Hey, wrote:

committed to change! wrote on 18 Mar 2016 13:43:

So....did the dude (simonconfused) do either 1- counseling or 2- show up at a real meeting like any other addict and work the program -- or has he (still) done not much more than most of us end up doing: think it over, fantasize a bunch, post a little, and worry about it all some more?

And what did you mean to post there, commited-to-change? Not clear to me, chaver. Can you just clarify a bit?

Thanks and thanks

- Dov

i wanted to offer personal perspective.  please have patience for me.  this is the first time i've posted, or even discussed this.

i BH BH BH am 3 days away from 90 chart completion.  I have had a very hard time for many years of keeping clean and not acting out (in almost every way that is wrong).  i don't mean only masturbation.

after many attempts to go clean, and failing, listeing to Dov, Dovid Chayim, and many other resources online here, something finally sparked in me to make and affect a change.  most of it had to do with understanding and believing what is right as a whole, not what is right just for me.  the momentary (or even hour or 90 minute session with a prostitute) or anything like that was what was right for me when I looked at my selfish life.  when I looked at my life, and the others who were counting on me,(wife, kids, parents, friends) nothing was able to set me straight or inspire me enough to keep my head on straight.

UNTIL i believed more and more that Hashem needs me to be ....me.

hard to articulate, but G-d put us on this earth to enjoy the fruits of this world, in the right way.  In our cases, where our issues are sexuality and sexual desires, we need to find a way to direct it so that it is productive, and stays pure. 

it is weird how it has worked out for me, but my relationship with my wife, especially in the bedroom, has gotten much better with this new approach.  I am hoping that some of the other broachos (success, strength, etc) come along too.  

I think about acting out all the time.  I strongly STILL have the urges and lust, but I am focused on doing what I was set out to do....to succeed.

thanks to Dov, Dovid Chayim, Rav Lopian, Rav Brody and many others, the lectures and shiurim I've listened to, the letters I've read, etc have given me hope, but more importantly, a plan.

I hope i have the strength to continue, and i hope we all continue to progress.  Through all of our efforts we CAN and WILL succeed!

chazak to everyone

Hello Guys, and thanks for all the wonderful comments. I have been really busy with finals here in LA in this disgusting city so I have not had time to respond to any posts.

1) I have not gone for counseling nor done any treatment. I really need to focus on school now which honestly takes up my time. For now, money is hard to get so I am being cheap in general. Can't afford any of these zonos.

2) To the wonderful people who PMed me, I will get back to you. Don't worry.

3) Great post by lovingpapa. Its really refreshing to see so many people strugling and being able to relate. I guess marriage does not solve these things after all.

Please keep posting...we need to keep this thread alive.

Kol Tuv!

Simon

The way threads go, it's the original poster that keeps it alive. Even group threads.

As long as you don't RIP this thread will stay afloat, so you gotta choose life or death, and i think you're not confused about these which choice to make

i do agree that marriage does not solve everything.  from my (limitted) learning, it was apparent that many times marriage was suggested as a motivation to people who we were struggling, but times were different, and today, we need more.  we need to build ourselves up so we can move on.

However, having a special someone to come home to, and having that someone who you can relate to, love and look forward to being with helps a lot..PM me if you want.  happy to help if i can..

Yeah, heartily agree.

A long time ago, I ran to marriage to save myself from the loneliness inside. I was sure that sex with a real woman would help me - my masturbation and porn obsession was terribly upsetting. I saw it as my only real serious issue.

Heh.

The truth was that the reason I was running after fantasy sex with myself and fantasy women was precisely because I had a few screws loose. Loneliness does not stand by itself - it comes from not being able to really connect...with anybody. Having that wife won't 'finally' make a person 'connectable'. And so, as many thousands have experienced, marriage just ramped up my acting out from imaginary, to real. I see now that when a year or so went by and I realized that my final solution was not gonna work, I was terrified.

And since starting being sober 19 years ago in SA along with hundreds of (more and more) other people, many of them frum yidden, I have learned to become connectable - and our marriage works now, one day at a time. It doesn't work to save me from lust - nor to save me from myself - it just works as a marriage is meant to work. It's real. I have a life with real things to do right now. Real things to deal with and be useful about. And she and our marriage are a big part of it, then come our kids, and klal yisroel after that, etc. Yeshiva-days as a 'ben chorin' freed of any real responsibilities (besides figuring out a R Chaim), are over. This is real life, and it's for keeps.

Not that yeshiva isn't great - but there is a time for everything. 

As long as I'd keep saying, "Well, I'd rather be learning Torah," I am fixing the game to have an excuse to fantasize and masturbate, etc...because it is affirming that I'd rather not be doing this life I have right now.

And I cannot afford to run from my real life for a minute.

This is what i mean when I say getting engaged (to a girl) is not a solution - but getting engaged (with real living) always is. 

Hi Dov,
Long time no speak. If I may add to your words. I have found that although living in the real world was a difficult therapy at first to help relieve me of the shackles of lust, living in the real world is now my reward because living real is so rewarding and invigorating. I never realized how geshmack living in HKB"H's world is.
So the medicine was bitter for only a few weeks and now it is sweet and enjoyable. I never want to trade it back for the life of misery and isolation of lust.
You were a big part of motivating me to finally take the frightening step of actually meeting with fellow addicts that I knew from my real life in person to do the work i need to in order to stay healthy.
Thank you!

Thanks, man. It was all your choice, and you took it.

Living in reality is so simple and so far from being understood by anyone out of it and into fantasy. It's like RaShb"i would never have had those miracles in the cave if he had packed a cooler of sandwiches for himself 'just in case', right? Living in reality is not an act, but a state of being that slowly develops and we are never really fully there - but close. Close is good enough, tho! And it seems that it only gets better.

Thanks for reminding us!

I will make sure to PM those who have offered to help me. Thank you. As for all of you, I respect that you are putting in the effort and all, but are there any unmarried guys in yeshiva, college that are 21-23 years of age that are going through this as well in the forum that can talk up. I always like talking to those in my shoes...thanks and have a really nice and uplifting purim!

Hey Simon - I'm currently 28, single, in college, formerly in yeshivas.  Also, I was 21-23 about the time I first tried posting on GYE, but didn't take the steps I needed to recover at the time.  I hope that now I am getting to where I want to be.  But how I wish I had taken some different steps when I was "in your shoes".  I think you'll find there are plenty of guys here that can really talk to you on your level, even if they happen to be older or married.  Find the ones who seem to "talk your language" and reach out to them for help.  That's my 2 cents.  If you think it would be helpful to you I'm glad to talk with you - here on the forum, on the phone, PM, e-mail...  whatever.

Behatzlacha

P.S. Sorry about hijacking a bit with my next post

pischoshelmachat wrote on 21 Mar 2016 13:35:

A cooler full of sandwiches just in case  . I'm still laughing, but I'll try to type anyways.

How do you find fellow addicts that you know from real life? We're pretty much all in hiding (even those of us that are not..) I'm not afraid to share my struggle generally with others - some details I keep under the rug, but generally I can be open, with a bit of coaxing maybe.  Still, that doesn't mean I shout it to the world either.  I mostly talk to friends about friend stuff, and to program guys about program guy stuff.  But sometimes it sure would be nice to have someone who was both - knows me and my life and also someone who we can be level with each other and work together or discuss recovery stuff..

When you post honestly your true feelings, when your reach out to others in time of need, when you respond to their calls, when you contact outside of gye, when you talk to others on the phone, etc.

There are so many of us that know each other in real life. And guess what? Our lives have all changed for the better, and we still are. And another secret.....they are my closest friends.

I've said this many times: a post from a "real" friend impacts me and makes five times the impression on me as one from the a-non group.

It happened by accident. I went to an SA meeting and we met there. Embarassing at first because we are friends and he is my good client. I was absolutely mortified and horrified. I decided never to go to SA again..but I did accept his invitation to work together one on one which benefits us both. It is miraculous that since we started working together, my lust has become like any other taava and no longer overwhelming and impossible to resist.
Clearly, what I originally thought was a curse was the greatest gift from HKB"H.

thanks613 wrote on 22 Mar 2016 05:17:

I am not suggesting this to anyone here, but you asked, so I will answer my part:

Since I determined that I am really an addict - a real addict, not just 'technically fitting the definition of an addict per GYE or a book' - I realized that my life was trashed till I got real help. And I was ready to get real help...finally. After years of bits and pieces of opening up...I was ready to really open up fully, explicitly, and totally vulnerably with real people. Real help is not found 'between me and G-d' (as Rabban Yochanan ben Zakai taught his talmidim [who were tanno'im in training!], nobody but nobody takes Hashem nearly as seriously as he takes even the gentile total stranger who sees him standing nearby at a bus stop) but between me and real people. Dealing with real people are totally different than 'working it out with Hashem', for us, and are totally different than virtual people on a forum can ever be. 

In my own case, I finally (after 20 years of acting out and running from myself to therapists, rabbis, marriage, etc., none of whom saved me) was suggested to try SA, a 12 step fellowship of people of all walks of life, who agree they are abnormal. That they are addicts. And they are anonymous to anyone outside the group. Safety, at last - even though I was totally vulnerable and open without hiding anything from these people...we were all brothers, and I was finally around many sober people. People who lived just as fake-ly as I had for years, but were now living without masturbating and without running after erotica. People who were actually clean without a need to 'get their fill' from engorging themselves on 'kosher' sex with their wives, or on 'victim-less' fantasy.

I was amazed.

I was finally safe.

I was home.

It certainly is not for everybody - I have met many for whom it is not appropriate. But for me and many others I know, it is exactly how Hashem saved their lives and families, one day at a time.

So that's how I'd answer your question. You say you are an addict. I understand that walking into a room of fellow perverts may seem insane to you right now, but would you actually be willing to sit in an AA (yes, I wrote AA) meeting with total strangers and introduce yourself as "Hi, I'm (your real first name [not your username] here)  and I am an addict."? I am not daring you to do it. I am not baiting or even challenging you. I am just asking.

If doing such a thing is way out of your league and sounds pretty extreme or crazy, or if the butterflies in your stomach feel like they'd ripo you open like a hatching Alien when you start to approach that meeting-room and you just can't go in there, or if you'd go in, but use a fake (English) name that no one really calls you...then I do not question your sincerity - I just think that would demonstrate something to you. Perhaps you mean something different than I do, when you post the words, "I am an addict". . 

And that's fine! But let's at least spell it out. Doing concrete things that put the implications of things we say or believe about ourselves into action, is a powerful tool to help us realize what we truly believe, vs. what we cheaply say...especially just on paper of computer screen...especially using a virtual name with other virtual-named people.

I am not challenging you. You may mean something else, when you write the words, "I am an addict", and that's fine. I am just spelling it out as I see it for myself.

Is that helpful in any way?   

- Dov