Yup it is possible. I was exposed to it say 12. Semi addict until 17. From 18-29, became full blown addict due to rise of high speed internet and getting a laptop. Quit at 30. Now am 32. Wasn't a smooth sail.
Thanks for sharing. I started around the same age..maybe 11 or so really. Semi addict until 18 and full blown since then with it just getting worse and worse over time. I'm almost 40 now.
I was addicted for 15 years. Until I finally managed to go past 1 year of semen retention. This happened because learned from other who did it and created my own system around it. Then I relapsed. That's bcz I had holes in my game. Holes I could avoid during the relapse but couldn't for long. Now starting back again. As for advice, I highly suggest reading the book I have attached. It was a game-changer for me. That's what helped me to go from not being able to go past 1 week to go up to 1 year.
looks like originally it was someone in the Chinese NF community, then graciously translated (400+ pages!!) into English. What a supreme example of the spreading of goodness!!
We should consider a WhatsApp group of men with a long time addiction problem. I've been indulging in this cycle for 18+ years. The group can be there for each other (support, advice and encouragement). How does that sound?
I have quit for over a month and what has helped me is an image blocker. Might sound extreme, but my addiction is really bad, decided to take drastic measures. Semi addict from 14-18 years of age. Full blown addiction from 19-24.
Um, around 30 years now. Tried to quit a few times, longest streak was about 21 days. Thing for me is if I have sex i then fap the next day thinking about that sex - usually a couple of times. Then I just want to fap more. I'm not sure total abstinence is an option.
Addicted around 30y. Now I know that quitting was the easiest part. Surviving flatline is a real challenge.
I first got addicted between the ages of 12 and 14, and I'm 35 now, so I was addicted for a little over 20 years. I've been recovering for 3.5 years now, and it's only in the last few months that I've been feeling like I'm almost free from this addiction. The past three years have been a hellish rollercoaster, and I'm so glad to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I've only relapsed a few times in the last year, and I barely think about porn anymore. Every week that goes by, it seems like I leave more and more of my old self behind. Healing from something like this seems like it's going nowhere at first, but the gains you make are exponential. A lot of people get impatient during the first few months of NoFap, but once you start hitting milestones like six months or a year, you'll notice that your progress will gradually be speeding up. It's very similar to physical exercise in the sense that it feels like it's a perpetual uphill trudge when you first start, but it gets easier and easier as the weeks and months go by. Don't lose hope; it can take a long time to rid yourself of this addiction if you were addicted for many years. And if you got addicted during adolescence when your brain was in a very malleable, impressionable phase, it can take even longer to reverse the damage the addiction did because your brain hardwires everything during crucial stages of development like adolescence. I have a feeling that this is why it took so long to rewire my brain. No matter how bad the withdrawal symptoms get, you just have to persevere through them because what other choice is there? Yes, it's going to be a very difficult journey in some ways, but just think about how much of a relief it will be to finally get this monkey off your back once and for all. You also have to ask yourself this: what alternative is there? There are only two directions you can go from here: you can continue being an addict, or you can decide to work towards no longer being an addict. Only the latter will improve your existence; the former will do nothing but keep you shackled to this situation that you're in right now. By quitting PMO for good, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. That was the crossroads that I found myself at when I knew that I had to quit PMO for good, and I knew there was no way that I could continue down that same road that I had been on for two decades. I know you can do this because I'm living proof that it's possible; I was a severe addict for a long time. Sometimes, it will be easy; other times, it will be immensely difficult. Recovery from an addiction isn't a straightforward, linear process; it fluctuates up and down. As you progress, however, the lows you experience will gradually get milder, and the highs you experience will get better. Then it will dawn on you one day that you haven't even thought about PMO for a few days. And then a month or two after that, you'll notice that you can go a whole week without thinking about it. Once you reach that stage, it just keeps getting easier and easier. I wish you the best of luck in your recovery! And if you ever need to message me for any kind of advice or support, I don't mind at all.
The answer is "yes", but with a few words of caution: How would we know we were addicted, rather than just using? Many men use porn and many stop as they grow older. They just stop. As addicts we find it almost impossible to stop, but we only realise when we sincerely try to stop. I was using porn from teens through to 45, when I recognised that I had to stop. That's about 30 years. But was I addicted all that time? Who knows. How do we know we have quit? I am on a very long sobriety streak: I have not used porn since the end of September 2016; I am on Day 2310. But will I relapse tomorrow? If I do how quickly might I fall back into heavy porn use? I am probably being too hard on myself, I have quit, but I find it useful to remind myself that I am an addict — it keeps me vigilant and reminds me to maintain & renew the techniques that help me stay porn free. Good luck. You say that you have "tried so many times". Make sure that each time you fail you learn something and put a new technique in place to fix it. We are all experimenting here, sharing what works (and doesn't) until we each find the set of tools and techniques that finally give us the strength to stay porn free.
