Common questions about porn addiction. Posted Wednesday, May 28 2008 by ThroughTheFlame.org with contributions by Dominus, Light, and FoolishMind 1) I'm not sure if I'm ready to give up porn, is this really an addiction ?
Many people who suffer from porn addiction may not even realize, and some don't want to acknowledge the problem or admit that it is adversely affecting their lives and relationships. Here are some commone questions asked by people who aren't quite sure if they are ready to quit.
2) You don't understand, my sex drive is much higher than the average person.
Most people who are addicted to pornography claim they are more sexual than the average person thereby rationalizing their need to rely upon porn. In most
cases their sexual batteries are charged up because of their behavior, focusing on the sex act for many hours a day, and not their genetics.
While people may naturally have varying degrees of sexual engery, pornography addiction can greatly increase this kind of behaviour.
As long as you are using porn and feeding the monster (or habit) it will continue to feel like it has control over you.
It is possible for you (and all of us) to get to a place of more "normal" sexuality. If we removed porn from our lives entirely for a couple of years, your sexual energy would become more natural and balanced..
There is a saying that goes something like "what you think about expands" which is related to another quote "you can judge a tree by it's fruits."
This applies directly to porn addiction. If you feed your addiction every day, take care of it, nurture it, and spend time (sometimes hours a day), you can bet it's going to take up a good root in your head, and after a while, you're going to think it was always there, a part of you. In reality, it isn't you at all, you've just been feeding and taking care of it till it can overcome you whenever it wants.
3) I've tried quitting porn and masturbation before, but a funny thing happened - I got irritable and snappy toward my partner and surroundings. I then relapsed back into viewing porn and masturbation, because I didn't think becoming a nervous wreck was worth it.
Irritablity is probably one of the more common side effects of the withdrawl process, and most recovering porn addict's will agree that it is a normal reaction to expect. Have you ever been around someone who is trying to quit coffee or cigarettes? Or worse, drugs or alcohol? It's not pretty. You are denying yourself something that you are conditioned to having and your body is reacting to it not being there. Porn addiction and masturbation work on the chemical level in the brain and when these chemicals are no longer present, your body reacts.
In combatting this problem, many PA's have suggested working out new ways to relieve stress that are healthy and beneficial. The biggest one that's helped many is simple exercise. Start going for a walk every day, or go to a gym, etc. There are lots of thing you could do to get through that tough detox period.
After you have made it a month, many of these side effects will begin to wear off and lessen, and you will start to see that what you thought you needed and what you really need are not the same thing.
4) I don't look at hardcore porn, surely softcore porn now and then couldn't be harmful to me?
The internet and porn addiction can take you places you never thought you would go when you started looking in the first place. If you have ever read histories of long time porn addicts, many started with soft core forms of porn and gradually migrated to more and more odd and violent forms of porn. This addiction can go from a "habit," or something you wouldn't classify as a "problem" and quickly escalate into something that controls you instead of the other way around.
Porn becomes a problem when it affects your choices, when you go to it for emotional comfort, when you spend increasing amounts of your free time seeking it out, when it begins to change your thought patterns, habits, and actions. Also, when it desensitizes you from things that you would have found repulsive before porn entered your life, and when it so colors your outlook on things that when you see members of the opposite sex, you can only think of them in terms of sexual objects.
