I grew up reform. And have been a “user” for 30+ years. About 5 years ago after a trip to Israel my family started to become observant. We have taken great steps including moving into a community, changed jobs and giving lots of things up to be Torah observant. Giving up eating trafe, being shomer Shabbos, proudly wearing a kipa all the time have not been easy but all were taken on a keep from that time on. But this, after a year and a half I still have not made it to 90 days. As I stood before Hashem on Yom Kippur asking for forgiveness I thought to myself can I really say this will not happen again. The answer is no I can’t say it. I have had 445 days without falling vs what used to be a pretty much every day thing for the last 30 years but other than feeling time I am keeping a commandment (which is not a little thing) I don’t feel any better for it. Some people have said they feel free, closer to their wife, like they were saved from destroying their life. I wish I could feel that way, I am sure it would make it easier but I don’t. I keep finding myself thinking that since I am more observant that 90% of the Jews in the USA is this one thing that bad. Any help to figure what I am missing would be great.

Welcome!

Its easy to think that this one single this fine! Why not? I do everything else right. But lets look at another angle? Do you like it? Or is it ruining your life? Meaning if you stopped lusting, would that make you feel better?

Check out the GYE Handbook and Skep's tips

I can relate, I've used the same arguments to myself in the past. I also don't have my emotions helping me too much in this area. When we're inside of this stuff then it makes us very subjective and we can't see why to stop. As long as you know that you have to stop and you're trying to, then you're on the right path.

Maybe you're strategy in stopping has some parts that can be fixed up?

Keep posting, it helps to an amazing degree.

Just because you indulged in a bit of it every day, doesn't mean that you are an addict. It just means that you enjoyed it.

For many of us on here, we used it as an escape from our lives. The fantasies in our minds were better than anything we had to really deal with. So we indulged all the time : When we were supposed to work, when we were supposed to sleep, when we were supposed to eat, when we were supposed to spend time with our family and friends, and so on and so forth. It took over our lives.

So when you stopped, not much has changed, because it was just a guilty pleasure that didn't mean much to you. When we stopped, we gained a whole new life.

Wait, I just reread your post and I'm a bit confused.

You write that you have never made it to 90 days, but then you write that you had 445 days without falling.

Am I missing something?

I have never made it 90 days in a row. But have had 445 total clean days since trying to stop a year and half ago.

I apologize for my first post then. I misunderstood the situation.

People usually see the change in quality of life after having been clean for a while. Of course, working on the quality of our lives during that time helps, too.

Remember quality is more important than quantity. We shouldn't be worried so much about how many clean days we have, rather that are days are lived well. Also having clean days won't necessarily solve our problems. Perhaps during those days, you were a dry drunk: just trying to get by, holding your breath, in between falls.