28 year old introduction

Hi guys. I’m going to just do a life dump here. Been performing this exercise independently relatively recently, encourage other people to do the same and build up a narrative for themselves if they haven’t already (mine was fairly weak/blurred until relatively recently).

Early childhood was pretty unremarkable. I have fairly wealthy parents, and always felt safe/secure before adolescence. Once adolescence hit I was put in a bunch of gifted programs in middle school and high school, took lots of APs, did very well on standardized tests, etc. I eventually started to withdraw. I masturbated very frequently. I believe I have an abnormally high libido, but I also did it as an escape mechanism/was too nervous to approach girls for that. I became stressed, self conscious and ended up fighting with my parents (mom in particular) a lot my senior year because I didn’t know what I wanted out of life/was scared about going to college. It got bad. In retrospect I think you could call it abuse; was berated a lot, had my belongings put in garbage bags, was threatened to get kicked out, generally shunned, etc, all as a consequence for my continued withdrawal/increasing habit of getting up late and putting off homework. Apex was being (voluntarily) institutionalized for a brief period despite not being suicidal/not needing it (parents sold it as a “place to talk about my issues”, and I thought it’d be a good way to get away from them and school for a week). People there agreed I didn’t belong. Was only there 2 days, but it was very traumatic. I became exceedingly ashamed to be around anyone I knew previously due to feeling severely other-ed and for my plummeting attendance/grades, which messed with my identity as “smart”, and I lost connections with most of my friends.

I used masturbation partially as an outlet to cope with all this after it occurred. I ended up repeating a lot of the same patterns in college, and ended up failing out due to not going to class.

After basically 5 years of half assed school attempts/community college/self wallowing I made my way into the software industry via a bootcamp and lots of independent studying. Fast forward a bit and I now have recruiters knocking down my door/am living independently with a nice apartment and a nice car. It was a great win for me, as I was worried I would be relegated to careers/jobs where I was viewed as inferior due to my poor college performance/general difficulty sticking with menial tasks long term most jobs require, despite my intelligence.

My parents have improved, and my Mom in particular regrets how she handled my withdrawal. But they still view me as “learning disabled”/“different” because of my issues in high school and college, and I feel like I’ve never gained back my self respect or true acceptance/respect from them.

I’ve tried NoFap intermittently before with mixed results. Longest streak was about 2 weeks. It made me feel good, but I was still dealing with other underlying issues that pushed me into relapse. Also, as stated, I think I have an abnormally high libido (have very short/non existent refractory period), but that might just be habit based.

My NoFap journey this time around is a part of a wider self improvement plan. I’ve been pretty unstable for a while, despite my wins, and I’ve had a pretty severe self critic I can’t seem to shake. My parents have done good things for me in addition to the bad/I don’t want to completely shit on them, particularly because I think my withdrawal preceded most of their nastiness, but I think the abuse my senior year left me with a form of CPTSD, as much as I’ve tried to deny it/have felt like a self pitying pussy for entertaining such things in the past.

I’m hoping sticking to improvement plans in a supportive, anonymous atmosphere like this will be keep me improving myself/keep that critic at bay. I’m going to try to post regular status updates to this forum/use it as a way to stay accountable. The more long term health habits I can crystalize/the more I pay attention to self care, the fewer all nighters/procrastination spirals/etc I can avoid, and the more I can accomplish.

Although I’m unsure whether I can win back my parent’s respect, I know I can win back my self respect if I can stick to my self improvement goals. I believe most of my problems lie in self doubt and an unwillingness to commit.

This account represents my serious commit. NoFap for me is just a piece, but it’s an important one, and I’m now committed to it.

Happy to be here, gents.