Porn in moderation? No extreme?

Echoing what others have said here - when you are an addict, you will experience withdrawal symptoms that are much worse than the 'fun' of watching P. So every single month, you will experience that horrible first two weeks of NF before you start to experience the benefits again. And repeat.
How long before your monthly session turns into a day-long binge to make the withdrawal 'worth it'? or once a month becomes twice a month, maybe once a week ... back to square one.

If you have always been a moderate user and never had any problems, you can probably carry on. But be aware that changes in your life might tip you over the edge. I was a moderate occasional user, before a failed relationship tipped me over the edge, suddenly I wasn't going out and socialising because I discovered camsites, etc. If you are relying on P to get you through stressful times, you are an addict in the making, because life will never be easy, you will start relying on whatever crutch you use more and more and more.

 

My take on the title 'porn in moderation' is NO, pornography is a drug that keeps a large part of the population enslaved to some degree thru addiction, and it messes with your reward centers. you can consider doing moderation with MO and sex AFTER your initial long-term sexual abstinence, but stay away from drugs such as pornography. it takes a lot of self-discipline and wastes a ton of energy to to use a drug that is so addictive, and then not use it for a while and have to stop yourself from using it, and besides that there are no benefits of pornography. try dancing. try cooking your own food. remove all of those limitations in your mindset!

 

Moderation may not be for everyone, however with discipline it can work. It took many many years to get to the point were I'm at with moderation. It wasn't until 6 months ago I found Your Brain on Porn book, I took 3 months off of porn. I then discovered, that there is a lot of dogma around nofap and it really wasn't a all or nothing thing. I really didn't need to completely eliminate it but just reduce it, to see the benefits I was looking for. Again, this approach my not be for everyone, find what works for you.

 

I hope it continues to work for you. It reminds me of alcoholics who can eventually learn to drink in moderation.

I am trying to achieve moderate PMO like you, but so far I haven't been very successful. Part of this may be due to the underlying problems that often cause PMO addiction. If a person can solve those problems then the PMO addiction no longer has a foundation and tumbles (hopefully). But I haven't succeeded yet.

 

I imagine it would be for very few on this site. This is a porn recovery site. Porn is a display of fake sex and fosters fake behaviour - trying to mimic real intercourse via masturbation. It is not a healthy thing to watch or encourage IMHO.

 

If you try to moderate it and you have an addiction, it just is not going to work. I wish I were one of those people with the discipline to put it on a schedule, over and done and then the will to abstain. But - I'm not. I've been away from here and went over to the other side with accepting it and keeping it as a regular part of my life - "accept yourself, your urges and desires, and just enjoy it". It was enjoyable, who doesn't consider it a fantasy escape, step right up and see whatever you want. It really failed, and I always wind up back here. There has always been the chaser effect for me, and the last time I got into a 5 day binge - 5 times, but that's a lot for me. I ended up very angry, ashamed and feeling unworthy. Sooner or later if you're addicted, you can sneak it in now and then but your willpower will fail, and when it does you are sitting in your own prison cell once again. In the meanwhile, life goes on around you and your opportunities and chances to feel good about yourself are once again ruined.

 

Hi Rick. I've been doing a lot of thinking about "porn in moderation" recently, and I was here on this thread getting many points of view. Thank you for your post.

 

It sounds like porn, failed relationship, and stress are determining your actions, but only your own thinking and behavior are responsible for your actions.
If you accept that you are responsible for your own thinking and behavior and not blaming the out side world, you'll be in a much better position start making changes. Being inner directed vs outer directed is much more productive and you'll have a much better chance of dealing with negative events and temptations.

Albert Ellis"s Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) has been very helpful for me realizing that I'm in charge of my behavior not the outside world.

 

I found that the thought of completely giving up porn was much harder than limiting my self to weekends only. Knowing that I can view porn on the weekends, made it easy to get through Monday through Friday without it. There are lots of people how have a daily glass of wine or beer and others that drink heavily one day a week (maybe on a Friday) and are not alcoholics.

 

“Yeah, well, you know, that’s just, like, your opinion, man.” — The Dude

 

I think for us addicts it's all or nothing. Moderate porn use is a slippery slope and eventually will end up in a binge and everything starts again. Been there thousands of times.

Also: some fetishes will suddenly vanish after you quit porn. Sure, everybody has some preferences, but some of them are a direct consequence of heavy porn use and in reality are much less interesting/arousing.

I think the only exception for watching porn would be to create your own "porn" with your GF and watch those videos/pictures purely for your own amateur use.

 

In Mark Manson's book Models he offers what he calls a "porn diet". I've basically been using his "porn diet" and this is what give me the idea of moderation. What he recommends if (If remember correctly) is one week no porn and masturbating no more than once or twice in a week (I eliminated the masturbation too). I generally know when I'm going to have sex and begin using the porn diet several day before sex.
For an example, I usually have sex on weekends and I'll start the porn diet on say Sunday or Monday.
What I've found is, usually beginning around day 5 of no porn and no masturbation ED, DE and desensitized arousal toward real woman is completely gone.

 

Porn and real life are the same thing happening inside you and the matrix. There is little variation in your body functions.

 

I agree with the consensus here. No such thing as moderation. There are two different but connected arguments. One is whether 'porn is bad' intrinsically, which I believe is the case. If you agree with that, then obviously there is no moderation.

The second that is regardless of whether porn is ultimately good or bad, the fact that people are addicted to it means that we have not been able to follow rules we have set for ourselves. Just an hour tonight... oh shit, it's 3am, how did that happen? Just once a week... how about twice a week? How about NOW? Only independent home-made... but I just didn't quite find what I was looking for, I hate that industrial crap but just one then I'll stop, ooh look, she's gorgeous... and so on and so on. Before I joined this site, I had pretty much given up trying to set rules for myself because I would just immediately break them and feel even more hopeless. I know from experience that the habit can come back full force after years. So I can predict with some confidence that moderation is not realistic.

 

Thank you, this is of course true and I will look into REBT.
I think it is helpful to identify 'triggers' and what led me to the point I am at now. But I make a decision every time I view P that is mine and mine alone, and only I can change that.

 

Can’t speak for other men but for me there is no moderation

 

A few things I've noticed after joining this forum recently is there seems to be a lot of dogma around nofap. In not interested in joining a religion or the ethics of porn, i'm just trying to improve my sex life, which nofap has greatly helped me!
Another is moderation. Moderation is very import life and many things must be used in moderation. Exercise, vitamins, sunlight, and water are all good for you in moderation, but too much can be very harmful. Surfing the web, video games, tv, junk food, alcohol and porn all can have a negative effects when used in excess but can all be enjoyed in moderation.
Giving my self a "cheat day" (or two) per week to view porn made it easy not to use porn in excess. When I completely eliminated porn I had many set backs where I binged for hours thinking this is the last time--I'm going to get it all out of me and never use it again (but that never happened).
I've found it wasn't very practical for me to eliminate porn with all the triggers in modern life--bikini ads, yoga pants (especially see though, those are the worst) etc.
Giving myself small doses of porn per week kept my cravings down (without the side effects--ED and DE), where as eliminating it my cravings would be so high that a lingerie ad in the corner of of my computer sent me into all day binged. A metaphor of this (but not perfect), many have experienced, what happens when you get really hungry or have a food that you really like, that you haven't had in a while, generally, I over stuff my self and feel sick.
Using porn for me in moderation has eliminated all the negative effects I had when I over-used. Some of the benefits I've seen with moderate use are: keeps libido high, no need to binge, new ideas to try and great fun to watch with partner.

 

This but even small doses were too painful for me

 

@RickMartel Did you also masturbate during your cheat days or only watched porn without doing anything else? Do you watch only the previews or full videos?

I know your approach. In the past I tried several times to only watch the previews of my favourite amateur channels. Sometimes I lasted doing that even for 1-2 weeks, but at some point it turned into a binge. So that is very risky for me. Sometimes my urge is not even motivated by sexual horniness, but rather simply because of the crave for novelty. My mind thinks: "Wow, there must be soo many new releases on all the channels you used to watch, you are missing out, why don't you just check out what's new?" But it's dangerous.

 

My situation may be different than yours, I'm 40 years old and have been with my wife for 18 years. You could say I'm using porn and masturbation in moderation or you could say I'm rebooting or using nofap on a weekly basis.
Do to conflicting schedules, my wife and I have sex on weekends. For example, we have sex on a Saturday and during this session sometimes we watch porn together and sometimes we don't. Generally I'm pretty horny the day after sex (chaser effect) and I'll view porn and masturbate or maybe a HJ from the wife while watching porn. I watch whatever videos I'm in the mood for, I just set some time restrictions so I'm not wasting a whole day watching porn. Also, if I watch porn, I plan on having some kind of orgasm regardless of the source (bj, sex, hj, masturbation). If I view porn without orgasm, those were the days that turned into a several hours porn binge.
For rebooting/nofap I'm using them on a weekly basis. For me, sex is on the weekends, knowing that, I begin rebooting/nofap (no porn and no orgasm) usually about 5 days or so before sex. What I've found is usually without porn or orgasm for at least 3 or 4 days my libido is pretty much fully recovered and around 5 or 6 is when I start getting really horny and porn cravings start. When I binged on porn and masturbated too close to real sex (maybe a day or 2 before sex) thats when the ED, DE, lack of arousal, etc started. Taking those 5 or so days off of porn and masturbation has made sex so much better that, thats really all the motivation I needed to stay off of it until my next cheat day.