Back to try again

[gnein]

Some of you may recall me from a few months back when I tried to quit. Well, at the time I felt I was making progress, then at the start of November I got sick with Giardia for a few days and fell back into P, hard. Then I went to New Zealand for three weeks and managed to cut back (largely because I was busy doing so many other things). Unfortunately I fell again on my return, and have been on something of a P binge for the last few weeks.

I know I can't go on like this, but the truth is I was so embarrassed about my "failure" at the start of November that I've been afraid to show my face in these parts. I was worried that everyone would judge me as not being serious in my attempts to quit. Unfortunately, an addiction of 15 years is hard to get rid of.

So I'm going to try again. Tomorrow I'm planning to get out of my apartment all day, and not return until I'm too exhausted to look at P. That's not a long term solution, but it might break the cycle of having to look at P everyday, and right now, I'd consider that a success.

[Dominus]

Good on you for coming back and being so honest. I know something of how you feel. Don't forget that this is a support forum, its a rare person who actually succeeds in quitting entirely on the first attempt. I used to put a lot of store by counting days, but thats really discouraging if you fall. If you have looked at porn less since joining TTF then that is progress, albeit maybe no as much as you may have hoped for. Every day that is porn free is another notch in the tree. You will never entirely rid yourself of some level of temptation to view porn, but every day you resist the temptation you strengthen your self resolve and make the likelihood of failure a little less.

At the end of the day though prevention is better than cure. You are going to have days where the desire to view the porn will be so strong that you will probably fall. If there is no porn to view then you can't fall, so blocking software or anything that physically prevents you from being able to fall is a big help.

Ive slipped up myself this year more than once, so I won't be judging you, and I doubt that anyone else will either. Its good to have you back. Just keep on fighting the fine fight.

[Rowlf]

Hi Gnein,

Good to have you back. I think a fairly normal pattern is 3 steps forward, 2 back. I'm full of admiration for the people here that seemed to be able to stop cold, but I'm not one on of them and I'm happy to be in the company of others who make progess, relapse and then get up and try again.

I think the only failure is to give up the process of change completely. Howevever slow the progress is, doesn't really matter I think. Just keep going each day. And I'm going to keep trying each day as well.

Good luck and welcome back!

[Vincent]

Great job, I can see that you are making good expectations and I have no doubts that you will succeed.