My First Journal Entry

[PatriotsFan]

I feel like an artist that has so much inside themselves but stares at a blank canvas not sure where to start. Actually artist is not a very good analigy. I am in fact a sex addict, something of which I have been trying to reason with for a very long time. I have left a number of hurt people in my path of destruction...99% of whom I can never apologize too because one, I can't remember their names or two, I've simply lost touch with them. More often than not I would just disappear to leave them wondering what happened or it was anomynous sex to begin with. I've probably been a sex addict since I was twenty years old or so...certainly had a better chance of an easier recovery back then than now. I recently took some online tests that my therapist provided allowing a detailed sketch of my inner sanctum...my brain. I was kind of shocked when he told me that on a scale of one through twenty a normal person would average two to three; I scored a sixteen. Over the years my "drug" of choice has changed thanks to the internet. I used to laugh when I heard someone doesn't use computers...how I wish I was one of those. It started with magazines, strip club (with a fake i.d. I was in the clubs before I was even out of high school), videos, pornography of any kind, anonymous sex, and most recently escorts. Thankfully the money I've spent on escorts pales in comparison to some of my fellow brothers I've spoken with in the last six months or so. My behavior has caused infidelity in a nearly three year relationship. I currently struggle with fantasy and that has caused the desire for anonymous sex. I've rediscovered my relationship with god and that feels good. Something I've struggled with for as long as the addiction. There is much more to be said that fits between the lines here but I needed to start journaling and get it out there.

[Rockinastorm]

Hi PatriotsFan,

Welcome to our humble online support community. Your time spent reasoning with your struggles has not been for nothing. Admitting we have an addiction is a really tough thing to do, but you have done that here, and it sounds like other places as well. I think it took me 9 months for me to finally admit that I was an addict, and I remember well how tough it was to even say that aloud. You have taken the first step on a long road my friend. Now you must choose what you do about it! There are so many others like you here: We are young, old, single, married, engaged, divorced, widowed... we all are struggling with the effects of P, over-sexualized societies, infidelity, heartbreak, and shattered self esteem, to name a few... I am glad you have joined us here. TTF has been a blessing in my life and an amazing tool toward my recovery. I hope you find the same. By the way, whats a Patriots fan doing all the way in Arizona??

Rockinastorm

[SOHope]

Glad to see you here and open to sharing and getting support from this great community of people.

[PatriotsFan]

Well not even sure where to begin. Maybe this is the fourth (?) time I've been discovered? Went to couples counseling this evening with my partner/girlfriend. She mentioned having a letter she wanted to read because 1) she finds it good therapy for her and 2) it's a little easier for her to get her full message across. I asked her if she was going to sabotage me with the letter in our session. Not knowing what to expect we went in and she disclosed all the facts she found out most recently about my continued behavior, my lies, & secrets. I was so angry for about the first ten minutes I told the therapist I wanted to walk out. Of course this epitomizes my behavior for many, many years now. Not liking it... walk away, or run ... whatever suits me. It took some time to talk it out and eventually as I thought about what was being said and the questions I was being asked... I knew of course I have no right to be angry. The more we talked about my problem the more I was (once again) accepting the seriousness of my problem and I even began to feel a sense of relief. A point for starting over again. However, by the time the session was through fear was setting in. I said at times I feel like I am two different people... a dr. jeckle and mr. hyde if you will. I am feeling like a man with a large wall in front of me with and my survival depends on getting over this wall. Amazingly enough my partner believes in me; believes in us. She humbles me in so many ways it's difficult not to break down and cry. Normally a very calm & supportive person though I thought for sure she was going to be very angry when the therapist said we had to start the 90 day sobriety campaign all over again. Instead she said she would wait as long as it takes. Not once has she ever raised her voice at me...ever. Oh there have been plenty of tears no doubt and the shame I bring on myself is pure torture. So here I sit pondering the future and like so many others I know are out there I question whether it's possible to feel normal again. Everyone says "it gets easier". That doesn't help me. That thought is so far removed from where I sit right now I can't even begin to understand how it's going to "get easier". I know I will have to take things one day at a time but there simply is no comfort in what I know in the difficulty that lays ahead of me. I wouldn't wish this shit on my worst enemy.

[Disillusioned]

Hi PatriotsFan, and welcome to TTF. We are a mixed group of people as Rockinastorm noted, and some of us are from other countries. The one thing that we have in common is that we have all been harmed by p. This p stuff has no limits in its ability to infest. I hope you find a sense of peace and acceptance here, and possibly some sharing that augments what you are doing in counseling.
Have you read about the changes that happen in your brain with repeated p use? P takes our natural lust and intensifies it to the point where there is little else. P stimulates the same areas of your brain that many narcotic and stimulant drugs do. It is an ultimate high, and very available. If MB accompanies the p, it is recorded by your brain as the same as a real episode of s-x. The brain does not distinguish.
Rats in a lab with electrodes attached to the pleasure center of their brains, can press a lever and stimulate that center. In time, the rats quit eating and are not interested in a receptive female. They are happy with their lever and their high. Human beings can end up the same way, and not even be able to function with a living woman.
P is all lies, PFan. It does not tell you anything about how true, loving, intimate s-x between two people can be. It is staging, lighting, gymnastics, pain, injury, and it makes the women there look like ever-ready, ever needy dogs in heat, devoid of restraint, only wanting the fire put out. (NO insult to dogs. I love them and my life has been graced by being owned by several of them! Heat is a good description of what they endure.) Human beings, especially women, are not like this. They need that loving connection to feel true satisfaction. Apparently, you have run into some who are like the dog in heat. I hope you understand that they are also lost and trying to numb something that hurts, something from deep within.
I have heard it said that trying to understand where the pain is coming from is much like peeling back the layers of an onion. This is really the center of the addictive part of this. What starts out as a curiosity and a stimulant for lust, soon begins to take on its own life. The images stay with you and normal, loving s-x is no longer on your radar. People try to re-enact what they have seen, and most are disappointed with the results. The use and habit grow, and begin taking up more time to look and find something new and novel that will result in something similar to that initial kick. If you've had a bad day at work, come home and use p and MB, you will feel better. IF you are having money trouble, cure is the same, or at least the pain of this is numbed by the use of P and MB. You don't want to feel any discomfort in your own life, and P becomes a tool to avoid it. Works pretty well, until the day you realize, you are hooked. You try to stay away, but are unable.
In choosing to be p free, you are taking a higher path. You become willing to use other tools to help deal with the pain of everyday living. You are able to invest in another person to help understand you and soothe your pain, and you realize I am an adult now and can deal with the issues in childhood that started this need not to feel the pain by numbing yourself to it. That is essentially what is at the root of P addiction. The continued need to not feel your own pain. Usually there is a time in childhood where there was chaos or indifference to your pain as a child, and you begin to understand that as a child your method of coping and self-soothing was to wall off that pain, not feel those lonely emotions. I believe that is the wall you see when you look at this PA.
When you get to that wall, you will have to take a leap of faith. That faith will be to allow yourself to experience the feelings you have walled off for so long. P has been another tool that was used to numb you, but it is addictive and only added to your problems and pain. The difference between now and your childhood is that you have a whole arsenal of things to help you cope with the pain. You are an adult and can cope with things learned in your maturity and as an adult that were not available when you were a child.
This opens you up to a whole new world of understanding, seeing, empathizing...all good.
Our society teaches boys, that boys must not cry, must not emote. To do so is to be soft and feminine. Two lessons are taught here. Boys must not cry or feel, lest they are branded a sissy. What we do to so many boys is deny them the right to feel and to experience life with those feelings that all human beings, male and female are entitled to. It also lets boys learn to see that to be female and emotive is undesireable and soft. It divides us as human beings. Being p free and allowing you to feel your own emotions does not mean you are soft. It means you are human, and in your identification of being human, you are more able to see others as the same, and that includes women. Women are human beings just as deserving of respect as are men. They are not assorted body parts to lust about. They are each unique individuals, just as you are. They are not to be stared at, leered at, or fantasized about. To do so is akin to stealing something that is not yours.
YOu will need to identify triggers in your own fight. Those things that you see, hear or feel that in the past would make you want to act out. Things like the pain of criticism of your job performance, a friend not having the time to sit down and talk, coming home to an empty house as that is the time when you were once able to use P without the worry of discovery. Then, you are to come up with things that you must do when you are triggered. Physical things seem to help a lot of our fellows. Things like running, doing push ups, coming home to the empty house and grabbing the vacuum cleaner immediately to run through the whole house instead of doing p. Many men get some relief by logging on to TTF and reading the struggle of other men. My h says if you can delay a strong urge for 20 minutes, its hold on you lessens and it becomes easier to cope. There are also visual triggers that you will encounter everywhere in our society. S-xu-l images and thoughts travel across the brain circuitry at 2% faster than other impulses, which is why advertisers use images of scantily dressed women to sell everything from aardvarks to zebras. When you catch a glimpse of an advertisement, or see too much leg,or too much chest, you will have to train yourself to look away and think about something else. Try to say the alphabet backwards from z to a. Something to get the brain away from that urgent s-xu-l message.
It is a long recovery struggle, but so worth it in the end. You don't want to dull your life and not experience it, and you certainly don't want anything as shabby as P or SA soiling your experience and becoming captain of your ship and your life. It is for you to experience, it is your time and your life, and you don't want to waste another minute of it on the emptiness that is p and Sa. You want the dash between your year of birth and year of death to be meaningful, and a legacy for your children and grandchildren. You want to leave a positive mark and that cannot be done if you are living in the La La land that is p.
You want to take the higher road and be all that nature intended you to be, the Dr. Jeckyll in your life, the man your SO loves and knows. Good luck in your journey.
If something didn't make sense to you in my long meandering, please feel free to write back or post it in your journal. People here care about you and want you to be free of what our fellows call "the beast."

As an afterthought, which came to me when I was running my bath, it was Mr. Hyde who responded to your partner's questions for you when you both met with the counselor. The addict is defensive and doesn't want to look and believes it's no one else's business. How quickly you dispatched Mr. Hyde and put him in his proper place. I suspect he will try to visit more often now that you are trying to evict him. Congratulations for kicking him in his sorry behind, Mr. PatriotsFan. That's another step forward on your journey.

Might check out the threat called "Why doesn't he get it?" in general discussion. It is sure to provoke some thinking. By the way, PatriotsFan, you have taken the first steps on your way to recovery. Great going!!!

[no_excuses]

Not much left to say after Disillusioned writes an awesome post like that. I would add, why oh why did you have to pick that screen name? Well, us Giants fans are glad you're here anyway ;-) The only thing I want to say is that you may feel like a split person, all us PAs have felt like that, but we're not. You are the good man that you're uncovering. We may have grime stuck to our core, but do not mistake it for being the core. With daily focus and work, the grime will come off.

My perspective, seen in most of my posts, is that it is entirely about living consciously, honestly and fully in the moment. "The rest of our lives" is a false idea and a moot point. If we never doubt who we are, and we never disrespect it, not even for a moment, we will be who we're meant to be at all times, and we will never go wrong again.

[PatriotsFan]

Well first I appreciate feedback from those who have left comment and am always open to anyone who would like to leave their opinion or suggestions (even if you don’t like the patriots).
Today was not a bad day though I had a hard time thinking of anything but this whole mess. Got the dogs in the car to take them to the groomers and was a block away before I realized I forgot the paperwork for their rabies shots. Got back in the car and was a half block away when I realized I left one of the dogs muzzle at the house so for the second time I turned around. That left me in a state of frenzied anger. Sometimes it’s like I can’t focus on anything except what I’ve done and where I’m going. Came home and worked in the yard which for me is a little therapeutic. Felt much better once I came inside.
Am not thrilled about having to cancel my phone…it’s a data/smart phone and I’ve taken advantage of it too many times so it’s best I just get rid of it. I have a work phone I can use so shouldn’t be as big a deal as I feel it is right now. Just one of those things where I’m losing control and I need to get used to it.
Am heading out shortly for my Thursday night meeting. I attended for the first time a couple weeks ago and really enjoyed it. I attend three different meetings the weeks I am home. If there is one piece of advice I could pass along for those seeking a meeting: they are NOT all the same. Some of them I really didn’t like, some of them I do. You have to spend some time looking for what feels right for you. But do it, it’s relieving to talk about your problems with others like you (in the same room). It’s good here too. J
Today I feel blessed. Today marks only day seven of sobriety. I am hopeful.
Ciao…..Peace

[Disillusioned]

Day 7 is no little thing, PF. It represents your first steps to a new way of thinking. Sorry I bombarded your journal with so much information. It seems I learned a little here and a little there, and just wish I had had it put in a summary at the beginning so I knew what to expect. Believe me, there is a lot more to learn.
Still I want to congratulate you on a victory of 7 days. Sometimes folks seem to crawl up the walls the first or second days, but you have gone beyond and are still hanging in there. You are also going to meetings, so your recovery is well underway. In no way is that little.

[Disillusioned]

Hi Patriots Fan, Just wanted to ask you a question as far as the P industry. Do you know how they treat their actors and actresses. If not, might take a look under Gail Dines on the web, or Shelly Lueben. Their words are far more powerful than anything I can say.
I am sincerely wishing you well in your recovery. This is hard stuff as you are truly rebooting your brain.

[PatriotsFan]

Day 9 of my sobriety and I felt good today, kept busy. Very little thoughts. Even as I sit here in my hotel room all alone I am feeling no desire for the “dark side”. Have been praying every day and while that may not work for everyone, it has been comforting for me.
Wishing everyone a healthy & peaceful Super Bowl Sunday.