Lingering Guilt

Hi everyone,

I'll try to be brief, concise and transparent here. I've struggled with irregular sexual tendencies my entire life. Even as a kid, I can remember having sexual fantasies and desires at an extremely young age. With that being said, it's probably not surprising that I ended up developing a pornography addiction. I watched a lot of porn in my adolescent years, but things seemed to spiral out of control after I graduated college and had less social interaction/preoccupations. My mind became extremely warped and perverse, and I assume that--like many of you--I didn't know how serious this issue was getting until I was knee-deep into it. My two "vices" were trans porn and voyeur porn. For about two years, this habit was really bad. I was working from home, and when my girlfriend would leave, I would just dive into it. Quickly, I became reclusive, anxiety-ridden, and generally unhealthy. The people around me knew something was wrong with me, but they weren't sure what. My psychological structure became an absolute hell, and it felt as though life was reminding me of what I was doing at every turn, sending me subtle messages. I wanted to quit, but I couldn't. In looking for candid/stolen images of women, I stumbled upon questionable/illegal material a couple of times (was never my bag), but it freaked me out and increased my paranoia a million-fold. I was exchanging pictures and emails with transsexual escorts on Craigslist, and I was afraid that somehow all of this activity was going to loop back around and destroy my life. I developed so many irrational complexes and expectations, and I just kept going deeper and deeper into insanity and paranoia, thinking that everyone around me and life in general was out to get me, expose me. I also cheated on my girlfriend, and she left me. I had no self-control at all. By the end of 2018, I was an absolute shell of a person, and I was internalizing everything. In 2019, I finally made the resolve to overcome this habit, but I would go a week, relapse, etc (normal stuff, I assume). The entire year was a struggle, but I was absolutely determined, and by the beginning of this year, I had at least pretty much quit watching porn. Long story short, it's been about six months since I've been "clean," and I have completely changed my lifestyle, diet, routine, everything. I started incorporating yoga into my life, and I literally don't even have a sex drive anymore. This has been wonderful, but it took many months for me to heal the psychological wounds. Reflecting, I can now clearly see how this issue progressed from one stage to the next, and I realized that my anxiety/guilt/shame was perpetuating the behavior. I didn't want to face what I was doing, so I just kept increasing the frequency and intensity of the activity. Looking back, I'm simply in disbelief that I lived that way or was getting off on that kind of stuff. It doesn't even seem real. I have come to terms with most of it, but there seems to be some nagging scar tissue, and I feel absolutely inclined to confess what I've done/been through, and to share my story as a source of inspiration for other people--especially those who have completely internalized everything and feel backed into a corner.

I was in denial for a long, long time, but I'm not anymore. It's just taken time to turn this shit into manure. Perhaps the greatest silver-lining I've found is that, since I've come out of this, I no longer judge other people. I don't hold strong opinions about anything, and I'm so much more receptive to the pain on everyone's faces. Almost everyone I see is walking around with something nagging them, eating at them. I feel at peace, but I feel that I owe it to myself and others to share this and offer my support. Getting on here and articulating my experience has been really hard for me, so I apologize if this post isn't very good. It just feels necessary to really free myself from the remnants of the pain.