Unbusting my balls

[BrassBalls707]

Day 11-13

I stayed up a while longer than usual and noticed that my ability to resist PMO is proportional to the time I haven't meditated. I did so around 16:00, and am now noticing an extreme struggle to resist PMO at around 23:30. It is worth adding I had a 1 and a half hour nap at 20:00. I think both time spent since the last mental exercise and sleep lower my ability to act conscientiously. A necessary revelation for sure, since I almost relapsed. Holy moly this is the most difficult thing I've done in my life. I see now why some religions saw some sexual acts as profane, it literally feels like a demonic possession .

This makes sense because most people say that urges are greatest right after they wake up or right before they go to bed. In other words, when the mind is compromised.

I am going to start doing mental exercises first thing in the morning and last thing of the day. I already did the latter, but now I have all the more reason to.

Onwards!

 

[Androg]

Stay tough!

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 14

To follow up, I am experiencing and even larger decrease in resistance towards PMO the more tired I become. Mental exercises, meditation and breathing exercises also decrease in helpfulness the less I sleep.

Unfortunately I am faced with a severe risk. The coming three days I will be exhausted due to a lack of sleep. I have deadlines (I am a procrastinator) so there is no way out of this. I am looking forward to stabilizing my routine to prevent this from being a risk again. I am working myself to decrease procrastination during these harsh times. One step before the other.

I am sleep deprived, I experience severe urges, I feel intense pressure, this is suffering.

Yet I take it in stride. I will not break! I will not relapse! I will not fail to meet my goals!

I will make it through! Staying tough!

Onwards!

 

[Androg]

Procrastination can be such a curse. Or rather, "choosing to be proactive is such a blessing."

 

[BrassBalls707]

Ironically and shamefully I admit to a relapse.
I slept for a few hours to increase my mood and energy, but after waking up forgot to do my mental exercises again. Soon after I saw some triggering material, and since I didn't put myself in the right headspace beforehand I click - click - clicked and my dick had appeared in my hand.

It's frustrating because I had the right idea and solution to this beforehand but failed to apply it. I could have set a reminder before sleeping to remind myself afterwards, but I think I was simply too confident. I can't trust myself to remeber shit or make the right decision in the future, it's like I have to let one state of mind coach the other and it was too exhausting on top of my other responsibilities. As I quoted before "if stopping PMO isn't at the top of my list, I won't make it".

It happened, but I learned a lot about myself and am optimistic for the future. I'm going to think more about how I can sabotage the type of relapse I had to tomorrow.

Onwards.

 

[strongfuture89]

Sleep deprivation makes it more difficult to resist triggers. I also noticed that and since the start of my reboot I´m sleeping minimum 8 hours a night. I check when I need to wake up, then count backwards to tell me when I have to sleep - no exceptions. When you´re sleepy, you don´t think straight, you won´t be able to focus on what´s best for you.
If needed, place you phone in another room when you go to bed.
Naps can sometimes disturb your wake-sleep rhythm, so first priority is a good long sleep each night.
I also procrastinated a lot. When you are well rested, you can work faster.

 

[BrassBalls707]

Sleep deprivation makes it more difficult to resist triggers. I also noticed that and since the start of my reboot I´m sleeping minimum 8 hours a night. I check when I need to wake up, then count backwards to tell me when I have to sleep - no exceptions. When you´re sleepy, you don´t think straight, you won´t be able to focus on what´s best for you.
If needed, place you phone in another room when you go to bed.
Naps can sometimes disturb your wake-sleep rhythm, so first priority is a good long sleep each night.
I also procrastinated a lot. When you are well rested, you can work faster.

All truths there, I agree. Already put my phone far enough away when I go sleep, so that's not an issue. But I'll take your advice about naps and focus on getting my nightly sleep right, as opposed to patching holes with naps.

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 7/30

I haven't been posting as I come to the same conclusions often. I am posting now to keep this battle at the forefront of my mind, lest I let down my guard like I did last time. I've been continuing to meditate to cultivate conscientiousness, to prevent having as many close calls.

That's all for now.

Onwardssss

 

[Androg]

Day 7/30

I haven't been posting as I come to the same conclusions often. I am posting now to keep this battle at the forefront of my mind, lest I let down my guard like I did last time. I've been continuing to meditate to cultivate conscientiousness, to prevent having as many close calls.

That's all for now.

Onwardssss

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 16/30

I relapsed again, getting further than last time.

I recall not reminding myself of the steps necessary to curb this addiction. It really is as simple as staying conscientious for me, and if I don't cultivate that I will keep relapsing.

I know what my mistakes are. Bringing phone to bed, not meditating, not keeping this at the forefront of my mind when the urges will be strongest...

I will beat this.

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 13

I've relapsed quite a few times since September but I have gone without (PM)O since the end of December. I am still applying what I've learned, but balancing it all is a bitch. For two weeks now I've been unable to sleep between 2-6am and that's caused a decrease in resistance to triggers. I've also reinstalled Instagram to re-link with some people but I am reaffirmed it is detrimental for me to use it, so off it goes.

I've managed to workout consistently and meet other goals, but once again keeping concentration has been hard. Using social media is doing shit to my brain and sapping my conscientiousness. I want to break free! ()

Arguably, I have more on my mind than last February and August but the time for me to pick myself back up decreases. That's reassuring.

I'm going to continue posting as much as I can, since meditation is still hard to keep up.


Onwards

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 14

I did some research into nail-biting, anxiety and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and learned a lot about myself by combining it with other insights. I believe I have a personality which is sensitive to falling in the traps I have. Reading papers, they almost seemed to fit too well as prophecies. Early psychosocial conversations could have revealed issues way earlier in life, but I am here now, dealing with it in the present.

Due to childhood related trauma, I suffer from an exaggerated anxiety response to expectations placed on me. This is noticeable at work and in academics but also at home. Because I do not possess good coping skills, I have resorted to nail-biting, other oral aggression such as biting my lips and cheeks, PMO, the internet, social distractions, videogames... While they drew my attention away, it did not cure my anxiety. I merely became able to shift focus elsewhere. I became very good at shifting my focus elsewhere. So good in fact, I may have developed ADHD as a young teen.

The role of PMO here is the same as any other emotional or anxiety regulation method I used.
I feel like I can confidently say for myself that the intensity of urges I feel is directly linked to my feelings of distress. This inadvertently means that if I can develop healthier coping mechanisms through techniques learnt in therapy and by myself I can diminish the urges and ultimately diminish my risk to relapse. Although anxiety and ADHD are but components of my PMO fight, they required recognition. I will bring this up with my therapist soon, as we have only done EMDR for trauma processing.

On a side note, I saw my friend off to the hospital. He was taken there by an ambulance last night right after I posted. He is prone to addiction and suffers from substance use mostly. It caused some stress in addition to that which I already have so today was especially rough.

Onwards...

 

[Blondie]

Hey @BrassBalls707, I just read your post here, and I wish you the best of luck. You know, I've had some of those same responses to stress in my life, obviously the porn use, but the biting my nails, or picking in my case, has been a real thing to battle with. All of these false coping mechanisms never bring us a true sense of peace, but usually more stress afterwards. After your nails start bleeding for the thousandth time, and you've told yourself you're going to quit, but haven't, your life is nothing but stress.

Best

 

[BrassBalls707]

Hey @BrassBalls707, I just read your post here, and I wish you the best of luck. You know, I've had some of those same responses to stress in my life, obviously the porn use, but the biting my nails, or picking in my case, has been a real thing to battle with. All of these false coping mechanisms never bring us a true sense of peace, but usually more stress afterwards. After your nails start bleeding for the thousandth time, and you've told yourself you're going to quit, but haven't, your life is nothing but stress.

Best

Thanks for the inspiring and sympathetic words, I appreciate it. It's good to be reminded I'm not alone in this.

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 21

I looked at porn today and the day before. It was out of sheer boredom. I hate the fact that I can't tolerate boredom or turn my attention to something productive, it's something I will focus on more the coming days through (you guessed it) meditation. I've taken heavy hits to my motivation and mindset from not sleeping well and enough. I'm struggling to fix that but am hopeful. If I see no improvement to my sleep-wake cycle in one week I will contact a medical professional because this has been dragging on for too long.

I've also recently added Instagram back to my phone and I constantly abuse it. I feel like a dog that hears a dinner bell with every notification and if I turn those off or set an app timer I feel an urge to check my inbox constantly. What's interesting is that this urge is far bigger than what I currently feel towards porn, likely because it's far more accessible, normalized and streamlined to your likes and dislikes. I am removing the app once again, because I don't trust myself to use it properly.

The porn glancing has mostly been at night, once more having fallen into the habit of keeping my phone near my bed, it's a no-go. Also getting back to moving it elsewhere when I don't need to use it.

I am noticing some urges to PMO (again) because of stress. Working out as of late was a good way to vent that stress, but as I had fallen ill I decided it would save the energy to get better faster. Ironically, this is the same dynamic as exactly one year ago. That insight alone gives me more hope for the future.

Onwards.

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 23

Today was fine urge wise but the day before was purgatory. I was constantly bombarded by urges but managed to stay the course. I had difficulty due to fatigue as I had been up since 3 am (unfortunate, I couldn't sleep despite my best effort). I decided to pace naps through my day today to build back some 'resistance' and it seems to have worked.

I'm closing in on 30 days more motivated than before and I am looking forward to moving that goalpost further.

Onwards

 

[MapleSyrup]

Wishing you good luck man. I read your post and I can really relate to dealing with exagerated anxiety responses to expectations. In my case, my maladaptive coping habits came in the form of porn-use, binge drinking and self harm, which I'm glad to have put behind me now.

I'm doing way better now after quitting all 3 bad habits, and replacing them with more healthy coping mechanisms. Glad to hear you're working with a therapist. That really helped me in my case, especially with recognizing unhealthy thought patterns.

30 days is a great goalpost for now, and you're almost there!

 

[BrassBalls707]

Wishing you good luck man. I read your post and I can really relate to dealing with exagerated anxiety responses to expectations. In my case, my maladaptive coping habits came in the form of porn-use, binge drinking and self harm, which I'm glad to have put behind me now.

I'm doing way better now after quitting all 3 bad habits, and replacing them with more healthy coping mechanisms. Glad to hear you're working with a therapist. That really helped me in my case, especially with recognizing unhealthy thought patterns.

30 days is a great goalpost for now, and you're almost there!

Thank you for the kind words. If you don't mind me asking: what was your process for replacing those habits? What did you replace them with?

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 24

Had only one urge today and managed to exert some self control. Once again saying I should meditate tomorrow and get ahead of these urges before they "strike", as I haven't been as mindful/conscientious as I wanted to be today.

Onwards

 

[BrassBalls707]

Day 25

I did what I said I would do, albeit after some urges struck. I kept busy throughout the day and feel satisfied and fulfilled. I had a mood dip in the evening and immediately meditated to prevent reaching for coping mechanisms. I am glad to say it helped.

Onwards