BS"D

Dear Friends,

My story starts a good 24 years ago.
I am now almost thirty, when I was six years old I started to do this Maaseh, which in later years of course caused zerah l'vatalah. Ever since I been doing that as much as six or seven times a day. Now I wasn't born Jewish and came from a family with a very liberal stance on practically all issues. My parents credo always was that you have to leave people do whatever they want to do as long as you don't infringe on the rights and lives of others. Throughout high school my lonely sexual activity was very high. I wasn't very popular as a teenager because most people didn't share and understand my concerns. I have always been a very emotional type of person. When an earthquake would hit the most forlorn corners of the world I was totally taken by it. I didn't care about what brand of shoes everybody wore and I certainly wasn't interested in the latest television shows etc... I liked classical music as relaxation and reading books about everything under the sun. I was frequently found in museums watching art, which were abundantly in our city. Since I had very low self-esteem I wasn't really grouped in the grades I belonged so all my peers were interested in just about the opposite. (Girl)friends, fashion etc...
At age 19 I entered university having for the first time the internet at my fingers. I didn't start looking for the bad stuff directly, but about two months into the semester my inquisitiveness got the better of me. Before I knew it, I was sucked in and started looking at this stuff full time. From early in the morning till late at night I was watching this stuff, skipping college and blowing my study.
As I told you, my parents are quite liberally and when I decided to convert to Judaism they were supportive under the credo: "If you are happy that way, then we are." First they wanted me to stay in our home-country, but after I failed in university they understood that they couldn't keep me there. They helped me and bought me an one-way plane ticket to Erets Yisroel where I would finally do what I yearned for, becoming Jewish!
I enrolled in a yeshiva and started learning there for my conversion, but unfortunately I brought my addiction along with me. Of course instinctively I always knew it was wrong to do it, whatever my parents had told me. So in the most holy city I kept looking for internet parlors to see just that. I couldn't stop myself. Every time I told myself I would stop the moment I would enter the mikveh and become a real Jew.
Well, all the good intentions were there....... I became a Yid Boruch Hashem. But again the cutting off, of old bad habits didn't go so easy as I had envisioned. After a few weeks clean I fell again. I kept falling during my time in Yeshiva. Ashamed and afraid to speak with anybody about it. I was oiver in l'hoitzee zera l'vatalah b'yadayim numerous times. Several times a day.
Every once in a while I would go to internet parlors to watch stuff.
Then I got married after three years in a yeshiva. After a short bliss I fell back in the bad habits. I spoke with my wife about it. She was understanding B"H. She has been helping me battling it. After a few years I had her make belief that I was totally clean, to ashamed to tell her that I was still deep in the mud.
Then we bought a house in a small Hareidi town. My wife found a job which involved the internet. I went into a kollel.
Although we had a filter, still I was able to lay my hands on the stuff which I wanted to see. I didn't have the hard stuff at home, but I still had a lot at my disposal. I got very upset with myself and I spoke with a friend to speak with a great mekubal. (not the type of shady person, but more into the area of Rav Yaakov Hillel shlitah) He told me that I was in a certain amount in the class of oines, I certainly would have to work on it, but he regarded my case as not so bad. Oines because my whole youth I was encouraged to do it. He asked me how many times I was oiver two years ago and a year ago and now. Showing clearly decreasing numbers.
Notwithstanding, it was only going to get worse.
A few months ago I opened up totally to an avreich, with great understanding in numerous matters.
He helped me and is still helping me quite a bit.
Now, this is kind of what I am up to right now. Really wanting to stop, but feeling chained. I can't get to three clean days to be charted into the wall of honour -system. Now I am holding at the second day. Hashem Yisborach should help me that I will finally get sober me and all who are reading this.
Another time I will tell you more.

Dear Levi613,

I know you want a lot of progress really fast.  We all do.  Some people succeed very rapidly while other have a more challenging recovery.  From my simple vantage point, it seems that people that make use of resources and exert more effort to recover, recover quicker.

You will shortly be bombarded with advice from everyone on this forum about reading the guard your eyes handbook (It helped me), and receive much encouragement (It continues to help me).

This kind of addiction (I really don't know about others), requires all of your strength to overcome (oneiss or not).  Its required a lot of my strength... and I have seen signs of blessing for my effort.

May Hashem grant you success in this area as well as others,
mekubal.

Dear Levi613,

I am the admin of this forum. Welcome to our community! Once you've arrived, there's no turning back. Everyone here will just grab a hold of you and pull you up, up, up!

We have another Ger Tzedek on our forum who calls himself "Ben". You can see all his posts by clicking on this link (read from bottom up).

As a Ger, you have come a very long way and have much to be proud of. Still, Hashem left this one area that he knew you would struggle in mightily, to leave you this one place where you would still need to learn how to fully give Hashem your heart. Well, you have come to the right place.

Scientific studies have shown that it takes 90 days to change a neural thought pattern that was ingrained in the brain through addictive behaviors. Did you join the 90 day chart on-line? Sign up over here...

Make sure to install a strong filter. It will be almost impossible to break free of this while having all the garbage within a mouse click away. See this page for one good filter option, along with instructions on how to install it best - and give away the password to our "filter Gabai"... See this page for another 20 (or so) filter ideas and information...

We get cries for help every day, by e-mail and on the forum. Tzuras Rabim Chatzi Nechama    And that is why we created the GYE handbooks (links below). If you read them well, from beginning to end, slowly, and try to implement what you read, you will find the answers within them to enable you to completely turn your life around. You're worth it.

Also, join the daily Chizuk e-mail lists to get fresh chizuk every day, and post away on this forum. You will get tons of daily Chizuk and support. This disease can't be beat alone. It works best when you get out of isolation!

GuardYourEyes also offers various free anonymous phone conferences, where you can join a group of other frum Yidden, along with an experienced sponsor. See this page for four different options. Duvid Chaim's group just started a new cycle last week! Hop on board now! This would be a tremendous step in the right direction for you and help you learn freedom from this addiction. Not only will you learn the secret of the 12-Steps - which is known to be the world's most powerful program for beating addiction having helped millions world wide, but joining the group will be another way of GETTING OUT OF ISOLATION and connecting with others who are going through what you are.

Let me tell you a little about the two GuardYourEyes handbooks. They lay down the cornerstone and foundation of our work, and they make our network much more effective and helpful for people.

You see, until now, people would often get "lost" when coming to our website, not knowing what tips and techniques to try. For example, a beginner wouldn't jump straight into therapy or 12-Step groups, while on the other hand, someone whose addiction was more advanced wouldn't be helped by the standard tips of "making fences" putting in "filters" etc... So it was essential to develop a handbook which details all the techniques and tools to dealing with this addiction in progressive order. Now with these handbooks, anyone can read through and see what steps they've tried already, and if those steps haven't worked, they can continue on through the handbook where the steps become progressively more powerful and "addiction-oriented".

And the second handbook, called the "Attitude" handbook, can also help anyone, no matter what level of addiction they may have. Often people write in to us saying that had they only known the proper outlook & attitude that we try and share on the GuardYourEyes network when they were younger, they would have never fallen into an addiction in the first place! So we hope that through this handbook, many addictions will be prevented.

The handbooks are PDF files, set up as eBooks, and they have bookmarks and hyper-links in the Index, to make them easy to navigate.

Note: You might want to print them out to read away from the computer. Keep in mind though, that if you do this, you won't be able to click on the many web links in the articles. But you can always come back to them later. The truth is, it's anyway good to go through the whole handbook once without clicking on links, just to get an overview of all the tools available. Once you did that, you can start again from tool #1 and read each tool through more carefully, click the links and study each technique and assess whether you have tried it fully yet or not...

Right click on the links below and select "Save Link/Target As" to download the handbooks to your computer.

1) The GuardYourEyes Handbook
This Handbook details 18 suggested tools and techniques, in progressive order, beginning with the most basic and fundamental approaches to dealing with this addiction, and continuing down through increasingly earnest and powerful methods. For the first time, we can gauge our level of addiction and find the appropriate tools for our particular situation. And no matter what level our addiction may have advanced to, we will be able to find the right tools to break free in this handbook!

2) The GuardYourEyes Attitude
The Attitude Handbook details 30 basic principles to help us maintain the proper attitude and perspective on this struggle. Here are some examples: Understanding what we are up against, what it is that Hashem wants from us, how we can use this struggle for tremendous growth, how we can deal with bad thoughts, discovering how to redirect the power of our souls, understanding that every little bit counts, learning how to bounce back up after a fall, and so on and so forth...

May Hashem be with you!

Shalom Alaichem reb Yid!!

This site has many bnei torah ubnei aliya. We have a full spectrum ranging from talmidei chachamim to yeshiva bachurim, and a whole 'spectrum of different colors'.

Make yourself at home.

I am sorry that I don't have the time to write a long post, complete with divrei torah, chozuk, mussar, and bedichot (funnies)....but I gotta run.

BS"D

Dear friends,

I already saw this website and even printed out both handbooks close to a year ago. I was craving to get to the wall of honour, but somehow, the rules are you are not allowed to start till you have three clean days. Believe it or not, I didn't make clean these since pesach sheini last year.
Today is the third clean day, so tonight I will be able to hook up. I"YH

Levi613

Dear Levi613,

Wow!!! Don't know if you realize this but you have really done the impossible....

I have heard from my Rov who has spoken with Rav Pam Zt"l re. this topic of H"ZL. Rav Pam was talking about a bochur who had already gotten hooked onto this for a few years, and was overtaken by guilt. Rav Pam said that this Bochur was an Oines...

You are coming form a totally secular background and started at age 6!!!!
My friend please please don't ever allow the Y"h to harass you when you fall....

We will be here for you and help in which ever way we can...

Also our place is growing by leaps and bounds... try to find a few people amongst us who you feel are up your ally
hook up with them for the long haul...

keep us posted... and let me tell you G-d has to be smiling when he sees us little guys down here who want to do the impossible in order to make ourselves holy....

Love and Peace....

BS"D


Dear Trying123 and to whom it may concern (most of you probably),

I very much appreciate your words and I am very happy to read them. They mean a lot to me. In my story I was telling in the first post I told about an avreich who has been greatly helping me over the past month in many inyanim, but foremost in this one. When I was drunk at Purim I started crying so much at once. You can't imagine. I was soooooo broken. May three oldest children KN"H are still talking about it. I was eating (and drinking) the seudah at a different friend. But somewhere in the middle I realized something which made me breakdown. I said to my dear wife that I wanted to speak to the avreich and I walked out of the door on my way to the other yungerman. I was walking to the streets practically howling, not able to restrain myself.
Although it sure was a bit embarrassing, but the night thereafter I realized that a Yid is known Bkosoi, bKisoi uBkasoi. His real self comes out in when he is drunk, they way he spends money and the way he is when he is angry. Well, at least afterwards I realized that my Neshomeh is yearning for Kedusha. That was actually part of the Nechomeh.
Hashem Ya'azoir that I will be able to keep clean this third day. It is a far cry from ninety, but a 1000 mile journey also starts with the first step.

Thanks for your attention
Levi613

Dear Friend,

Your tears on Purim came from your inner essence, I get the same effect...

When I drank my inner pain came to surface, I felt it in a profound way...

Wondering if you were perhaps feeling Pain, if yes this indicates how hurt you must be inside...
(In addition to dealing with the actual H'Z, wondering if you think it may be worthwhile to also address/work through all the pain...)

90 may be too big of a goal to invest your primary focus on, I'd say to take it one day at a time or like someone on this forum once said -one hour at a time...

Peace and Love Holy Bro...

BS"D


Dear Trying123

What do you mean with:
"(In addition to dealing with the actual H'Z, wondering if you think it may be worthwhile to also address/work through all the pain...)"
I mean English is not even my first language. I am sorry.

Levi613

I think that for some people it's not (only) that the addiction causes pain but the opposite: Pain causes the addiction....

What I was asking was whether it is possible that your pain wasn't only about the addiction but perhaps other deeper dynamics as well...

The reason I was wondering was because you stated that as a youngster you weren't made to feel very good about yourself etc...

If indeed this is the case, and Ma'bating serves the purpose of filling an inner hole, It may be worthwhile to see what that pain is, and how it can be healed.......

I hope I'm making sense here...

Please fill us in, and keep us posted...

With Love,
Your Brother

Welcome to the forum, Levi613.

You have already taken a huge step in posting here. 

I'd coin a phrase, unless someone else already did it, "a post a day keeps the yeitzer away."

There's nothing like a feeling of responsibility to a whole forum.  It has saved me quite a few times.  This somehow works even though we're all anonymous.

You certainly have come a long way in your life--further than most.

Tumah is attracted to Kedusha.  It's no surprise that holy neshamas have such a hard time in this area.  It's not a sign of our lowliness.  It's a sign of our greatness.

I struggled for decades, too.  In fact, probably everyone here has a similar struggle.  You're definitely not alone.

But this site is total genius.  We've never had such support, and such tools, to combat this problem.  The stories are endless--over and over again "I've come further in the past three months than in the past twenty years..." etc etc etc.

There's hope for us.

You've come to the right place.

Stick around.  Recovery is on the horizon.

Good luck to you.

  --Eye.

First of all, welcome, Reb Levi613! I feel fortunate to be on the same forum as you!

You clearly have a strong drive for truth, and have a feeling for spirituality. It's just a matter of channeling that energy in the right way - and hopefully, being here will help that!

BS"D

Dear friends,

When I got married I kind of shortly mentioned to my hadracha-teacher after some prodding that I USED to have a problem with pornography. I was to ashamed to admit that I was still in the middle of it.
You (Trying123) asked: "It may be worthwhile to see what that pain is."
This Rabbi then mentioned to me that a shortage of parental-love can cause these types of behaviour. Now my father certainly loves me and did so when we were children, but he would never express it. Maybe somewhere deep down....

Eye.nonymous thank you for your comment, you mentioned: "It's not a sign of our lowliness.  It's a sign of our greatness."
I have felt so lowly in the past, and this awareness slowly but surely seeped in. As a youngster I was always told by my peers that I was a nobody and in my subconcious it might have given me a big blow. Numerous time beaten up by the bullies of the school, numerous times told that my existence was really of no significance...etc etc etc. To hear this kind of things for year after year, it was no wonder that I hit rock bottom on age 16 and almost took my own life. That was about the time that Hashem Yisborach in his GREAT kindness opened up my eyes.

It is definitely true that my self-esteem amounts up to next to nothing (a difficult point in my life and marriage and chinuch), but the whole addiction thing doesn't help it a bit to raise it. Opposite, if only I could break free....

Levi613

Levi613 wrote on 05 Mar 2010 02:29:



Dear friend,

My heart goes out to you, It couldn't have been easy to go through all that.....

I hope you realize that this might be the root of your inner pain...

We are here for you...

Peace and Love

Rabbi Twerski also suffered from low self-esteem for years. Listen to him talk about it here.

And read his many great books on the subject. See here.