Excited to be free

forestwater

Member
I posted this in the 20-29 group before I realized there was a category dedicated to women. Hello!

My story: I grew up very religious, and porn was considered one of the evils of our generation. I fully believed that until I grew up and left my religion, at which point I thought all the anti-porn stuff was just another way my religion tried to repress sexuality. I had sex before porn, but it wasn't until porn that I had my first orgasm. I didn't have sex again for a long time (for unrelated reasons) but I was PMOing regularly in that time, and I think it messed up my brain wiring. When I did have sex again, I had just an "okay" time, and it certainly didn't bring me any Os.

This continued for several years. At the time, I chalked it up to mediocre sex with young, inexperienced partners, and assumed that once I found a good partner who I could have sex with on a regular basis, I would start orgasming from that instead of porn. I kept PMOing in the meantime.

Cut to now: I have a wonderful partner who I adore and am very attracted to. During sex, they take their time to be sensual, learn my body, and make me feel amazing. Our libidos are pretty equally matched too. This is all I ever wanted sexually, but even now I'm experiencing sexual dysfunction. I have a hard time getting wet, and no matter how expertly my partner touches me, it doesn't bring me to climax. (Unsurprisingly, I can still PMO easily on the rare occasions I've done so while in this relationship.) I've spent months reading all sorts of articles and trying all kinds of techniques, but nothing has worked.

Then yesterday, by chance, I stumbled across this website. I did some investigating, and realized that my troubles orgasming are not because I'm "just a complicated woman" or because I'm "not breathing enough" or whatever other b/s. They're PIED (or whatever the equivalent would be for me). Figuring this out is a relief, because now that I know what's wrong, I can work towards a real solution. I've read Easy Peasy, and I've made the commitment to never PMOing again.

Some questions:
  • Are there any tried-and-true techniques for rewiring your brain to be turned on by real people? I've seen a lot of talk of rewiring but not a lot of concrete advice
  • What about MO during sex, such as while looking at my partner? Would that help or hinder my progress?
Here's to freedom & healing from the damages of porn.
 

forestwater

Member
Day 2: I talked to my partner about this for the first time. They were incredibly understanding and supportive, and have committed to helping me in my reboot however they can. We decided on a game plan:
  • We'll start interspersing Karezza into our routine, in addition to sex
  • During sex, we won't put any effort into making me orgasm. If my partner touches me, it will be solely for the purpose of making me feel good, not to make me cum. If I happen to orgasm anyway, that's fine, but it won't be a goal to work towards
  • I will work on changing my mindset in the following ways:
    • If it's not real, no deal. That means no fantasizing at all during sex, simply being present and enjoying what is happening in the moment (I might work on non-sexual mindfulness practice too, to supplement)
    • I am not entitled to orgasms, nor do I need them to live a happy, fulfilled life. If I experience withdrawal, I will accept that and work with it, instead of seeing it as a sign that I need to do MO asap
One thing we're not sure about is roleplaying. My partner wonders if it might hinder my progress given that it incorporates a big element of imagination. I think it should be fine; even though there is an imaginary element, it doesn't change the fact that it's real sex with a real person. If anyone has input on this, let me know!

Overall I'm feeling encouraged and excited. The journey ahead might not be the easiest, and I have no idea how long it will take, but the rewards will be well worth any struggle along the way. Someday I will be free.
 

canguro

Active Member
Hello and welcome to the forum! You made a good decision by coming here and starting your reboot!
I am myself from a pretty religious family and sex was always a taboo topic and I think this is a reason why porn was so appealing. Good were done with that, but it is true that porn is damaging, but not because it is a sin. =D
And even better, that you told your partner and they are supporting you.
I wish you the best for your journey! Stay strong!
 

forestwater

Member
Hello and welcome to the forum! You made a good decision by coming here and starting your reboot!
I am myself from a pretty religious family and sex was always a taboo topic and I think this is a reason why porn was so appealing. Good were done with that, but it is true that porn is damaging, but not because it is a sin. =D
And even better, that you told your partner and they are supporting you.
I wish you the best for your journey! Stay strong!
Thank you very much!

Yeah, one of the hardest parts of leaving my religion was re-defining right & wrong. I asked myself a lot, "Is [thing considered a sin by religion] actually wrong? Why or why not?" I decided that if something did more harm than good, then it was wrong. Unfortunately, I didn't know about the damage porn can cause, so I mistakenly put it in the "not actually wrong" category, and now I am paying the price for that error.

Good luck to you on your journey as well!
 

forestwater

Member
Day 3: My partner and I tried Karezza for the first time, and it was wonderful. I would highly recommend to anyone in a relationship. It made us feel so intimate and connected, and while we both felt the sexual desire building, it didn't feel urgent at any point. It was also excellent practice in mindfulness and staying present in the moment. I think doing Karezza on a regular basis will be very good for my progress.

Meanwhile, my body is showing plenty of signs that I haven't O'd in awhile. I could let myself become frustrated, but instead I will delight in the opportunity to practice a new way of relating to my sexuality, to accept the urges without allowing them to overpower me. The rewards of liberation will be well worth any difficulty of the journey.
 

forestwater

Member
Day 4: Pornified images keep popping into my head unbidden. Not even memories of porn, just I'll see something unrelated and my imagination will turn it into something I could PMO to. I'm in the early days of my reboot, so it's no surprise that this is still happening; however, it's an excellent reminder of why I'm doing this. Enticing as those mental images may be, they cannot love me or care for me the way my (very real, very wonderful) partner can. I want the kind of life where those kinds of images mean nothing to me, and where my partner's sweet touch gets me wetter than they ever could. Hoping that life will soon be mine.
 

forestwater

Member
Day 5: Since my last post my partner and I have both done Karezza and had sex. I didn't O from the sex but I noticed that my ability to get (and stay) aroused was slightly improved, and I think I got closer to O-ing from it than I've ever gotten before. I'm still not fully healed, but I'm doing my best to rewire to my partner as best as I can, and it seems to be working. That's an encouraging sign that I'm headed in the right direction.

I also joined Fortify, which is the program that Fight The New Drug runs to help heal porn addiction. I'm not sure if it'll help me with anything that this forum doesn't, but it seems really good, and I would recommend it to anyone who's interested.
 

forestwater

Member
Day 7: Partner and I had sex again, haha. This whole deal of no-O has really increased my libido, and my partner is happy to go along with it, which I appreciate. The sex wasn't as good as the last time, but I think that owes entirely to the fact that I hadn't gotten enough sleep the night before, making me more easily distractible. It makes me understand more clearly why porn recovery programs emphasize getting good sleep; porn is stimulating enough that you can get off to it no matter how tired you are, but sex with a real person depends a lot more on your physical & mental wellbeing in order to be good. Something to keep in mind.

Overall this reboot seems to be working, slowly but surely. I've been noticing fewer PMO urges, and more instances of desire for my partner. I don't know when I'll be fully healed, but I have hope that it will happen someday soon.
 

otanerferguson

Active Member
Congratulations on your progress!!! Remember this feeling you are experiencing right now and maintain the course. Beware of a possible flatline around the 15 day mark where you might feel like shit for a couple of weeks like it says in this video. I imagine it is similar for women. Stay strong and true to your lifelong commitment to never use porn again. Happy and very wet holidays!
 

forestwater

Member
Day 34: Hello again! Partner and I spent the holidays with my family and only recently got back home, hence the gap in journal entries. Some updates on my progress, in no particular order:
  • Around day 15, I tried M on an impulse, being careful to keep my mind blank and focus purely on the sensations. And it worked! I O'd pretty quickly. This may not count as progress to some, but personally I have never ever succeeded in blank-mind MO, so I took it as a sign that my condition is improving. I decided not to do it again though; now that I have satisfied my curiosity, I want to continue rewiring myself to my partner, not just my hands
  • Being unable to have sex with my partner (due to lack of privacy over holidays) really amped up the desire between us, and I saw some improvements in how my body responded. I think the ability to build desire without the pressure to perform sexually was helpful
  • When we were able to have sex again, I got close to O a few times (potentially closer than I've gotten before). The fact that I didn't quite get there was discouraging, but I'm trying to remind myself that the point is the intimacy & pleasure, not the O
  • One downside of making progress in this reboot is that now I am extra sensitized to pornographic stimuli. Like, a sex scene in a movie probably wouldn't have gotten me going in the past unless it was super explicit, but now any sex scene can arouse me and make me want to PMO. What I've been doing has been just to avert my gaze, control my breathing, and to remind myself that real sex is way better than any temporary gratification, but I'm not sure how well it works. Any advice?
tl;dr Despite some frustrations, I am making solid progress. I'm excited to keep making more!
 

forestwater

Member
Day 35: Well, you know how I said I wasn't going to MO again? Funny that...

I kept my mind completely blank, of course, no fantasy whatsoever, and it went incredibly quickly. I don't count it as a relapse at all. But I still don't know how I feel about having done it.

Pros:
  • I had been dealing with some Christian guilt about sexuality that was holding me back from being with my partner, and this little MO session eased that. I was even able to Karezza with my partner later which was great
  • I felt happier and more relaxed the whole day afterwards. If there was any chaser effect, it just made me want to be with my partner, which is ideal
Cons:
  • I fear that continuing this will keep me conditioned to only O to my own touch, which isn't ideal. I mean, a big motivation for me to reboot is for me to become able to O to my partner's touch, and I don't want to do anything that will prevent me from that
I think how I will go about it for the time being is to simply avoid M as much as possible, and continue my reboot as planned. If I happen to end up MOing on occasion, that's alright, but if it starts to seem like it's slowing down my rewire, I'll stay away from it completely. Any suggestions or input?
 

forestwater

Member
Day 36: Wonderful news! Last night, only 36 days into my reboot, I finally had an orgasm to my partner's touch. It took lots of time, patience, instructions, and points at which I just wanted to give up, but in the end it all paid off. I feel so proud of myself. This is the first time anyone (besides myself) has ever made me cum without the help of sex toys, ever in my life, and I owe it all to this reboot. My partner is pretty pleased too. ;)

Even though I've accomplished one of my goals for this reboot, I know my journey isn't over. The temptation towards P is still there, and I think it'll take more work & practice to be able to 1. fully rewire my arousal to my partner instead of a screen, and 2. be able to orgasm easily to my partner's touch. But! It's encouraging to see this progress, and I'm excited to see where else this journey takes me.

To all those who are struggling, don't give up! You too can see results if you put in the time and effort!
 

forestwater

Member
Day 37: Nothing much to report. Still getting some P flashbacks which trigger arousal, but I just try to stop the thoughts in their tracks and think about something else. In the meantime I've enjoyed just being near my partner, touching, kissing, flirting. Been thinking about sex the other night and wondering whether it'll be easy to have another orgasm. These are natural thoughts, but I still don't want to make orgasms the be-all end-all of my journey; I want to rewire, fully and holistically. Maybe it would be best to do more Karezza before we have sex again, just to help remind me of the importance of love & intimacy.
 

forestwater

Member
Day 38: Still getting P flashbacks out of nowhere, but no desire to relapse. I'm just hoping the flashbacks will go away with time, as my brain starts to drop those neural pathways when it realizes that I'm never going back to that life.

On a different note, I'm starting to see why there are so few women on this site; it's not that welcoming of an environment. I won't go into why (at least not right now) but I would encourage the men here that if you want to become a better person, you might want to take a long hard look at how you view & treat women. Porn wants you to see women as objects for you to use & degrade. You've given up porn, but have you given up the mindset about women that it gave you?
 

Honey98$

Member
Day 38: Still getting P flashbacks out of nowhere, but no desire to relapse. I'm just hoping the flashbacks will go away with time, as my brain starts to drop those neural pathways when it realizes that I'm never going back to that life.

On a different note, I'm starting to see why there are so few women on this site; it's not that welcoming of an environment. I won't go into why (at least not right now) but I would encourage the men here that if you want to become a better person, you might want to take a long hard look at how you view & treat women. Porn wants you to see women as objects for you to use & degrade. You've given up porn, but have you given up the mindset about women that it gave you?
Don't MO please. It will only dealy your success. Due to heavy porn usage, your dopamine has been depleted, you should now give it some time to reset it to the natural healthy levels. You will feel the difference. One mistake that people do while rebooting is that they relapse and keep doing dopamine releasing activities, and ingesting substances that spike dopamine, this results in dropping their dopamine baseline levels. Hence, their dopamine levels struggle to set at the normal level. Deprive your body of dopamine for a month or so, and boom! You're there
 
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forestwater

Member
Day 39: My partner has been having a rough time for the past few days (completely unrelated to all this) and thus has not been interested in sex. I am happy to wait as long as my partner needs, but I can feel the sexual tension building up, so I will take extra care to avoid situations that might tempt me into MO. If my partner is not in a space to satisfy me sexually, that's okay - I can find satisfaction in other areas of life.
 

Blondie

Respected Member
Day 39: My partner has been having a rough time for the past few days (completely unrelated to all this) and thus has not been interested in sex. I am happy to wait as long as my partner needs, but I can feel the sexual tension building up, so I will take extra care to avoid situations that might tempt me into MO. If my partner is not in a space to satisfy me sexually, that's okay - I can find satisfaction in other areas of life.
Good good job on your journey! You seem to be making some great gains. It's funny (not really) what porn does to us, makes us sexualize everything and everyone, thinking we have a "right" to get off whenever we want. But that's not life, even for highly sexed couples. It's just a fact of life that you just can't have sex whenever you want, and that's okay. Porn, and all the associated problems that come with it, is never an option for anyone who wants a life of stability and true lasting happiness. Keep it up!
 

canguro

Active Member
About the environment that you think is not welcoming to woman.
I think a problem is, that on the one hand especially the NoFap-Community overlaps with Mans-Rights Activists who are against porn mainly because it makes man "weak" and follow the old, boring story of the evil woman who is tempting the man and on the other sadly big parts of self-proclaimend feminists are pro porn and think it is empowering and shit.
I really think this forum is good, because I know the people behind it are against sexual exploitation, too, but on the other hand there are also many conservative guys here (especially in the 40+ section, better not go there =D).
That's why I think it is very valuable to have the insights of woman who are partners and suffer from the addiction of their man on the one hand and woman who are addicted themselfes on the other, so it is not only men talking about their problems and partly trying to find someone to blame for it.

I think it would be very helpful or at least interesting to hear what makes you feel unwelcomed as a woman and like if you would share your view with us.
 
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