Porn Addiction, Erectile Dysfunction...Why Can't I Perform!!

[pianoman]

I had started to notice the problem over the past few years. I would rely more and more on hardcore porn than I had before. I didn’t think it was an issue, I thought my tastes were expanding, like I was becoming more open-minded.

I started using porn when I was young, discovering that part of my life quite suddenly. My journey was typical: as the evolution of the internet continued, I continued to watch the next best thing available. Pictures, clips, short videos, long videos, and ever onward. Looking back, I almost knew I had an obsession, but at the same time always just thought I was crazy for thinking that. Normal people do this all the time; it was just my religious conscious I was brought up on talking (I would later renounce that, but I still felt bad).

As I have been taking this journey towards self improvement a lot more seriously recently, as well as the randoms I would pick up over the years, I have gotten girls back to my apartment and gotten to end game. I suddenly found I couldn’t perform, I couldn’t get an erection. “Oh, it’s just the alcohol”, I would tell them and myself. It wasn’t until after a third time (twice with the same girl) that I finally decided, hey, maybe I’ll try to cut back on alcohol and porn and let my body reset a bit, to see if that helps.

I didn’t think of it as a big deal, and thought maybe a couple weeks dry would be good. I started a body fat loss challenge with some fellow forum members and coupled that with a 30 day no drink challenge, thinking alcohol to really be more of a culprit than anything and decided to give it a try (I have often wondered if I have an alcohol addiction). The no porn challenge started on 2/7 (as earliest as I can remember, it may have actually been the weekend before), and the no drink challenge started 2/10. It has been two weeks approximately for both. I feel better when I take time off drinking; I have done this before. I assumed that this was easily going to fix my issue.

I continued to not see improvement in my self-performance and thought, “Man…maybe this will take a bit longer than I thought”. However, all this time I have been plagued with a bad feeling and that something is really wrong. I just couldn’t figure it out.

Let me back up again to give you more of a background of my psychology. I have a history of depression and anxiety in my family, as well as noticing severe OCD tendencies in my father and now realize in myself. The typical Type A personality. All of these issues twist together in a psychological cocktail to sometimes make my life miserable.

Fast forward again to today, I have just been feeling like something is really wrong with me but I couldn’t find anything related to my performance issues that really clicked. I read general erectile dysfunction information, but none of it really seemed to matter. How could a twenty something healthy guy have an issue with ED? I tried to connect alcohol and performance, but still didn’t find anything that clicked. I continued to be a little morose about it all, and it caused ever more anxiety.

Finally, last night I came back from hanging out with a girl (same one I had 2 performance related issues with), and was kind of in a crappy mood. I was stone cold sober, hoping this was the key, and wanted to close the deal, but I was feeling surprisingly not up for the task. My game skills weren’t really tested, and I didn’t try to close. I just really didn’t feel into it from a sexual perspective (..what??). My mind was saying, “Go for it! You need to learn to push this frame!”, but it felt very incongruent. I came home feeling blah.

It somewhat clicked in my head that there could be another issue, with another challenge I was doing. It didn’t seem as plausible to me, but I thought I’d check it out. I whipped out the ol’ Google website and typed in “porn and erectile dysfunction”. A couple articles popped up that I looked at, they were junk (at the top of the list too, hmph).

Then, I looked a few links down: “www.yourbrainonporn.com” (henceforth YBOP). “Hmm, this one looks interesting”, I thought. Since my self-improvement journey started around 2006-7, I have been much more open minded to information that does not come directly out of mainstream. Mainstream information is not always correct or congruent with issues I have, and there are plenty of “underground” type issues that groups of people slowly gather around that say, “Hey, THAT’S my problem!”, and a great information site starts out of it.

And so, this seems like it’s the one for me. YBOP starts to describe all of the issues I have related to performance / ED. In particular, it described my lust for stronger and stronger forms of porn. It described things that really clicked about not being able to maintain erections without that stimulus, and having it affect interactions with real people (even if I find them appealing). I definitely have gotten to a very extreme version that I am not particularly proud of, but something had to do the job.

The problem with all of it was that, to me, I didn’t have “that big of an issue”. It has seemed as though it was something harmless this whole time, and that I could quit whenever. It wasn’t hurting anyone, I wasn’t losing productivity as far as I knew and my job was going great. I don’t believe that anymore. I believe that what has happened is the slow increase in use has been a long journey that has built up into a big issue I didn’t recognize. So I started my own little recovery journey without knowing about this issue about two weeks ago, and now I am extra motivated to follow through.

After 2 weeks, I feel like I am in a mood and libido downswing, without a lot of motivation and drive. While that feeling sucks, I see this as a great thing after reading success stories, because this is a typical recovery path. I am going to continue to ride this out and see what happens after I “reboot”, as they call it on the site. The typical journey is 6-12 weeks, so this will be a long haul.

I definitely am a little enlightened overall about myself and my psychology. I don’t think what I have is very common, and if it is maybe I have a worse version of it. That’s why most of you reading this probably don’t have any issue pounding out a few in a row, still going out and getting the job done later. I function pretty normally and can be a normal guy, but these small little roadbumps have always been difficult for me, sometimes without me knowing it. I see my OCD’s and addictions with a new clarity that is pretty refreshing (for instance, my sugar intake can be horrible at times). My new goal is to try to tailor them to things that are positive influences on my life (self-improvement, working out, etc.).

While my journey is still young, I may discover ever more, but for now I wanted to share my findings from last night for anyone with my type of issue. May it help guide you towards a happier life. Check out the website for more information.

(Note: I have no monetary interest in the link I posted, it is merely a self-help website for anyone struggling with the issue of porn addiction. If I can’t keep the link, please search for Your Brain on Porn on the internet).

[ninjamatt]

My only question is, is it possible you aren't getting hard b/c the girl isn't that attractive?

I've had women I thought were going to be hot and when they came out of their jeans, they were too rugged and I couldn't get hard. I also had one who was too pale once I thought I could get hard and could not. Also if this is your first time you could just be nervous. You may just need to try to upgrade women.

The only issue I really have with porn is, guys get an idea of what a hot woman looks like a foot from their face but that caliber of woman and especially banging 3 or 4 of them at once like they do in porn, most guys won't ever get.

[pianoman]

Haha nope, its exactly as described on that site. I have had sex hundreds of times, only with women that I find hot (...mostly). Last few were of that category. I'm just wired a bit different.

[pianoman]

Thought I'd just follow this up for anyone who was interested. I've now been 67 days without porn or attempted fantasy or looking at sexy photos of girls, etc. Basically only going out and seeing the girls in real life. Proud to report everything is back in working condition and I feel better about myself in many aspects now that I don't have porn as part of my life. I imagine it will only continue to get better. I was proud to have my first close last night post discovery of my problem.

If anyone has this challenge too, the only way to overcome is to just drop it altogether. Do your best not to relapse, there is hope in the future.

[grimm1111]

True shit right here. Happened to me too. I think it happens to a lot of guys and they just don't want to talk about it. Like you said, the only way to get back to normal is to drop porn altogether.

They once did an experiment where they hooked electrical wires up to the pleasure center of a monkey's brain. Every time the monkey would hit a button, an electrical current would go thru the wires and stimulate the monkey's pleasure center.

The monkey hit the button so many times, it fried it's own brain.

Porn is kind of the same way. It's kind of like cocaine. You want more and more and more, until normal sex is just boring, and that's why you can't get it up. The only way to get back to being excited about normal sex is to withdraw from your porn habit.

Good thread.

[Myshkinrush]

Cool thread!

I agree with the above. I recently quit porn and virtual sex and I've noticed a huge splurge of energy and confidence. I'm more active, productive AND started to gain an awesome libido.

I read this weird stat that when countries want to lower rape crimes, they start mass-advertising porn, and they've found that increased porn activity resulted in fewer rapes. interesting, huh?

I'm trying to get awesome at game and it's become my motivation to quit porn and masturbating. I started about 4 weeks ago and relapsed once, but I was so angry that I haven't relapsed for a few weeks now and I don't plan - matter of fact, I'm starting to abhor it.

[Flayinglion]

The only issue I really have with porn is, guys get an idea of what a hot woman looks like a foot from their face but that caliber of woman and especially banging 3 or 4 of them at once like they do in porn, most guys won't ever get.

While my journey is still young, I may discover ever more, but for now I wanted to share my findings from last night for anyone with my type of issue. May it help guide you towards a happier life. Check out the website for more information.
The monkey hit the button so many times, it fried it's own brain...???




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[pianoman]

glad to hear this has helped some others. keep up the good work and don't get too worked up about relapse, just keep pushing forward.

on the comment about girls face and unrealistic expectations, it didn't really come down to that for me but I can definitely see some guys holding too high a standard. just be realistic about who you are and the kind of girls you truly find attractive, don't fantasize about the porn girls.

So I will may start a thread on overall addiction sometime, as I have noticed I have some serious alcohol and other addiction problems and could improve the quality of my life if I could cut them out. let me know if anyone is interested and I could start it sooner than later.

[voyager]

So... did you ever talk to a doctor about this?

[ninjamatt]

Beeg, What I do to try to combat alcohol use is go to the gym as a substitute for alcohol. No matter if you are chubby and could use a treadmill or scrony and could use the weights, or a little of both and can cross train. Eventually you start getting runners high or weight lifters high and it builds your confidence. I also use nyquil many nights to go to sleep. I don't know what a membership costs to Golds Gym on Fairmont, but you could probably cut out some drinking and use the extra money to get a membership. After a 2 hour work out, I usually don't feel like drinking.

Another thing you could try rather or not you get a gym routine is pick a night of the week to go out and not drink. The same crowd will look like a totally different atmosphere but try to talk to a few people with out using alcohol. Do if after you've got home from the gym when you have your gym-high and got finished with a good work out. You don't have to stay out all night but try to stay in a place for an hour or so before you go home. I can get a little bit of a high or euphoria just talking to women without alcohol.

I've had struggles with it since I was in my mid 20's and I don't think there's anything wrong with picking a couple nights to go out and have a few drinks but eventually you have to put a stop to doing it several nights per week, especially if you are eatting a big supper on top of it. You certainly want to avoid drinking alone, or drinking at home when there's no purpose other than to feel euphoric. But you can get the euphoria by doing things good for you like the gym or running or walking down the street