Year Five: The Tradition (Pandemic Edition)

Well, well, well, here we are again. This year is the fifth year that I’ve come on here to do my holiday tradition, and as I said in my final post of last year (https://forum.nofap.com/index.php?t...est-holiday-tradition-you’ll-ever-see.258923/), I’d be back tomorrow, and here I am.

Now obviously a lot has happened in the last year, and let’s go over how the last 11 months that I wasn’t here went, just like how I did last year.

January: I had this back and forth feud with a bully but overall it was a pretty good month. The whole Kobe thing really sucked though.

February: Easily the best month of 2020, it was the only one that actually felt normal. I went to Utah with my dad, his friends, and his friends’ sons (who are my friends) and we had a lot of fun. At school I really hit my stride, and no virus that was in my eyes at the time “just the flu” a whole ocean away could stop me.

March: It started out pretty good and was one of my strongest months ever... if you ignore the last 20 days. Yeah the start of quarantine really sucked for me and it was a tough pill to swallow, and as the month went on I began to realize more and more that my junior year was over, but it wasn’t until mid April that I fully realized it.

April: I began to come to terms with the pandemic but I was a sedentary mess. I did get my school work done on time a lot though. Once the end of the school year was officially cancelled later on in the month and things seemed a little more certain, the best five week period of the pandemic began. At the end of the month I began to walk more regularly.

May: Easily the best month besides January and February. I was walking everyday, going outside everyday, taking pictures of all of the trees and flowers, and even going in my pool towards the end of the month, but at the same time, the riots really weighed on me as the month closed. I also slacked off on my school work a lot.

June: I kept up with my healthy habits from May by doing my Zoom meetings for school in the morning, walking in the afternoon, and going in the pool in the evening to start the month, but I continued to slack off on my school work (until I crammed the night before grades closed), began to feel the 2020 burn out from the pandemic and the riots, and began to slack off when it came to walking later in June.

July: I got my license and saw my family more, and in the middle of the month I cut out all political content I was taking in, which was really good for me, but unfortunately with it being infested in everything, even sports, I couldn’t avoid it.

August: It was a pretty chill month, I turned 17 and actually had a fun birthday, but stuff like the NBA protest (which happened on the day that was supposed to be the first day of my senior year) made me stressed out. My friends and I also had our fantasy football draft.

September: I actually got to go back to school in hybrid and to my Scout troop meetings, so I actually saw a ton of my friends again and I joined a second fantasy football league with my cousin. It was a pretty good month all things considered.

October: This was when the burnout from the pandemic and every other awful thing from this year really began to impact me. I really got sick of everything awful and was banking on things getting better once the election was over. I also got to see my cousin from Colorado for the first time which was cool.

November: This month began really good actually. I was happy with the election results (and even more happy that it was over), and things really felt like they were turning around, especially with the vaccine announcement, but then clown world came back even harder than before. My school went remote and so did my Scout troop, so now my entire life is online once again, and it’s probably gonna last until January if not longer unfortunately.

Now, reading all of last year’s post has made me so nostalgic because eleven to twelve months ago feels like the good old days in comparison to all of the doom, gloom, and terror that every moment since then has been filled with for the world, and for the last eight and a half months for most average people. 2019 was so great and I miss it so much. I was struck by just how optimistic, happy, and laid back I was in my diary entries, I definitely remember feeling like that during that time but those entries are far more relaxed and cheerful than even me in my 2019 rose tinted nostalgia glasses remember.

Well as you can probably guess, almost all of that cheerfulness has been evaporated away. I’m stuck at home all day now, and even though I did get to go to school twice a week for ten weeks under our hybrid school model my district gave up. They had a plan to switch to remote learning over the holidays, they didn’t care about how it would negatively impact every single kid in the district, didn’t care, and went through with their stupid plan anyways. We returned to full remote learning on Monday and it’s just as terrible as I thought it would be but luckily it was only for two days this week. They say their plan for us is to return to hybrid on January 4th but I have no trust in them or any of our elected officials (who say that we could be back to normal on May 1st) to get it together and get us back to normal when they can’t even follow their own rules, fight constantly, and clearly don’t care about us at all unless caring about us helps them. But anyways, I’m getting off topic just know that my senior year is completely screwed up and I feel absolutely cheated. Look, I know that the odds are increasingly looking like our class will be able to get all of the traditional events that we deserve come May and June but again, I have no trust in our elected officials and wouldn’t be completely shocked if all of the restrictions are the start of an authoritarian technocracy (but yeah it’s probably not that).

All of my negativity and cynicism of late has made me realize that I really do need this this year. I can’t focus on anything, I’m very behind on my college applications (I think, maybe I’m just fine idk), I don’t go outside much anymore, I’m pessimistic about the future and nostalgic in a bad way, and I don’t see my friends much. This year is less about me growing socially (because without the pandemic honestly this year would have been amazing socially but alas, I got screwed again) and more about me rising above the pandemic and clown world.

Now I’m gonna be honest, this year is gonna be tough, out of the five years of this challenge so far, this one is probably gonna be the toughest, but even years tend to be harder NoFap wise and in general for me, I need this more now, way more than last year.

I have no real goals but I can tell you right now I’m not making it for the whole 30 days, I won’t even come close, but I hope to make progress, I’m walking into this ready to get better each day.

Some of the main challenges that I’ll face this year is the lack of time away from home. Like I said above, my school plans to go back on January 4th but the absolute earliest we could go back is December 21st, and if they did that I’d only get one day in school because of the hybrid model they have. There’s no in person Scout meetings or events that would take up my time either, my dad and I might be able to go skiing during the second half of the challenge, but that’s not a guarantee, and where we usually ski in Vermont has strict 14 day quarantine rules that we’d have to consistently ignore to ski there. So it’s gonna be tough on that front but I also am a lot less happy than last year. Less happiness generally means a harder time when it comes to NoFap, which doesn’t bode well for this year. Stress and anxiety levels are also a negative factor, which also loses this year points.

The odds are definitely stacked against me, but I’m here to face them and fight. I have one month to shine, one month to fix things, one month to get focused and finally get things done and stop putting stuff, like my college applications, off, and one month to rise up above the divisiveness, sadness, terror, hate, and literal hell that is 2020. That one month begins in 35 minutes, it’s go time boys.

 

UPDATE: It’s currently 12:03 AM, which means that we’re off and the challenge has begun! Hopefully I’ll be a better man and person with my life better together a month from now! Let’s get it!

 

DAY ONE:
Today was a pretty decent Thanksgiving Day. We only had my grandpa over, so it wasn’t anything like last year where the whole family was over. This meant that he wasn’t here for as long and I had more downtime to watch football and stuff. Downtime is usually a bad thing but I was fine today. No major problems but I know that I’m in for hell in about 24 hours, but we’ll find out soon though. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

 

DAY TWO:
Yeah today was a lot harder than yesterday, but I didn’t break. I edged a whole ton and everywhere hurts now, but part of that is because my balls are already inflating a ton. This ain’t Deflategate we have Inflategate up in here. It really kinda hurts and it’s a little bit annoying but I’ll pull through. I’m hoping to take a walk and wake up earlier tomorrow in an attempt to start my healthier habits.

 

DAY THREE:
It wasn’t as tough today as yesterday. I’m still here and my opening streak has already surpassed two of the last four years and if I make it through the night I’ll surpass all four years. I just gotta keep rolling.

 

DAY FOUR:
Today I have the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good is that my opening streak was the longest in any of the five years and surpassed the longest streak of last year. The bad is that it only beat last year’s longest streak by nine minutes and ended at 4:21 AM because I’m not disciplined enough to go to sleep when I have an urge. The ugly is that about twelve hours later I did it again. Yeah I gotta be better, but I’m getting ready and preparing. I’m trying to find new outlets for dopamine, I even bought a watermelon at the store today, I need my comfort food.

Now tomorrow is day five, which means school, and although it’s different this year, school opens up a whole new can of worms, but I just wanna be ready for it when it comes. Gonna be good tonight.

 

DAY FIVE:
Well it’s back to “school” and I think that school held me in check most of the day but NoFap isn’t going all that great. I made it through today relatively easily but now I have bad urges. I just hope that I can turn the corner in December. Also congrats to all of the No Nut November winners.

 

DAY SIX:
Well today was a tough way to begin December. I relapsed last night and binged a little and my urges have continued to persist since. I even had some watermelon to help out with the dopamine and that didn’t help much either. It’s been tough but I hope that I can get it together.

 

DAY SEVEN:
Today was the worst day in all of the five years I’ve done this challenge. Some of the worst edging and most fapping in any of the 134 days so far I’ve done this challenge over the years. I’m stressed out about everything, I hate the dullness of school with the remote “learning” and I might not get into college if I keep slacking off on doing ANYTHING for my applications and I might not get my Eagle Scout either.

But tomorrow is a new day, and things hopefully WILL change, I can feel it, but that all starts with getting a good night’s rest and getting back into the healthy habits I had in May and June tomorrow. I’ve seen the mountaintop, and I feel like I’ll get back there again, but it’s all on me.

 

DAY EIGHT:
Well today was better, I made it through the day, but still it’s pretty freaking bad.

Right now feels like how it did in 2018, and that’s just bad news. Hoping that things get better.

 

DAY NINE:
Well today I actually got out of the house. “School” was boring as usual but after feeling depressed all morning I felt a little better later on.

I’m just so sick of doing all of this “mitigation” shit. Like what’s the point anymore? Oftentimes it feels like it’s never gonna end but I don’t like thinking like that. I hate that it feels like I’m starting to take the black pill, I don’t wanna do that. I just want normal life back and I’m not gonna put up with this for much longer. Oh well the clown world circus probably isn’t anywhere near over.

NoFap wise I relapsed again before I went to bed last night. But about an hour ago I beat an urge for the first time since like Saturday. I know that in order to feel better, I have to stop fapping, so I’m gonna keep going and going until the midnight on the 26th no matter what.

 

DAY TEN:
Well I’m feeling better, and I got off to a longer streak, but that’s over now, although I do feel like I still have a better handle on my urges and that I’ll be better off for the remaining two thirds of the challenge as a result of that.

And that’s an important point to make, the challenge is already one third of the way over, but there’s still twenty days of possibilities, so let’s get it.

 

DAY ELEVEN:
Today was one of the easier days of the challenge, there were still moments where I edged but not nearly as much as any day since like day one where I didn’t edge at all. I felt like shit at the beginning of the day, but now I actually feel fine for some reason, but the doom and gloom of “school” comes back tomorrow morning, and I just hope that this week goes better than last week.

 

DAY TWELVE:
Well today I lost my 43 hour streak on accident, which is always fun, makes you feel like a complete idiot but I’m back on the horse again. Today was yet another depressing day and it seems like we got at least two more weeks of those left. Ugh, onto the teens.

 

DAY THIRTEEN:
Definitely one of the easier days of the challenge so far but there were still some challenges. I’ve just been feeling pretty depressed lately so my mom and I have talked about me going on Zoloft or Prozac until the lockdowns end if they end. If this happens, I might not start it until the tail end of the challenge however, so it’s side effect of having a lower libido may end up having no impact on the challenge even if I go on it, just a heads up.

 

DAY FOURTEEN:
Well boys I’m officially on my second longest streak of the season, I have a bit of an urge now, but hopefully I’ll pull through. I felt better today for the most part but I’m still not happy. Part of that might have been that I got to see my grandpa again today for my Christmas pictures, but even before then it didn’t feel as gloomy as the last few days. In almost exactly 24 hours from now, it will be the halfway point of the challenge, and I’m trying to roll into that strong.

 

DAY FIFTEEN:
Well I’m a little bit late but I’ve now passed the halfway point of the challenge. Yesterday I binged a little bit, but in all likelihood I will be away from home starting either tonight or tomorrow morning until probably Tuesday or Wednesday which will make it harder for me to fap, which is good.

 

DAY SIXTEEN:
I know I’m a little late again, but yesterday was pretty stressful with lots of schoolwork, but I didn’t break, and now I’m gonna be away from home for up to eight days, which will make NoFap easier, let’s get it.

 

DAY SEVENTEEN:
I made it through today again but it was harder and I have urges. I’m hoping to get through tomorrow, but day eighteen has always been a day that eluded me and always was a day that I failed on, but I have a chance to right the ship this time, and I‘ll try to do that.

 

DAY EIGHTEEN:
Well I didn’t make it through the night, but I did go the entire day without edging after waking up. I went skiing in Vermont today, which was fun and kept me tired. But now tomorrow I have to do “school” up in the loft. Ugh.

December 14 has been a perfect day for me in this challenge, and I’d like to keep it that way. Let’s roll.