with "control" not "pleasure." I will only do what NEEDS to be done, not what WANTS to be done. I'm not killing or starving my sex drive. Just controlling it.

2.) Sex is what I truly crave, not porn. When I have m'ed in the past without porn I have felt fine. Because I felt it was a need. Porn makes it a want. Masturbating can still create addiction. But with these two things I'm trying and hopeful they will not.

One guy said it to me best to know the difference between porn addiction and porn affliction. And it's simple, what do you seek first?? Porn or arousal?? If it's porn meaning porn comes before and induces arousal that's an addiction. If arousal comes first and porn follows that's affliction. To me it's simple because if porn has to come first to induce arousal that's a problem that is an addiction. If it's the other way around, that's an affliction.

I know this was a long post. If you read this far, thanks for reading and I hope you took something away from it. Maybe my method for me will not work for you. We all have different battles and different reasons we are here. Since I feel I crave sex and can't have it I can take my approach to clean myself one at a time from PMO and space it out until it's gone. Maybe it'll fail. But, I could spend a year doing this method and it'll work but knowing it'll take longer. Or, I can keep trying cold turkey and never getting there. If it fails, at least I'll know.

Disclaimers:

*Most of my opinions and thoughts are based around being single and not having sexual outlets with another partner. If you do have a sexual partner, interpret how you feel as I know that will be different.

*My method may work for me but not for others. Find a method that works and know that everyone is different.

*My opinion is to control my sex drive, not starve or kill it. To me, I don't want to be a slave to my desires. And I already feel those chains breaking. Maybe I'll never get to 30 Days or 90 Days. But, maybe I don't have to. Maybe all I need to know is that my sexual desires don't have to dominate my life and thoughts. Maybe all I need is to control them until I find the right one to share them with. So a number of days to me is irrelevant. If I masturbate every week or 10 days or longer without porn, but I am confident and know that my sex drives don't dictate my thoughts then maybe I did win. Reaching 30 Days or a certain number doesn't automatically cure you. Maybe all you need to know is that your sex drives come and occur when you want them to. Not when they please.

 

I respect everyone's opinion. I truly do. I accept that many people have many different views of how to go around NoFap. I don't feel I'm addicted to porn or PMO necessarily. The reasons why I described earlier. But even if I am, working to cleanse myself of one thing first, porn, is more doable and achievable to me right now than doing all PMO. My mindset is 30 days porn free. Eventually I will build to PMO free. For me masturbstion without porn is not a rush like it is with porn. I do it that way as a need. I did research on it and many guys felt the same. Everyone here has their opinions. Mine is that cold turkey hard mode NoFap is not the ONLY way to win this battle.