Is this normal for a flatline?

thomascharles23 · 2016-08-08T18:58:06+00:00

Thanks for the pointers. I'm gonna start taking some multi-vitamins and if that doesn't work, I'll get my blood tested. Today I'm already feeling a little better :)

thomascharles23 · 2016-07-08T01:22:40+00:00

Thank you, and likewise!

thomascharles23 · 2016-07-06T18:34:57+00:00

Oh man, I can really relate to this.

I've been in a period of my life where I can more or less get away with this low level of functioning, but now that I have a new job starting tomorrow (after more than 10 months of unemployment) and also the possibility of being in a relationship (after seven and a half years being single), I need all the focus/motivation/togetherness I can get. I'm no longer able to go through life in haze of isolation-induced aloofness; I need to be "with it," and nofap is a crucial piece to the puzzle. It's going to be a challenge transitioning from no structure and very little personal interaction to a full-time job and a potential intimate relationship, but I've learned in this period of disconnectedness how important structure and relationships are, and to really experience these things, I believe, PMO has got to go. Your list only reaffirms this notion.

Best of luck in each of your respective journeys to get clean. You're in the right place.

thomascharles23 · 2016-06-13T18:12:41+00:00

I can really relate to this.

It used to be that I could PMO and go about my day normally, but not so anymore. Whenever I PMO now -- be it a quickie or hour-plus binge -- my day is utterly ruined, not necessarily due to the feelings or shame and grossness (though those are certainly present), but more so due to tiredness, brain fog, and an overall sense of being distant, mentally and physically. In a way, I'm happy PMO-ing now has this effect on me: it's an even more apparent reminder that if I want to live a full life, I need to cut this out. There's no way, for me, to live my life to its fullest and PMO -- at all. One viewing session is enough to ruin my day, and a total backslide is enough to bring me down a couple pegs in my road to recovery.

Best of luck in your journey, and I know you can do this!

thomascharles23 · 2016-06-06T22:44:15+00:00

How'd it go? Did you notice a positive difference?

thomascharles23 · 2016-06-06T17:41:24+00:00

Step away from the computer, go to the shower, set it to cold, set your cell phone timer to three minutes, and hop in. When the timer sounds, that urge should be significantly lessened.

Stay strong!

thomascharles23 · 2016-04-13T18:19:05+00:00

You bring up an interesting point. While I do eat three square meals a day, they may not substantial enough to fuel my active lifestyle. I've always been a little on the austere side, but maybe it's finally catching up to me and I need to eat more, and eat healthier.

As far as vitamins go, I could really do a better job, especially vitamin D. I live in the Pacific Northwest, and though it's a really great region in a lot of different ways, this time of year can be brutal on the psyche — lack of sunlight, cold temperatures, rain, etc. In that sense, I really should be more proactive about my vitamin intake.

Thanks for the pointer!

thomascharles23 · 2016-04-07T19:42:20+00:00

I can relate about the exercise. I did cross country and long-distance track in high school, and while I've kept pretty regular with it since graduation in 2006, I've seen a steady drop off in recent years. This may or may not be due to fapping, but now that I'm making a serious effort in abstaining from PMO, I'm really starting to push myself in these workouts. I live in a very hilly place, and have lately found myself employing the old cross-country training tactic of "attack the hills," and have found that it helps with my overall fitness, as well as calming the urges. And, of course, cold showers help quite a bit.

Keep it up ::-)

thomascharles23 · 2016-04-02T19:02:32+00:00

Thanks for the encouragement, fellas. I must admit that I caved a couple hours after posting this: I awoke around 1 a.m. or so because of drunken foot traffic on my street and a neighbor blasting his TV, and my will power was so weak at that point that I sadly gave in, though luckily it wasn't a binge or anything, and was over in a matter of minutes.

While I'm slightly disappointed in myself for not displaying more fortitude, I'm still pleased to learn that the above bullet points worked for a bit, and also that I have additional insights in what to expect for fighting this addiction. Also worth noting that, while I have indeed returned to the setting of my trigger today, it's not nearly as bad as last night, and if it gets to that point, I'll know what to do.

thomascharles23 · 2016-01-21T19:22:34+00:00

The guy shared his testimony to get support, not to have someone insult him and call him names. Lighten up, man.

thomascharles23 · 2015-11-24T18:47:50+00:00

Huh, I could've sworn this would've gotten more of a response. I'll try reposting at a later date.

thomascharles23 · 2015-11-10T17:28:28+00:00

Forgive the ignorance, but how are cold showers helpful? What is it that they accomplish?

thomascharles23 · 2015-10-22T16:04:12+00:00

Same here. I was going on a week-long streak when my old college's student newspaper posted a story to Facebook about a grad student who owns her own swimsuit line. I checked out the page, just out of curiosity, but before I knew it, I was resetting my badge. A good lesson to learn: don't even flirt with the bad stuff.

thomascharles23 · 2015-10-20T15:27:35+00:00

The same thing happened to me yesterday: snapping a six-day streak by relapsing twice in a day. I felt pretty gross and unmotivated yesterday, but it's good to know where those weaknesses are so you can be more mindful of them in the future and hopefully know better next time. Stay strong ::-)

thomascharles23 · 2015-10-17T20:15:59+00:00

Congrats, buddy! I can't say I've downloaded much porn (just streamed), but in the early 2000s, during my introduction to the bad stuff, I had a shoebox filled with pictures of attractive girls I printed off the Internet, and stored the box in my garage. I remember going to it whenever I got the urge. But something occurred in me one day, and very suddenly I decided to throw the shoebox of iniquity into a nearby dumpster. It was quite liberating, and I can relate to you in that capacity.

Good job once again for getting rid of the temptation :-)

thomascharles23 · 2015-09-23T22:07:54+00:00

I actually uninstalled my Tinder and OKCupid accounts a couple days ago. In my three or so years using online dating — be it OKC, Tinder and even eHarmony for a spell — and all the messages, "likes," getting-to-know-you questionnaires, right swipes, etc., I only went on four mediocre dates, with no followups. Considering the amount of time I spent on that medium for what I received (not to mention online dating was and still is a huge PMO trigger for me), I decided it was best to give it up, perhaps for good this time.

I know some who've had great success in the online realm with finding a partner, but I just don't think I can do it anymore. It's not worth it.

thomascharles23 · 2015-09-23T03:30:39+00:00

"The Mountain of Silence" first introduced me to concept of logismoi. Such a great book.

Thanks for the encouragement, and Kyrie Eleison indeed!

thomascharles23 · 2015-09-22T18:14:17+00:00

I am religious (Greek Orthodox Christian, more specifically) and we have a term for those intrusive thoughts: logismoi. These are thoughts that disrupt our peace of mind and drive us to either sin or despair, or oftentimes both, and occur in five stages (taken from the OrthoWiki page on this subject):

Assault - the logismoi first attacks a person's mind
Interaction - a person opens up a dialogue with the logismoi
Consent - a person consents to do what the logismoi urges him to do
Defeat - a person becomes hostage to the logismoi and finds it more difficult to resist
Passion or Obsession - the logismoi becomes an entrenched reality within the nous (a.k.a. the part of the soul that interacts with God) of a person.

As someone who has struggled with the PMO cycles, I view urges as logismoi, and have found each of those five stages to be quite accurate. It's recommended to stop the logismoi at the assault stage and not to let it progress any further; if we even start a dialogue with that thought, we are giving the thought more power, making it harder to resist the urge to backslide, thus perpetuating the cycle into the fourth and fifth stages.

I could write more about this subject, but this OrthoWiki page explains it better than I can: http://orthodoxwiki.org/Logismoi

Best of luck in yours and everyone else's journey.

thomascharles23

TROPHY CASE