Hi
@Orbiter, it is great to hear from you, as I have not heard from you for a while. I hope that everything is good on your side and that even though you had some setbacks in your journey, you will only move forward.
Thank you for your perspective and your ideas on how to move forward from here. I think that you are correct in that I experience a lot of shame and disappointment when talking about myself as I have a lot of expectations none of which are met. However, before I learn to love myself, I will not be able to accept the way I am and have a deal with myself. In reality, I am always harsh with myself and would never speak to anyone I love the way I speak to myself. It has been some time that I understood it but it is difficult to shift these behaviour patterns.
When it comes to my major bad habits (porn and video gaming now), there are some points that I like about them, you are correct. I can write about them, no problem. For porn and masturbation, it is the imagination that I have intimacy with the women from the video, seeing their naked bodies, watching them reaching climax and imagining that it is me who drives them to these feelings. Also, you can choose a woman you want, not limit yourself only with the ones that you attract in real life. A woman from images won't make you spend a lot of your time before the intimacy, you do not have to laugh on her bad jokes and she won't drain your energy and money as it often happens in real life. Add here the fact that I cannot seduce anyone I like, and that I cannot even seduce a woman that I do not like either, and that I have not had intimacy with a woman for almost two years (I do not count the prostitute because it is a paid service and because I did not get erection), and you can derive a conclusion that I would really like to have intimacy with a woman but I do not get it, so I come to this imaginary world to get what I lack in real life. It gives me a sense of delusional satisfaction and that I can have an intimacy with a woman I physically like. Finally, my ED scares me to have connections with real women as I always anticipate failure in bed. This is why I think that no girl will date me or anyone would like to sleep with me a second time. You do not have such problems with porn.
For gaming, there is definitely a social aspect - talking to other players online (especially girls), and getting some achievements which I cannot attain as easily in real life. I almost do not have friends or communication in real life, and when I go to meetups sometimes, the women are not my taste, and it is more difficult to have a playful tone and teasing conversations with them in real life. In game, there are some young beautiful girls who flirt with you as it is just a game. I have almost zero achievements in real life, but in game you can get tens of achievements in a single day. Also getting adrenaline from some games when your team depends on you and you are the one driving your team to victory. In real life, I am almost never a main character and most of the times I am NPC. I do not like it but cannot easily change it.
Finally, when it comes to my interest to the third gender, I think that this comes because of my porn addiction and my ED. I cannot get erection and I cannot imagine myself with a man because it is against me. But many these third genders have women bodies and look really feminine but they have erection which I do not have myself. So, my brain tries to deceive me that I will get both a girl and a pleasure and that this is not as bad as being with another man. (I do not say it is bad in general and I respect anyone independent of their sexual orientation, but for me personally, I cannot imagine myself with another man). Because if I am with a real woman, there is no point of having intimacy with her as I cannot get erection and this meeting will result in a lot of shame and disappointment.
I perfectly understand that these women in porn are virtual, not real, that it won't move me any closer to real women or elevate my game. That it won't cure my ED, but it helps me to relax and move this weigh off my shoulders for a moment. I also understand that game achievements do not make any difference in real life, that I am not a vlogger who would earn from these achievements and that this social circle is not going anywhere beyond this game and that there are no meaningful conversations in the game. And finally I perfectly know that I would never ever date a transgender even with a most feminine look, but the constant lack of good sex and curiosity pushes me to think about it even though I do not want to try it.
Progress with PMO:
I did not count the days without porn or masturbation, but have not had any of them so far. I wanted to masturbate mentally, but physically it seems that I did not want it as there was no erection.
I wrote a goal of no porn, no masturbation and no escorts visits in 2026, I hope that I will achieve all three. But for now, there is no point of speaking about it, as the year is ahead and it will be a long journey. Last year was extremely difficult in maintaining my promise of no PMO (and I failed many times), so let us see how this year unfolds.
