itsdemmusic
Member
General info: 18yo, (heterosexual) male
I think it was about 2-3 years ago I first heard about YBOP and the possibility that PMO could lead to PIED. During that time I wasn't entirely convinced yet and I had a hard time quitting. There have been a few periods in the beginning that I actually gave up trying to give up PMO. I just tried to not think about the harm it might cause. It really was a sedative for me. It was a time where I think you could actually say I was depressed, it almost came to a point I had to take anti-depressants, but in the end I decided not to. I was completely drained of all energy and drive to do whatsover, I never really lost the will to live, I just lost the will to do something with my life.
When I finally got a hang of quitting PMO, having had streaks lasting a few weeks or longer, it got me some motivation to at least just continue to persue beating this destructive part of my life (however I kept indulging in others; going to bed at 4 AM, watching films and series all day and having a very unhealthy, sugar-filled diet).
I read more about PIED and the science behind it and got more and more convinced this could actually solve the PIED problem I now figured I had. (I wasn't getting hard when making out with girls anymore, whereas that wasn't a problem for me before I started using/abusing porn.) To be clear, I probably PMO'ed 2-6 times a day. It was also that I had went on a holiday and had to go without porn for a few weeks (still MO'ed) and when I was thinking back about that it actually had felt like a slight improvement erection-wise. All of this resulted in my decision to give up PMO for good. That's a somewhere between a year and a year and a half ago. To be honest I don't recall it being that hard anymore. I was finally convinced it wasn't good for me and the desperation I felt by the idea of never being able to have sex or be intimate with someone was enough to just get over it.
Now I wasn't PMO'ing anymore, but I wasn't doing anything else either, really. The part of actually trying to improve myself by doing certain things, instead of just not doing certain things (I ended up quitting gaming and eating refined sugar as well), is still something I struggle with to this day.
This summer I finally started working out again 1-3 times a week and that's something I feel good about. I also have meditated sporadically, but I still find this a very hard habit to keep up (I do think it's very good for me however). I'm also finally reading again, daily. (Years ago I had pretty much given that up for gaming.)
Looking back I don't want to be too hard on myself and I just think: first things first. It comes as it comes. And I do feel like I'm going in the right direction.
For the biggest part of, I think, a year of being PMO-free I distanced myself from the communities like YourBrainRebalanced, /r/NoFap and when I heard about, RebootNation. It felt that they were actually triggering me to worry and stress about my PIED issues and that they were even sometimes tempting me to (P)MO. I notice that they still make me feel stressy about it sometimes so I really try to keep it to a minimum. But now I finally think there has been actual improvement and succes I feel like I have to share this with you guys.
By giving up PMO, gaming, refined sugar and periodically (binge)watching series and films I felt like I had met all the requirements to just sit and wait back for PIED-improvement to happen. I figured that by minumizing the dopamine flow to my brain and giving the please centres in the brain a rest things should in the end just go back to normal. However I also feared that I had weakened the pathways to a natural sexual-response in such a way (I was never actually using them and my brain had been hijacked by PMO) that they'd just be too weak to actually function again. That's also why I picked up meditating from time to time because I read it's healthy for the (grey matter of) the brain.
Those sitting-back-improvements never came, I think. I ended up seeing my doctor about it and a sexuologist and although my doctor sort of gave me some good advice the sexuologist told me to try and (P)M(O) to get the juices flowing. I tried that (no P) but I didn't feel like it helped me, I felt horrible after MO'ing so I just decided to return to a PMO-free zone. I don't know to what amount cutting out stuff did or didn't help, but fact is that only this summer I have seem to have had any actual improvement. And that was a time that I have been actively engaging in sexual activities, leading up to actual, succesful sex. It started with making out and fooling around and went from there on, spread out over several weeks. I'm still a bit afraid to make any assumptions that I am now in fact 'cured of PIED', I have only had, what I would call, succesful sex once. Since the first time I still had trouble getting and keeping it up. During these weeks I hadn't had a full, hundred percent erection but 'enough' to suffice. A hand- or blowjob wouldn't make me O. First time sex I was actually able to O, but I lost my erection after that. Only this last time having sex did I have a full erection and was I able to keep it up for a full hour even after O'ing once, which felt incredible and unbelievable.
I was, to say the least, very nervous because I knew sex was going to happen again and I was really afraid I wouldn't be able to sport an erection, that I would have to explain myself etc. and that everything would be ruined. However, as soon as we started kissing I felt an erection coming up and I when I went in I knew things were good.
I'm curious, slightly nervous but at this moment also feeling bright about what the future will hold. Hopfully things will be as good as last time but the fact that it happened once at least gives hope and taste for more. I'd like to thank everyone who helped me during this process by giving the motivation to keep going and if any of you has any questions feel free to fire them up.
I think it was about 2-3 years ago I first heard about YBOP and the possibility that PMO could lead to PIED. During that time I wasn't entirely convinced yet and I had a hard time quitting. There have been a few periods in the beginning that I actually gave up trying to give up PMO. I just tried to not think about the harm it might cause. It really was a sedative for me. It was a time where I think you could actually say I was depressed, it almost came to a point I had to take anti-depressants, but in the end I decided not to. I was completely drained of all energy and drive to do whatsover, I never really lost the will to live, I just lost the will to do something with my life.
When I finally got a hang of quitting PMO, having had streaks lasting a few weeks or longer, it got me some motivation to at least just continue to persue beating this destructive part of my life (however I kept indulging in others; going to bed at 4 AM, watching films and series all day and having a very unhealthy, sugar-filled diet).
I read more about PIED and the science behind it and got more and more convinced this could actually solve the PIED problem I now figured I had. (I wasn't getting hard when making out with girls anymore, whereas that wasn't a problem for me before I started using/abusing porn.) To be clear, I probably PMO'ed 2-6 times a day. It was also that I had went on a holiday and had to go without porn for a few weeks (still MO'ed) and when I was thinking back about that it actually had felt like a slight improvement erection-wise. All of this resulted in my decision to give up PMO for good. That's a somewhere between a year and a year and a half ago. To be honest I don't recall it being that hard anymore. I was finally convinced it wasn't good for me and the desperation I felt by the idea of never being able to have sex or be intimate with someone was enough to just get over it.
Now I wasn't PMO'ing anymore, but I wasn't doing anything else either, really. The part of actually trying to improve myself by doing certain things, instead of just not doing certain things (I ended up quitting gaming and eating refined sugar as well), is still something I struggle with to this day.
This summer I finally started working out again 1-3 times a week and that's something I feel good about. I also have meditated sporadically, but I still find this a very hard habit to keep up (I do think it's very good for me however). I'm also finally reading again, daily. (Years ago I had pretty much given that up for gaming.)
Looking back I don't want to be too hard on myself and I just think: first things first. It comes as it comes. And I do feel like I'm going in the right direction.
For the biggest part of, I think, a year of being PMO-free I distanced myself from the communities like YourBrainRebalanced, /r/NoFap and when I heard about, RebootNation. It felt that they were actually triggering me to worry and stress about my PIED issues and that they were even sometimes tempting me to (P)MO. I notice that they still make me feel stressy about it sometimes so I really try to keep it to a minimum. But now I finally think there has been actual improvement and succes I feel like I have to share this with you guys.
By giving up PMO, gaming, refined sugar and periodically (binge)watching series and films I felt like I had met all the requirements to just sit and wait back for PIED-improvement to happen. I figured that by minumizing the dopamine flow to my brain and giving the please centres in the brain a rest things should in the end just go back to normal. However I also feared that I had weakened the pathways to a natural sexual-response in such a way (I was never actually using them and my brain had been hijacked by PMO) that they'd just be too weak to actually function again. That's also why I picked up meditating from time to time because I read it's healthy for the (grey matter of) the brain.
Those sitting-back-improvements never came, I think. I ended up seeing my doctor about it and a sexuologist and although my doctor sort of gave me some good advice the sexuologist told me to try and (P)M(O) to get the juices flowing. I tried that (no P) but I didn't feel like it helped me, I felt horrible after MO'ing so I just decided to return to a PMO-free zone. I don't know to what amount cutting out stuff did or didn't help, but fact is that only this summer I have seem to have had any actual improvement. And that was a time that I have been actively engaging in sexual activities, leading up to actual, succesful sex. It started with making out and fooling around and went from there on, spread out over several weeks. I'm still a bit afraid to make any assumptions that I am now in fact 'cured of PIED', I have only had, what I would call, succesful sex once. Since the first time I still had trouble getting and keeping it up. During these weeks I hadn't had a full, hundred percent erection but 'enough' to suffice. A hand- or blowjob wouldn't make me O. First time sex I was actually able to O, but I lost my erection after that. Only this last time having sex did I have a full erection and was I able to keep it up for a full hour even after O'ing once, which felt incredible and unbelievable.
I was, to say the least, very nervous because I knew sex was going to happen again and I was really afraid I wouldn't be able to sport an erection, that I would have to explain myself etc. and that everything would be ruined. However, as soon as we started kissing I felt an erection coming up and I when I went in I knew things were good.
I'm curious, slightly nervous but at this moment also feeling bright about what the future will hold. Hopfully things will be as good as last time but the fact that it happened once at least gives hope and taste for more. I'd like to thank everyone who helped me during this process by giving the motivation to keep going and if any of you has any questions feel free to fire them up.