It all started back in April, I had been fapping every day for the past three months consistently and looking at porn about once or twice a week. My internship ended halfway through and I was sitting around not really looking for a new job, mostly playing video games and relax. Overall, feeling kinda shitty and depressed.
On the 17th of April, I was on some website with pirated movies and was watching some sex scenes. Halfway through the scene, I was bored and didn’t even want to fap. At that moment I decided that it was time to stop fapping for good. I’m a 26 year old male and fapping didn’t have the same appeal of when I was younger, time for me to grow. I had tried to quit before with some success. Previously, I had stopped fapping for the first semester in college and then for a mission trip. I was uncomfortable fapping in the dorms with a roommate around, but eventually I returned to my old habits.
This time it was going to different. I needed to convince myself that it was going to be different this time otherwise why would I even try. At that moment, I decided to tryout the Fortify program and spent $40 on it. The program was alright, it was mostly focused on pornography addiction. I didn’t consider myself a porn addict. I would occasionally google search for some sexually explicit content on a weekly basis. The fortify course wasn’t as useful as I hoped it would be. Most of the materials are short videos and journaling activities. I didn’t care much for the journaling, eventually I skipped it altogether. The videos were alright, most of them had content I had previously seen on the internet.
One of the best videos was on S.M.A.R.T. goals. Would highly recommend googling S.M.A.R.T. goals. I really like the battle tracker, it gave me a sense of accomplishment. I would stay up every night past midnight to track my progress for the day.
I was good for about two weeks and then the urges got really strong. I caved, watched some porn, thought I was alright, stopped watching, couple of hours later I masturbated. My mind was playing tricks on me and convinced me that if I didn’t masturbate with my hands it didn’t count. After I relapsed I binged and felt terrible. This is when I came to the realization that battle trackers (streak counters) are a dead end. They don’t truly reflect the progress you’ve made. They tell you, “youre a failure and you’re no better off than when you started.” They give you an excuse to binge once you’ve fail. They reinforce the cycle of addiction.
From that moment on I decided to not care about streaks. Instead I would look to what I was before Nofap, a daily fapper, and compare it with the frequency of my habit now. I started a spreadsheet to individually track my porn, masturbation, and orgasm habits. Every time I peeked, edged, or orgasm I would write it down. I haven’t masturbated since then, at least according to my definitions.
In order to track my success first had to define my success. I setup working definition of constitutes use of porn, masturbation, and orgasm. Porn: Seeking out sexually explicit content or nudity. Masturbation: Touching or rubbing the genitals. Orgasm: Blowing my load.
After I defined what failure was, it was much easier to track my success. Over the past 3 months I’ve had 2 slip-ups looking at porn. I was at a Barnes and Noble and I looked at a book with some photographs of naked women and the other time one of my coworkers showed me a video a naked woman pooping out eggs (wtf?).
As for masturbation, I’ve stayed true to the definition and I haven’t touched or rubbed myself down there. However, there has been couple of times I came close. A couple of weeks ago I was trying to get off by rubbing my nipples, but I just couldn’t do it. I lost a lot of precum and felt terrible. Since then I try not to touch my nips as much as possible.
Since I binged in May I haven’t had any orgasms, just couple of wet dreams around the 40-60 day mark. I don’t mind wet dreams because wake up in the next morning feeling refreshed, unless of course it’s dream about relapsing then it doesn’t feel that great.
I have a link to the spreadsheet I’ve been using. I recently updated my excel file to include a current, longest, and average streak calculator to track my progress. Feel free to copy and use for yourself. PMO_Spreadsheet!
Fapping get old after awhile. Don’t get the same pleasure, or at least it doesn’t seem the same, not worth it. Definitely seen the benefits. Going back to school and all the girls are giving me those eyes. However, I’m mostly doing this for myself, not for the girls.
LINK – 118 Day Nofap Journey
By NetherMink
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