PSUB or not ?

Don't sweat it. Like you said you didn't get aroused or masturbate after so don't feel ashamed. The fact that it is helping with your craving for human touch and loneliness is a great thing.

 

These are not porn subs, but you should not continue to pay for these anyway.

Intimate but non-sexual physical activities, like hugging, cuddling, and wrestling (I guess for some) release hormones that relax you and help you bond with your partner. These activities are very good for reducing urges during a reboot and forming connections with SOs.

However, paying for these services creates connections in your brain that are not very positive. In a relationship, intimacy is shared and enjoyed freely between partners. The activities that release the hormones I mentioned are enjoyed by both partners, and show care and affection between each other. If you are paying for this connection, you are connection monetary value and conditions on affection and care, which isn't very healthy. It's very different than paying for sex, but still creates unhealthy and unsustainable connections in your mind. You are setting yourself up for failure and hurt later in life if you are conditioning yourself to associate monetary value and transactions with intimacy.

You should not continue to pay for these services. Try to find intimacy and connection through real partners and shared experiences. They are much more sustainable and fulfilling.

I have actually found moderate success with finding cuddle partners on dating apps like Tinder and Bumble. If you have had any success on dating apps in the past, you should be able to find a cuddle buddy too, especially nowadays when people are stuck inside and alone a lot. Put it in your bio, and just tell the girls you really miss cuddling and want to do it sometime. It's basically what you're doing right now, but for free haha. I highly suggest trying this.

 

You tell him not to do it but then you suggest for him to use a dating app instead of paying for it. Maybe he doesn't have the time to waste on dating apps. Guys need to realize there isn't nothing wrong with paying for intimacy if you crave it

 

Yes like @modernstore99 says, it's best to avoid intimacy that comes with a financial cost.

While the activities may be pretty vanilla, and you refrain from PMO after the event, it's still not giving you a natural progression from action to reward.

In addition to that, women love foreplay like this... So it's not something obscure that should be paid for anyways.

Many guys just want to get straight to it and go. If you're the type who likes to touch, cuddle, play fight/wrestle etc, you should know there's a big demand for this from women!

With a bit of hard work and patience, you can find plenty of women who will be more than happy to do these things with you.

I did a similar thing a few years ago but it was giving massages. Just takes a bit of time finding women who are into it, but they're out there!

 

There's nothing wrong with these activities (they are actually necessary for recovery), and their is nothing inherently wrong with paying for them. However, they are creating connections in the brain that are unhealthy and unnecessary.

While paying for these services is debatably ok for the average guy, it is not ok for the average porn abuser. We already have messed up connections in our brain, we don't need any more.

And like @Reborn16 has reiterated, there are people that will cuddle and wrestle you for free. Might as well do that haha

 

How do you think your future wife would react upon discovering you paid women to cuddle with you?

 

Yea, no. You’re trying to rationalize this hard. This would creep out 99% of women, if not more. I get it, you’re craving interaction and bonding with women but this is very, very far from a healthy (or fiscally) sound way of going about it. If you do wind up telling a girl about it, it is going to scream “I’m desperate,” because you are willing to PAY for basic human interaction which suggests an utter lack of social acumen.

Stop trying to justify a bad buy. Don’t waste your money like this again.

 

Sorry for resurecting this old thread @TMustStopPornConsumption, but may I turn this around and ask you some questions:

1. What is a psub?
2. What are your psubs?
3. Are psubs bad?
4. Should psubs always be avoided?
5. Does indulging in a psub count as a relapse?

Here's what the site's glossary says about psubs:

I guess it all depends on our goals. I know men here who treat their psubs the same way as they treat porn. For me I am cautious about the things that risk leading me back to porn, cautious but forgiving.

 

Well, in that your counter is at "1" at this posting, I don't think these extracurricular activities are helping. I think you're deceiving yourself. While a nonalchoholic can have an innocent drink perhaps, an alcoholic in recovery cannot. The same with sex addiction. Recovery is not a good time for these activities.