zeroofhate
New Member
Hi everyone. My name is Eric, although I enjoy going by "Zero" too. I'm 21. I can't say exactly when my addiction started, but I know that by the time I was 16 I had a laptop that I was using almost daily to look at porn, so I'd say that's as good a starting place as any. I found Yourbrainonporn.com a couple days ago, and it made me confront something I've always known but never understood, which was my addiction.
I knew I looked at porn too much, but I thought it was harmless. I assumed many of the symptoms, such as my morphing fetishes, were just part of me and nothing to worry about. I thought my difficulty achieving orgasm during sex was simply because I wasn't very sensitive. Hell, I was even proud of it. I used to brag that after three straight weeks of sex with one of my girlfriends, I had exactly one orgasm. And I would always gloss over how many times I lost or couldn't achieve erections during that time, and others. In hindsight, I should have realized that wasn't normal. I learned in college that I didn't masturbate correctly. I always knew I did it differently, but I didn't realize I was doing it in a harmful way. Even then, I kept doing it out of a misplaced fear I would become too sensitive to have sex.
I'm a musician, or at least, I was. I started out playing bass guitar, because I wanted to be like Cliff Burton, the late great bassist of Metallica. From there I moved onto playing guitar too. I got pretty damn good at both of them. Hell, I still am. But I never, ever practice anymore, and I know that if I don't start soon all my skill will decay away. I can remember in high school, before my addiction was this out of hand, I would spend days obsessively practicing songs I liked. I even locked myself in a room for an hour a day for two full months before a talent show, just to make sure I put on the best possible performance I could give. I looked back at the songs I wrote for my girlfriends, at how much progress I made, and I just wondered "Where the hell did all my passion go?" I had wanted to be one of the best musicians to ever live, and now I just sat around, looking at porn between bouts of apathy. I barely even play video games.
Right before I found this website, I had been dealing with some extreme issues with my sexuality and gender identity. To keep things brief, I can say with almost certainty that the sexuality issues I have had are a result of the porn use. I'm straight, and never try to date guys or feel bad for not asking them out, after all. But it had been one of many extreme fetishes in my life, and around the past few months I've started to wonder if I might be gender fluid. Realizing that I have an addiction has made those questions all the more obscure, but I've got some hope since I will be going back to college in about a month, where I can meet a therapist and I'll be living with one of my closest friends, who has been nothing but supportive of me through all this. My main source of stress lately has just been that I don't feel like me anymore, and I know that once I get this addiction sorted out, that will become less of a problem.
I can't lie though, even though I deleted all of my porn, I'm nervous. It's only been two days since I decided to quit and I'm already having flash backs to porn that I used to like. I keep remembering site names and images. The only ways I've been avoiding it are by trying to remember/meditate on some poetry from a friend, and by working, but I'm quitting my job this Friday. I'm really scared of that. I've got lots of plans already of how to fill up the spare time, and I won't be home alone, but it's utterly terrifying. I need all of the help I can get, because I want to be the healthy musician I used to be. Not the lazy addict have let myself become by mistake.
I knew I looked at porn too much, but I thought it was harmless. I assumed many of the symptoms, such as my morphing fetishes, were just part of me and nothing to worry about. I thought my difficulty achieving orgasm during sex was simply because I wasn't very sensitive. Hell, I was even proud of it. I used to brag that after three straight weeks of sex with one of my girlfriends, I had exactly one orgasm. And I would always gloss over how many times I lost or couldn't achieve erections during that time, and others. In hindsight, I should have realized that wasn't normal. I learned in college that I didn't masturbate correctly. I always knew I did it differently, but I didn't realize I was doing it in a harmful way. Even then, I kept doing it out of a misplaced fear I would become too sensitive to have sex.
I'm a musician, or at least, I was. I started out playing bass guitar, because I wanted to be like Cliff Burton, the late great bassist of Metallica. From there I moved onto playing guitar too. I got pretty damn good at both of them. Hell, I still am. But I never, ever practice anymore, and I know that if I don't start soon all my skill will decay away. I can remember in high school, before my addiction was this out of hand, I would spend days obsessively practicing songs I liked. I even locked myself in a room for an hour a day for two full months before a talent show, just to make sure I put on the best possible performance I could give. I looked back at the songs I wrote for my girlfriends, at how much progress I made, and I just wondered "Where the hell did all my passion go?" I had wanted to be one of the best musicians to ever live, and now I just sat around, looking at porn between bouts of apathy. I barely even play video games.
Right before I found this website, I had been dealing with some extreme issues with my sexuality and gender identity. To keep things brief, I can say with almost certainty that the sexuality issues I have had are a result of the porn use. I'm straight, and never try to date guys or feel bad for not asking them out, after all. But it had been one of many extreme fetishes in my life, and around the past few months I've started to wonder if I might be gender fluid. Realizing that I have an addiction has made those questions all the more obscure, but I've got some hope since I will be going back to college in about a month, where I can meet a therapist and I'll be living with one of my closest friends, who has been nothing but supportive of me through all this. My main source of stress lately has just been that I don't feel like me anymore, and I know that once I get this addiction sorted out, that will become less of a problem.
I can't lie though, even though I deleted all of my porn, I'm nervous. It's only been two days since I decided to quit and I'm already having flash backs to porn that I used to like. I keep remembering site names and images. The only ways I've been avoiding it are by trying to remember/meditate on some poetry from a friend, and by working, but I'm quitting my job this Friday. I'm really scared of that. I've got lots of plans already of how to fill up the spare time, and I won't be home alone, but it's utterly terrifying. I need all of the help I can get, because I want to be the healthy musician I used to be. Not the lazy addict have let myself become by mistake.