LAST CHANCE
Hello
I am 38 and writing from Italy, so you will forgive my spaghetti English (i ll try to do my best to be at least understandable)
I lived for years with shame and with the idea to be not normal (and very perverted). I don't deny that brings me in the past to "bad thoughts" about what to do with my life
But let's start with order...it's even difficult to understand where i should start with my story
For as long as i can remember i was always been very horny about sex (never had ED with my most important important girlfriend..i barely know the concept thinking it was related only to very old age)
Problems started i think, around 10 years ago when my internet connection became faster: i started to escalate to more hardcore porn: if you consider this like an inclined plane i rapidly reached the bottom. In the first period i had a girlfriend for years and was still possible to have sex, but quickly the things started to getting worse and my gf broke with me. At first i though was a normal love story arrived to his end..only now i realized that my interested for her and for real sex was decreasing
After that it was no possible for me to have sex with others girls. When porn use continues i started to have ED every time and i started also to lost interest and romantic involvement. In that period (more or less 2016) i was not sure if it was due to anxiety or to my unrestorable perverted nature; i didn't recognize the cause and i continue with porn...i was very stupid, i know!
Just to be sure, in 2017 i had medical visits but everything was on the norm (hormones, blood supply, mechanical functioning and all the rest). Was in that period that i lost every hope: with all girls i failed except with one, that not coincidentally, was more similar to my extreme fantasies. Anyway also this relationship ended shortly because i was not fully involved and quite indifferent like a zombie
With this girl i had my only almost sufficient sex experience..unfortunately not possibility to cultivate and continue that relationship. It could be the occasion for save my life but she told me that i was "cold" and insensitive and not interested. A story that i heard a lot of times in these years
I was a porn addicted: a case study with all symptoms compulsion, use continued in spite of adverse consequences, Inability to Control and literally craving for more.
Before covid by chance i saw a new book on sell, "the penis book" by Aaron Spitz. I was shocked and surprised to see my problem so well described: how could be possible that my own problem and only mine was so common?
This book bring to one article in the footnotes by Park and G. Wilson about link between porn and ED (i don't post the link cause i think you know well it). In the same period i bought also the book "the brain that changes itself" by N. Doidge (because i was and i still am passionate about neuroscience..maybe it's a fluke)
After that readings, to be honest, i thought that quitting porn was not so hard but at the same time i had no hopes to healing. I was only telling to myself "It can only brings benefits". After several relapses i download i filter for my mobile phone (bulldog blocker is the best!) and i tried to do the same for my pc and i encountered for the first time YBOP and reboot nation (now i am reading Wilson's YBOP book)
I think that for me the problem is more severe than quitting with porn. I mean porn is now on my brain and in my fantasies and i can not install a blocker on my mind, so it's a drug immediately available even without a connection. The problem start directly from me ...internet porn is just a following step
In my opinion the solution for me is not quitting with manual stimulation but reduce it (a lot) and only with "good" fantasies
But there is another big problem: restore connection with feelings for girls (and other people in general) without this, is difficult to come back to any kind of normal life and long relationships
If you have read my story thank you for your time even if you don't want to add comments, but in that case thank you twice
Have you my same problem? bad fantasies and not only just internet porn? (1)
Have you the same problem with romantic feeling (if i remember well Spitz mentioned it on his book mentioning also the brain region involved...i am having a deep look on YBOP website) (2)