Hey mylaststand, I agree with the sentiment of ilovemyhand (great name, btw) and Numez. Fantasy is counterproductive at the least and has the potential to be relapse inducing. It stimulates and feeds the pathways that porn has created. It provides nourishment to the pathways you are trying to weaken and ultimately eradicate. It increases cravings.
Maybe I can control them.
Maybe you can, maybe you can't. Maybe you can control your porn consumption, maybe you can't. Being able to control something doesn't make it beneficial, necessarily. Do you want to recover? Do you want to have the best handle on this thing as possible? If so, going without fantasy will make you more successful. You will feel less cravings and more at-ease sooner. If you still want to be the slave of a soul sucking, ultimately unfulfilling activity deep down you probably will still want to partake in fantasy. If you still want to, I urge you to think long and hard about why and come back here to this post and explain why. Not to justify it, but to be honest and open about your motives. I'm not about to judge you. I've been down a similar road, and so have many others on here. Most (if not all) of us fantasized and used it as a crutch at the start of our reboots and justified it in various ways. Questions you ought to ask yourself are, "Do my thoughts and actions align with my goals, of what I truly want for myself? If not, why am I doing this? How does it benefit me?" Usually the answer to the last question is that it's a quick escape from the shittiness (numbness, depression, anxiety, non-idealness, etc.) of your current reality. Problem is, in the long run you're just as-- if not more-- miserable.
All that said, great job of being on day 52 of hardmode. Stay strong, maintain your resolve. I'll check back on this post the next few days to see if you wrote something.
Regards,
Crow
