The day you wake up, and don't miss it, and don't think about it. When it gets easy not to...that is when you have successfully quit it.
From my experience, the only way to know that you have quit is that it doesn't bother your anymore (and you have a healthy family life with your wife), or if you are still single and have urges, then you have control over your urges (not easy, but the urges do not take control over you. and you can decide what you want to do).
Yea, like, I'm so long free from P and M, and I'm single, and I have urges (there are like periods when it is stronger and periods when it is lower), and I sometimes even have this thought to M, but I have the strength to choose not to. For P I don't have any urges whatsoever to watch. Maybe the Ming urge will go away too when I get to the same number of days as P free, I don't know.
The methods start before urges. If you don't want to have urges on a regular basis, you must maximally minimize the triggers. You cannot daily see triggering material (you must analyze, what triggers your mind to think dirt), and expect yourself to be able to resist, it's impossible. For me, even a single word can trigger me, if it reminds me of that topic. That's why it's not a good practice to write words that remind you of it, better use substitutes like P, M, relations, etc. If you already have urges, it's a different story. The best possible scenario is that you have something to do, that keeps your mind preoccupied (for me, composing music or programming works extremely well, because my mind is submerged into the process and I even forget about everything around me). Work sometimes works for me, but sometimes it get monotone and my mind starts to wander. One emergency method (when it hits you and you can't stop your mind) that I have found is this: I learn some big chunk of text (not one or two sentences, but like a paragraph or even more) from heart, so that I can recite it from memory. When thoughts start to come, I just start reading the text from my mind and it overrides the thoughts, and eventually, you get relief. It must be a hard enough text, that you must not recite too easily, but involve your thought power to remember. This one has saved me a big-time in very hard moments. One was recently some weeks ago, but the problem started with the first point, that I wasn't careful enough, to prevent myself from going on just a regular site, where you can get free photos or stock videos, for your video projects. When I realized this, I completely stopped myself from going there and found an alternative. I'm losing some good material to use, but at least I don't get triggered anymore, what can you do, must sacrifice for higher good If you wish to hear more advice, feel free to ask. But if you really (like REALLY ) implement into your life these simple things that I have mentioned (especially the first one), you will see very big progress. And the first major recovery progress comes on average 3 - 5 months after you stop M, and even bigger changes in ~ 1 year. You must also work on your character, then you will become superhuman. But as for everything - you must use it for good, not for bad. Also, forgot to mention, when urges hit, I don't feel like when I was completely addicted, that it felt like my body controls me, but it's more of a war of thoughts.
My husband said the exact same thing. He tries to recite the Gettysburg address in his mind or different Bible verses. He said it helps immensely.
Nice question. I've done more than a year without porn, from 2018 to summer 2019, and then slowly start getting back porn, untill...i'm here again because im into that again up to my neck... So, idk, a har user will never be safe for the rest of his life, i guess.
