Open and honest

O

OhOh

Member
I am in a bad way with this. Really a mess.

I won't do a full confessional here. It would be enormous.

I will say:

I'm in my 50s. I live in the UK. I have a partner.

I have had trouble regulating my sexual behaviour in a way that has negatively impacted me for as long as I can remember. Really into childhood.

I have had an absolutely compelling fascination with porn/erotic entertainment since I knew it existed.

I have visted sex workers. It's been a compulsion. It always started with obsessive cruising of their websites.

I have engaged in risky behaviours - inviting getting caught I think.

Internet porn is everything to me. I am absolutely terrified of living without it. And absolutely aware that it completely consumes me.

I have a broader issue with being online more generally, and social media in particular. First it was Facebook, which I left in 2016. Then Twitter. Now, it's YouTube. (I work online, from home.)

In the past couple of years I have come to understand that I have (or am, as you prefer) ADHD or ADD. It's possible I'm somewhere quite near "normal" on the autism spectrum too. The ADD though I would say I'm around 99% certain of.

At my age, where I am, and with the resources I can devote to it there's very little chance that I would get a diagnosis. I'm pretty sure the symptoms are the driver of a lot of my problems in life - addiction of various types, depression, anxiety... (I now recognise, for example, rejection sensitivity disphoria as a major issue for me).

This has made "adulting" as they say, a challenge. I'm really not very good at being alive, healthy, and doing the things that someone like me is expected to do. Within a few days of being left on my own I simply start to devolve into... nothingness, a blob that sits in bed with a phone and a tablet. It's not good.

My partner, who is wonderful, quite often travels for her work. At the moment she is away and out of the country for several weeks. I can easily spend 12 hours a day online, sitting starring at this computer using porn and social media. My sexuality now feels completely divorved from anything in the real world. I've also done physical and mental harm to mysef (I've self harmed in various ways since my teenage years) with excessive porn use and masturbation. I really feel broken.

I'm lonely. We moved house 2 years ago - really because I was unable to cope with living in the city any more. I know hardly anyone offline. I find meeting people, making friends, keeping friends... it's all hard.

I hope I'm at a rock bottom with this. I'm so down. I'm so ashamed. I feel so guilty. I'm so tired of all the excuses and all the lies.

I do have some positives:

I'm a recovering alcoholic with coming up to 10 years of sobriety. I have also stopped using drugs (I was at times a compulsive user of most intoxicants, most stubbournly marijuana). I gave up smoking.

Recently I have started to exercise in quite a serious way. I run, play soccer, and do other bits and pieces. I'm probably in the best physical shape of my life. I started this at the same time as giving up twitter. I have stayed off twitter. (It's hard to imagine anything more designed for an ADD brain than twitter.)

I'm trying to meditate and doing OK.

Since understanding myself as having ADD I've started to engage in learning about it. There's sooo much stuff out there, but I do find some useful material.

I am materially quite secure. I have a safe home. I don't need to immediately worry about money. In many ways I'm quite priveliged. None of this has made me happy or well adjusted, but I do know that I am lucky and that not having to worry about immediate concerns like that is a big plus.

Today, I've started cleaning some things up: I have a number of online personas and email addresses... They've all gone.

I set up a new addiction on an app I used to help me off twitter.

So there we are.

I've made so many attempts to give up porn and yet here I am.

I try again, I don't know what else to say.

I did use porn today.
There was no immediate trigger, it's just what I do - was what I did.
To soothe my anxiety and stress I did some press ups.
I'm grateful to be able to see beautiful nature when I look out of my window.

This is day 1.

Thank you,

Owen.
 
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O

OhOh

Member
I should add a goal.

It's permanent abstention, but I'm very much in one-day-at-a-time territory at the moment.

If I can do a day that'd be amazing.

I should also add, to be more positive, that I do feel I have some things to use:

Exercise has been very positive for me.
I have had more of a struggle with meditation but I like to think I have more room for growth with it.
I do have interests and passions (music, environment, walking, activism of sorts) that I would love to direct myself towards.

And, I'm glad to have posted here. (A couple of edits on both posts.)
 
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jonazo91

jonazo91

Active Member
Welcome! A lot of what you posted rings true with me, especially the ADD stuff. For me, it was almost embarrassingly easy for me to get a diagnosis, but I don't know if the American healthcare system differs from the UK one in some ways in that regard. Ultimately I've decided not to use any medication for it anyway. But, if it exists, I'm like the poster child for it. And otherwise, the "on-paper" good life situation that belies a whole other internet persona of sexual deviancy, I feel that greatly.

The sexual deviancy isn't WHO you are, though. You sound like a good guy, with a monkey on your back, like we all do here. It doesn't mean that obsession with sexual behavior and online porn IS you.

Hope to see you around more, and best of luck to you. I only have positive things to say about everyone I've run into on here. Welcome.
 
O

OhOh

Member
Thank you jonazo, that's very kind and it's nice to meet you.

I don't even recall hearing of ADHD until I was well into adulthood. What I heard then tended to present it as exotic, questionable, controversial thing.

I think it's different here now and it (and neurodiverse descriptors generally) are pretty generally accepted.
 
O

OhOh

Member
This is my first day then.

I have been starting my days with PMO X 3 in bed and it's a very embedded habit.

I'm theming today on Letting the Light in. I often hide in the darkness, but today I'm going to make sure I draw back all the curtains.

It amazes me how quickly and completely I fall apart. My partner travelled away last Monday. I went supermarket shopping on Sunday. I didn't put it away.just dumped the bags on the kitchen floor.

I'm trying to orientate my brain towards thinking of this period as an opportunity to do things around the house. I am hopeful.

I'm back at work today.

On we go! X
 
O

OhOh

Member
I've done a day! In fact, if I look at my SoberTime timer I'm currently on 1 day, 21 hours and 7 minutes.

That's as well as I've done on my own for a while.

I used a thought from when I gave up smoking a lot. I did that with a lot of support from a man called Joel Spitzer. He has a smoking cessation YouTube channel that really helped me. It's very straightforward and factual. The concept that really worked well for me was the lie of "just one". That's what the addict says they'll have, just to relieve the cravings, but, if course, "just one" actually means weeks, months or years of continued addicted using. Keep the full depths of the addiction in mind when you're telling yourself that you'll briefly, safely dip your toe in.

I'd somewhat fallen off my exercise programme this past week. But not completely, and I plan to get back fully into the swing of things over the weekend. Meditation too.

My computer died yesterday. It was pretty old and had been groaning for a while. I'm going to keep this new machine clean.

Things are going ok. It's not easy. It's not supposed to be.

Thank you for the supportive likes.

On we go. X 😀
 
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O

OhOh

Member
I made it through today.

Some tough moments. In fact, this morning I was sure I was going to relapse. I got caught in a thought loop and it felt inevitable.

I'm pleased to have escaped it. My cousin was due to visit and had I not had that appointment...

After that I spent a lot of the day exercising. And I cooked a relatively complex (for me!) dinner.

It's not much fun to realise the extent to which my life was dedicated to porn. Honestly, I think it might rival the amount of time I spend at work.

So, I have a large gap to fill.

There are some great opportunities. Exercise is good because it's so unequivocally positive for me and very immediate.

Thank you.

On we go. 😀
 
O

OhOh

Member
Thank you Blondie.

Along with the huge amount of time I waste on porn I want to note the amount of time I've been trying to stop using it. At least 7 years in a way that was serious enough to involve signing up for a quitting site.

One day at a time. That's fine for now. It's very early days.
 
O

OhOh

Member
And, I'm afraid I relapsed.

Not in a terribly bingey way for me. And, to be frank, 3 days clean (when I have the opportunity) is the best that it's been for me for a long time.

I really was a porn user and, honestly, not much more.

Once my partner went away - as she does often - I would watch porn while also following something like Twitter.

Really, all day, every day.

I am coming to understand this in terms of some sort of self-medication or self-soothing around ADHD and maybe other things.

So things are getting better.

It used to be that partner would go away and I would spend all day getting drunk and stoned and watching porn...

I'm going to exercise now. And have a think about what to do better or differently.
 
TryingHarder

TryingHarder

Well-Known Member
One day at a time, one week at a time, one month at a time. I always told myself: if I can do one day, I can do two. If I can do one week, I can do two, and so on.

I always give this advice: if you haven't already, get a copy of Your Brain On Porn and read it cover to cover. It will be a big education on how deep a porn addiction goes, how serious it can be, and why it's so important to reboot, recover, and walk away from the addiction.
 
O

OhOh

Member
Thank you TH, and Captain Haddock! I do appreciate that people have shown support. It is why I came here.

I haven't read YBOP and perhaps I will. I have read Noah Church's book, which is good and covers a lot of the science. I think he gives it away free now. I also watch his YouTube channel.

It is a very tough habit to break for all sorts of reasons. I'm a recovering alcoholic and addicted drug user and an ex smoker and I haven't managed to stop this yet, despite many years of trying.

I'll be at 24 hours around 11am.

I don't want to use porn today and I'm determined not to.
 
GBS

GBS

Respected Member
A really good YouTube video to watch is this


it’s the legendary Gary Wilson (writer of YBOP), doing a Tedx Talk on the whole subject. A really good place to start .
 
O

OhOh

Member
Thank you GBS. I'll take a look today.

I did a day. Today I'll do another day. That's the plan. I'm fairly unbothered by sexual urges thus far, it's boredom and unhappiness that undo me.

I'm exercising a lot still. That helps. I have work today.

On we go.
 
O

OhOh

Member
So that was a bad day...

I know very directly what the triggers were.

I'm very deep in denial about this thing. That's a very big issue.

I'll see how I feel about all this tomorrow.
 
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GBS

GBS

Respected Member
Got to make a decision at some point….you’re doing it or you’re not. Backbone required. Giving in is the easiest thing in the world. You surely didn’t come on here to show us all that It’s too hard for you?
 
O

OhOh

Member
I've done a full day.

That's good enough for now.

It may well be that forums are not a useful tool for me.

I emailed the Samaritans on Tuesday and have been in correspondence with someone there since then. It's been very useful for me. I'm grateful for it.

Also grateful for exercise. Today I ran, did yoga and some calisthenics.

And I'm grateful not to have looked at porn, and to have stopped and started stopping again more quickly than I have in the past.

On we go. Thank you.
 
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