A question for mentally ill fapstronauts

[brightsidealien]

Here goes my story:

I'm schizophrenic. I take medication but angry, mocking, cruel voices are still there all the time and the truth is, I can't bring myself to believe they're not real. I also have chronic depression which brings suicidal thoughts and a crushed, awful feeling of pain and emotional turmoil to my consciousness at almost all times.

I use porn for MO' but just look for something, five minutes, in, out and I'm done. I don't spend endless hours looking for fapping material anymore. BUT I AM addicted to celebrity blogs and I save the pics I find hot to my computer. This gives me A HUGE dopamine hit and I even feel almost HIGH as I do it.

All that said, I wanna quit the blogs and PMO as well cause all along in my life, sex and porn and masturbation have not only brought me bad things, but also I've been abused, raped, and more, which makes sex mix with all kinds of bad associations and images in my mind.

OK, so cut to a week ago. I started the process of blocking all porn and blogs from my devices. Took a while but it happened. With the exception of measly SAMSUNG INTERNET, on my tablet. I disabled chrome and got Spin browser, only to find out Samsung internet was not blocked by anything. So it's all pointless.

Needless to say, everytime I get super depressed I end up dropping all my efforts to improve myself, I end up feeling like what's the point? who cares if I do this or not? I might as well be dead, and so on and on.

So a 3 week challenge, like the one I was attempting, turned into 3 days NO PMO, and then a series of resets and relapsing every night till now.

What can I do so I'll CARE ENOUGH that I don't drop NoFap and my challenges as soon as the first wave of depression hits? Anyone out there in a similar situation? I have a pretty effed up life, I never leave the house and I'm constantly bullied and harrassed by these voices. I eat to fill the void and pacify my hurt, so I've become quite fat too.

I think I can safely say that I may not think PMO is enough of a problem for me so that I need SUCH a huge effort quitting entails. I feel enslaved by it sometimes but mostly I see it as a release valve for my huge anger and rage. When I quit PMO for more than five days, I become a mean bastard, always irritable and angry.

What do you guys think? Should I keep trying or just give up? And HOW THE HELL do I block SAMSUNG INTERNET from my tablet??

 

[B_Max]

Hey brightsidealien - hang in there! All we can do is keep trying. It might not seem like it, but each time it gets a little easier and you can get a little farther.

I have a Samsung phone and I use Norton App Lock to block apps (like Samsung internet) that I don't want to be able to access. Have a friend/family member set the password so you won't be able to bypass it.

 

[3nigma]

Hey man. I have schizoaffective disorder. I don't hear voices but I have had to deal with depression and I know it sucks. It makes it difficult to accomplish even simple tasks let alone a challenge like nofap. I think what got me right was a combination of getting the right meds and going to a clubhouse (https://clubhouse-intl.org/what-we-do/international-directory/). I also have a bunch of healthy coping skills in my arsenal. If I'm feeling down I might watch a movie, or listen to a comedy routine, or read a book. I might turn on some uplifting music. It's a constant battle but I've found it's easier once the meds are right so talk to your doctor about your depression. I didn't develop these skills over night. I went to group therapy for years and now I'm in this clubhouse program.

I remember from a group therapy session something about the voices. You can fight them, you can ignore them, or you could acknowledge them and move on. Fighting them doesn't work it just makes it worse. Ignoring them doesn't work, they just get louder but what you can do is rationally talk to your voices (in your head). Let's say you have a voice saying "You're worthless." You can say something like, "I hear you saying I'm worthless but I don't believe that anymore." Supposedly this will make them easier to deal with. I don't know cause I've never dealt with them.

I think the root of your anger and irritability is stress. Stress from dealing with the voices. Stress from dealing with the depression. And stress from dealing with horniness. Again, the answer to this is healthy coping skills. You can try art therapy or even just an adult coloring book to deal with the stress. Some people turn to prayer. Others to meditation. Maybe a hobby like woodworking. Exercise goes a long way to combating stress.

Anyway, I wish you luck. We're all routing for you.

 

[brightsidealien]

Thank you for your heartfelt and honest reply @jarvyjarvison , I truly appreciate it. I have some coping skills myself and I meditate daily aside from other things, but jeez it's like the waves of depression are so harsh and huge, they obliterate it all and I'm left there standing, waiting for them to wash me the hell away and drown me. As soon as I feel depressed, the coping skills go out the window and I'm screwed.

I STILL haven't managed to start a new nofap challenge cause I know my mind and my heart are not in the right place for me to provide a decent effort in the fight against PMO. It's sad but when you are so depressed and feel like total shit, ALL you wanna do is just pamper yourself, indulge and be fuckin soft on your pained and destroyed self, but that only makes you even weaker and your discipline nonexistent, and then you're screwed.

Needless to say, I don't think I have what it takes right now to be in any sort of challenge, let alone one so difficult and tricky as a NoFap challenge can be. I'll do my best keeping myself occupied and most of all ALIVE but surviving is all I'm good for at the moment, and even that, just by a damn thread.

I also failed to mention I have bad complex PTSD and I spend all day re-living past events, re enacting them without my choosing so. I get emotional and bodily flashbacks and it sucks so much. I'm truly more broken than I care to admit and probably, most likely, too broken to be fixed or helped.

Thanks everyone for their input and help!

 

[Deleted Account]

I was thinking of making a post about this earlier, but you already have...
I'm schizoid; I have heard voices in the past but they've usually been as a result of polysubstance abuse. I managed to recognise that I was in the prodromal phase of psychosis about 2 months ago due to cannabis abuse but managed to stop, and am using that as my motivation to remain abstinent indefinitely. Even after I stopped I heard whispering and had this horrible... black feeling in my mind for about a week which I wasn't sure would go away.

Thankfully it has and I'm left with my usual state of consciousness, which does have psychotic features but they're attenuated to the point that I feel taking medication would be more of a disruption to my life than learning to live with what I've got. I do experience the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, and some of the positive paranoid features, but thankfully they're not intrusive or I'm able to work with them.

Avolition, anhedonia and depression are fucked. I was so dismayed when I quit drinking and they didn't resolve themselves. After a year, I asked my psychologist when they would go away and she said, really awkwardly, that I would have to learn to live with them. That was a kick in the guts; I can't at all pretend to understand your circumstances but at least can relate to having this permanent part of my being that makes every day fucking torturous. The dulled emotions are horrible. I also live with CPTSD and yeah, emotional and somatic flashbacks are just horrible. I really haven't found a good way to get through them yet.
Interestingly, I have taken inspiration from a schizophrenic friend, who gets through his episodes by blacking out the room, putting the radio on quietly and lying on the couch. When I get home from work and recognise derealisation/depersonalisation, I've started doing that and it helps me get out of it a lot quicker than I've ever experienced.

In regards to nofap, living in general... I'm really just trying to look past the fact that everything I do feels meaningless and any sincere effort brings no sense of joy. The best I get is a heavily muted sense of satisfaction, if you can call it that, which is fleeting and soon replaced by abject numbness. The biggest challenge is the knowledge that even if I complete the 90 day challenge, I will just have done it and the main payoff will be not feeling guilt and shame, or exhausted from MO. I don't think it's realistic at all to expect some of the more positive emotional benefits people report. That's the ultimate potentiator for relapse, and one of the main reasons I've resorted to using porn for so long.

I think it's worth continuing, for all of us, because at least by getting away from PMO, or porn at least, we are giving our brains the best possible chance of performing at their highest level, even if that's not what we wish it could be. I've conceded to my fate as such and am going to start studying electronics engineering in the next couple of months. The upshot of the dissociative aspect of my personality is that I can place my consciousness inside a circuit... Learning about electricity in that regard at least gives that element of my being something positive to feed on, and I can eventually turn it into a comprehensive knowledge of the subject that far surpasses the mere mortal.
The downside is that I'll always default to that state of emotional void. This will always make maladaptive self-soothing behaviours hard to fight against...

 

[The Bink]

Hey man, I won't be able to give you advice on your condition except for the fact that the benefits of nofap are real, keep fighting!

However, I can help you with blocking other browsers expect for SPIN browser. The creators of SPIN actually made another app that blocks every other browser except for SPIN. It's called manage SPIN. I've been looking for a long time for a good blocker and this is the one.
The bad thing is that within the manage SPIN app there is an option to delete manage SPIN so I installed another blocker to block my access to manage SPIN. That is something I do, but that is up to you if you want it.

Hope I was able to help man, stay strong!

 

[IGY]

I'm truly more broken than I care to admit and probably, most likely, too broken to be fixed or helped.

From one broken man to another. I have great empathy for what you are dealing with. There may well be parts within us that are beyond fixing and being realistic about that actually helps. Notwithstanding, there are many parts within us that can be restored... with help. When people like you and I have severe and enduring mental health diagnosis (and the trauma that caused it), we cannot sort things out alone. Our mind is broken and we need professional assistance in addressing these issues. Is it possible for you to access psychological talking therapy that specifically helps with your problems mate? Even if it means a referral and a long wait, it is good to have some hope of movement and progress.