The problem with wet dreams

Hi guys, I hope everyone is having a productive day and is doing well in their endeavours. I've had a realisation recently that wet dreams are a lot more potentially damaging than is commonly accepted, and I'd like to take the time to explain why I think this.

OK so for years now I have struggled with porn-induced intrusive thoughts and fantasies, that linger in my mind for long stretches of time and play an important part in creating urges and tempting me to relapse. These intrusive thoughts are obviously caused by excessive PMO, thats blindingly obvious. But, in the last 18 months that I've been doing NoFap, I have PMO'd significantly less than in the past, but the thoughts remained. It took me longer than I think it should have to realise that, while I the thoughts no longer bothered me as much during the day, they weren't really going away because my streak was being compromised by wet dreams. I would regularly have wet dreams about these fantasies, which would reinforce them in my mind, leading to a cascade effect where one wet dream could trigger many more throughout the week. Relapse was made more likely because I was being subjected to a barrage that I could barely cope with. Last week, I had wet dreams 5 out of the 7 days, all back to back, with some days having multiple dreams. I was literally ejaculating more often than I would have been if I just decided to relapse.

Thankfully, I have a solution to this problem, at least they helped me and can hopefully help someone else if they find that, after going on long streaks, their body makes them have a stupid amount of wet dreams. The solution, is to deliberately get up early in the morning, not stupidly early, but early enough that you arent still in bed after 7am. It is during the morning hours that wet dreams seem to be more likely. Another tip is to get out of bed no matter what time you wake, as falling back to sleep again greatly increases the risk of falling right into a wet dream. I hope this post helps someone, I know that I was going out of my mind for a while because of this. While I dont count wet dreams as a relapse, I do think they can be harmful when they are being triggered by the addicted brain, and not happening simply because the body is doing its normal thing.

 

They aren't when they contribute to the chaser effect, reinforce porn fantasies and intrusive thoughts, and happen so often that it makes you feel worse than relapsing would, thats the point of this thread.

 

I'd honestly argue that in certain situations they contribute to the chaser effect more than actual relapses do. When you relapse, at least you get to "enjoy" (I hate using that word in this context but you get what I mean) the actual act, when its a wet dream you dont control it and its just the body forcing you to go through it. I believe that this can make the urges incredibly strong because on some level you think "well I already feel bad because of the wet dream, and am super horny, why not just relapse and start fresh later?". Its faulty logic of course but this has happened to me a fair few times.

 

Well you may not ever have one, you might end up having loads back to back or even more than one a night. It depends on the individual so I cant really tell you exactly.

 

I dont think about porn during the day and still have wet dreams all the time, not to mention a lot of them arent about porn at all. I have managed to wake myself up during some before the ejaculation actually occurred, so I know that it is possible to do it some times, but I dont think even with the strongest of wills you can stop it entirely.

 

Yeah you are right, 6 days into this and I've already started having wet dreams, just sooner than usual. I still think I'm going to end up having less overall, simply due to me lying in less on a morning, but this tip isn't foolproof.

 

I've had a fair few dry dreams in the past as well, and its always really weird how they play out, like my brain knows that something is wrong and wakes me up. But then most of the time I just sleep right to the end and only wake up after the climax, so theres no consistency. I really do wish it was possible to somehow set myself a limit, like once a week, on a certain day, I will have one, and then the rest of the time I wont. Its irritating as hell waking up to the results of a wet dream knowing that I'll have at least 48 hours of stronger urges and chaser effect to contend with, not to mention, the sheer amount of these dreams that I have means I'm dealing with this almost every day.

Regarding wet dreams decreasing, I cant find any consensus online for how many is too many. My problem is I have so many that its essentially giving me the side effects I would get from relapse, just without the actual relapse. Its a dilemma and I can only hope my body calms the hell down as I progress on the streak.