Hiya Everyone! (Introduction and My Story)

Hiya everyone. As you can see, I’m new to this place.

I’m a 20-year-old Christian male who’s had an addiction to masturbation for as long as I can remember. Until the last two years or so I was never really into porn at all; I typically used attractive pictures of celebrities to masturbate, or things like clothing store ads. To be honest, I never really used to think much about it. I didn’t consider myself a porn addict because I never really ventured in that direction, and I always found a way to justify masturbation to myself even though I knew deep down that it goes against my religious beliefs.

Things began to change when I started letting myself get near porn. I went from completely avoiding it to using non-porn websites to try some of it out (using video searches like Bing). More and more I began to feel like I couldn’t find the things that particularly aroused me without venturing into full-blown porn, and soon I found that just like that, I was visiting those websites 24/7.

Well, it took a huge toll on my mental health (more on that in a moment). Where I once viewed masturbation as a normal part of my life that was no big deal, due to my ever-increasing depression and anxiety I started to become more and more aware of the dark hole that I was digging myself into. I was distancing myself from the God I desperately needed, I felt like my family didn’t know the real me anymore (I pretty much kept everything to myself), I was wasting my life, I was going against my morals and I felt like complete and total garbage. I’m not kidding when I say that I didn’t even want to look at myself in the mirror anymore just to shave or brush my teeth.

Concerning the mental health issues- I’ve been dealing with what I’m certain is OCD for the past eight months now. I went through it briefly a few years back, eventually it sort of faded. But since October of last year, it’s come back worse than ever. Each day I’ve spent in depression, fear, and crippling anxiety, and porn/masturbation is a big factor. It’s caused all sorts of doubts and fears. My hope is that by cutting off one of the sources for my depression and insecurity, I can do something to make this better and hopefully improve my mental health.

But at the end of the day, the real reason I want to quit is because I want to be more. I want to walk with God, I want to be the good person I still know exists in me deep down, and I want to hopefully get married and have a family one day. One of the worst things I can think of is destroying that future with a porn/masturbation addiction.

But now that that’s all out of the way, some of the better things about me:

First off, I’m a huge nerd, haha. I’m both a Marvel and DC fan, I love all the superhero stuff (particularly Batman and Deadpool!) I’m also a big horror nut (though admittedly I don’t think this has helped my depression, anxiety, etc) and I enjoy drawing, reading and writing (though I don’t think I have a talent for that last one!) One thing I also like to do is research and read virtually anything that catches my interest, and I love science and technology.

Not sure how good I’d be at describing my personality, but I can give some personal details: a lot of people tell me I’m funny and have good sense of humor. I’m very empathetic and am not at all judging, I have a deep sense of compassion for people (I’ve always wanted to be someone who could help everyone through their problems, even people I don’t even know at all whatsoever), which unfortunately conflicts with my OCD (if that’s what it is). Concerning music, I love Skillet, Breaking Benjamin, Shinedown, that sort of stuff. And, I’m actually quite goth.

Deep down, what I want more than anything else in my life is a closer relationship with the Lord and a lasting, loving relationship with a wife. But in order for these things to happen, I need to make permanent changes and put an end to the things that are destroying my life once and for all.

Well, that’s it, guys. Now that I’ve put a couple of hours into writing this introduction, I hope to join you all in this fight to finally improve my life, my mental health and hopefully my future, as well as my walk with God!

If there is anything else anyone would like to know about me, feel free to ask!

 

First off, hiya! It’s great to hear from another Christian! Thanks for reading it all, I only now realized that my post was quite long. XD

Anyways, I’m glad to hear that quitting it helps with depression and anxiety, because that will be the last obstacle in my life when I’m finally free from PMO. It’s also inspiring to hear it from someone who has a lot more experience with depression/anxiety than I do!

I’m not currently taking any meds, as I have never been to any therapists and therefore I have never had an official diagnosis. Thanks for the heads up, however.

Absolutely! I will definitely pray for you!