Hello everyone. I joined this forum because I've come to learn it's popular and supportive, so I figured I could get some help. The thing is masturbation is ruining my life. I want to stop because it is just not right! It ruins your view of women and your confidence as well as making you feel guilty and horrible. The main reason I'm quitting is because this act is strictly forbidden in my religion. I have struggled for years. I have for a long time been able to control myself and I do no longer masturbate during the day, something I'm grateful for. However my body makes me pay for it. My problem is that almost every night I automatically wake up and start doing it...while lying in my bed, it's this semi-conscious thing. I just can't control it for some reason. It's as if my body is telling me "nope, you're not escaping this act!" Some night I feel more conscious than others but it just happens and for some reason I don't care about what I'm doing but only when it happens at night after awakening. Do any of you experience the same? Do you have any advice? Because this act is strictly against what I believe in and it's causing a great deal of sadness and horrible thoughts.
@w.k777 welcome to nofap. I actually never had any experience you are describing but it is possible that you are exposed to a lot of "triggers" during the day and at night the inevitable happens. You probably want to wear something which makes it difficult to MO it might be uncomfortable but the more time you delay doing the act when you are semi sleeping the more the possibility of stopping it. Also only go to bed when you are read to sleep, this technique helped me control my fantasizing habit.
Here is a growing collection of startup strategies compiled from myself and I've added some from others on NoFap. Keep these in mind. This is by no means a be-all-end-all list of suggestions but it is a list for you to use and add to for yourself and modify to meet your needs. Delete all of the P that you have from your computer and smartphone including the browser history and cookies. This will not stop you but will slow you down. Identify your triggers. What are the things that you happening in your world to cause you to turn to PMO for escape and comfort! This is the most crucial step in the process. Once your triggers are identified, determine healthy ways of dealing with those triggers such as exercise, running, leaving the stressful situation and going outside for air. Follow this link to find out what NoFap is about. Within this link is a link to a glossary of terms commonly used on NoFap. This will help you communicate knowledgeably and more effectively. https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.php?threads/newbies-list-of-rebooting-resources.50878/ Go to http://yourbrainonporn.com/ to learn more about the effect PMO has on you. Do this also to educate yourself on the damage you are doing to yourself. Guard your eyes. Be careful of what you allow yourself to see. No, you cannot live with your eyes closed but you can determine how long you look at something. If you know it may cause you to fall, flee from it! Run in the other direction, sometimes that need to be literal. Stop placing yourself in situations where the situation has leverage over you. That means stop placing yourself where you know you may get weak and either give in at the moment or later on. When you see yourself beginning to be in a bad situation (ex. alone with a computer and horny), say what you feel or know you are about to do or likely to do so you can hear yourself say it. (Ex. "I'm alone in a room [with a computer] and I'm feeling lonely [or whatever the emotion is] and horny and I want to [watch watch porn and] masturbate but if I do that, I will have lost the progress I've made". By hearing you say what you are about to do, you may realize the price you pay is not worth what you will receive in return. Masturbation... do not keep your hands to yourself. Unless you are bathing, changing your underwear or actually using the bathroom, your hands should be nowhere near your penis. YOU ARE BANNED FROM TOUCHING YOUR PENIS FOR RECREATION!!! IT IS NOT A TOY!!! Your bed is limited to only the time you are sleeping. No laying in bed other than that. As soon you awake, you should get out of bed. Can't sleep, if awake for more than a few minutes, get out of bed until you are sleepy enough to go to sleep. Keep doors open unless necessary. You need to be isolated as little as possible. You're less likely to M when people can see you. Keep curtains and blinds open as much as possible. Similar reason as above and also allows light inside. Many time M'ing is more likely in dark places. At night, keep lights on as often as possible. Similar to above, lights on may lessen your desire to fap. If you are a naked sleeper or a boxer sleeper, consider sleeping in a in jockstrap, cup or briefs or compression shorts, something more constrictive so that you are less likely to feel movement while falling asleep or when awaking. They may provide a better barrier to prevent those that subconsciously reach for their penis at night or in the morning. They may also be a visual barrier for those that have morning erections too irresistible to not touch. Begin a journal so that others can encourage you and connect with you. Become active in this community. The more active you are, the less time you will spend focused on you. The less time focused solely on you, the faster time goes. There is an old saying, "a watched pot of water doesn't boil any faster", which means for this example, focusing solely on yourself and your issues won't make them go away sooner. It's OK to track progress but when spending more time doing other things that were once important to you and encouraging others, you will notice the time of your sobriety will go so much faster than if you didn't. Remember that whatever you feed will grow and whatever you starve will eventually die! Each time you PMO you feed the addiction, each time you resist, you starve the addiction. This a journey. Unless you began your addiction yesterday, don't expect to have complete victory by tomorrow. It takes time. We are here for you for as long as it takes. Your triggers will be those things that occur and you find yourself wanting to turn to PMO for escape and comfort. There are visual triggers that may be avoided but the emotional triggers are much more difficult to avoid. Here are some common emotional triggers: Laziness Fear Hunger Anger/ aggravation / frustration Lonliness Tiredness Depression Inebriation Depression General stress Need for control Boredom
Thanks for your reply. Lots of useful things here. I have tried many of those and am still working on them. I think leaving the curtains open and a night light on will actually help as my biggest problem is automatically waking up and doing the act. Maybe this will help me stop. I will also try to track my progress and keep everyone updated and stay active. We're stronger together. Again, thank you for such a detailed response.
Hi @w.k777 , welcome to NoFap It is a big step if you can understand what is triggering your urges, because this will allow you to be awake and kill those urges as soon as they appear. I recommend you to create your own "Emergency Toolbox" with readings that can be handy to read when you start feeling urges to screw up. I can share this post with you with my own Emergency Toolbox, it helped me a lot during the first few months, i had them in my cell and read them every time I started falling down: https://www.nofap.com/forum/index.p...y-first-320-days-of-reboot.62938/#post-473978 I wrote some tips in this post that perhaps will help you too: http://NoFap.com/forum/index.php?threads/tips-that-helped-me-to-start-my-reboot.46617/#post-330318 You can watch some interesting videos which are also very helpful in this post: http://nofap.com/forum/index.php?th...t-help-me-a-lot-during-my-reboot.39774/page-2 I also suggest you to read "Breaking the Cycle" by George Collins, it is a must-read if you are serious about getting rid of this addiction. Last but not least, I would strongly recommend you to take the NoFap Academy course if you can afford it. The course is great but the best value are the weekly video calls with @alexander (the creator of NoFap and NoFap Academy) and Mark Queppet, where you can chat with them in real life and listen to other guys's stories and problems too. I hope that all this helps you to fight this shitty addiction. Let's keep on fighting Fercho
Thanks D.J great ready reck or in times of emotional stress you are absolutely correct the change is slow but very sure give time time keeps hands and mind of Dickie
Hey everyone. I think it's time for an update. I have not had much success yet. I found I was able to control myself much more when I had the night lamp on. The episodes were reduced to once a week. But I stopped keeping the lamp on because I have read it disturbes your sleep. I am now considering keeping it on again, as I personally care more about this than sleeping. Afterall, I notice no difference in quality of sleep after leaving the lamp on, so I doubt my sleep is being affected, right? BIG REALIZATION: I know my triggers and I know how the problem will go away I think. I am constantly tired and fatigued, which makes me irritable and more stressed at times. I also get episodes of depression. My theory is that my brain realizes this and that it wants to counteract it by lifting my mood and making me feel more awake. The result is that these episodes happen. My body wakes me up because it needs some relief from the tiredness. This theory is supported by the fact that I binge eat on sugary foods, sweets, anything to lift my mood and energy levels often. Especially when I feel more tired. It's as if I need a "kick" to keep me awake. It's as if this horrible habit we are trying to stop functions as some sort of energy giving and mood lifting drug? Maybe it's only my case. I'm chronically tired and very sleepy all the time. I've seen doctors and been referred to a specialist after complaining about tiredness, fatigue, and many other symptoms. And after my blood tests revealed abnormal RF of 450, the doctor took me seriousy it seems. The results indicates some sort of autoimmune disease present. I believe when I've figured out the cause of my tiredness, with the help of the doctors, I will have taken a significant or maybe even final step to competely stopping these horrible, life-destroying and depressing episodes that FOR GOOD. So if anyone is feeling down or tired all the time, maybe you should take care of this first? Maybe many others are just tired? Should I post this elsewhere to people that might need to hear it?
Thank you so much! I read part of your emergency toolbox post and I found it very inspirational because it makes brings the hate to this habit and it makes me want to stop it even more. It's late here where I live, but hopefully I'll get around reading the rest of it, along with the other links you gave me. Yes, let's keep fighting this!
Good to know @w.k777 , I am happy to contribute with your reboot BTW, if you want to reply to somebody in particular write @ and his name ( as I did with yours) so the other member gets an alert About the sleeping: good sleeping higiene is one of the pillars for reboot. I used to fap because I have trouble sleeping when I am stressed. You should try exercising before going to bed, it can be before or after dinner. Also do not use any device when you go to bed ( no computers, IPad, cell phones, TV, etc). Read a book or a magazine, ( paper, no electronic). Have you tried meditation, yoga or Tai Chi? I am doing meditation and really helps a lot, specially when I get up in the middle of the night with some sad thoughts, ( probably due to some bad dream) chi used to fap to get back to sleep, now I meditate and I get relaxed and sleep again. Tai Chi is also great, I started practicing when I started my reboot and was very helpful Keep on fighting Fercho
