My Symptoms, YOUR prescription?

David, expect the long haul. I mirror your history ( apart from the toys) and it has been hard. However, I think that age is on our side. My guess that although the addiction neural pathways are firmly set we were not exposed to concentratedo daily porn from a young age. I advised going P free permanently and avoid any self pleasuring for 90 days as a start. Having said that, you can do it and will feel invigorated and proud of yourself even in the first few weeks. There is a need to address the old childhood issues as well or it may be a mental struggle requiring a lot of willpower. All the very best with this streak.

 

Yeah 90 days as an obtainable goal, and then when you reach it you can set another amount of days to have a snowball effect.

The problem is as you get older it's harder to rid neuro pathways that you have have formed from years of addiction, but it's not all bad though. Realistically I would say a full reboot would be over a year because of the amount of time and severity you've been PMO'ing, but your withdrawal symptoms won't be severe for that long though. A lot of people believe just because you're older "you can't teach an old dog new tricks", but that's highly untrue and damaging, anyone can quit addiction it just might take longer or require say more commitment.

Like for me I think it might take me a year or more for a complete reboot, due to mainly the severity and early age I started P. And that's okay, because no matter how long it takes as long as I rid P I'll be free.

Just never give up hope, stay strong and truly believe in yourself because no matter your age or who you are, people are capable of doing positive and great things with their lives!

 

I’m 44 and only 10 days away from 90 day milestone and I have PIED. It’s definitely better than Day 0 for sure but it’s not completely healed either.

I noticed that fantasies are less and less now in my head so that’s surprising part. In the past, I could easily pull up any favorite porn or sex experience and get off from that and now I am starting to realize that the “fantasies” are fading. Maybe that’s the rewiring process in my brain and starting to see more natural arousal when I see women replacing the fantasies now. It’s definitely going to be a long healing journey for sure. That’s why people say you are better able to relate to women when your brain is rewired. That’s so true!

All done by Day 90 - No - but you will definitely see good definite signs of healing before Day 90.

Granted that it’s my first journey so far away from my PMO days, I can’t definitely know the answer to when I’m all healed. I would say anywhere from 6 months to 1 year. I’m trying to aim for that and see where it goes from there.

My suggestion is for you to reach 90 days then reassess your healing and by then you should know how much more to go beyond 90 days.

Good Luck!

 

I’m in my early 40s, but I believe those of us older guys that started PMO regularly around the time internet porn became a mainstay have a very similar set of symptoms because porn wasn’t as prevalent in our sexual development.

Having PIED myself after 20+ years of heavy porn use and edging, I did a no-PM mode that lasted for over 140 days. When I achieved 90 days, I could see great improvements but I wasn’t where I wanted to be yet. I can say now, even after a brief period of relapse, that I’m better than I’ve been in several years. PIED is gone, and things continue to get even better.

I will say this, though. Relapse doesn’t take you back to true zero/rock bottom, but you can definitely tell the difference between your best days and your relapse days. You can never turn back to this stuff just because you think you’re “cured”. It’s easy to go back down the rabbit hole and undo progress, so treat rebooting like a complete lifestyle change or else you’ll find yourself in an endless cycle of relapse and recovery.

 

I feel that you should focus more on bettering yourself than on how long the reboot will take.

The less you think about it and just build your life the quicker it will go

 

I agree! At the beginning of my NoFap journey, I thought that PIED would be cured by day 90 and now I know that’s not the case. It’s indeed a complete new lifestyle change.

 

I don't mean to scare you but I'd say well over 3 years honestly...

 

I wouldn't say over three years though, there's a lot of factors that go into withdrawal symptoms and recovery. It really all depends, it's definitely going to be at least over a year though.

 

I would honestly say within 1 to maybe even high as 3 years to recover.

I've seen a guy that is up to five years and still suffering, but he was only addicted for 11 years since he was 15 and it was softcore, yet I've seen people recover in a couple of years and they were hardcore and did it for 20 and started before they were 10 or 12.

So I think again it depends on how you're recovering as well as a lot of other factors like mindset or underlying conditions that prolonge it but I really don't think you'll be like four or five years though.

 

An old dick isn’t a young dick. I say 3-4 months hard mode should really help. Age matters, general health matters, even type of masturbation. One thing I would suggest is skin therapy cream or oil for your penis to heal any dry spots or rough patches of skin. If you have trouble getting hard try 5 grams of L Arginine a day on an empty stomach. It will increase blood flow into your genitals and is perfectly safe. After 6 weeks you will notice a big difference.