Thank you, this post means a lot. Sometimes I get so caught up in the feelings of shame and regret post relapse that it's hard to take a step back and look at the progress I've made so far this year - this is the best year in over 10 that I've had with regards to abstinence from PMO, which is great. My focus is now putting one foot in front of the other and building myself up again. All the best to you Thank you for this post, it strongly resonates with me. After I relapse I always put myself down, which ultimately does nothing to improve my situation. Specifically, I wholly underestimate my ability to climb out of the hole, instead thinking "F it, I've already relapsed I might as well go on and on until the urge completely disappears". I choose this because it's the easy thing to do, and then after the binge is over I go into dejection mode. A better way to approach it would be after a slip, to think "Ok, you've slipped but you've made great progress so far, put your effort into getting back on track now and tomorrow you'll thank yourself for it". This links into what you say about having respect and true love for yourself - to be truly understanding and caring to yourself at all times would I imagine make this process so much easier. The difficult part is making that self love and respect happen - it's so easy to fall back into periods where I have a negative mindset because I've been used to it for such a long time. Regarding your second point, I completely agree - overthinking everything makes it harder to make this change happen. Rather than thinking "Hmm, I feel horny and I want to scroll social media to accidentally see some triggering images... but I could read that book I always wanted to read but I haven't touched yet... but I feel horny and I need some stimulation, ok here I am down this path again" is to be mindful of that feeling and rather than dwell on it, go straight to that positive activity, e.g. reading, playing guitar, exercising or whatever. And the difficult thing is that going to that book or picking up that instrument is going to feel uncomfortable and unsatisfying in the beginning because I'm not used to it - I have to think about it and feel right about doing it and then actually do it - which is tiresome. Of course it's so much easier to scroll through social media or watch TV because that's what I've been used to for so long. Getting to the stage where I don't have to think about reading that book or picking up that instrument when I have spare time is where I want to be. A therapist recommended I read a book called Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi that goes into the above in detail - getting to the stage where positive activities become "flow" activities, rather than unhelpful and harmful activities like PMO which has been a "flow" activity of mine for the past 10 years. I've not picked it up yet but I will carve out the time to give it a read. "You don't need things to feel a certain way before you move on" - this speaks to me a lot and I'm going to put this in my signature. Thanks and all the best to both of you. Day 2
Day 4/30 I'm working the next six nights and can't see my new friend until next Wednesday. Hopefully I should make it!
Started six days ago after i got diagnosed with Sex addiction with voyeurism this has been the worst day yet.
Yahooo today I complete 90 days from Porn and Masterbuation I am really really thanx to all of you people and my Higher power and specially my wife who always encourage me to stay away from this bad shit This is very great and big achievement in recovery Again I am very very thanks full to you Love u all I will stay here more 3 month in this group and complete 1more challenge here