Hello to everyone.
I am a recently ( 7 years ) religious baal teshuvah with no yeshivah background, so please don't use too much yeshivish on me, I can't read it!(Maybe we need a common phrase forum).
I am a professional man with three great children and a lovely observant wife.
Self abuse has been my obsession since I was 11, and what is worse I had a brief affair with another boy from 14 to 18. Because of this I think from the age of 15 I have been almost completely impotent (without the use of viagra and the like which only came along in 2000). I really do think that HaShem visited this on me as a judgement, because there is no medical problem at all ( I am sure you all have some good yeshiva/yiddish term here) and have prayed about it many times. The only good thing about impotence is that it severely limits the ability to force yourself on anyone - my wife has the box of viagra ( actually levitra, its better) and can pick and choose when I am capable of entering her. She hates me abusing myself and wasting seed - we have even tried chastity aids in the past but they are nasty things. We practice sexual purity in marriage too so what with this and her intermittent desire for intercourse I only get to fulfil the mitvah once a month or so. The rest of the time I struggle with the YH down there ( being impotent affects my erection, not my ability to masturbate to orgasm). Actually with prayer and mindfulness I am getting slightly better, but I still think and do filthy acts that I would not write about, and still have the urge all the time to slip into the bathroom or wherever, and yes, I still look at pornography as well as my wife's body.
I would very much like partners to talk to, to keep an eye on me, to own up to and to be supported by. I am not a sex crazed wreck, I am a normal guy with a problem that disgusts me as a Jew and a man trying to be more observant.
Menach.

WELCOME! You are in the right place. We are all in the same boat. Have you read the handbook? Keep reading and posting on the forum.

Shalom Shalom,

Such a painful story. I can relate to being stuck in the insanity of this addiction for so many years. It can seem like there's no solution, no way out. But that's absolutely not true. You must work at this, though. Like they say, "It works if you work it". So, number one, get filters on anything that has pixels.

It turns out that this journey is really about getting closer and closer to Hashem. Putting the plug in the jug is just the first step to turning our lives over to Him, since we haven't done much of a job with it ourselves. Filters. It's your real committment to Hashem. Blessed G-d, my only true Lover, my Father, my Lord, I need your help to do this. And I will take the step of getting filters for YOU. For YOU I do this. Because I love You so much, and want to be in Your arms, all day, all night. I will take this step. Today. Before the yh starts yammering at me.

Best of luck. This is do-able. Absolutely. For certain.

Joel