Extra Lonely Today Because of my Stupid

Its ok man. These realizations are important as hard as they may sting. Self reflection is a key component of getting better. Just remember that every scar is a lesson and that every lesson makes you a better person than you were before in one way or another.
Hang in there

 

Oh...I'm so sorry for you. You are on a right way. You will be fine!
Thank you for sharing your story. I suppose that your situation reminds mine.
I don't understand why my hubby hasn't stopped watching everything at once. I suppose that there were p-subs just for the same not long time for about a year. It's freaking me out. It makes me think my shape isn't good enough and everything like that.
My heart aches. I don't know how to stop that.
Sorry for crying here. But I've just read smth similar in your post.

 

Just one question for you, please. Is it possible not to look at p-subs? I mean it looks like it is possible to avoid hard videos, but p-subs seem to be everywhere and an addicted person can not avoid them. One image triggers an idea to have a look at more and here it goes...
For SO it doesn't matter what kind of hot women an addicted person is attracted to. How not to be hurt?
Right now do you still look at p-subs or have you completly stopped?
God bless you! Thanks!

 

I'd like to comment on that from my perspective. For me, P is an obvious zero tolerance on viewing it. Where it's trickier is with p-subs. It's true that it's impossible to avoid seeing a sexy woman on a billboard or TV commercial, girl in tight yoga pants and top at the gym or even on the cover of a magazine at the grocery store. we can't control that. However, what happens when you see that is the important part. Certain things we won't be able to avoid (unless we become a hermit and never leave our cabin in the woods), but we can control how we respond when we do see those things. So for me, if a VS commercial comes on the TV or if there is a bedroom scene in a movie, I avert or close my eyes. This might sound extreme, but I don't even want to let those kinds of erotic images into my head. Why? Because I know for me that if I see those I will struggle with bringing them back up later and allowing myself to entertain them, to play out scenarios around those in my mind's eye. It's all about fantasy life and thought life for me. If I look at what triggered me to act out with PMO, I see that it typically started with fantasies and erotic thoughts. I go up in my head and entertain them and then get aroused and go use M or worse use M with P.

This is something that my wife is aware of and tries to be a support for me with. If a bedroom scene comes on watching a show, she knows I will close my eyes and she will then say "all clear" when it's done and I can open my eyes. It's a small thing but it allows us to be partners in this and is a way she can be supportive. She can't fix me or be my accountability partner, nor should she try, but she can be supportive in this way and she can ask me at times how recovery is going. We don't get into details as she can't and shouldn't try to manage my recovery but she can ask how it's going. That lets me know that she cares about me and my recovery process and I give her a very high level status of where I'm at and what I'm currently working on so she knows that I'm serious about recovery and actively engaged in it.

So then for me it's all about needing to nip it in the bud and work at not going down the fantasy/thought life trail as I know that will always lead to PMO acting out. To do that I have to be hyper vigilant 24/7 and recognize that when I see something suggestive at the gym, or on a commercial or whatever, I need to immediately "bounce" to something else instead of dwelling and entertaining. I need to close or avert my eyes and immediately think about something else. That takes work though and also commitment. You can't let your guard down or you'll find yourself going down the path you don't want to be on. Or, I've found sometimes if the triggering was caused by seeing an attractive woman in person who is dressed provocatively that I will stop and tell myself that she is must be hurting and that's why she is seeking out the attention of men by dressing that way. Recognizing that she is crying out for attention possibly as a result of her own pain and wounding helps me to empathize with her from a afar and not objectify her as something to lust after but as a real human being with feelings and hurts and pains. When doing that it's much harder to fantasize about her or later bring that image back in my mind as a p-sub to get off to.

Does this mean that I have that area of my life mastered? No. I wish I could say I did, but that isn't the case yet. I may have to always work at that in my life and always be vigilant with my fantasy life. I will say that it gets better and easier over time, but there are times that I'm more susceptible and need to work harder at not giving in to fantasizing or looking at p-subs. For example, if my emotional needs aren't being met, if I'm feeling lonely or hurt/wounded, or if I'm bored. In those times I've noticed I have to work harder at it. The other thing I've observed is that as an addict I have a tolerance that is affected by what I see. When I was heaving in the addiction and looking at hardcore P seeing a girl at the gym in yoga pants or a VS commercial wouldn't do all that much for me. It was tame compared to the stuff I was consuming on a daily basis. But now that I haven't watched porn in almost two years? Little things that are fairly tame can now be a trigger if I'm not careful. The tolerance I had built up from viewing extreme images is gone and now I have no tolerance. A VS commercial that many wouldn't find that big a deal is something that is quite erotic for me now given my lack of tolerance. This is why I have to be so vigilant. As you said you can't avoid all the sex and erotic things in our culture and society but I can work at how or if I respond to them or allow myself to be triggered by them.

 

Allan and Ted, thank you so much! You have brought me a ray of light and hope! I feel much better now!
Actually I mixed up the definitions when asking. So P-sub is something you may see on TV or in real life, which is not porn but may be used as such.
Actually My concern was about porn. Stuff in Playboy is porn, what else it is. These days this stuff seem to be in many places like Flickr, tumbler etc.
So an addict feels urge to look at more of these stuff when stumbles across some images. It makes true recovery impossible I thought.
But based on what you are saying everything is possible!
Actually if that happens than the addiction is still there, right?
I thought that how recovery looks for an addict(to surf this stuff instead of hard P) and that is not true, I can see now.