UPDATE: If your healthcare provider wants continuing education credits that address porn-induced sexual dysfunctions, they may want to look into this course (not affiliated with this website). In the UK, consider this course.
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First, the good news
What do experts tell guys? Gradually the word is getting out that too much porn can cause sexual performance problems and loss of attraction to real partners. In 2016, a urologist finally gave a presentation on porn-induced sexual dysfunctions at a national urology conferences. Watch it here. Also see – Porn-Induced ED in the Media: Primarily Experts
In 2019, world experts first made available a training for doctors and psychologists entitled, “When Pornography Becomes a Problem: Clinical Insights.” It features a case vignette in which a patient experienced sexual dysfunction and escalation…and had been poorly diagnosed by clinicians who hadn’t identified his compulsive use of porn as a problem.
The scientific research is slowly beginning to catch up with today’s reality of unprecedented rates of sexual dysfunctions in men under 40. See 90 studies linking porn use or porn/sex addiction to sexual dysfunctions, lower brain activation to sexual stimuli, and lower sexual satisfaction
We see more comments like this (but still too few):
I am 25 years old currently facing the problem of ED (erectile dysfunction) which my doctor prescribed me viagra for at february 9th. That was the trigger for me to search for my deeper problems and the day after my psychatrist (that helped me through depression in university) actually told me about this subreddit and told me that i should try a reboot.
A sexologist posted this:
I see it over and over with my clients. Men come in for a consultation with complaints of lowered libido, delayed or absence of ejaculation, and problems with their erection not being as firm and full as it used to, or even no longer having erections at all. The first thing I ask them is whether or not they watch porn on a regular basis and the response is invariably yes. … Even if you have a “normal” level of porn consumption that doesn’t [rise to the level of addiction], your porn habit could still have a detrimental effect on your sexuality. In my opinion the “Do You Have A Porn Problem?” screening questionnaire should look something like the following:
- Do find you need to masturbate and climax more often than before?
- Have your erections gotten less firm and full?
- Do you have times were you cannot get an erection?
- Do you find it takes longer to climax than it used to?
- Are there times when you can’t orgasm at all?
- Do you find it takes more stimulation to climax than it used to?
- Do you find it difficult to climax from intercourse?
- Do you find it difficult to climax from oral sex?
- Do you find that some sexual images aren’t arousing at all?
- Do you play porn imagery in your head during sex to help you climax?
- Is sex with a partner not as satisfying as masturbating to porn?
If you answered yes to a few of the questions above, then it’s possible that your porn watching has begun to have an impact on your sexuality.
2014 Things are definitely changing. See post:
My therapist, and urologist said the exact opposite.They said MO/PMO certainly causes porn or fantasy induced ED.I did the same route as you did.I saw every friggin specialist there is. Nothing wrong with me. My general practioner, who is a very good friend of mine ( we went too Rutgers and Cornell Univ. together)and who happens to be a leading specialist on the east coast in ED and hormone replacement said that MO’ing most certainly causes ED.
When I went in to see him for my results I go ” Hey, does too much porn and MO’ing cause ED or loss of interest with your wife/significant other?” He shook his head and smirks and goes “do you know how many guys I get in here a day from ages 20 to 60 with ED..it’s staggering..and 90% of them are porn addicted or MO addicted”. So, if anyone has any doubts, here’s the proof. This doctor friend mine also said “if everyone stopped watching porn, properly dieted and stopped wacking off..I would be out of business”.
Another guy in Germany:
Hey there, 17 year-old guy from Germany here. So I’ve basically been clinically depressed for about 2 years now. It was treaded with different types of therapies and later medication. None of which seemed to help or just helped for a short amount of time. I decided to go to another therapist since my first one didn’t help me at all.
Yesterday I had my first session with him and I told him my story and how I feel. I was surprised when he asked me if I masturbate frequently. I did in fact never tell anyone that I do that shit at least 2 times a day since I was 12. He was well aware about porn-addiction and the depression it can cause. I’m “clean” for about 24 hours now and it’s not easy… I’ll definitely stick around just to stay motivated. 2 Months until school starts again. My first goal is to [quit] until that and see how I feel. From what I’ve read so far I’m pretty positive.
And here’s a story about a visit to an insightful urologist:
[Age 21] I could rarely maintain an erection long enough to finish. I started noticing loss of morning erections as well as a low sex drive in general. It got to a point where I could only get wood if I was watching some hardcore porn. I wasn’t quite depressed, but I knew I had a problem. So I went to a doctor. He asked me a few questions and I answered honestly.
He told me that a modern form of ED is due to watching too much porn. Our minds get used to that level of engagement, and anything short of it doesn’t register to our sex drives. I was told to start exercising, quit watching porn for 3 months, and avoid sexual contact for about 6 weeks. No sex, no masturbation, etc.
It was hard. But 4 weeks in, I started getting morning wood again. Between 5 and 6, I had a wet dream. Instead of using my kung-fu grip, began using [a Fleshlight]. It’s been 2 and a half months and I haven’t watched porn yet. I’ve tried to get laid, and I got lucky last week. My performance was still nowhere near where I used to be, but it is significantly better.
And another urologist (September, 2012)
Yeah I have had a talk w/ my urologist about this bc I was being tested for lowish testosterone. He mentioned that more and more young men were coming in talking about having ED and that he estimated that over the past year about 50% of his patients for ED were probably younger than 35. So either we are just having huge effects from increasing toxins that are in our world that affect men (which may play a part and is possible) or (more likely) this porn stuff is REALLY screwing with us. He also mentioned that although a lot of these patients have lower than normal T levels, they aren’t low enough that they should be seriously complaining about ED.
And another urologist (December, 2012)
I saw a urologist today. Interestingly, he said that he is very interested in all of this new thinking about how excessive porn use can cause ED. He actually encouraged me to try to not use porn for two months…though when I asked him about masturbating, he insisted that I continue to masturbate as frequently as I want, and at least 3 times a week. Though he also recommended using a lubricant because doing it too much without one can actually damage nerves. They tested my penile nerves and they’re all fine, but he recommended using a lubricant going forward.
I thought it was very interesting that “your brain on porn” is actually gaining some currency among established urologists.
Yet another urologist (October 2013)
So I recently saw a doctor to rule out any physical reasons for my ED. Unlike my previous doc who prescribed viagra and sent me on my way, this one actually talked to me about my issue! He inquired about my habits and told me porn addiction is a real thing and I need to stop! Anyway hearing that from a medical professional really helped my resolve and I thought I would share it.
Another urologist (October 2015)
I went to several doctors and got all sorts of tests done and so far everything is fine. The only test we haven’t done is an ultrasound which we might eventually do but all my doctors agree that I’m a perfectly healthy 24 year old male and I can run 13 miles without stopping no problem so heart disease is extremely unlikely. Luckily my urologist is aware of PIED and shares my opinion that porn is the problem. He suggested ED meds to maintain penile tissue health and sex drive and to rewire with my partner and abstain from PMO and MO. Basically the idea is to continue to have blood flow through the penis.
It’s part of the same protocol they give to patients who have had a prostectomy. This can also be achieved with the use of a vacuum erection device and probably through kegels and reverse kegels as well. I don’t know how important this is for someone with PIED vs vascular forms of ED but it’s what my doctor recommended and it seems to be helping. Taking them at a low dose over a period of time also helps to establish a baseline level of nitric oxide to help make erections stronger but that can also be achieved through diet and exercise which I recommend strongly.
This doctor, himself, had porn-induced ED and recovered: Age 28 – Medical Doctor: ED cured after years of no legit sex and years of PMO. So did this one: Age 27 – Medical Doctor (ED)
And this one who also described the typical protocol he follows with patients:
Our “usual” routine is as follows:
- perform accurate physical evaluation: does the patient have short frenulus or phimosis? in case, suggest surgical evaluation and reassessment if symptoms persist.
- investigate other symptoms suggestive of different pathologies. Hyperthyroidism is frequently associated with PE.
- ask question in regards to erectile dysfunction. Some patients develop PE as a solution to erectile dysfunction.
- suggest psychological evaluation (of the couple, if needed). is the problem appearing only while having unprotected sex? is this a new issue or something which the patient has always known?
If none of these solve the problem, we suggest treatment with specific drugs. [In other words…doctors in Italy don’t ask about internet porn use.]
Bad advice still abounds from sexologists, but some medical doctors are catching on:
I am from Bulgaria and here watching porn and masturbating all the time is not considered as problem. Even some popular Bulgarian sexologists have never heard about PIED….
In 2009 … my sex life then went very bad. Only ED, PE and sometimes both of them. That is why in the end of 2009 I decided to quit sex and to be dedicated only to porn. … I did not make any connection between too much compulsively using porn and sex failures. … In the beginning of the summer of 2015 I met great girl. We tried to have sex, but nothing happened. My penis did not move. However if I watch her pictures in swimsuit I can get an erection for one or two minutes. …
I went to doctor, Endocrinologist. He [gave me] some blood tests and X-ray picture of my penis. After he saw the results, he told me: “Dude you are supposed to be a sex machine. Throw your computer from the window, forget about the porno and go for sex with real women. Even prostitutes are better choice than the watching porn.”
… After that I read many articles, forum posts and I downloaded all the videos from YouTube about PIED. I visited the greatest Bulgarian sexologist prof. Stanka Markova. She is really aware on PIED. According to her and to other sources the first thing man with PIED should do is to stay sober from porn and masturbating for 3 or 4 months. After that is time of the second phase. Find a good girl or go to prostitute. Force the brain and body to accept a woman as a object for arousing, but not the hand. The brain should be reset and re-configured. It needs some time for adaptation. You should not give up if you fail in the beginning. My PIED story. I need your advice and opinions
A redditor told his psychiatrist:
My visit to my psychiatrist was a bit of an eye opener today. I confessed all of everything about my cyber/porn/fap problems, and he recognised that I am certainly addicted at this stage. I told him about nofap and pornfree and the 90 day reboot target and he said this:
“90 days is a good start, but 90 days is when relapses usually occur on a serious quit attempt. Psychologically, you should not considered cured of your addiction until you haven’t indulged in it for one year or more. It is the same for all addictions.”
So, this is my new target. It’s a long term target for a first attempt, but there is too much at stake: My wife, my daughter, my job, and ultimately my life if things escalate any further.
Another guy:
So here is the situation, PMO for over a decade, ED for about that long too. Didn’t think porn was the issue, gone to shrinks, they all been telling me porn is “healthy”. Anyway went to one more shrink, put me on to www.yourbrainonporn.com Watching those videos felt like I got slapped in the face by reality. It all made sense. The theory, the reasoning behind it. Everything. As you can see I’m on a 41 day streak. Longest period since I can remember. No P. No M. No O.
Anyway hot blonde has been flirting with me to the death. I’ve been trying to hold her off, but she is being persistent as hell. There’s only so many times a guy can say no to a hot female. Feeling all fucked up and excited at the same time. Thoughts of doubt, anxiety etc etc. But its my fault. I did this to myself. I got no one else to blame. Face your fear head on. I got my dick pills ready, since I’m still flatlining some. Wish me luck people……
Another guy:
I decided enough was enough and sought help. I asked my parent to take me to see the doctor again and he sent me to the psychologist and psychiatrist, and they both diagnosed me with porn induced ED. I was to immediately stop watching pornography and go on a hard mode reboot.
When I came to my doctor at first regarding my inexplicable ED, extreme sexual anxiety, and complete lack of a libido, he first ordered a testosterone test. When this came back normal, he put me on anti-anxiety medication. “It’s all in your head, you just have to remind yourself of that, and this should help.” While it WAS in fact all in my head, and pills DID in fact help a bit, it never got to the root of the issue. For months it went on with continued ED and failed sex attempts, and that all added up to a much worse mindframe.
Anyways, NoFap has been helping so far, and from the success stories I’ve read (and the sheer volume of them), I’m optimistic it’ll continue to get better and actually fix this. So, when I was in for a physical yesterday, I gave my doctor a link to the TEDx talk and talked to him a bit about the concept. He seemed very interested, and I think he’ll actually give it a watch. Hopefully if he does, he can point another struggling dude in the right direction.
TL;DR- Told my doc about the TEDx talk hoping he’ll tell other patients with similar concerns to mine instead of medicating their symptoms as opposed to the root issue. YOU SHOULD TOO!
I was refilling my prescription of cialas and my doctor (who’s a super cool guy) said “how much of your ED do you think is psychological?”. We talked about performance anxiety a bit then I told him about PIED and the theories on YBOP. He reflected from a moment and said “I think that’s a perfectly plausible theory”. Why cant more practitioners be this open minded? anyway keep up hope, not every doctor is an asshole.
This guy’s doctor also diagnosed porn use as a cause of depression:
I always used to masturbate only using my imagination or “wank bank”. But a year and a half ago I got introduced to porn and I seriously started watching it. My life started to spiral downward as a I would watch for about 2-3 hours a day, I got more and more tired, and I didn’t want to do anything. My erections got weaker and weaker, my mind got foggier, until my mother took me to a doctor and I explained my situation.
I was diagnosed with major depression, anxiety, and sexual addiction. I started taking medication (Effexor XR), and for the past two months or so, I’ve regained all my energy, started going out and being active again, and my grades improved. I finally felt like I was living up to my potential.
Initially people I talked to about porn said porn wasn’t the problem. That’s why I didn’t get it treated sooner. There is a misconception in society that porn is natural and healthy for boys to get rid of their sexual frustrations. People don’t know that too much of it turns you into a zombie.
Another guy:
After going to 3-4 different doctors over 4 years, after numerous failed attempts at sex with multiple different girls, the fourth doctor recommended me to this site.
I have been relapsing regularly for 9 months but it finally stopped. Its not a flatline as I can have sex (I still have PE but I hope it will go away in time and practice. I have seen a sex therapist about it twice and I highly recommend doing this if you have PE or ED. It has helped me realize how wrong [porn use] was, talking about it with a stranger in the real world. He said that almost all of sexual issues amongst young people (under 45) is related to porn or sex addiction.
Another guy:
I was in trouble. This worried me so much I went to the doctors, something which I try to avoid at all costs being a typical male. The doctor quickly understood my symptoms and even described a few that I was having, but had not associated with my problem. She was able to explain the resolution of the issue and was even able to give a time frame before things returned to normal, so what was it?
That’s right, erectile dysfunction caused through use of pornography. I’m not a biologist but from her discussion what I’ve gleaned is that porn causes our brain to react differently to when experiencing ‘natural sex’, producing a way higher level of dopamine, effectively causing your sex drive to become addicted and making it harder and harder for you to get hard (pun intended) under normal circumstances.
Another guy:
A week ago I started doubting that my problem might be from Porn. I talked myself into thinking I was deficient in maybe magnesium or zinc. After making an appointment with my doctor I decided I might just try PMO once or twice so if I am deficient he’ll definitely pick something up in a blood test. Well as it turns out my health is fine, and he agreed that I have Porn ED and need to let my brain rest from anything sexual.
Another guy:
Started seeing a sex therapist
He is aware of noFap and is in complete agreement about the noFap-way to beat PIED, et al. For me, it adds a lot of credibility to this site that professionals agree point-for-point with what we are doing. He agrees, in my case, with a hard-mode approach but says one should do what comes naturally. He also did not think my goal of 1 year was necessary–he thinks there will be a recovery sooner. I still (after 22 days) find it impossible to imagine what wellness could be like. I am literally not sure what I am supposed to feel about women in general and or my wife specifically. I think my problems are actually bigger than just a porn addiction, but that’s my problem and I’m going to table my doubts and give this (and therapy) a serious go.
[Not about ED, but interesting]
I am a practising doctor and, truly, this [website] is a new world of possibility, clarity and info for me re addiction…especially when during med school, years ago, an addiction centre staff member who lectured us, postulated back then that addiction was like falling in love …he ‘suspected the same pathways were involved’ … we now see he was right… I congratulate all these gentlemen working towards their own health…and I have a whole new armoury for helping clients I may not even have realised had a ‘shadow’ problem. In addition, it seems to me I must look for this diagnosis before I make any other and not the other way around. I recently started therapy with a ‘narcissist’ but it seems to me this trait could possibly be totally erased if this addiction is dealt with first. I thank you all….Thank you
Another doctor gives advice to forum member:
Talk to your Doctor about NoFap… I did!
As part of my annual physical check-up, I spoke with my primary doctor today about the effects of masturbation on my health. I have a great doctor who’s been monitoring of my body’s well-being for most of my life, including my bouts of depression, so he was well qualified to consider my medical history in his response. Fist of all, my doctor confirmed that there are no specific health risks determined by whether you masturbate or not. Downplaying the claims some people make [that] masturbating helps prevent prostate problems, my doctor said, “I wish I could say,
‘You should ejaculate this often to help prevent prostate cancer,’ but I can’t. That’s just not true.” -Dr. Grayson, D.O., 1/8/13
Additionally, my doctor agreed that not masturbating can help improve other areas of your life since, “you can use that energy to form other habits.” My doctor has been monitoring my testosterone levels with blood tests every so often since it tested low in the past. While it will be interesting to see if a change correlates with me making it half way to 90-day NoFap (woot!), he was strong in his opinion that masturbation use has little to no effect on testosterone levels.
Finally, when I told my doctor that I feel cutting out porn and masturbation has improved my health, he nodded in agreement, stating,
“My patients tell me that [avoiding porn and masturbating helps them], and I believe them.”-Dr. Grayson, D.O., 1/8/13
I was surprised and encouraged to find that I’m not the only one who’s spoken to my doctor about this issue, and that others who’ve seen him are experiencing the same results! Be encouraged, my friends; the hard science may still be out on the issue, but doctors are listening to their patients and are reaching the same conclusions as us!
Some background; I was a chronic fapper, 3-4 times a day every kind of depraved stuff you can think of. Noticed I have horrible social anxiety and generally scared shitless about talking to people, not knowing what to say. Culminated in no confidence in myself, lonely as fark, depressed, dark feelings all the time.
Tried to fix it with meditation and therapy, but all in all nothing worked.. started to get OCD and slight paranoia too which sucks.
Fast forward to now, I quit fapping 26 days ago; this is the longest I’ve ever been without fapping in my life since age 12 (I’m 21 now) and I feel like the man. My fear about everything is much reduced (not gone unfortunately), I am a lot more positive about everything and am finding things a lot more fun now whereas before I’d think; “Whats the point?”. Socially I’m no longer scared shitless and can look people in the eye and even have witty conversation (I’m still suffering from anxiety though but i’d say it definitely helps).
I never thought PMO could have such a huge effect on my life, but there you go. it’s almost as if my brain can breathe now and is being allowed to heal (strange sounding :P)
Longer accounts:
- What the doctor said…[about my fetish porn tastes and inability to find partnered sex pleasurable] (2018)
- Advice column with pediatrician recommending YBOP
What experts tell guys: Now the bad news
First, a true horror story. This man underwent surgery for revascularization, when it problem was most likely chronic porn use: Age 33 – Underwent penile revascularization, but it seems to be porn-induced ED
This guy got a penis pump…but did he really need it? He, “used to watch hardcore porn when he was younger – sometimes several times a day – which made it difficult for him to get turned on by real-life situations. … He went to see a doctor aged 21, but was told he had been masturbating too much – leaving him more upset and anxious.” Sounds like he may have needed help quitting. Instead, he got the pump. Hmmm…
Traditionally, urologists assumed that if a man with ED could achieve an erection and ejaculate when masturbating, his problem was anxiety about sexual performance with a real person. However, this test can produce misleading results in young men who have been masturbating exclusively to supernormally stimulating internet porn. Even if they have no anxiety they may have conditioned their sexual arousal to screens and unending novelty, such that partnered sex doesn’t evoke the anticipated responses.
As a consequence of this outdated protocol, much professional advice misses the mark and features only useless advice, such as, “Here’s a trial pack of Viagra and referral to a counselor to discuss performance anxiety,” with not one question asked about the possibility of problematic porn use. Consider these men’s reports:
Just got back from urologist…Handshake and a smile and slapped some cialis in my hand and told me to call him if I wanted a prescription. He had never heard of abstaining from pmo in relation to fixing ed. No explanation as to why the ed, just a typical band-aid approach. Looks like I’m on my own to fix this.Tell me nofap will work guys….I need to hear it right now. Feeling like shit after that experience. (July, 2014)
AND
I went to my local physician, and he sent me to a specialist. This specialist couldn’t understand what was wrong with me, so he redirected me to another specialist. After getting redirected several times, I was finally redirected to Dr. Wu. Dr. Wu ran some tests on me, and decided he had to stimulate an erection in me to understand the blood flow. So, Dr. Wu took a 6 inch needle and injected into the side of my flaccid penis. As I’m writing this, I am still wincing at the excruciating pain, having a 6 inch needle in your dick feels like. Long story short, Dr. Wu said there is nothing physically wrong with me and that my ED problems must be nerves. So he slapped a prescription of viagra in my hand and sent me on my way.
So I didn’t know what happened. The pills worked when I needed them to – sometimes. But it still made me not be able to finish unless it was me finishing it. If you know what I mean.
I am a college student at one of the top universities in the country and I realized I used pornography to cope with the stresses of life. For example: Hard day? Porn. Fight with parents? Porn. Test coming up? Porn. It got so bad… I was using it every day… for years… and I was using more and more harder porn. Let’s just say, I was in a pretty dark spot.
By the grace of God, I found this subreddit. I found the YourbrainOnPorn video of how the guy fixed his PIED. On yourbrainonporn, there is a test to understand if you have PIED or just ED. I recommend doing this test. Basically, if you’re skeptical of all of this, try to Fap without porn and see what happens.
If you can’t get it up or it’s difficult – fap with porn. If you find that you can easily get it up with porn, but it’s extremely hard to get it up and finish without a porn video going – you have PIED. AT LEAST a mild case of it. When I did this test and found out that I was no longer able to get it up without porn – I freaked out. I quickly went on YourBrainOnPorn and started reading. I read about PIED and I fit every symptom. I found NoFap and knew I had to change…. [Now]
- I get raging erections when intimate with women
- Sex is better
- Girls have thrown themselves at me a few times during this challenge – I had sex/intercourse around 5 times or so during this challenge. 65+ Days NoFap – you won’t regret reading what I have to say. (Sept., 2015)
This man’s urologist suggested a penile implant.
90 days report – future looks much brighter (or how my urologist got me almost suicidal)
English is not my first language. I got a new gf after being single for almost 3 years, during which I PMO’d at least once a day (often more than that). I already struggled with my previous gf (I used to PMO during that time, albeit not as much as I did after we broke up), now with my new gf my PIED got so bad I went to see an urologist – actually, one of the most highly reputed (and costly) in my country.
He asked a few questions, then had me tested: he injected some viagra-like substance in my penis (and, yes, it hurts a lot…), then played a porn DVD and told me to watch and masturbate to get hard, so that he could check my erect penis with some sort of scanner. I did not get hard at all, I guess partly because the porn was way too mild relative to what I had grown accustomed to, and partly because the whole situation (i.e. masturbating while a guy in a labcoat watches you, right after getting a needle in your dick…) did not exactly help setting the mood.
So the urologist told me that I was basically skrewed. He chastised me for not confronting the issue before, then literally told me “if you were older [I am in my thirties] I would immediately book you for surgery. Because you are relatively young, let’s first make a desperate attempt with heavy doses of chemicals”.
Now, the pills did very little (and cost a lot). Needless to say I was very depressed, confronted with the choice to either having a pump surgically implanted in my penis, or giving up on sex forever. Then I found Nofap. I gave it a try because a lot of what I read seemed to apply to me, plus I had nothing to lose at that point.
So here I am, 90 days after, and I am glad to say my PIED is mostly gone! I can have sex with my gf regularly; initially, it happened that I would sometimes get soft during intercourse, but now I usually manage to stay hard until the end. I think there is still room for improvement, and I have some doubts as to how I would perform with a condom (which does not really matter at the moment as my gf is on the pill), but even if this was the full extent of my recovery, it’s just great!
Now I am wondering if I should go back to the urologist to talk about how he got me almost suicidal, and whether he is aware of nofap. Maybe it could help others, I don’t know…
TL,DR: Had PIED. Urologist recommended penile implant surgery. Cured PIED with nofap instead.
I’m 25. When i was with my ex, our sex life declined dramatically. It got to a point where sex was impossible and feelings of self worth went down the drain.
Tried all kinds of meds to get my potency back, until i was. Even got hospitalized cuzz i kinda OD’d on one. Till one day i saw something on tv about porn addiction. It literally saved me from a dark pit.
Now ive gone from a sexual 0 to having some female friends i look up when i’m in the mood. Everything is so playful and fun whereas sex used to be a real painful experience.
I’m not 100% where i want to be. But i’m very excited to see how much better it can get. Exciting times, i feel like a teen again
[Asked about trip to ER from “overdose”]
The lack of knowledge is indeed the most shocking part. Ive spoken to countless doctors in my battle against ED and none if them thought to ask me if i watched porn.
When it came to ED meds i tried viagra/cialis/levitra but all of them failed. A doctor suggested a final slightly more drastic approach. A locally injected medicine called “androskat” you self inject this into the penis…..yeah i wasn’t thrilled.
My relationship of 7 years however was under a lot of stress due to the inability to have sex. I feared it would end and i didn’t want to go down without a fight.
So i learned how to prep the needle and tried to do it. First times is just sat there frozen on my bed with a prepped needle….just to afraid to do it….panic building in my mind.
After 2 weeks i finally worked up the courage, with my ex next to me (real romantic) i jammed that needle….it hurt….i had to redo it a couple of times and god…worst feeling ever.
After that it did get rock hard tough and we had sex. Albeit very artificial and not really enjoyable as i was coming down from the idea of just having stuck a needle in my dick.
Problem was, it didn’t go down…. So i had to get to the ER. Rode the metro with the biggest boner imaginable….nurse openend my pants to see the “situation” only to almost get slapped in the face by mister enthousiasm.
In the ER room they called in a specialist and after having laid there for an hour with an ice bag they started manually removing the blood with…yet more needles.
Ive never felt so ashamed and hurt mentally in my life.
I however look back at it with a mix of hilarity and a certainty that i will never go down that road again.
Its crazy where pron use can bring you Age 25 – PIED, Docs prescribed needles in my penis…but porn was the problem
You come to realise that PMO has an even darker side and not only has it changed your perspective it can also makes it difficult to even get hard for girls in the first place i.e. through PIED, I believe this is especially likely if you have not had a great deal of experience with girls in real life – alongside PMO. This is terrifying for a young man I can assure you if you have not experienced it, you hear about it affecting older guys, but happening to a 20 year old? What the fuck is that?
I went to my doctor who said that it was most likely performance anxiety and he prescribed me with some Viagra, I was sceptical that this would even work, it is so disheartening when you are unaware why you can’t get hard for girls you are really into, you start to question even fundamental stuff you thought you were certain of such as your health and your sexuality, it is truly sad.
I scoured the internet for months during this time I had PIED not knowing what the problem was, I thought there was a good chance it could be health related, I hadn’t used the viagra yet but like the packet and information about it says: if your brain is not sending signals to your penis to increase blood flow etc. the viagra will not make you hard magically. So I knew it was not the solution. Finally I find yourbrainonporn.com and all the accounts from young guys whose symptoms where exactly the same as mine, thank fuck! I remember how happy I felt, finally I wasn’t a freak of nature after all and there was other guys like me, there were stories incredibly similar to mine. I was comforted to know that I was afflicted with the same thing as whatever these guys had.
It was weird, I wasn’t even aware if I could be cured or if I could turn my life around, but I still had that eureka moment because I could finally identify the problem that had plagued me for so long. From reading stories there I quickly came to see what I had was PIED all along and through YBOP I found nofap and it was helpful to hear other stories and little tips that helped you guys achieve a life without PMO. Age 22 – PIED resolved: Motivation is up, Focus is excellent, Sleep has improved
5 girls later and I’m still not getting it up. The girls always look so embarrassed and ask me the same questions. “Is everything okay? What’s wrong? You don’t like THIS?” omething is horribly wrong with me. Fed up and angry at my dick for not working, I go to a Doctor and ask him to run testosterone tests on me. A week later the results were in and everything looked fine. AWESOME, I think. Let’s try this again.
Girl number 6 was by far the most embarrassing one of them all. She was really cute and I really liked her. I knew the moment she left my room that I’d never see her again. Now I’m Fucking Furious. I go to a different Doctor, He tells me the testosterone tests came back fine, Then I go to a third Doctor who will be checking my blood circulation, He tells me everything is fine, and by my 5th Doctor, I decided that none of these guys could help me. What the fuck is wrong with me?
I then turned to Google and started reading up on all of the ED success stories, all of the statistics of men around the world under 40, and under 25 experiencing ED. Most men in their 50’s start experiencing ED because of testosterone problems, but why were these young men experiencing similar symptoms? Internet porn. These 50- year-old men didn’t have porn growing up, they relied on magazines and their imaginations, haha.
Anyways once I identified the problem. I stopped watching porn and I stopped jacking off. Today marks 30 days since I’ve stopped whacking it, and I have added 2 more girls to my body count whom which I haven’t encountered any problems with in the sack. Actually, Since I stopped whacking it, I’ve been able to perform ROCK HARD.
This shit is the bomb! 7 Girls embarrassed cause I couldn’t get it up… ED CURED!
I actually was checked by a number of urologists, cardiologists, and some more, and all tests came great, blood, testosterone, everything that could be checked got checked and the results were really good. They all suggested me going to a psychiatrist saying it’s due to performance anxiety, but no way I went to a shrink.
Doctors have NO IDEA this thing actually exists and it’s pissing me off. Why dont we go to the doctor ?
[Another guy on same thread] Been there. All physical tests came out good. He referred me to a shrink, who would not stop talking to me about anxiety and treating me like a goddamn lunatic. I’d obviously recommend everyone do the same to ensure nothing else is at play, but seriously, fuck that shit. Why dont we go to the doctor ?
This guy’s doctor tested him and ordered a series of penile injections to force erections…without ever asking about his porn use or considering the possible side effects of addiction. Serious ED diagnosed by a doctor
Another guy: Getting up was always a problem I needed head to get hard enough for sex. I tried everything from supplements to drinks, wine, penis rings, etc and nothing worked. Even got testing done everything was normal. Doctor suggested Viagra. I was like, “Fuck that, what the hell is my sex life gonna be like 30 years from now while I’m still on this shit?” All those supplements and herbs only help you get up and be horny but they obviously don’t keep you up enough. So at first I thought it was my grip-style of masturbating. I would kinda I guess have a death grip when I did. So I changed my habit but still noticed only minimal improvements.
Sex Expert on Medhelp advising partner of porn addict:
You can always find well-meaning people who will tell you that something correlates to something else; however, scientists will tell you that correlation doesn’t equal causation. For instance, every time the moon is full, some dogs bark. Can we then conclude that dogs barking causes the moon to be full?
Of course not. Let’s look at the pertinent facts: You state your bf is perfect, except he’s unemployed, won’t get a job, and lies to you. Your true issue is a conflict about sex, not porn. Why haven’t you had a serious talk about sex? Why didn’t he tell you he was using Viagra? Why would he tell you he’d stop using erotica and then continue to do so? How is your sex life together? I ask these questions because in my private practice, I see more and more people who want to talk about fears around erotica, rather than the real issue for them, which is sexual dissatisfaction.
Sometimes we don’t realize we’re dissatisfied because it’s more convenient to blame something else. As I said, it’s time to have a long talk with your partner and decide what you want to do–together–to improve your sexual relationship. And it’s time for your bf to look at why he’s avoiding getting a job. This is just a symptom of something more important (e.g., perhaps he’s clinically depressed or has some other mental health issues).
Best of luck to you. Dr. J
Here’s a 2014 sexologist who’s just as uninformed: “I can’t orgasm during sex, only masturbation”
A young MD with porn-induced ED
My sincere hello to all the guys here! I’m turning to this community for help, and I wanted to introduce myself and my situation. I’m 33, healthy, a physician who just finished my training … and for the past 6 months have struggled with ED and DE which ultimately led me to realize that porn and arousal addiction have destroyed my most recent relationship.
The loss of my girlfriend last month over a lack of “physical chemistry” as she said it …. my ability to please her, as I say it …tore my heart in half and made me feel like a fraction of a man, but in the process forced me to take a good long look at myself and realize that my habits and coping mechanisms over the past 15-20 years of my life have caught up with me … and I am going to have to fight hard if I am going to dig myself out of this emotional and biochemical abyss so that I may have a normal, healthy, and enjoyable sex life and a successful relationship in the future.
Although doctors know a lot about the human body, there are certain phenomena that are not yet in the mainstream fund of knowledge. The dangers of PMO and arousal addiction are not yet mainstream. Even though I am a medical doctor, I had NEVER heard about them or realized they were so well described as they are on the internet by the pioneers like yourbrainonporn.com and the nofap community. (My ex-girlfriend, also an MD, had no idea too.) What I did know was that I was not happy, and frankly had never been when it came to sexual relationships and intimacy with women.
Here are reports from various patients about the advice they received:
From this thread – How come it took us so long to make the connection that porn was the problem?
A significant problem is that the medical profession is far behind the times.
My personal issue is primarily sexual function, not brain fog/social anxiety/etc. I googled around a lot about ED a few years ago and found almost nothing that talked about the link between porn and ED. All the “respectable” website didn’t even list it as a possible cause of ED. In fact, most sites say something like, “if you can get it up to porn, then you have no physical problems…it’s all in your head.”
So I started seeing doctors and spent a lot of money. Same thing there: “Erection to porn means it’s in your head…take some Viagra.”
Ultimately, I did a lot of research on ED and spent quite a bit of money on doctors, tests, medicine, etc. Not once did any health care professional say to me, “Hey, you know, watching porn too much can cause sexual dysfunction.” Instead, they offered up other things which are not even proven to be linked to ED and typically did not apply to me anyway (e.g. anxiety…even though you’ve been with your spouse forever and show no signs of anxiety; stress…even though you don’t show any indication of being stressed; diet…even though your weight is normal and you eat a balanced diet; low testosterone…even though low T hasn’t been linked to ED (except in extreme cases…and even that is weak) and your T is not really low).
Then there’s reddit.com/r/sex…with absolute horrible advice from “sexologists” who frequent the site. So bent on being “sex positive,” they not only deny the potential negative consequences of porn use, they actively ridicule the notion of porn-induced ED.
So, though I feel stupid for not making the link between porn and ED myself, the fact is I sought out research and advice from professionals and porn was never brought up except in a positive light. I didn’t think to say, “Hey, I fap to porn” because, at the time, that was the same to me as fapping generally….everyone does it, it’s normal…in fact, it’s healthy.
I even started the process to evaluate the possibility of surgical intervention. It would be between $25k and $30k out of pocket and the results are not encouraging (penile revascularization). The day after that appointment I stumbled on YBOP. Oh my god…what a revelation and what a relief.
And it works…I’m not 100%, but I’ve improved dramatically and things keep getting better. My PIED started about 10 years ago. I’ve spent thousands of dollars on doctors, including a well known urologist specializing in ED (had to travel a couple of hundred miles for that one); thousands on tests; thousands on pills.
And it turns out all I had to do was quit fapping to porn. Unreal. Honestly, I’m a bit angry given that I actively sought solutions from professionals, including specialists, who graciously accepted my hard earned cash yet gave me bad advice.
Thank you, Gary. You figured this out when everyone else was saying, “no way!”
As individuals, one of the best things we can do is give your doctors feedback on this issue. Let them know your experience. Save an erection…point them to YBOP.
91 days – serious ED cured !!!- mild anxiety and mild depression cured !!!
Now I am 32 years old. I started NoFap to cure myself from ED and PE, to stop wasting my time on PMO and to cure mild anxiety and mild depression.
This is where I started: I have been suffering from ED and PE for 14 years. My ED has been very serious. No Meds worked for me. Not Viagra, not cavernous-body-auto-injection. Official diagnosis: venous leakage. No hope for healing. The Doctor told me about Penis-Prothesis.
But I never gave up hope. All my hope based on the fact, that a combination of viagra and Ixense (based on the dopamine (!!!)-antagonist apomorphine) caused at least to some degree an erection for a short time.
When I read YBOP, especially the part about dopamine, I knew that I had found my cure!
Then in college when I started to find myself in bed with girls, to my horror I could not get hard. At first I thought the girls were not attractive enough, but then when I couldn’t even get hard to girls I thought were sexy as hell, I knew something was wrong. I became depressed. I had no idea where to turn so I visited a urologist. I insisted something was wrong with my penis but tests and blood work proved my penis functioned perfectly.
One time I broke down and cried right there in the doctor’s office because I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me. My doctor deduced that the problem was in my brain and referred me to a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist said I had symptoms of anxiety and obsessiveness. He prescribed my Xanax because he believed I had Performance Anxiety. I definitely think part of my problem was anxiety but the glaring flaw of Xanax is that it lowers my libido to basically nothing. After several failed attempts with Xanax I decided to take matters into my own hands. I started to research online how to heal myself. Eventually I realized I had PIED.
Porn-induced ED coupled with a strange fetish: Long road, but completely cured
I had tried talking to a therapist for the first month in hopes for help in geting better, but i feel it was a fucking waste. He told me PIED didn’t exist and my troubles were from anxiety. I don’t get anxiety and the outdated fucker had no idea what he was talking about. My mental state and comfortability with my girlfriend had not changed since day 1 and I have never been depressed. PIED is as real as it gets and do not let anyone tell you differently.
I was watching porn for about 10 years and now I have gotten to an abstinence of about 3 months. I really feel a great and massive improvement within my sex life (Interesting side note for everyone who still questions the destructive force of porn: I tried so many other things like fitness, healthy food, visited an urologist, tried natural aphrodisiacs… nothing really worked…). https://www.reddit.com/r/NoFap/comments/3f2o22/questionadvancing_the_reboot_of_the_brain/
My GP is not convinced of PIED
So last year before I learnt about PIED, I saw my GP quite a few times, but he kept telling me that it’s all in my head and that I just need to regain confidence with the help of some blue pills.
Luckily I found YBOP, NoFap and YBR in December 2014 and I immediately started my reboot! Now at day 58 I feel so much better!!! I have been having strong morning erections for the past two weeks and I’m also experiencing other benefits such as improved concentration and deeper voice. But I’m far from healed, I still have no libido and no spontaneous erections.
Anyway I went to see my GP today about my testicular microlithiasis situation. We then talked about my ED. I told him that there is condition called Porn Induced Erectile Dysfunction, I also told him about reboot, nofap, YBOP, YBR. But clearly he was not convinced, he insisted that there are only two types of ED, either physical or psychological, and that there is no such thing as PIED.
I told him that Viagra and Cialis didn’t work on me, but abstaining from PMO for 58 days has recovered my morning wood at least. I insisted that he check out the YBOP site so he noted down the URL. I hope he will check it out, learn from the site, change his views and then help out other guys that are struggling with PIED.
I will be seeing an urologist in a few days. I will continue to spread the word if he is not aware of PIED yet. We should all do the same, to keep the doctors informed, so they can help more people and hopefully provide valuable cases to researchers for PIED related researches!
22 years old, Been watching porn since a young age. I didn’t know I had a problem until the beginning of this year. At first I didn’t know it was porn related so the doctor gave me viagra. … I was completely put off porn as soon as I learned what it was doing to me. …Day 84 I successfully had sex with my gf! Best day ever!
After struggling with PEID for 3 years (17-20) I finally had enough. I broke down and confessed to my father that I could not get an erection with a girl. (I had never really talked to my dad about my sexual relationships with any of my girlfriends before so this was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do).
Thankfully, he was extremely supportive wasn’t going to stop trying to help me overcome my problem until it was fixed. He is an orthodontist and has several friends in the medical field so he got me in with a urologist that evening.
I told him my situation and he simply gave me a small dose of Vallium and Cialis and diagnosed me with “Sexual performance anxiety”. He recommended that I go see a psychologist and discuss my anxiety issues. He asked me if I might just not be into women and suggested that I might be gay. I walked out in the middle of the session. Months later is when I discovered NoFap and yourbrainonporn.com. THANK GOD for this community that sheds light on this new epidemic. Age 21 – The dark cloud of PIED has cleared away
Thankfully, he was extremely supportive wasn’t going to stop trying to help me overcome my problem until it was fixed. He is an orthodontist and has several friends in the medical field so he got me in with a urologist that evening.I’m a 16 year old guy who once thought he was invincible. At age 15 I realized that is not the case. In May of this year, about 7 months ago, I got PIED. It was totally humiliating when I was not able to perform with an attractive girl… Not to mention the fact that she went around telling people about my issue. Unfortunately it took me until over 5 months later to make the connection to a porn/masturbation problem. Before I found Gary’s TED Talk, and YBOP.com, I visited numerous urologists, only to be told I was perfectly healthy. Having a problem that i thought only 50-year-olds got, I spiraled into depression.
November 2nd, 2014 I started my no PMO journey. My equipment shriveled up the first 30 days which was scary. When this happens it’s tempting to test things out, you know, to see if everything is not broken. DONT DO THIS. At day 30 I had my first morning wood in 6 months! This was a good reason for me to keep doing no PMO. http://www.rebootnation.org/forum/index.php?topic=2808.msg27409#msg27409
(Not ED, but assured the patient that porn addiction does not exist, and that powerful drugs were the solution)
That is from my story: “In 2012, I tried to get help from a professional psychotherapist/sexologist (in the public health service), where I earlier wanted to get help for depression and social anxiety disorder. I plucked up the courage to tell therapist that I also had a great problem with compulsive PMO and that ruined already 20 years of my life. I hit a wall of incomprehension. It seems most doctors and psychologists don’t understand yet this problem and even do not consider compulsive PMO as a behavioral addiction.
This psychotherapist tried to convince me that it was a high sexual desire (hypersexual disorder) and irreversible paraphilias (as I said I was aroused the most by anal sex and rough porn scenes). Therapist said this could not be porn addiction, because porn addiction doesn’t exist. Sexologist wanted to prescribe me a potent anti-androgen drug to reduce sex drive. I didn’t agree being aware of its side effects, like gynecomastia. I wanted to get help with PMO addiction but had to accept no one would help me there. I decided to focus on your resources and trying to reduce/quit PMO all alone and later with the support of YBR.”
I am so mad at psychologists and psychiatrists
these people have so much college education apparently yet they couldnt tell me that my anxiety was caused by porn addiction? i cant tell you how many different doctors i went to and they all tried to make me go to counseling, give me pills, but guess what? I have finally been able to connect with people and realized that when i went 40 days of no pmo, no mo, i have less anxiety then i could ever remember. wtf is wrong with doctors today?
Addendum – to those asking if i had mentioned the porn to them. yes many times. even told them how addicted i am and they didn’t take me seriously. one even said it was normal to view porn just try to take it easy. yeah that’s really easy for an addict. they are frauds and scam artists
A year before I started giving up PMO, I even went to see psychiatrists and psychologists who diagnosed me with severe social anxiety disorder and depression, and wanted to put me on antidepressants which I never agreed to. When I found out that the central problem of my life (ED, lack of responsiveness to real women) that was on my mind 24/7 can be reversed, the heaviest rock was lifted from my heart.
When I went on my first NoFap streak (cca 80 days) I started noticing similar super powers as reported by others. Is that really so weird? The central thing destroying my confidence and making me feel alone on the planet of 7 billion, was being reversed and it turned out to be very common. Today, on my 109th day of NoFap, I feel happy, confident, social, smart, capable of meeting any challenge, etc., etc.,…
My liberating journey OUT of PIED (porn induced erectile dysfunction)
It has been gut wrenchingly sad and humiliating to realize that all of my ED experiences when single with hot girls who were totally up for it was DIRECTLY caused by PMO and NOTHING else….I had gone to doctors, taken testosterone supplements etc… It has also been incredibly relieving and empowering to realize I still work great down there as long as I break this nasty hold that cybersex had over my brain.
The worst thing is I’d spent loads of money on doctors and urologists, viagra prescriptions etc. and at not one point did one of them mention over-masturbation. Even when I told the urologist I masturbated normally at least once a day and have been looking at harder and harder P (was careful to mention “nothing illegal” as, well, I wasn’t looking at anything illegal and didn’t want him to think otherwise!), but at no point did he mention it. He did suggest trying some sexual health books by Masters and Johnson (but didn’t even stifle a giggle when I mentioned I would try to “master my johnson with Masters and Johnson), packed me off with some free viagra samples and sent me on my way…
This is what a wrote at the beginning of Nofap for me:
“At the Age of 20 I went to a doctor who gave me Viagra and some other ED-Meds which didn’t work for me. Another Doctor gave me powdered viagra and ixense (based on the dopamine-antagonist apomorphine) which lead at least to some degree of erection. But another test, cavernous body auto-injection therapy, failed Diagnosis: venous leakage. The Doctor told me about Penis-Prothesis……. After this diagnosis I suffered from very, very bad feelings, my self-esteem did not exist any more, today I think, it was the first time, depression striked on me.”
Since day 24 I woke up on 3 Days with nice morningwood! I did not experience this for many years! Holy Shit… Nofap is working !!!
Yesterday I was licking my girlfriend and during this process I came without stimulation… I am feeling like 13 and not like 31!!!
Just wanted to share this with you. Stay strong everybody, don’t ever let PMO destroy your life! I will never ever fap again! http://www.reddit.com/r/NoFap/comments/1hhlfm/nofap_is_curing_my_ed/
For three years, I had to deal with ED. Talk about a complete blow to ones self esteem. The sad part is that my doctor did blood work and found absolutely nothing wrong with me. My blood pressure was perfect. My testosterone levels were normal. I was in great shape. He prescribed Lavitra and told me to just not be nervous. For three years, I had to deal with planning sex with the pill or not being able to get it up. This was a low point in my sex life.
In 2013, I finally made the decision that I just wasn’t going to have sex anymore. Obviously, I had issues and I just didn’t want to deal with it anymore — until I started dating someone. Of course, without the pill, I had problems. I saw the doctor again and he gave me the same advice as when I saw him in 2009. blah. A 38 year old with ED? To me, there had to be more to the problem. This can’t be normal.
Then I found this site. I started the full PMO on February 15th of this year. I did the full PMO for 4 weeks and have avoided porn and masturbation since then. I finally had a chance to have sex for the first time in April, a few weeks ago (several times since). Needless to say, I am completely recovered! In fact, I am finding it difficult keeping flaccid, lol.
The first was a urologist who ran a blood test to check my testosterone levels and also checked my prostate (unpleasant first experience of that, urgh). In the end he couldn’t identify anything physically wrong with me, and short of actually “testing” with a real girl, there wasn’t anything he could do further. He even encouraged me to masturbate to porn more, advice which I foolhardily followed 🙂
I told the doctor I had PIED and he laughed and asked if it was a real thing.
I explained briefly what I learned from yourbrainonporn and I told the doctor to research PIED later.
He gave me some levitra and some laxapro for depression. I hope everyone is having a good day. I just want my libido back.
I’ve been at it for a solid year. Well, not solid. I’ve relapsed quite a bit. I have probably gone a month at a stretch. But most of my relapses were with real sex. Anyways, this phenomena is real. Had sex once last night, and then again this morning. I’m not 100% yet but 10 years of damage will take some time. Had sex sporadically the past month too and everything was fine.
My last step is informing my Dr who sent me to two urologists to help me. I pray we can inform the medical community so other young men can get help.
The second was some other kind of doctor that I visited for another sickness but told him about my problem anyway. After detecting nothing physically wrong again, he referred me to a neurologist. This neurologist did a fricking MRI on me to see if my brain was the one having problems, and for the final time, seeing nothing physically wrong, kinda gave me religious-ish advice such as not having guilt about masturbating as a Christian. Suffice to say, I felt like all these doctors did nothing to give me the answers I so desperately needed.
I’m a 15 year old who hasn’t been able to get a full erection in over a year to anything. When I get morning wood, it’s still not fully hard. I went to normal doctors that do check-ups. 1st time, doctor said it was stress and it will go away. 2nd time, doctor told me to warm up my penis with a hot rag (not joking) before fapping. 3rd time, doctor let me get my blood levels tested, but he said they came back normal.
[Age 51] I’m 65 days porn free now and seeing results. I’ve had ED since 2007. It had steadily gotten worse to the point that even Viagra didn’t help. I was getting depressed and desperate. I’ve been searching for ED remedies for months. I’ve tried everything, quitting caffeine, DHEA, vitamins and minerals, losing weight, adding muscle mass, increasing my cholesterol, herbs. I was starting to think it was something that I was going to have to live with, that it was just a part of aging.
I stopped cold turkey on the porn and I haven’t missed a bit. If porn robs me of real sex then it’s not worth it. My recovery’s been up and down. But my morning erections have been very consistent the past couple of weeks and the last two times I’ve had sex I got the rock hard erections I hadn’t had in years and I maintained them the entire time. And ejaculations are coming more easily and feeling so much better. The sensation of sex is coming back too. Before when I was able to get a hard enough erection for sex it felt like my penis was almost numb. Now I can feel the vagina sliding over my penis and it feels WONDERFUL.
I told my therapist about my porn/masturbation addiction when I failed to deal with it myself. He denied that such a thing could exist and recommended that I just watch porn and masturbate once every day. What terrible information. I almost dumped the therapist because of that alone. He wouldn’t even listen to me when I tried to explain to him the negative problems that arose from chronic masturbation to Internet porn (copulatory ED, brain fog, depression, etc…) doctors really need to be educated on this material.
[No indication of ED, but shows professional response]
[90 days] I definitely had withdrawal symptoms. I felt at times that my life no longer had meaning. I felt like this major thing that made me so happy was ripped out of my life. I felt depressed and irritable. But I knew I wanted to push through and get past these feelings so I would never have to “detox” again.
Slowly, I didn’t have to think about it and police myself as harshly anymore. Living without porn started to become automatic, not something I had to try extremely hard to do all day. I could relax more.
I did end up going to a psychiatrist and he put me on wellbutrin, which is supposed to help with addictive behaviors and depression. It helped me so I didn’t feel such a huge energy crash in the afternoons where my productivity dropped to zero. Things leveled off more, my mood improved, and I’ve kept up my abstinence.
I’ve also gone to a couple of SA meetings and they were good, but I also felt a little like a “lightweight” being around people who have gone to prison for sex offenses. I had to tell myself that we each are going through our own recovery and not to compare myself to them.
I went to a doctor with ED and she asked, “Do you get morning erections?” I said, “Yes but they’re weak.” So she sent me for a testosterone test. It came back normal and that was it. Sent me on my merry way.
I’m a fairly good looking guy, so opportunities for sex (especially in high school), were very common, meaning I got to fail at sex so MANY TIMES!! FUCK!! During this time I continued watching porn and jerking off, not suspecting that there was any link. I went to a doctor who tested my testosterone, prescribed my cialis and sent me to a psychologist. The testosterone was fine, cialis worked sparingly, and the psychologist put it down to nerves and told me to relax. I had a girlfriend at the time that I avoided sex with, safe to say this didn’t last long.
That failure, along with all the other casual ones, and the fact that meds, doctors, and therapists didn’t help meant that I withdrew socially, hated myself, feared that I would never be able to live a normal life, and accepted the fact that I was probably going to end up killing myself. I’m not overstating that.
Suicide became a very prominent thought in my head for a lot of years, and was often the first solution my brain offered up to me when I encountered a problem, or when I thought about sex. I would have shooting visions of stabbing myself or shooting myself or jumping in front of a car. I never planned it out or got to a point where I tried it seriously, but it wouldn’t have taken much for me to get there. At one particularly stressful time I wrapped a noose around my neck and stood there tugging on the rope listlessly – but then I got a DM on instagram, and you can’t kill yourself without checking your DMs.
Initial Rebooting and Viagra
Around four years ago I decided that porn could be a contributing factor, I had read a message board where someone had mentioned it and I thought it was worth a shot. So for three months I didn’t watch porn, but continued jerking off here and there. After not seeing any results and not knowing about all of the resources out there I started PMOing again. But it was around this time that I got my hands on some viagra. I had only had sex a handful of times in a few years (with varying degrees of success and chlamydia), but my body reacted to Viagra pretty dramatically. My dick got hard and stayed hard for the most part. So I went to the doctor and got a prescription with a bunch of repeats, and started to have a lot of drunk sex.
Side note: I haven’t researched how bad viagra is for you long term, but I can’t imagine it’s exactly a multivitamin. I’ve also had high blood pressure for a while now, which could be put down to stress and diet, but might have something to do with the large amounts of viagra I routinely put into my system for a long time. So do some research.
This boosted my confidence and reintroduced me to sex at the age of 21. I had a few flings here and there but wasn’t emotionally very involved with any of the women that I was sleeping with. It was very much just about tits and ass and pussy and fucking, which was fun, but also an impersonal element to sex, which while natural to some degree has been made worse by the pornification of our society. This kept up for about a year and a half until my anxiety and depression came back full force. My dick couldn’t get hard without a pill that was probably pretty bad for me, and my brain was yelling at me that I was still going to be a lonely little worthless loser for the rest of my life. This put me the closest to killing myself I’ve been since.
PIED Diagnosis and Recovery
And then, just as I was entering a mental health freefall I heard a comment in passing on a podcast that changed my life. A comedian was having a conversation and said something like
“…or teenagers that masturbate to porn and then can’t get hard for the real thing.” I’d seen things in passing on forums referencing this kind of thing before, but never paid it much attention because of all the misinformation and the lack of a lot of concrete information or resources, but when I heard this it clicked. After work I went home and googled the shit out of PIED. I found Yourbrainonporn, and Gary Wilson’s ted talk, I found Gabe Deem talking about it (shout outs to Gabe for being so open and unashamed about the issue, for going public with it, and for creating a platform and resource centre for people afflicted with PIED).From that day I stopped jerking off or watching porn. Which honestly wasn’t that hard for me, because after so many years of watching porn, my dick was half soft when i was watching porn, and my natural sex drive had been at 0 for a very long time. I noticed an initial desire to masturbate and preoccupation with porn-fantasy (leftovers from a habitual porn habit), but then I entered a flatline. After a month of this I entered a casual relationship and continued having sex with viagra for 5 months or so. After this I didn’t have sex or masturbate for over three months.
With no sexual stimulus or cumming I started having wet dreams. I started jerking off at age fucking 9 so I had never had enough excess cum to warrant a wet dream. Shout outs to wet dreams they fucking rule but can also be super weird and gross. I remember having one where I was fucking a a weird opening in a pillar made of alien flesh. Not something I would jerk off to but probably already a genre of porn.
After that 3 month period I got another girlfriend and have been dating her since. Miraculously I managed to hide this whole embarrassing escapade from her. I used viagra with her for about 9 months. Towards the start of the year I started panicking that I couldn’t get hard without it and had a few failures. But she was really understanding about it and didn’t seem to care. And I stopped putting so much pressure on myself to be able to perform. We have sex 2-3 times a week now, and I’ve stopped using viagra completely. I have no trouble getting hard and we have a good sex life.
Sometimes staying hard with a condom on can be an issue. When that happens I just go down on her and usually just finish without a condom (risky, but she’s on the pill, and we don’t have sex without one if I’ve already cum). Like I said at the start of this long ass post, my sex drive still isn’t where I think it should be, but I have a loving relationship built on trust and acceptance so I’m not going to start bitching. 2 year struggle – Felt suicidal due to porn-induced ED: Now I have no trouble getting hard, my GF & I have a good sex life
Porn CAN alter a person’s sexual tastes. This happened for my case lightning fast. Porn knocked me out of sexual norms. And right now I’m in a rough stage of my recovery with no professionals in my area knowledgeable enough to console me in my self-hating misery. I had asked a few professionals along the way, “Is porn safe?”, and “Can porn change your tastes”? And just only got a “nah, you’re just kinky my friend. That’s normal. It’s good for ya!”
Back in December, just before I gave up porn for good, I received treatment at a VA medical center for my erectile dysfunction. I remember even then the doctor reassured me that there was nothing physically wrong with my penis. Sure enough, since my reboot I’m having great sex now, with no issues at all.
Well today my mom was going through some old mail and it had the result of my examination on it. It read.”Your VA physical shows no erectile dysfunction abnormality or functional impairment. At the VA medical exam you report an onset of erectile dysfunction in August 2011. You also report being able to achieve an erection but not maintain an erection. You show receiving no prior treatment for erectile dysfunction. Upon physical examination the penis is normal with no evidence of deformity, masses, or tenderness. There is no urethral fistula. This VA exam diagnoses erectile dysfunction, and the etiology is identified as psychological in nature.”
The second time i went to the same doctor she just didn’t know what to do. She just told me that she had seen a lot of guys with my problem and the only thing that she could do was give me some Viagra. I tried to explain that maybe was a pornography issue and she replied saying that she’s not aware of those kind of problems, so zero help from doctors.
Reading through this page earlier in the week brought back a memory of a trip to the doctor about 5 years ago. I discussed with him the fact that I was not getting proper erections and he put it down to the fact that I was still a virgin and that once I was with a woman and had the full physical stimulation of a woman, things would be fine.
I realise now that he had no idea what he was talking about. He was clutching at straws and as soon as I mentioned that I was a virgin, he pounced on that, said what he said and told me that there was nothing to worry about. He saw that as the way to quickly dismiss me and get me out of his hair. I then, at that point also started having blood tests every 6 months to look into my thyroid etc. The medical profession has absolutely no idea about porn related ED or how to cure it.
It’s absolutely pathetic. Without awareness you cannot even begin the fight. You just carry on believing that what you are going through is simply how things are and that there is something inferior about you or something medically wrong with you.
Treatments I have attempted: I have been to an urologist. We made all the possible exams and everything was fine. Then I started using ED drugs. I have tried all of them and eventually I started using them with porn! I thought to myself that porn was the cure rather than the problem, because having a good erection would make me feel good emotionally and confident about my sexual, organic health.
The downside: the more time progressed, especially after using ED drugs with porn and even been with a escort girl, I finally realized that I actually didn’t have any sexual interest for real girls, only an emotional interest to start a romantic relationship. The problem, of course, is that women typically expect us to perform as a confirmation of her attractiveness and beauty. So it’s really tricky. And let’s face it: it’s really difficult if not impossible for a normal, real 3-D woman compete with hardcore porn. I have started a rebooting process with an initial goal of 12 weeks or 84 days, so as to monitor my progress and changes of mood, libido, possible withdrawal symptoms, etc. along the way.
I am on day 14 already and I already feel a renewed interest in getting in touch with girls and having something real. I also feel more interest in life for the mere detachment of worrying about having an erection or orgasm. This stalled my progress over the past couple of years because I was not able to deal with flatline symptoms and fooled myself into thinking that porn could help me keep up my self esteem. I think this is not the case, because I had got to a point of being addicted, masturbating to exhaustion sometimes, even though I was already trying to withdraw from porn use.
(Age 38) It only remains for me now to thank you INFINITELY for all this work you’ve done and for spreading the word rather trying to make some kind of profit out of it. My new girlfriend asked me to thank you too! I can’t bear to think how the rest of my life would have unfolded if I’d continued with these problems. I was approaching the point where I thought it would be less stressful and frustrating if I were to just forget about the prospects of building up a proper fulfilling relationship, and basically put a line through my sexuality in order to be (relatively) at peace with it.
Over the last ten years or so I’ve had various scans (like MRI), cerebro-spinal fluid analysis, endocrine analysis, nerve conduction studies (electromyograms), consulted a urologist, a sexologist and a psychologist. Not a single one has asked me about porn usage. I think there’s a real problem here. For what it’s worth, I’m doing what I can in my own way to spread the word too.
Saw a few doctors, nothing wrong physically, was always misdiagnosed – they never ask about porn. I suspected there was a link to my PMO habit but couldn’t be sure, so I kept it going. A month ago my gf left, and I decided to solve the problem once and for all, otherwise I don’t have enough confidence to approach new women. Found this group and the Tedx video, went cold turkey about a week ago, feeling a lot better already (better mood, increased vitality).
I have a friend who is a very competent psychiatrist, and I’ve argued with him for years about the cause of this crazy ED. I didn’t know what it was, but I also knew that throwing Viagra, etc. at the problem wasn’t the solution, with which he disagreed. Well, I recently talked with him after rebooting and recovering my sexual performance, and referred him to YBOP. He soon thereafter conceded defeat in our little debate. And, he is really looking forward to where the state of this new body of work will be in the years to come.
On Monday my girlfriend called me, she wanted to end the relationship. To cut it short, one of the reasons was my whole sex issue. My problem is that I am unable to reach orgasm with a woman when performing intercourse. I can however orgasm from a hand-job from my girlfriend. I believe my body has conditioned it’s self to reach orgasm through stimulation of the penis with a hand. A hand can obviously create a tighter grip than a woman’s vagina.
Onto the doctor’s visit. I basically informed him of my problem and what I thought was the reason behind it. I wanted to rule out any physical problems – he agreed I probably didn’t have any physical problems as I could actually get an erection. He went on to suggest maybe bringing in porn in to the bedroom and sex toys. He also said he could prescribe Viagra, but it would probably cost me as I have no physical problem.He (the doctor) even mentioned ‘don’t look at the fire when you’re poking it; look at the monitor or TV during sex’ . I mentioned this to my ex, and she didn’t seem up for it, and I agree it’s not right.
39 year-old heavy chronic porn user here. I know there’s a growing number of males, even in their 20s, experiencing these issues. I’ve lost all libido for a number of years, and have moderate ED. Medicine, psychiatry and psychology have investigated my case from every possible angle. I’ve been found to have ADHD, GAD and dysthymia. I’ve had a penile doppler done, and blood flow proved unremarkable. All hormones have been looked into a number of times. I’m myself a health care worker, just so you know. It’s also common in those with ADHD to have addiction issues. What I want to find out about is whether those like me who have been masturbating to porn for years have also experienced total or near total loss of libido as a result of this ?
I have suffered from Social Anxiety since I was 13 and gradually getting worse (now 26 years old). After stumbling across your article I decided to give it a shot. You hit the nail on the head and I just wanted to thank you for making a huge difference in my life! I told my support group at http://www.socialanxietysupport.com/forum about your material as well. In the back of my mind I always felt like too much masturbation and porn was causing these problems (social anxiety and erection issues). I even asked the doctors at medhelp.com. They all laughed at me and insisted masturbation is healthy and that you can’t masturbate too much.
I took Viagra and Cialis for years because of my porn induced ED. To say that after a while, they made things much worse is an understatement. Stay away from the pills if you want true healing.
A few months back I was at a point of needing to find a solution for ED. Several urologists had said my problem was psychological, but didn’t suggest how to resolve it through means other that meds. I always hated Viagra due to the flushed face feeling. Cialis was great when it worked, but over time it failed and was not reliable. Since 16, I have slept with around 100 women, so I never had an issue getting laid, until now because I am finding myself sabotaging potential interactions to avoid a potential misfire. It is becoming a big drag not being able to stay hard very long, a condom makes it almost impossible.
I will NEVER forget having an attractive, attentive, willing partner say to me “You don’t want this [sex].” The HELL I didn’t. I’d been chasing that particular experience for TWO YEARS, and then Big Jim and the Twins decided not to come to work.
I went to the doctor shortly after that, but he declared that I didn’t have a problem, because I could fap. If everything works fine when you’re by yourself, you don’t have a plumbing problem. The problem is between your ears. He gave me viagra. but it didn’t help. It says right on the box: does NOT produce an automatic boner. Sexual arousal must already exist. (I paraphrase.) It was Your Brain On Porn, which I found, ironically, while searching for more porn, that put me on this track. I went porn free as an experiment 31 days ago. I won’t say my ED is gone, but it’s greatly improved. Over the past two weeks, with two different partners I was able to achieve and sustain functional erections.
I had sex with both guys and girls, but unfortunately none of them was successful, I couldn’t get a proper erection for penetrations, I couldn’t maintain an erection when receiving oral sex. Eventually I gave up and lost interest in real sex.
I’ve seen quite a few doctors over the years but none of them solved my problems. I’ve seen more than 10 doctors this year alone and wasted thousands of dollars! I tried Viagra, Cialis, Message, Traditional Chinese Medicine, Acupuncture almost everything I could try, but no, NONE of them worked! I asked all the doctors the same question that whether my ED is caused by excessive masturbations, surprisingly almost all of the doctors assured me that masturbation won’t cause ED! And that my ED is psychological not organic.
I was so desperate for answers, so I turned to Google to see if there is a connection between masturbation and ED, and so I found Gary Wilson’s website YourBrainOnPorn.com, OMG I feel so relieved to find out that I’m not alone and that there is a way to cure myself. Suddenly I found answers to all my problems!
So I started my Nofap challenge on 1st December, now at 30 days, I feel so much better!! Starting from week 3 I started to have morning erections, which were strong enough to wake me up. Now I can also get a firm erection by stimulating my penis, although it will only last a few seconds unless I keep stimulating. I almost had a wet dream this morning, but I held back the urge to ejaculate the moment I woke up from the dream. Overall I feel more confident, more energetic and more social! http://www.reddit.com/r/NoFap/comments/2qwxqr/30_days_nofap_severe_ed_since_17_and_confused/
I’m at the start of a long road to get ED out of my life. It’s nice to see progress, but I’m going to stick with this. No P is a permanent change. No fap for as long as it takes….and very little fap after that. As someone else posted, do the next guy a favor and tell your doctor abut YBOP and this site. I’ve seen multiple doctors and have wasted thousands on office visits, drugs and tests. Education can start with you.TLDR: first successful PIV w/o meds in 7 years…after only 17 days. Stick with your plan…this works.
At 51, I went to the doctor seeking answers for my ED. He told me the same thing, “It’s all in your head”, after asking me a few questions about my sex life (nothing about porn use, though). Oh, I had blood work done a few months before that and my testosterone and other hormones were all in the normal range.
I did manage to have sex in my 20s but it was pretty bad. As soon as I’d put on a condom I’d go soft. I did manage to have one decent encounter with a condom but I think that was because I had spent all weekend with this chick and didn’t jerk off the week before she came to visit me. But the bottom line is that I just wasn’t functioning as I should. Finally, at the age of 28, I went to go see a urologist. He determined nothing was physically wrong with me (at least below the belt) gave me a script for Cialis and sent me on my way. Around the same time I discovered YBOP and suddenly everything made sense. I saw a lot of commonality between my own story and what other guys had shared. It was a HUGE discovery for me.
So, approximately 8 weeks ago I started a reboot. No porn. No masturbation. No orgasm. My goal was to have sex with a condom all the way to orgasm. I focused my energy elsewhere. I started working out more, started reading again, and tried to stay away from the Internet (unless it was related to work).
I achieved my goal! This past Friday I had sex all the way to orgasm. I used a condom with no issues. During foreplay I didn’t get hard right away but after a little bit it came back! Such a surreal feeling. Putting on the condom wasn’t an issue. I just took it slow with no pressure. And to be honest, getting off after not doing it for 8+ weeks felt awesome. She enjoyed it as well based on her reactions 😉 I never had a wet dream and I’m not sure if I ever “flat lined”. My libido did wax and wane but I never noticed a real pattern to it.
The biggest thing I can tell you is to stay away from porn and all Internet images , don’t jerk off, and be patient! I cannot tell you how many bad encounters I’ve had, how many ruined condoms I’ve gone through because I couldn’t stay hard to put them on. This is a huge step for me, like climbing Mount Everest or breaking the four minute mile or something. So hang in there guys. You can fix this.
I’ve had ED problems with normal sex this whole time, and only managed to come when she’s giving me hand jobs and I don’t tell her to be gentle about it. After a while of this I got frustrated and went to my 60 something year old family doctor and told him I had ED at the age of 21.
He asked me about how much I had been drinking when I couldn’t get erect and all of that. Then he just handed me 2 sample pills of Viagra and a prescription for a box of 4 more.I was so excited when my girlfriend came down to see me next.
I told her what the doctor ordered and after a couple wines we retired to the bedroom. It’s safe to say I didn’t go flaccid easily. It did when I had to stop for breath for about 5 minutes, but was right back up again when we got back into it. It was amazing!I had a problem though. Once again, I couldn’t come. Even with a long vigorous hand job, nothing happened. Except, my penis was pretty sore in the morning. None of it seemed fair.
After I came back home I slumped into a rut of depression, like I had many times before and wondered what the hell was wrong with me. Was I gay? Was I torn apart by anxiety? Was too fucked up from my past sexual experiences?? The list when on and I agonised over it to no end. I was like this for a while and just I felt shit, then sad, then bitter, then numb. I made my mind up that I would just go back to the doctor and get more pills.
It seemed logical; since I wasn’t having sex every day (I was masturbating instead) so why not just pay the bill and be happy? It took me to pick up my telephone and look up my doctor’s phone number before I could answer my own question. “Because I just want to be normal” “Because I don’t want something so natural to be such a problem.” I would lie in bed at night with my toilet paper beside me, a screen in front and my hand on my fully hard penis and look at it and think “Now, why the hell cant you do that for me when I actually with a real girl?”
A couple of weeks ago I Googled “desensitised erectile dysfunction” and went to the first site on the list and read about porn-induced ED. It turned on a little light in the back of my head.
120 days ago I had ED totally and could not get erection no matter what she did. We are both in the age 50-60. Then one day I surfed on web to find some explanation; First I found a lot of “doctors-pages” with explanations like anxiety, depression ………. . . . . All these didn’t match to me while I have good health both physically and mentally.
Then after some hours reading I found Gary Wilson’s website www.yourbrainonporn.com. Realized that I was really deep into a web-booty-addiction with years of 1-3 PMO every day. Started immediately on my nofap/noporn/noedge journey. Tried to have sex once every month. Got better and better. Now after 120 days I was able to have sex with full erection, long lasting and to control it and let my orgasm come when I wanted. Thanks to all of you on this website. You have given me support every day. And thanks to G.Wilson and his wife.
My wishes for the future is that the academic skilled persons among us fapstronauts will make a revolution in all kinds of encyclopedia to inform everybody about MO – that it easily leads to PMO which leads to ED.
No PMO for 10 days. I have been unconsciously unaware of my 15-year porn addiction until last weekend it clicked, and I honestly jumped out my bed saying “OMG… OMG…” I joke you not! I’m 27 at the moment. When I was a teenager I never knew much about sex, female genitals or the porn world. I never grew up with men in my life so porn wasn’t accessible during my teen years.
I remember when it all went wrong (wrong in the sense I was introduced to Miss 2-D Vagina). I was watching a German television channel when my mum worked late that night. I had never seen something so stimulating in my life. I can still remember the adrenaline rushing around my body that night. The show I was watching was explaining to woman how to have orgasms with vibrators. At the age of 14 that was Hardcore Porn. Ever since then it has fascinated me (I must sound like a creep). By the age of 15 I had porno magazines and VCR tapes, I never thought I was doing anything wrong by viewing this material. But looking back it changed my view of females as if they were for taking when I felt like it. I never had sex until I was 16.
Even then, it wasn’t special because I was just looking to have sex with anything really. Luckily it was with my girlfriend, but shortly after that I finished with her and went with a different girl. (I really broke that girl’s heart; it was her first time also.) Through the years I was an absolute sex maniac, I could have sex every night with no hiccups. I have always been a quick to anger kind of person. Everything out of my control angered me especially if a girlfriend refused me sex, even though I would have sex most days.
With the sex and porn addiction I also had a drug addiction to most drugs available on the street. Now that I’ve learned about the Limbic System, Dopamine and Receptors I can now understand why I had to have that “Hit” all the time, got the hit from sex, risky sex, drugs and drink. Basically my brain was craving shots of dopamine all the time, but I was unaware of this situation.
The last 8 years have been the worst: I was depressed, anxious, and angry, confused and didn’t know what was going on with me. I was taking anti-depressants, which never helped. Then taking anxiety medication that never helped. Then I went to anger management which never helped. Then I went to addiction counselling for my drinking behaviour, which never helped. Then I went to a psychologist who could not diagnose me.
You see, I was giving up on myself. The only thing that made me happy was having sex or watching porn to have that hit of dopamine.In the last year, I have noticed my erections have been really weak. I have premature ejaculation also, and that annoys me so much. I feel like half the man I should be. So, after a little research I came across articles on the dangers of pornography, and each click got me to this site and I can’t stop reading everyone’s posts. This site is amazing. It’s a light from heaven shining down to help me LOL.
So far I have not masturbated, watched porn or orgasmed. To be honest, I have watched so much porn I have made myself sick of it…constantly looking for new content when I was watching it. I have some withdrawal symptoms since I stopped PMO, which I would like to share with everyone:
• Headaches
• Feeling sick in the morning
• Sweating
• Always moving my legs in bed
• Forgetfulness
• Foggy thinking
• Waking up during the night
• Sleepy during the day
• Moods shifts each day or after a nap
But on the good side, I know I can beat this addiction. I’ve already sickened the addiction; I don’t want to go back to that. All I want now is my brain chemistry to reset back to a healthy balance and then I will try again in a relationship and love instead of lust over her body. I found myself in relationships with girls who weren’t physically attractive as me just to have sex with them. I found myself having sex with girls I got to know, and then never spoke to them again because I was ashamed. It was a bad, bad place to be in the world, but I now know what’s gone wrong in my life.
(Twenty-something) I have been to the doctor about this and everything is normal in terms of hormone levels, heart and all the other checks they do. They couldn’t help me. In the end they just gave me some Viagra and sent me on my way. That was useless to me anyway, as without a libido there really isn’t much point in getting an erection.
My situation in the past 15 years: lots of porn, masturbation twice a day, often fetish porn / extreme porn. I started watching porn when I was 18 and didn’t have any sexual relationship with women until I was 21 (just a short episode) and then 25. Erection was often bad or none at all. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong because during masturbation the erection was quite good (although not perfect!).
I had myself tested at many doctors and they all found out that I was absolutely healthy with one exception – low level of testosterone. I was happy that I found the solution but I was so wrong. I underwent a testosterone cure, my blood level raised to a very nice level but even after several months I did not feel any improvements at all. Of course, every girl wants sex so I lost all my relationships. My last doctor told me the problem was hidden somewhere in my brain but that’s impossible to fight.
i would never waste my time and patience on a urologist again. They are the most useless people in the medical field when it comes to erections, giving false diagnosis and telling you its all in your mind you’re just anxious. Someone high up in the medical field should be alerted of how little urologists actually know because it has to be the easiest bullshit job in the medical profession. It actually angers me how crap they really are. I would guess that they actually help 1 out of every 10 patients they see.
i’ll give you an example, for some hardcore porn users like me, the more i masturbated to porn, the more viagra started losing effectiveness and premature ejaculation started,
now if i went to a urologist and he injected my penis so i got an erection so he could take a scan of my veins and blood vessels, when it doesn’t work properly, he’s going to say its a vein or blood vessel problem, when in reality it’s my brain not communicating with my penis properly, does that make sense?
since i started my reboot Ive used Viagra once just to see if its working again properly and while it wasn’t working 100 percent it was definitely working a lot better than before i stated my reboot.
The reason for me finding yourbrainonporn is directly due to ED. Every relationship I ever had I experienced ED problems. From not being able to penetrate at all to being able to penetrate and stay erect for a couple minutes at best. Don’t even mention oral, being on bottom for sex or etc, no response at all, wasn’t enough stimulation. I used to imagine porn scenes while I was having sex in order to try to maintain a weak erection. I lost a marriage over this also. I’m now remarried to a beautiful supportive wife.
I tried all the ED drugs. I went to a urologist 5-6 times and they all said nothing wrong physically. Does this sound familiar? I tried sex therapists, they said it was sexual anxiety. Yeah, didn’t workout well there either. Turns out the truth as we know now was the dulled pleasure response perpetuating impotency perpetuating the anxiety via operant conditioning (fancy way of saying you learned to fear that you might not be able to have an erection and potentially humiliate yourself and your partner).
I am a 27 year old male who has been using pornography on a daily basis on average 1-3 times/day for the span of approximately 14 years. I hit puberty around the same time the internet really began to take off coinciding with the dreaded easy endless accessibility to pornography.
I’ve struggled with ED in every single relationship I’ve ever been in and for YEARS had no idea why. I thought there was something physically wrong with me at first.
I went to urologist probably 4-5 times to get a battery of medical exams done only to find nothing physically wrong with me. I was always recommended drugs and took one only to break out in hives with an allergic reaction. I then turned to sex therapy thinking it must be psychological since I get nocturnal erections.Strike out again (I was actually encouraged to use porn and to masturbate). What’s somewhat comical now is I used pornography likely 2-3 times a day and masturbated to orgasm the whole time this was going on and I “just couldn’t figure it out”.
I would stay up for HOURS viewing pornography and masturbating, missing much needed sleep. When porn time came it’s like nothing else in the world matters. I am an athletic guy in great physical shape in good health with this one illusive humiliating problem.
(Mid-30s) Until a few years ago, so I felt like a huge failure as there was nothing wrong medically but nothing would work. For many years I just thought I was broken as there was no cure. The urologist prescribed me Viagra in the first instance as he said that in many instances it helped kick things back into normal, even guys with psychological ED. Since then I have tried it as a helping hand, but more recently realised the best way would be to just allow the reboot period to take place, though I still wonder weather after it I should at least take it to help the first few times to get my confidence up, but then I don’t want to rely on it either…decisions decisions.<
Went had my testosterone checked and I was fine. So I googled my symptoms and BAM!!, here I am. I even recently made an appointment with my psychiatrist to tell her I figured it all out and that she was fired. Lol. The sad part is that she was not aware of this addiction and I actually taught her something. I feel fantastic now.
I’m 26, and have been having this issue since the time I was 19 years old (finally linked my excessive daily porn use to when I got my school issued laptop in college). The first time I experienced ED was when I had my first serious gf. I went to my primary care physician to see what was up, and he gave me some Viagra to get over my “mental hump” as I called it.
Up until about a year ago, this method worked fine, then I noticed I don’t even get morning wood anymore Sad. It literally feels like a lifeless piece of meat between my legs. Even when in the shower, I can recall when I was younger I’d be washing myself down there (inadvertently stroking) and would get a raging hard on from this. Not anymore. Even my most recent girlfriend I’d be able to have sex and engage in intercourse without the assistance of pills, but my erections would get lost very easily without manual stimulation and they’d always slope downward. Almost like the locking mechanism that would hold your penis erect just didn’t work anymore.
Needless to say I’ve been overly depressed about three things: 1) the fact that my dick does not stand at a 90 degree angle like it should when erect, 2) that my it takes an EXTRAORDINARY amount of effort to achieve an erection and lastly but definitely not least, 3) the fact that i need to rely on pills to have an erection at only 26 years old. Mind you, I’ve been to 4 urologists, 2 primary care physicians, 2 sexual psychologists and an endocrinologist. I’m an athlete, exercise twice a day and the consensus is I’m healthy as can be. I couldn’t be any healthier.
Exchange on another forum:
Guy # 1
I have been seeing a therapist for 3 years and we have discovered that my anxieties run pretty deep. I could quit masturbating and viewing porn for a year and it wouldn’t change much of anything. For me, the use of porn and masturbation is a way of satisfying my sexual urges because I have such difficulty satisfying them with real sex. In other words, I use porn and masturbate because of my poor sexual performance, as opposed to having poor performance because of porn and masturbation.
Guy # 2
If you haven’t even tried abstaining from pornography and masturbation you shouldn’t be posting here. We are not here to use porn and masturbation to satisfy our urges. As you can see from others’ posts, the majority of people here see huge improvements from abstaining. Most of my friends view porn and masturbate frequently, and they have no problems whatsoever, but then again not all of us have brains designed to handle all that stimulation.
Guy # 3
Most of us were actually 100% healthy before having an ED issue at some point. We don’t use p&m because of performance issues. We have issues because of it.
Guy # 4
Seriously man, you’re giving your 2 cents in the wrong forum. It sounds like you have deep psychological issues, but that’s not what we’re talking about here. If you’re in your late 50s, then obviously Internet porn wasn’t around when your problems began.
I can say with 100% certainty that I had ZERO erectile problem with real sex before I started jerking off to porn every day. Mentally I had no problem at all and poor performance didn’t start happening until I started wanted porn over the real thing. Even i it hasn’t been “scientifically proven” yet, I’m sure there are studies being done and books being written as we speak.
Guy # 5
Just because it has not been scientifically proven doesn’t mean anything. I know that all the stories here and the fact that nothing was helping with my ED symptoms until I started abstaining from masturbation show me that there is something to this.
Every place but a few on the Internet keeps saying the same crap, “Masturbation is healthy and doesn’t have adverse effects on your body! It’s actually beneficial to masturbate and have sex; the more the better! Your problem is purely in your head, you’ve got deeper issues than just masturbation.” Which I know isn’t true. I mean after stopping the porn and the masturbation, I saw a world of difference! The longer I go the better the results, and the better I feel.
You can’t tell me that masturbating two or three times daily is good for the body. I had no idea that dopamine could make me feel this way. I didn’t know that too much could have effects including thinning hair, lower back pain, pain in your groin, etc. Why would so many people be dealing with this and find their way here and topics similar to this? Why would so many people be seeing positive results with limiting both porn and masturbation?
Guy # 2
You are 50 years of age. I can’t imagine what you have been through in your life. I’m assuming you have been masturbating to VHS tapes and magazines since you were 11. Get some Viagra and take care of your family. Don’t come into this thread where people need help and try to deter them from what they really need because you “couldn’t do it”.
I can tell you from personal experience that this does work, just don’t give in . IT’S SO SIMPLE. I will be posting updates every week because this week alone has been a major improvement in my life. My anxiety is starting to diminish and my standards for women have dropped so much that when I see normal girl on the street I feel an erection coming on.
This has never ******* happened before. Everyone on this thread please follow my advice, and I know you can do it. It does WORK. Period. It’s a regimen everyone with ED who has been using porn should give a shot.
I want to thank you so much for helping me discover the cause of my sexual dysfunction in Internet porn. I have struggled with delayed ejaculation and ED for several years now, and none of the doctors and therapists I spoke to ever even hinted that porn might be a cause. They never even asked if I masturbated to porn, and I never thought to offer it as a possible cause. Your work has been a life preserver for me.
I started watching hardcore videos about 8 years ago and PMO’d daily with binges 4-6 times a month. I have been experiencing some serious ED symptoms for several months. I had never really thought it could be porn related until I went to the urologist and he suggested it was psychological since my testosterone levels were good and I am a healthy 26 year old male.
With the symptoms of porn addiction I suffered over the years, I saw a GP, Specialists, Psychiatrists and a Psychologist. Symptoms being depression, anxiety, tiredness, social isolation mainly. Not one of these ‘professionals’ made the link between the symptoms I had and porn addiction.
They sent me off for blood tests and/or gave me anti-depressants and anti-anxiety medication.What do these medications do to you? One of the major side-effects is ED. So to counter that they give you a tablet to help, like Cialis. A real vicious circle which ignores the real cause while creating a whole bunch of new problems at the same time as making your existing condition worse. And at great expense.
What I want to know is why it took internet research to find answers when none of the medical professionals I saw came close to identifying the real problem? Do the medical fraternity think porn addiction is a load of crap, are they not trained to recognise it as a major affliction affecting a whole generation or do they simply ignore it?
(Gay) Two years ago my wood began to get worse and worse, until finally RIP :(, no wood, no libido, no sensitivity in my penis………….I thought ‘this is temporary.’ But no erections even with porn. That situation frustrated me soooo much. I was worried after one month of that.
First I tried cialis and viagra, with medium results, weak erections but without sensitivity. Next, I tried going to a urologist. He ordered some tests and every was ok.
He sent me to an endocrinologist. There was an entire year of tests (and frustration) with the endocrinologist…only to tell me that my hormonal balance is okay. In that year I tried every kind of herbal supplements.
Finally, the endocrinologist sent me to psychiatrist for possible self-confidence problems as a teen. (I am 32 years old) uhmmm. The psychiatrist told me that also I was fine emotionally, apart from my frustration.
It was hard. My sexual life was a disaster. In that year, two guys left me due to my problem. I was ashamed to be with someone. I’m “fine and healthy,” but…. Anyway, I don´t know how I came up with the idea that the issue could be porn excess. (I had fallen on daily hard porn, pages and pages of hundred of guys.)
Googling “porn erectile dysfunction” I had the answer to my problem. The reason is simple: When you have daily multiple orgasm seeing Internet porn for years you overtax the reward circuitry in your brain. This problem affects women, hetero, gay, EVERYBODY. Apparently there’s a global epidemic ED caused by Internet porn.
It even affects guys under 18 who began to see porn at 11-13 (or lower ages) as well as guys in their 60´s. I can say that now I´m recovering. The solution is easy: no porn, low sexual life (easy in that state), for a couple of months. I can say that Internet porn overuse was the real cause for me. It’s two months since I began and GUAOOOOOOOOOOO I see real improvement!
I had been moving into watching some pretty hard porn. Sometimes I couldn’t get an erection with touch watching even that. Even so, I’d be wanking at least once a day, and always to this stuff. I spent a lot of time watching and downloading, watching and downloading. I was lonely, but I kept going with this stuff thinking that this was the result of an unfortunate series of developments that left me with ED, rather than being the cause of it. I never got random erections during the day, nor did I ever get morning wood.
Now, I was even having problems while watching porn. I tried to see my doctor, but he only dismissively gave me Cialis, which, if I stimulated myself to get an erection made it harder, but did nothing to make it easier to get one in the first place.
AGE 22 – I also got random out-of-nowhere ED at extremely young age. Been using Tadalafil (cialis) for a couple years. I have been to 3 doctors, 2 specialists; none could come up with an answer why someone young had it. No performance anxiety either. I perform extremely well in the bedroom, and still had issues with my girlfriend I dated for over a year. And yes, they did prescribe me cialis right away.
I jerked myself into oblivion. Suffered from all the symptoms. ED pills even stopped working. My life sucked. I was depressed but I could never put my finger on the problem. Visited psychiatrists and urologists. No one had the answer. So when I saw others in the same boat as me, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I knew right away I was an addict.
Fast forward to today. Today is day 38 of no PMO. My life has changed in every way imaginable. The fog has lifted and I’m so focused it’s ridiculous. No more depression, no more anxiety, music sounds better, I’m even stronger in the gym. I feel inclined to tell you all this because it’s not an easy road but the end result is amazing. It hasn’t even been 60 days yet, which is my goal.
I’ve had blood work done, everything came back normal. I went to another doctor who prescribed me Viagra. (I couldn’t afford it at $500/20 pills.)
Age 30 – (Couldn’t ejaculate during sex) <em>This therapist gets high marks for identifying the problem correctly.</em> Eventually, at the age of 28, I went to the doctor who referred me to a sexual health expert, who in turn referred me to a sexual therapist. This was the best thing that ever happened to me. She had resources on masturbation, and advised me to retrain my penis to get stimulation from a more relaxed grip. Eventually she gave me the ultimatum that really in order to resolve my issue I needed to refrain from masturbating to porn entirely and use my imagination only. However, motivation wasn’t my strong point.
The urologists and MD’s I have been to all told me the same: biological issues cause ED. They must be right. They deal with a lot of issues seeing as it is one of the highest paying medical issues. My urologist said porn and masturbation do not affect erections. If anything they would increase the strength due to neurological activation and stimulation. ED can happen due to vascular issues and trauma to your penis which can include but not limited to extreme temperatures such as too cold of water or too hot of water. So if you happened to take a couple too many hot baths you can actually develop ED. Also if you have ever been hit there can cause it. I have been on a proper diet and exercising regularly and heavily for years, so that’s not the cause.
I had to finally get to the point where I was with a beautiful woman, had sex that was unsatisfying for me (and probably for her), and felt the strong urge to look at porn shortly after. I knew something was wrong so I decided to not look at any porn until I saw her again.
That’s when the withdrawal symptoms started. I have heard many varying accounts of the withdrawal symptoms; let me tell you..mine SUCKED!!! To further attest to the power of this addiction, I really had no consciousness that the pain, anxiety, depression, insomnia increased need to masturbate and decreased ability to feel any pleasure whatsoever, were all related to my stint from porn. I attributed the symptoms to other things that were going on in my life, and there were quite a few stressful things going on. Needless to say, as I went pretty well insane, that relationship failed.
I went to doctors and shrinks and all I got was a bunch of pills for my symptoms which I later threw away. I knew that treating the symptoms was not going to cure the underlying problem. I had been viewing porn intermittently during this time, but the experiences were different. Now I was totally aware of the process and that my erections were many times poor during porn viewing. I became aware of my premature ejaculations and also delayed ejaculations (those that are hard to reach despite novel video after novel video).
Stopping was a scary thing for me to do because I think that I have never gone for more than a few days without ejaculation since age 15 or 16 (I’m 30). I have been a 1 to 3 time a dayer since 18 for sure. Anyhow, after two weeks porn-free, I am already starting to feel like a new man. It really feels like you’re stepping into a whole new world, and that porn is a weight that has been lifted off of your shoulders!
I am in my late 30’s, have used porn heavily since my teens, and have had ED problems for a long time – at least since my late 20’s, though it’s only recently that it’s become almost total copulatory ED. I’ve blamed it on partners (“I’m just not attracted to you”/”I wish you were more responsive”), the newness of partners (“I need to give my body time to catch up to my brain”), fitness levels, diet, age, stress, performance anxiety… And actually, all of those, except for the “I’m just not into you” factor, probably have a part to play.
Like a lot of men, I imagine, I went to a doctor, got a physical that ruled out any serious medical conditions, and got a Viagra prescription. But when I realized I could no longer even masturbate to orgasm without porn – something clicked. It seems blindingly obvious now, of course.
I agree with Shaman. I think urologists work fine for old men who have ED, but when a young man comes in with ED, they treat him like he’s another one of his old patients. I’ve been to two urologists over the past two years and neither were much help. They gave me a physical exam, Cialis, then a testosterone shot. None of them worked. Then they both told me that nothing was wrong with me and sent me on my way. They weren’t very inclined to explore other possible causes of my problem. It’s like they just followed the book and that was it.
I’ve been seeing my psychologist and discussing the topic of sex/masturbation -> anxiety with him for over 6 months now. He has this belief that masturbation is normal and should be done not like an addiction but normally for a healthy life. I told him that I go long periods without any PMO and he got upset with me.. He said, “Why are you doing this to yourself?” He said, “Just the fact you go 35 days without PMO will lead your body to go the other extreme (binge) if you slip. Why don’t you masturbate (without binging) and without to porn and see how that goes?”
[Great advice, except that an addict can’t follow it.] He does not believe in complete abstinence from sex. I told him about the rebooting technique and he either didn’t understand the point of it, or didn’t want to care what/why people are doing it. I am just confused though. I masturbate and I get anxious after the release. I don’t masturbate and the withdrawal (anxiety) symptoms come. I really need to figure out my body and see what it wants/what it doesn’t want and when…
[From Medhelp] I’m an 19 y/o guy and I have been watching porn for a while now and just recently I have a problem getting hard. Videos or photos that used to get me hard just doesn’t do it anymore. I can watch a whole video without getting hard unless I masturbate from a flaccid state to get me hard and even then I seem to lose it the second I take my mind off the porn. I am wondering if I should stop looking at porn and masturbating all together for a while to see if that changes anything?
[Doctor] “If you were having regular erections earlier, what you are facing now is sex related anxiety. This usually happens in initial stages and the problem will disappear over a time. This seems to be absolutely natural. If your morning erections are good then the cause is psychological. Mean while you should take protein diet, regular exercise, remain stress free, and remove sex related anxiety. Stop watching porn and do not indulge in excessive masturbation.”
[Question for the doctor: If the problem is purely psychological, why will stopping porn and reducing masturbation help?]
I kinda just felt separate from everyone, and as a result would drink to excess in hopes of appearing more confident… Didn’t work LOL. Thing is, I used to be so confident and popular. I even had counseling to address my ED, lack of confidence and social anxiety etc… but never was the question asked about porn use. If it had been asked, I could have sorted this a while ago.
Though in hindsight it is blatantly obvious that it was porn use which was the cause. But if a professional isn’t going to back up your hunch, and our generation is being brought up to believe P and M is normal and necessary, how was I to know? Doh!
I went to a urologist, I exercised more and fasted, drank more water, looked up psychological literature, took DHEA supplements, ate more testosterone increasing foods, all to no avail. I was depressed and miserable and considered the possibility of a hermetic life without sex. Luckily I don’t give up easily, so I kept at it, researching as much as I could to figure it out. Recently I started going to a therapist, and she gave me insight into sex addiction after I talked to her a couple times about my feelings. This started a raging passion for me to research as much as I could about it.
Age 19 – ED, depressed, anti-social, bad grades, felt crappy
My first sexual encounters didn’t occur until my mid 20’s and because of my porn use I couldn’t stay hard. It was the most embarrassing thing of my life to have a naked girl in front of me wanting to have sex and I’m sitting there with a completely limp dick at age 23. I went to several doctors who told me I was fine and gave me ED pills to try. They worked, but I hated using them because I had to plan sex. After feeling more and more depressed about my situation I started searching the web looking for answers and found YBOP.
After reading through everything I realized there was a good chance my problems were porn related and decided to go through a reboot. After almost a month past my initial 90 day reboot I’m proud to say that I’ve been having a healthy sex life and I’m able to get 100% erections and maintain through sex. Considering at Day 1 I wasn’t able to get hard at all, alone or with a girl, I’m so happy that the reboot process has helped me to gain myself back. I feel like I should and I feel like a man again. My life has completely changed for the better and I haven’t been this happy in a long, long time.
My main problem for about 3 years now (I’m a 20 year old male) has been chronic fatigue and brain fog. There honestly has not been a single day in the last 3 years where I was not very tired to the point I could nap. In fact, I feel like I could have slept at any point during that time except for the ~2 or so hours after I wake up from sleep. The reason why getting over the fatigue/lack of concentration is my main priority (as opposed to ED) is because of my past. I hate to sound cocky, but I was a REALLY smart kid in high school (just finished my 3rd year of university). I just understood things. I was a very good problem solver, and my memory was excellent.
The high point in my life was when I graduated high school. I was tall, in good shape, graduated at the top of my class, full ride to a local university where I could have been anything I wanted, had support of loving friends and family, etc. Things were perfect. But then, almost like a curse, as SOON as I started university the problems began to come on. I don’t really know how much I was masturbating but it was too much and it started catching up with me.
…A lot of doctors f****** suck. They don’t listen to your problems at all, and are so goddamn quick to prescribe some stupid anti-depressant. It made me feel like I was just another item to check off on their list of daily activities. I’m not depressed; at least depression isn’t the root of my fatigue/mental issues. If anything, I may feel depressed from time to time BECAUSE of my primary troubles, the fatigue and concentration.
I swore if I ever became a doctor that I would be better than the ones I’ve experienced. That I would listen and actually care for each individual. Anyway, I digress. Believe it or not, I diagnosed myself one day after putting in a combination of my symptoms in a Google search. I was shocked when I found a page titled “Adrenal Fatigue Symptoms” that listed everything I searched for and other symptoms which I was also experiencing.
I did a lot more research and found out that the main cause of this condition is too much stress on the adrenals. I was like ???huh??? I was the exact opposite of “too stressed” when problems began to arise. My naive ass didn’t initially make the connection that all of my masturbation was stressing my body out. It was bittersweet to find out what my problem really was.
Prior to coming here I did a lot of experimenting with gluten, chronic fatigue, hypothyroid, b12, vitamin d, etc. Some of it helped a little but to not to the point where you would feel like the root cause would disappear.
I was a virgin till 21 (late bloomer) used to masturbate on weekends away from the army like a madman (5 times a day) to those porn tubes websites. Started at age 12… A year ago i got a seriously hot girlfriend but to my surprise nothing happened down there. I was death griping like hell, only erect while sitting down and in need to think or watch porn to remain erect. I even used some tranny porn at the end…
Went to a doctor, who gave me pills that didn’t help at all, he told me its ok to watch porn when I really feel like it (great advice to give to an addict…)
I was totally screwed up, and couldn’t figure out a reason for it. Not too long ago, I visited a physician and she advised me about low Vitamin B count. I completed a 5-injection course of vitamin “B” but it didn’t help.
Here’s my story: 23 y/o male, been fapping since as long as I can remember, multiple times daily. Have had some steady relationships in the past, never was able to O from BJs. In a great relationship nearly 5 years now and decided to start NoFap after confronting so many young patients with ED issues in the pharmacies I work at.
I could not comprehend how so many individuals at such young ages have ED issues, and the TED video made me realize this about myself as well, even scared me a little. Throughout this journey my overall physique has greatly improved, have become a regular in a new gym I joined, bought a bike to ride everywhere now, and finished schooling for pharmacy. My SO loves that I have started this and has noticed my performance boosts in bed. I can O from BJs now! My more obscure fetishes have subsided, which was really getting to me.
(Age 37) I never realized I had a problem until now. Experiencing all classic symptoms: ED, desensitization, progressively kinkier tastes, soft erections (is this an oxymoron?), plummeting libido, etc. I’ve been on a wild goose chase to resolve sexual issues for years trying all kinds of medication, therapy, self-help, acupuncture, etc. but never attributed it to porn. Mental issues: HOCD (started with shemales), addiction, depression, frustration, guilt, not socializing, double-life, falling in love with images, acting out fantasizes in real life (worst thing I ever did).
Keep in mind, I’m a “pillar of the community”, successful businessman, and take care of my family and friends. I’m a so-called moral backbone in my community even though I have a secret addiction that has been trying to hijack my life (but thanks to your site and external links, I won’t let it). Not one doctor, therapist, psychology, or psychiatrist I have seen had ever related any of my issues to over-masturbating/being addicted to porn. In fact, they never even asked about it. I brought it up, and they said it was “normal”.
[From an 18-year old] Many websites, addicts, doctors, therapists and people in general say that there is no way that PMO leads to ED. By reading the accounts here I would say all these people are deluded. I don’t know why they say and promote such things without having knowledge on the issue. I am sure many guys wouldn’t be in their current dilemma if some one had not previously lied to them about the harmlessness of PMO.
At about 26, after a fairly significant health issue, I did an about face and decided to drop that weight, get into the gym, start running, eat better and be healthier. As a result my PMO dropped off slightly because I had less time on my hands, but I was still right there at the computer desk at least once every other day or few days. I even briefly saw some ED improvements, but even when I was getting back to where I wanted to be body-wise I was still having issues and I began to think I was having more of an organic issue with my equipment downstairs.
I talked to my doctor after some serious talking myself up and swallowing my pride. I tried Viagra and it only helped a little bit, and usually only after I’d slowed my brain down and gotten close to falling asleep, then I’d be ready to rock, as it were. Only really decent SO sex I had was with the morning wood and even that had begun to deteriorate and be pretty infrequent. It was great when it worked, but 19 times out of 20, not a whole lot happened down there. I’d get some arousal, but I’d have to usually hold on down there to penetrate. Oral was a waste of time.
I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me and it was tearing me up inside and last year I felt myself becoming more and more depressed about it. I’d have an occasional girl throw herself at me and I’d actively avoid it because I knew I’d be disappointing in bed. I was a mess.
About a year ago, a long-term relationship ended (with the girl I thought I would marry) due to erection problems. During the relationship, I thought it was due to work/life stress and the problem would just correct itself over time. I tried going to the doctor/therapist, using viagra/cialis, rings, kegels, herbal supplements, etc but nothing worked.
I even went to a urologist that specialized in ED and he performed some tests by injection and measuring blood flow. All tests indicate that I am physically okay. To give some history, I didn’t even start masturbating until 18 (in my late 20’s now), and I didn’t start watching porn until I was about 22. Before 22, my erections were always strong and I never had any problems with my girlfriends. From 22 onwards, I masturbated to porn (3-5 times a week) and did not have sex for about 2 years due to focusing on work. When I started dating again, around 24, I noticed my erections were weaker and by 25, I basically had full blown ED.
I finally saw a urologist for my ED this week and guess what? My genitals are perfectly fine. He advised me to take viagra or cialis on occasion. Great, that’s what I want to do – being 28 and healthy as could be…. He also mentioned that i should see a sexual therapist but told me in the same sentence that there isn’t one in my town anymore.
I’m 25 and have had erectile dysfunction problems since I was 18. I was prescribed cialis and viagra temporarily when I went to the doctor at 19 yrs old after failing to get an erection ten times with five different girls (I was persistent but the girls weren’t willing to be patient enough).
Anyway, I lost my libido and my confidence with women and basically gave up despite having medication. I waited two years before losing my virginity with the help of the blue pill.
Problem 1 : getting an erection, solved with medicine Problem 2 : Couldn’t ejaculate despite being aroused.
So I went into another depression as I couldn’t orgasm with my girlfriend. It was awful really. After trying for many weeks it was clear that the only way I could come was by me or her masturbating me. Needless to say, the relationship never worked out.
SO . . . not discouraged completely, I went searching for answers. I came across no fapping (sorry, no pun intended) and it was like a light flipping in my brain. It seemed so obvious.
I relapsed after 3ish weeks the first time and returned a few months later with determination. I’m now on 85 days.
I met a girl six weeks ago and we had sex two weeks ago. Basically, I managed to get aroused without medication and stayed that way until I ejaculated after being stimulated by her vagina after about five minutes of intercourse and a lot of foreplay. It was the best feeling I have ever had. We have since started having regular sex and none of my previous problems have as yet returned.
I can see now that masturbating daily since I was 12 wasn’t at all good for me personally, and without masturbating I have seen improvements physically, mentally and of course: sexually.
[Age 25] ED again, but this time it hurt, because I was so in love with this woman. I tried to do everything I could… Saw a physician, tried viagra, all to no avail. The problem persisted.
And yes, I have been checked. I saw a urologist a few years ago and he wasn’t sure why I would have ED since everything that normally indicates a problem with your dick checked out ok. He ended up prescribing me Levitra and guessing that I had a venous leak in my penis as there was no other organic indicator that I should have ED.
I was happy to get the drugs – and they worked at keeping my dick hard – but I would still only orgasm 50% of the time at most. I knew it was just a bandaid because I could maintain a solid erection for an hour and orgasm multiple times a day if I was watching porn.
My wife got so frustrated that she actually let me watch porn while we were having sex a couple of times, but I still couldn’t orgasm
At 24 I met a girl and we really took off, we were into each other massively. I decided to tell her about my body image issues and anxiety. This was very, VERY difficult, because I’d never told anyone. Fortunately she was very supportive and stuck with me. We tried sex, but I still couldn’t get an erection.
I still put this down to anxiety and my past failed attempts at sex, so I got some sexual counselling to help me over-come it. In all honesty, it didn’t really help at all. Sex for the first year of our relationship was dreadful, not once did I feel like I was having real sex, or even turned on (which I could not get my head around, because my girlfriend is very attractive to me). I felt so bad for my girlfriend for putting up with it. I tried Viagra and Cialis too, still no erection.
What became apparent after a year of the relationship, was that I was comfortable with my body (pretty much) around her, and I realised I didn’t feel that anxious when in bed with her. I became massively aware that I couldn’t get turned on by her. I also realised that for the last few years, I didn’t find any woman sexually attractive, unless they were in a porn film. I had a feeling porn could have something to do with it, and read a few stories on porn induced impotence, but I didn’t really believe it was possible.
I was watching a lot of porn at this point, behind my girlfriends back. Multiple scenes at once for hours at a time, but I never really felt completely hard. Obviously, I was very worried and as a result watched more and more porn to try and get 100% hard. I’d also realised that my penis didn’t feel as sensitive as it used to, and I never really felt satisfied.
More recently, I did more research into porn induced ED and this time took it seriously. Viagra and Cialis didn’t work for me, counselling didn’t, so I had to give it a try.[9 weeks of no porn] I think I still have a while to go yet, but my confidence is much greater now and my anxiety has reduced. I feel like myself again and feel like I don’t have to pretend I’m someone I’m not. Talking to girls is much easier now and socialising in general I’m finding so much less stressful.
As a whole, I feel great. For the first time ever, I have been feeling turned on and just generally feeling in the zone, horny and relaxed. I’d never felt turned on before naturally, it’s feeling great. Occasionally, we do try intercourse, and recently that has been very successful (though very quick haha). I’ve felt turned on and much harder than I’ve ever been with her. I feel greater sensitivity in my penis, and it feels how I always hoped it would feel. For the first time in my life, I feel as though I am having real sex.
MEDHELP QUESTION:
Hi i am a 27 year old male living in England. I am suffering from erection problems. I have been masturbating 3 to 5 times a day since i was 11 years old and i have not been able to get a full erection for the past 5 years or so. I have a girlfriend who i have been with for the last 9 years but when we have sex i can never get my penis fully erect. Over the last year or so my erections have been getting weaker but i still masturbate 3 to 5 times a day. When i masturbate my penis is not fully erect but i can still achieve orgasm.
My question is are my erection problems due to this amount of masturbation and if i stop masturbating will my erections return to normal? Also i have not had an erection in the morning after waking since i was a teenager. I’m not taking any medication.
ANSWER from SEXOLOGIST on MEDHELP:
You can have orgasms and enjoy them, but something is inhibiting your desire to be sexual. This is probably an issue that’s been affecting you since puberty. Generally, desire is affected by attitudes. So what are your attitudes about sex? Where do they come from? And what are your attitudes about relationships, and where do they come from?
Something is causing you conflict, and you need to figure out what it is.Nothing you can buy on the Internet is going to affect your erections. None of these substances has ever passed any scientific test of effectiveness.And no one can predict whether anything is permanent. There are too many factors which can be affecting your desire/erections.
As I said, try building up sexual tension; it may override your lack of desire. If not, first step is to become your own sex therapist and examine the issues I’ve raised. If you can’t come to any conclusions, write back, and we’ll start over. Also: just in case, here are some physiological issues which can contribute to partial erection. You might want to see a urologist to rule these out.
Inhibited blood flow to penis affected by:• Diabetes• Vascular anomaly• Low blood pressure• Heart condition
Dr. JPATIENT AGAIN: I have already been tested for all those things plus testosterone levels, high blood pressure, cholesterol and even a 7 day ECG monitor by my GP and everything has come back “normal.”
(Age 22) For as long as I can remember I masturbated up to 3 times a day – even when nothing would come out when ejaculating!! I had a girl over, and lost my erection. It’s really been the final straw. It’s left me mentally distressed. The last month has been horrendous – to the point where the doctor prescribed me Sertraline. One side effect is that it can cause ED! Not what I need right now…
My last g/f broke up with me because of the porn related ED. At the time I didn’t know it was porn related. I went through a lot of things. I went to therapy, I saw a doctor, I even tried herbal remedies. For a time the ED subsided – because I was going without porn for a while without even realizing it. SO me and my g/f for a time were able to have sex regularly again. It was then that I became brave and watched porn again – and the problem immediately returned.
Don’t even get me started about doctors. I live in one of the major US cities and went to see two (because I wanted two opinions) of the top urologists in that city. Both of them came in, did a 10 minute exam, and then prescribed the Cialis. They hinted that it may either be age related (i’m early 40s and in excellent health so that didn’t make sense to me. especially since i’ve read you can have normal erections into your 70s) or just performance anxiety.
They never asked me any questions about the nature or symptoms of my ED. You would think they would have asked questions about morning erections, sex with women, porn, etc etc. Nothing. Just gave the Cialis. You’d also think that they would be looking at each case on an individual basis and thinking, hmmm.. healthy guy, no history of injury or ever having any psychological problems, what could be causing this? They don’t look for cause, just quick band-aid fixes.
She’s never really known how much I would PMO, but she knew it happened. During the early stages of our relationship I went to see my general doctor, a urologist, and a therapist. I followed all their advice, took the pills, did the breathing exercises, but still always had the same results. Typically I would get semi-hard, then lose it quickly. I would just hope I could get it in fast enough for either of us to feel something.
I went to urologist. All my tests came out fine even the nocturnal test I did. I didn’t get a venous leak test because I don’t think the doctor saw the need because the nocturnal tests were fine. He gave me samples of Viagra those worked fine for a while then those eventually stopped working. I believe this might be from the PMO at the time. I don’t want to rely on a pill.
I haven’t had a libido for about 2 years and I’m 17, so this has pretty much completely destroyed my life. At this point [36 days no PMO] I haven’t had my libido return, and very, very rarely have morning wood. I went to the doctor about my testosterone levels and he said not to worry.
My gf is my life’s big support but I cannot expect her understanding, she is too hurt. My parents don’t understand why I did this when I have a woman. My psychiatrist didn’t really help, he didn’t even want to know about my paraphilia [HOCD], just blamed Asperger’s for all. The first sexologist I went to just told us to do whatever worked, and as you know, that doesn’t work that well…
This came to a head (sorry for the pun) when I met someone over Summer. However I couldn’t achieve erections sufficient for penetration with her and what would should have been a series of great sexual experiences, left me humiliated. I went to the doctor; my health is fine although I have cut back on alcohol for obvious reasons. He pretty much said it was in my head.
I knew that deep down porn was the reason but I was desperate for a quick fix. I tried Viagra, this gave me an erection but my penis felt ‘detached’ from my body. It wasn’t a genuine erection and I felt little from it. Furthermore I thought it was ridiculous that I had to take drugs for something that should be natural, so I stopped taking them (plus they are really expensive – I’m a full time student and can’t afford the cost). http://www.reddit.com/r/NoFap/comments/2tmj1a/thank_god_i_found_this_forum/
I’m 43. in excellent health. No heath problems. When I first had my intermittent ED problems I saw two of the top urologists in my city. They both examined my penis for 2 minutes and just prescribed cialis. One mentioned it may be performance anxiety, the other mentioned it is probably age related.
No questions about anything. I’m guessing the penis exam was fine. They didn’t say there were any problems. So I’m guessing my penis is healthy too. I never took the cialis because I just had this intuitive feeling there could be another cause to my ED.
I have been masturbating to porn for 20 years and once a day for the past 5 years. In fact, I did the same thing a lot of guys did that was the worst thing you could do. If I was with a woman and had ED, I would go home an masturbate MORE to make sure everything was working properly. Well, I started having ED with masturbation and porn.
My psychiatrist said that my porn use is because of me being Aspergers, meaning my ‘stereotypical behaviour’ is that I am doing masturbation and porn. He says that even if I stop it for a while, I will get back to it because of my Aspergers (‘m’ and ‘p’ could be my ‘special interest’ as written by T. Attwood in his books about Aspergers. That’s how I translate what my psychiatrist said).
I have been to the doctor and explained my lack of erection, and he has prescribed Viagra. I have not tried this yet, but thankfully I found this information before I did, as it is highly likely it would not have worked. To conclude, I have not looked at any porn images or videos since meeting this woman. I have suffered from restless sleep since. I would previously have lusted after women in the street, but this desire faded when the porn use stopped, but is gradually returning. The sensitivity is slowly returning to my penis, and I am getting morning wood again. I will NEVER again look at internet porn.
(Reply from another guy) I went through a lot of (expensive!) therapy several years ago at the request of my then gf. While it helped in a number of ways, including learning meditation techniques, it was always somehow unconvincing in its explanations and objectives. So, I agree 100% that there is a science information-gap.
Part of the confusion derives from the fact that sexual impulses are a natural human drive, in contrast to gambling, drugs, smoking or other addictions. Accordingly, there is a widespread perception that MO is completely natural in a way that drug-taking clearly isn’t, and therefore it cannot be an ‘addiction’.
This was the confusion that was unclear in my mind until coming across this site, which for me was like a ‘light bulb’ moment – it’s not just P, but also MO that has to be addressed to ‘re-wire’. It seems the medical/psychological profession are behind the curve on these matters, so I absolutely would not buy-in to the suggestion that PMO is somehow incurable or an inevitable lifetime cycle.
One of the first few things that I did when I had ED issues was visit a doctor due to the insistence of the girl I was seeing. I took numerous blood tests and my testosterone, DHEA, Prolactin, etc were all at healthy levels. This urologist told me point blank, “You have no physiological issues that could cause ED.”
Something happened my junior year of college that nearly shed light on my problem. I had decided to stop watching porn. I lasted for 3 weeks – and during this time felt amazing – I was able to focus in class, was not depressed, was approached by girls in my classes (which I was too insecure to take advantage of). I was hyper-motivated, scored high on all my midterms, and even surprised a few T.A.s at my recall abilities. Shortly after this however, I started to lose interest in girls (I was flatlining, but I had no clue that this was it). I began to feel afraid that I was gay. And so, every encounter with a guy who was attractive was avoided. I didn’t realize until years later that this was without doubt HOCD.
I even went to a therapist to talk about this. I couldn’t explain why I had no interest in girls. As a result, I became afraid, and went back into porn. My grades dropped a bit, and I felt completely worthless. What I couldn’t understand is that I felt like I was getting “dull” – like it was harder to retain information. In class, all I could think about were girls and my lack of them. I also developed a negative attitude towards girls – as if they were just out to hurt me.
Little did I know it was me who was rejecting myself – not them. In fact, the funny thing is, I ALWAYS had girls around me – studying with me, going out and dancing with me, subtly suggesting that we should “hang out” more (a depressed guy with low self esteem can’t catch onto subtle cues – it’s like a person who hates the way they look in photos, but in reality usually looks good).
Once I realized my problem, I quit PMO immediately. Fortunately at the time, I had no access to the internet at home (I would not have been able to give P up otherwise). It was crazy hard. The withdrawals were incredibly difficult for the first few weeks. I could barely hold on. I resulted to watching some “soft” porn at work – just to watch, not even to Orgasm. I eventually stopped this behavior. I learned that this made cravings more difficult. I eventually stopped watching TV as well – the “hot” scenes made it difficult to sleep at night. I abstained from Porn for over three months, but not from Orgasm. From Orgasm, I’ve probably lasted about 3 weeks. I’ve often told myself that an O is better than going to P. In a way, it was how I stood afloat.
However, although I felt much better, each time I hit the 2 week mark I started to feel grand, like something was happening inside me – life felt better, and in regards to women, I was less desperate and more interested in living life the way I wanted. I was more creative, often writing stories for hours. I was sharper – and I could even speak a second language more fluently. I felt confident – barely doubting my intentions or whether I would “make it”. The non-porn me is quite different from the porn-me. It’s like night and day.
Around 2000 I fell into a vicious cycle of porn & masturbation. It started out slowly but before long I started having ED issues. At first I had no idea that porn was the root of the problem. I went to my doctor and he gave me a prescription for ED pills. The pills helped but I did not have the desire and drive for sex that I did years before and getting and maintaining an erection was very difficult. I somehow managed to maintain relationships I worked a lot so I’d blame my ED on tiredness, stress & heavy things on my mind.
I’m 27 and have been suffering with ED for a few years now. Though at first I did what everyone does and just plain tried to ignore it. I eventually went to see the doctor about it. The answers he gave me had never been quite satisfactory. When I initially visited, he ran tested for diabetes and testosterone levels and stated there was nothing physiologically wrong with me, and therefore came to the conclusion that it must be anxiety based.
This was not a good answer for me because, without sounding conceited, I am not an anxious person. I’ve never had any major confidence issues, and when I couldn’t attain an erection in bed with my girlfriend the primary emotion I felt was pure bewildered confusion (shortly joined by frustration). Some moments felt pleasurable, but most of the time I found myself thinking that I was just trying to convince myself it was pleasurable. This was not good.
This issue has caused me and my girlfriend both a lot of stress. We’re childhood friends (and quite possibly soulmates if someone could scientifically prove they exist for me) and completely and utterly in love. However, being single for the past five years had led me to what I now realise to be a unhealthy reliance on internet porn. One that continued once we started dating due to our respective jobs keeping us away from each other for lengthy periods of time. Once we started failing to sleep together, I started taking Cialis from my doctor as a first trial and got nowhere with it save buzzing headaches. I quickly gave it up (that stuff’s expensive) and tried to search for a more effective method.
I didn’t start taking random herbal medicines as randomly suggested by the internet (other than zinc at one time). Being told by the doctor that it was most likely performance anxiety led to me constantly trying to psychoanalyze myself in the hopes of finding some hidden repressed feeling or memory that could explain what was to blame. The problem was, besides my self satisfying sexual habits, I hadn’t any real issues. I don’t smoke, do drugs or drink. I exercise regularly, have a good job, run a karate class on the side and have all sort of wonderful hobbies. I’ve got great friends who watch out for me and vice versa and overall have a life I couldn’t really complain about.
Personality wise, I’m calm, hard working, like thinking outside the box about stuff generally considered weird by most people I meet. Overall I figured I couldn’t be mentally screwed up compared to people out there with actual mental health issues, so it didn’t seem logical that I had some repressed anxiety.
And naturally like an idiot I had completely disregarded porn as a possible cause for my issues, mainly because I couldn’t find any information stating as such online or in psychology journals. The only thing that kept cropping up was how masturbation could prevent prostate cancer and several articles even stating that porn has no detrimental effect on performance.
At times I did try simply stopping. The longest I lasted having cut off porn and masturbation was fifteen days, but started up again after it simply didn’t work to improve performance in the bedroom. It also left me highly irritable and even more frustrated. (In retrospect as I type this now I realised that I was even counting the days -how could I not realise this was an addiction?)
I have experimented with Viagra, Cialis and Levitra to medicate ED and in fact I have dozens of pills left which I don’t even intend to use anymore. My experience has been that it’s also detrimental to sexual health. To compound the problem, I have used ED medication with hard core porn. It’s the fastest way to lose interest in sex and compound the problem of ED. The bottom line is that ED drugs can make a penis erect with less stimulation, but it feels like a fake erection. This made me realize that after all, an erection should be an experience of emotional and spiritual bonding between partners, and also not a goal in itself.
Continued symptoms over the next few months lead me to see a Primary Care Physician leading to a referral to a Urologist. My testosterone levels were normal, he check for a prostate infection/inflammation and found everything to be fine. This lead to a default diagnosis of “Performance Anxiety” and a sample of Levitra to get me back on track. I disagreed with the diagnosis as I had always been very confident in my abilities prior to my first noticeable symptoms, so why would I all of the sudden be anxious about it? The Levitra gave me an erection, but was not the answer. As a 24 year old otherwise healthy male, I wasn’t ready to rely on a pill to have sex with a girl I was very attracted to.
I have been masturbating to porn for years. I’ve lost all libido for a number of years and have moderate ED. Medicine, psychiatry and psychology have investigated my case from every possible angle. I’ve been found to have ADHD, GAD and dysthymia. I’ve had a penile doppler done and blood flow proved unremarkable. All hormones have been looked into a number of times. I’m myself a health care worker, just so you know. It’s also common in those with ADHD to have such addiction issues.
i went to a Psychiatrist and told him everything including the porn addiction. He didn’t believe porn would cause ED and described me 40mg (maximum doseage) of Citalopram for “motavation”. I took it because i thought it would help me with my porn addiction as well.
Well it helped for some time and i was happy with my gf but soon i got headaches and noticed that the citalopram cuase ED as well (GJ Doctor). In this time a relapsed now and then but it was kinda alright. So i went to my normal doctor and he prescribed me some other antidepressant that calmes down and has the same sexual side effects as citalopram (again wtf). So i chose to not take it.
But i ddn’t know that if you stop a antidepressant abruptly, you get an even worse depression. I was so fuckin’ agry and depressed in that time, plus the mood swings from porn withdrawl, i ended up breaking up with my gilrfriend because i thought my porn addiction wouldn’t get better and i hated being around her because of the depression adn mood swings. After that time i worked at alow wage job living at home adn taking some drugs to understand myself and magical cure myself (retarded i know).
Then I started having problems (in college). I would lose my erection trying to put on a condom. Hey, must be nerves right? Lack of sleep? Condom too tight? The porn continued. It kept happening. Sometimes I could manage to get hard enough to get it on and even have sex but it definitely was not working correctly.
The porn and the ED continued even after I graduated. I just thought I had a strong libido and to be fair maybe I did. But the masturbation, porn, and orgasm began a crutch when I was stressed and a drug when I wanted to escape for awhile. I did it every single day. Of course, the ED kept happening. I’d have a beautiful woman naked wanting to have sex with me and it wouldn’t get hard to save my life. It’s beyond frustrating. I’ve missed so many opportunities.
I went to a urologist who did the standard once over, tested my testosterone levels, declared me normal, and gave me some cialis. I was 28, fit, and using Cialis. In the back of my mind I knew this couldn’t be the answer.
I’ve actually been to a certified sex addition psychologist… I went for a few sessions earlier this year (before signing on here,) and then decided it wasn’t for me. First off, it was expensive, $100 bucks a session. Then he wanted me to take a huge questionnaire for another $179, which told me that I was really screwed up (like I didn’t already know this) and said I was borderline needing in-patient care because my addiction was so deep-rooted.
Then he wanted me to buy a start up kit with books and cd’s for another $395, plus get involved in another support group which costs $400. Then he talked about getting my family involved, and said a full recovery usually takes at least 3 years. He said the success rate is very high, and it was called something like the “gentle path” system. My thought is, this “gentle path” program is probably like the long drawn out way of recovering.
Sure it might work, but then you’re labeled as an “addict” or “recovering addict” for years, and your family, friends, and whoever else is all going to know about it. I told him thanks, but no thanks… This is not for me. I’d rather try the 90 days, ripping the band-aid off, reboot instead.
(Age 20, Day 61) Saw an endocrinologist who confirmed that there is nothing physically wrong with me that would cause ED. Been getting more morning erections, and have had several instances when I got them in public from seeing an attractive girl. I spoke to my doctor about the fact that I’ll be seeing my ex-girlfriend next weekend, and he actually recommended taking Viagra as a way to get over the performance anxiety. He called in the script for me.
(Age 50) Suddenly around 7 years ago got ED big time. It was like an off switch. Wouldn’t even work for my fav P! Went to the doc with the GF at that time in tow who knew nothing about the PMO and all tests were fine. Slightly low T but that wouldn’t cause the complete lack of life down there. Got Cialis prescribed and I was back in business with the GFs and PMOing daily for another 7 years!
A little over a month ago the Cialis would sometimes no longer work with the GF and that’s when I did an internet search on “Porn ED”. Holy crap was I surprised at what I was reading.
I figured what can I lose and immediately stopped the PMO with only one M in the shower without an erection the first week and one the second week but still with no erection at all. After that it was dead down there for the rest of the 30 days. Flatline I guess. I just happen to be between GFs so it is perfect timing.
I hung in there for the rest of the 30 or so days and then it happened I had my first wet dream ever! Morning wood only once or twice now. This freakin works! I can’t wait until I get my next GF! So in a nutshell about a month with almost no PMO and I’m seeing major progress.
I went to urology, endocrinology, psychology and finally psychiatry. No one gave a good reason and there was no solution. Endocrinologist (after all kinds of analyses) basically told me go to psychiatry, but meanwhile to “take some viagra and join ’em, ’cause what you don’t use eventually atrophies” (all with a sardonic smile). Basically “use it or lose it”.
I was desperate, because I also lost my sensitivity. I was thinking of speaking with a neurologist because it’s like I lost the connection to my penis. I knew it was my brain, or something neurological. I even thought the cause might be pornography. No F****** specialist gave me a reason, and viagra and cialis made me feel worse than ever. Fu**! I knew it, I knew it.
Sometimes I would watch porn and masturbate 4 times a day! Sometimes I just masturbated 2 or 3 times a day. I had a girlfriend all thoughout high school and we never really had a problem sexually except sometimes I couldn’t get off from oral. I never really worried about that though.
When I started college, I was in a new relationship and in the beginning we had a great sex life. And then one day, all of a sudden, I lost my erection while having sex. I was only 22 (24 now) and I could not explain it. I never had any physical problems or anxiety problems when it came to sex. So I tried everything. Pills, kegels, even went to my doctor. Nothing worked.
And when I continued to not get strong erections, and started ejaculating pre-maturely, I started to worry a lot, which of course didn’t help. I now have to have my girlfriend give me oral to get a strong enough erection. When we kiss I can get an erection, but when I go to penetrate it often disappears and she has to give me oral. And when I do get in, I go in like 2 minutes. It’s so frustrating and annoying.
Luckily I have a very caring and loving girlfriend :). I kind of realized something was wrong when I didn’t get morning wood or spontaneous erections, and regular porn did not arouse me (sometimes my erection would go down while watching and masturbating to it), and I didn’t get turned on by my girlfriend as easily. I also lost a lot of motivation and became lazy, which was not me at all.
I got some Viagra and that helped SOMETIMES. Had a bunch of sex partners for a couple years. A few fucking horrible (excuse my language) experiences. I realized this is messed up. I should be able to get rock hard in a few seconds no matter what. But the attraction to regular girls wasn’t there. I knew they were hot as hell, but my dick didn’t want to agree with me. To make things confusing for me too, I still till this day get very strong morning wood.
I saw my doctor, he blamed everything on performance anxiety, which kinda made sense ’cause of all the shitty experiences. Maybe my head wasn’t it in. But as a frequent PMO guy, i didn’t realize that my dick should be hard as hell very easy with little effort, and I should have strong sensitivity there too. So I listened to the guy and took the drugs.
All day I have felt as horny as ever. It probably has something to do with being at work all day surrounded by angels. Seriously guys, I am 30 and, until I discovered my PMO addiction and this site, I was convinced that this level of virility was simply gone with age.
I was buying in to all that western medicine corporate propaganda with Viagra commercials starring guys in their 30’s. Have you all noticed that? It seems that lately Viagra and cialis have been targeting younger and younger guys. Anyway, it is all BULLSHIT!
Though the great libido pendulum in my brain is not likely done with all of its bouncing around, I am seeing dramatic improvement. Today was simply incredible [many spontaneous erections]. 48 days and pressing on. I plan to go 90 days or until I feel like the improvements have reached a general plateau.
There was, and still is, next to no pro-active guidance on this issue. That is, no med-health sites having heavy PMO on their list of likely causes of ED.
(Age 26) The last part of the story I suppose is about me trying to find a cure for my copulatory impotence, and, as time went on, my ever-worsening ED. I searched for quite some time to find anything useful and initially all I found was articles telling me to work out more (which was no use – I already worked out more than I had time for), to eat healthily (healthy eating concerns were already starting to take over my life), and to masturbate MORE!
I’d always linked masturbation with porn, and so I started daily PMO. This helped get rid of my sexual frustration from working out, but my PMO sessions were anywhere from 45min to 3 hours. I started noticing that I was sometimes having difficulty getting to more than 10-20% even with porn. I switched from looking for the perfect girl (tall leggy blonde) to looking for the perfect passionate scenes. Surely there was no harm in that.
But my brain fog was getting worse and worse. My former relatively reliable photographic memory which, although nothing spectacular, often helped me to remember in minute detail things I needed for academic purposes, failed completely. Well, after just 3 weeks PMO free my memory started gradually improving, I started finding it an awful lot easier to concentrate on what people tell me. For the first time in my life I started having some real ambition, but it’s something I really have to actively work on. One interesting benefit is that my handwriting has once again become legible! Of course it’s a huge relief to be able to get rock hard erections again, although if I get a spontaneous erection it’s anywhere between 40% to 95%. But better yet, I can once again feel pleasure just from getting erect. I haven’t experienced this since I was about 15.
I can imagine that sex with erections like this must be (excuse my language again, but I’m afraid no other word will do) fucking amazing. Here’s one for the urologists. No leakage! How many recoverers are noticing they no longer have urine leakage after urination? No one has ever been able to explain this leakage to me, except by saying it’s the shape of the urethra, and that it can be “milked” after urination to stop it, or the PC muscles can be strengthened to help. No matter what I tried I could NEVER stop a fair amount of leakage since I was about 15. Now I’m pretty much cured of this problem.
It would be fascinating if any other no-PMOers could confirm this is true for them too. I’m guessing it’s concentrated spunk blocking urine flow! Could it really be that simple? If so why has no one thought to say it? (2 months with no porn and very little masturbation) The next morning I think I managed 80-85%, and I managed to O after 5 minutes or so. Simply a huge relief followed by the feeling of having aged 20 years would describe it. Then after about 4 or 5 hours we had sex again. I could swear we were at it for 15-20 minutes or so. She stopped me after maybe 5 minutes making it clear she didn’t want to O so quickly, so we took it as slowly as we could until she got there again. The whole time I think I was 90% or so.
I can only say that in this area what seems to have worked for me is focussing on one person. With all the women out there it can be quite easy to lose your focus, but we do have to focus, and hopefully that focus isn’t too short-lived.
I got news for you. ALL urologists will tell you exactly the same. Urologists are trained to only give you reasons to the problem that has been medically proven to be a problem. NO urologists will tell you porn or masturbation is the problem because doctors by law cannot give you hypothetical reasons.
I’ve seen several urologists in my time and they all told me it is in my head.
Porn-induced is not something a doctor or urologists can resolve for you. You found the answer right here on this forum. It is up to you to take this forum seriously or not.
At 51, I went to the doctor seeking answers for my ED. He told me the same thing, “It’s all in your head”, after asking me a few questions about my sex life (nothing about porn use, though). Oh, I had blood work done a few months before that and my testosterone and other hormones were all in the normal range.
He gave me a few samples of Viagra to “get my confidence back.” But said he did not feel I needed to be on it as a regular medication. That was six months ago and my finding has been that it isn’t just psychological. What I have learned from others on this forum, plus other articles on porn induced ED rings true. I’m a few days away from the 90 day mark (porn abstinence) and am seeing remarkable progress. Just slow dancing with my spouse gets me hot and bothered now. And my soldier salutes!
When I was masturbating to porn at least two times a day I started to experience lower back pain, muscle spasms, loss of muscle mass, fatigue, irritability, over stimulated nervous system ( exhausted ), inability to rationalize, memorize properly, study, etc.
My doctor told me my problems were psychological. GUESS WHAT HE ADVISED ME TO DO!!! MASTURBATE MORE WITH VIAGRA!! 2 TIMES DAILY!!!! Wen he said that, I looked him in the eye and gave him a reaalllllyyy bad look. He quickly changed that to 3 times a week. He prescribed for me viagra to be taken daily before each masturbation session (half a tablet, twice a day for 2 sessions).
[Guy advising another forum member] Just keep in mind very few (close to none) counsellors have been schooled within this subject. I went to one. He didnt seem to grasp this concept. Or at the very least he didnt take it seriously and kept going back to my weed smoking habit (funny how i could stop that whenever i wanted, but couldnt stop the porn). I think i brought it up like three times and we spent 1 minute on it tops. He just redirected the conversation to other issues, that he probably thought was more important. Even some sexologists dont have the proper knowledge on this, although some do.
[On Medhelp forum] Hello guys! I’m 27, I’m a doctor and I’ve been experiencing the same problem as you all. I’ve been watching porn during my entire sexual life. My first orgasm was when I was 14 and I was watching porn when that happened. The first girl I kissed was when I was 13 and my first sexual relationship happened when I was 16 with a strange woman and, by then, I didn’t get a boner.
In the beginning, when Internet wasn’t available, I used to buy tapes, latter DVDs but these types of porn usually do not provide you such an intense experience as the Internet. For example: if your fetish is cumming on the face of a woman, if you’re on the Internet, you can go straight to the scene, and therefore you experience a more intense orgasm.
Well, continuing with my story, during my adolescence, every time I kissed a girl I used to get a boner. After my first traumatic sexual experience (with an unknown girl) in my late 16s, I then got a girlfriend when I was 18. My first sexual experience with her was also a failure, but the next ones (over the whole 7 months we dated) was fine. An important information is that I rarely came when penetrating, usually had to stop and finish the job with my hand.
After that, I experienced a hard time on med school because I had to study a lot and almost didn’t have time with girls. The few experiences I had, I was able to get boners but rarely got to the climax penetrating (1 or 2 times). After I was 22, there was a boom of free xvideos in the net and, as I was addicted to porn, I went through this path, with more and more extreme sex situations being watched. As you can imagine, I started experiencing some more traumatic experiences. I started not having boners even when I was kissing girls. As the things got worst, 100% of my masturbation happened watching porn and I started avoiding situations with women because I had ED.
It was until my late 26’s that I started suspecting about porn as being the cause of my erectile dysfunction. I suspected because when I masturbated in the bathroom, I couldn’t get it hard and when I was able to do it, I had to imagine porn scenes to do so. I even tried to take Viagra to have sex with a girl but it didn’t work (this is typical of porn related erectile dysfunction (PRED)
About 5 months ago I decided to quit watching porn and I’m having several relapses happening frequently. Although confident of my condition, my sexual emotionality is so heavily attached to porn that I’m having a hard time quitting it. But I’m starting to have better situations happening in my life. 2 days ago, I brought a girl to my place, and despite the fact that I didn’t had that “really hard” boner I was able to penetrate the first time. I also needed my hands to finish the job. The girl wanted more, but I wasn’t able to get it hard again.
What I can tell you about how to get rid of PRED is:
1- Admit your condition
2- Get away of PORN. If you can’t do it, search for psychological assistance
3- Try to *** only with a woman with you
4- If you have a hard time getting with a woman, you should pay for it. Tell her about your condition and ask for help. If she is a professional, she will understand
5- Make your brain recognize new patterns. For example, if you can’t *** penetrating, simply do not ***. With time, your brain will recognize the penetration as the way it has to get pleasure.
6- If you can’t live without masturbating, because of your emotional lability, do it, but DO NOT THINK OF PORN SCENES when masturbating.
7- Do not masturbate too fast: try to make your brain recognize slower speed (as in penetration) as the pattern of speed that it’s supposed to ***. If you can’t *** with slow speed, don’t ***.
If you can follow these instructions I guarantee that in 3 month at most, you’ll get a normal pattern of sexual life. Of course, it’s almost impossible to follow these, because you have emotional barriers that eventually will break your rational orders. I’m having a hard time doing that, but as I keep trying, it’s doubtless improving my performance.
I hope that my experience with that will help some of you. I consider my case one of the most difficult (my first sexual orgasm was watching porn – this is a heavy emotional print) but hopefully I will have some day a normal sexual life. Aware others of the danger of porn.
At 26 I got into a new relationship (which didn’t last very long . When it got to the point of actually having sex with the girl I could not make myself hard. I was excited and everything. And was actually hard when we touched but somehow got soft when it came to the penetration. Though the lady told me it was okay and I should not worry I was really depressed. I was embarrassed and depressed.
I thought that because I hadn’t had sex for 2 years I had developed some kind of ED. This problem was really bugging me and I decided to make my goal of fixing it.
I went to the doctor and all the analysis came out negative. My prostate gland was normal. My heart was all right. Well in short everything was all right physically. So finally figured that the problem was psychological. Now, I can clearly formulate the main points of my problem.
1) Watching porn shifts your expectations of a sexual intercourse. That is, if you watch porn too much you kind of train your brain to get excited from visual images of somebody else having sex. And when you have sex with a live person your body and brain are not used to this new kind of sexual act. There are very weak action patterns in your brain, which makes you focus and concentrate on what you are doing and lose the spontaneous impulse. Your brain made the connection between watching a porn movie and pleasure but the connection between sex with a live person and pleasure is weak.
2) While watching porn the viewer is usually passive. You usually watch porn while seated (sometimes lying or whatever). There is little body movement during the masturbation. Again, your body and brain record this behavior. So after some time your body learns that sexual act is associated with fairly low muscle stress. Little blood flow is needed. But sex often is quite a workout and requires a lot of movement and as a result higher blood pressure. You have to put on condom, which is a killer for many people. Again, this makes you concentrate too much and you can lose your wood.
3) Porn can add to the performance anxiety. You start being afraid that you may not reach the qualities of some other guys. Now, thinking back about this makes me smile.
ow to solve this problem? You need to break the neural connection between porn and pleasure and create a new one between sex with a live person and pleasure. The only way to do it is to stop watching porn and to have sex regularly. Given that you are healthy in general, after some time your body will create a new neural network. In my case I went so far as dating new girls on a regular basis just to have sex with them (not calling on you to do the same, but there are many social networks online where you can meet interested parties. Tons of beautiful horny ladies there and very often it’s no strings attached).
At first I was using kamagra gel (a generic of viagra which is much cheaper and easily available online). After several month I didn’t need it. My body created new neural patterns. As soon as I saw the girl taking off any piece of her clothes I was getting excited immediately. Now, as soon as I am putting on a condom I am getting really hard because my brain associates penetration with pleasure. I have lost any sense of anxiety what-so-ever. I see a girl I like naked and I want to screw her no matter what. Everything else can go to hell. And this is the way it should be.
So to sum it up guys. There are absolutely no reasons to believe you have ED problems unless you have major health problems or you are over 50. It’s all a matter of wiring. And don’t take any failures to heart. It’s a road to self-destruction. Your body might just not be used to sex with a girl because over the years you trained it to watch porn and jerk off. The majority of the girls are understanding (if she is not there are more reasons to say goodbye to her). Just work on changing this pattern and it will all gradually come naturally.
[Forum member] We all know how “doctors” have their own agendas and serve those who give the money. So, if a guy goes blindly to these ASSECT “professionals”, he will most probably be advised to masturbate as much as his heart desires and then, if some problem arises, well… mister.. we have Viagra and Cialis and Levitra and God knows what else… “WE HAVE SOLUTIONS TO ANY OF YOUR PROBLEMS.”
The only thing they forget is that their so-called “solutions” do not work. I’m telling this because I’ve been several times to a sexologist (a “good” one, as people recommended him), and told him all about my ED problems when I was around 25 years old. After a few “counseling” hours, for which I spent a LOT of money, he finally gave me Viagra.
Of course, as all guys here having porn-induced ED, KNOW that this doesn’t (and can’t) work long-term. So…(of course, I’m being sarcastic here.) … trust your “doctor” and dismiss any “anecdotal” EVIDENCE on this site, or reddit/nofap or rsdnation. Instead of doing the damn reboot, go ahead … pay money and lose a LOT of your precious time on ASSECT PhDs !
The worst thing is I’d spent loads of money on doctors and urologists, viagra prescriptions etc. and at not one point did one of them mention over-masturbation. Even when I told the urologist I masturbated normally at least once a day and have been looking at harder and harder P (was careful to mention “nothing illegal” as, well, I wasn’t looking at anything illegal and didn’t want him to think otherwise!), but at no point did he mention it.
He did suggest trying some sexual health books by Masters and Johnson (but didn’t even stifle a giggle when I mentioned I would try to “master my johnson with Masters and Johnson), packed me off with some free viagra samples and sent me on my way… (link)
Decided to get blood work done and all that good stuff and meet with a urologist. Spoke with him for abit and he gave me some ED pill samples ( already tried em wont work). I also brought up the thing about porn and his nurse kinda laughed and he looked at me sorda like I was an idiot. He also suggested something about penis injections (ouch?) if the ed drugs dont work. At this point im just praying something is wrong with my bloodwork so i can get a quick fix.
Hi – just wanted to say that No Fap works I could not have an orgasm with PIV. So to deal with it I was trying every thing. Like different girls and also different condom types/makes and I went to a sex therapist. The only thing that has worked for me is No Fap it cures Delayed Ejaculation.
After months trying, I went to a urologist. He said I was nervous and had no problem with my body. Prescripted me some viagra. I went to her home this day, took the pill and tried. Got a weak erection and no sensibility. I felt nothing going on down there.
Fast forward, we had a fight (after another try) and broke up. I fell into an abyss, thinking I was broke. I went to a psychologyst for some time, but it didn’t help. Nothing seemed to help. I started to avoid girls and sexual contact. Started watching more and more porn. At this point, my erection, even with porn, was a 7/10.
I’ve kissed other girls after that, but with little response down there (just a lot of precum and blue balls, no erections). I was afraid to try having sex again. After being with a very sexy girl, at my 19’s, I decided to try to find the root of my problem again. Went to a sexologyst and another urologist. I was paying very expensive consultations. I had my blood tested for basically everything, and it was all ok. Then, I stopped seing her, I had no initiating. I was scared and hopeless.
A year ago, I went out with the girl I would take the risk again. We started chatting everyday. I was comfortable with her. I was sick of all of this thing. I told her I was a virgin, because couldn’t relax in bed. We continued seing each other. Then it happened. I was alone at home. She went over and we started making out. Again, little Arnold wasn’t responding. She gave me hand, head, nothing. We tried for about a month.
Someday I was reading some random stuff and went to a topic about anxiety and procrastination. Some guy posted the TEDx The Great Porn Experiment. I can’t describe what I felt during the video. Everything, every symptom matched. I was like “EUREKA!”.
A week later, I started it. NoFap was my only hope. I kept seeing that girl too. About 2 weeks, I would have some random erections again. About 2 months, I came the first time (with a girl), but I stil couldn’t penetrate. But it was working!
Than, FLATLINE! My erections did oscillate everytime I was with her. So much time passed. I was starting to lose my hope again, but kept in, reading posts here, at YBOP and other sites too. When I completed the 6th month without porn, my motivation started to fade. But I had nothing to lose, so I kept going. Had some relapses (without porn, just M).
PLOT – This week I completed 10 months without porn. I decided to take a cialis to do something different than just oral sex with my girlfriend (yes, I don’t know exactly when, but we just engaged into a serious relationship). I got a 10/10 erection that wouldn’t fade for nothing. We had PIV sex! It was amazing!
Two days later, yesterday, we had sex again. This time without taking any pill! Btw, it was my bithday. It was the best gift ever. Now I can say it happened. I am happy as hell.
I just want to say that my penis and I miss you more than anything in the world. We’ve had such great times together and I thought we would never split up. I didn’t realize that I didn’t treat you right, and that I was in fact hurting you, and in the end killing you. I can’t stop to think about all the fun we’ve had with girls, not just the ones we were physical with but also how you made my dick get move around in my pants when a hot girl walked by. Since you left it has felt like a part of me has died off and that I am walking around in constant apathy being an androgynous creature without the urge to have sex, or even fap, and little dickie won’t hardly ever get up anymore.
Because of your departure, I have been to the doctor and had bloodtests and got Cialis, and he sent me to a shrink dealing with sexual problems. None of those quaks could find any reason for you to leave and said I was fine and healty, and it probably was something in my mind. I have been missing you for almost three years and at first I didn’t even realize that you had left. I just thought that there was something wrong with my dick but it turned out that he, as well as I, were missing our best buddy – you!
Because you left, my girlfriend left too. So now I am alone after having realized that both you and her left because of porn. I want you back more than anything and I hope that you read this letter and decide that you will return. I have realized that you are more important to me and dickie than anything else. Hopefully, you will return shortly now that I have thrown out the bitch that is porn and you and I can be together again on many great new adventures.
Besides writing this letter to you and hoping that you will return I can also always re-read this if you return and remember what life is like without you. Come back REAL soon!! Love Penis and I.
Hahaha ! When I told my urologist I couldn’t get hard and was no longer interested in sex, he said ”well, don’t have sex then”. Which is rather consistent actually.
It’s likely that some professionals are struggling with porn addiction themselves. A forum member wrote this:
I work by supporting the computer systems of many medical practices. We’ve occasionally come across porn on doctors computers – it’s fairly obvious that some of them get a porn fix between patients. That’s a little disturbing – especially if your doctor is on a sexual dopamine rush just before you take your daughter in to see him for a check up!
[With respect to prostatis] Their advice is to ejaculate every day to cleanse the prostate. It never helped me and I had pain for years (intense pain where you bite on wood to deal with it). Asian practitioners recommend the opposite – to not stress the prostate and not ejaculate. In hindsight, I believe they are correct. So far no pain and I mentally feel better, in control and got the monkey off my back.
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