Day 0
Today, I decided to quit masturbating to porn. I will never watch internet porn again. The only source of sexual stimulation will be the partners of my choice. I have long suspected that there was a correlation between the erectile dysfunction I have been experiencing and my consumption of internet porn. However, I was in denial and unable to admit that viewing porn and reading erotica since age 16 or 17 were the cause for my discomfort around women in sexual situations. While I managed to get fully erect watching porn and masturbated many times a day, I could not produce or retain a solid erection with a real woman. In time, my erections became weaker even when watching porn.
I had never had problems with this in my youth and blamed all kinds of things for my disability to perform in the bedroom. I would blame my marijuana consumption, the recent lack of exercise, stress, performance anxiety or even my age (I’m 27!).
I simply did not see or did not want to see the real cause of my problem. I had been able to give great pleasure to my two steady girlfriends in the past. Nonetheless, my libido was steadily decreasing. After breaking up with my last girlfriend, I fell into a state of self-pity. The best way to suppress these feelings was to masturbate regularly. Only now do I realize that this merely enhanced my problems. The site yourbrainonporn.com has helped me realize that I neither have physical limitations, nor a general fear of sex. Excessive masturbation and especially internet pornography were the reason for my suffering.
Staying away from porn and drastically reducing the number of masturbation sessions will hopefully allow me to regain my male virility.
I have decided not to just try not using porn. I will just quit and never look back. I realize this will not be easy but I owe it to myself and my sex life.
Week 1-2
I must say that I am not yet experiencing all those positive changes some other YBOP users have reported even after a short while of abstinence. This could be due to the fact, that I never had any anxiety or fear of social situations before. Some people report that they were able to “stick up for themselves” more. I am glad that these people have overcome their social shortcomings but so far I cannot say that this has anything to do with masturbation or porn.
What I have noticed, however, is the increase of attention by strangers. I get more eye contact in the streets and more looks from girls – kind of like in the old days! This may have to do with a higher level of confidence on my behalf. I just feel so relieved that I found a solution to my problem. My optimism is allowing me to have a more positive outlook on things. I firmly believe that staying away from porn for another 60-70 days will help me fully recover.
I have already seen some progress In terms of libido and erections. I have woken up with morning wood on multiple occasions. I would say these erections range anywhere between 40-80% but subside pretty much immediately when I get out of bed. I have also had some spontaneous erections (one without any touching, others induced by a squeeze through my pants). These erections have been harder than those in the times of masturbating to porn. One was so strong that I had to fight the urge to drain the seed out of it. I opted for an experiment instead: First I observed how long I would stay hard without touching. I could clench my muscles to keep it hard and decided to try a condom. I hate condoms and I usually lose my erection just thinking about covering it with a rubber. Not this time! My penis stayed erect while getting the condom and opening the wrapper. I gave it a short squeeze before putting the rubber on and miraculously, my penis stayed hard – for a while!
Although I understand that I am far from being healed, I do see this as a positive sign. I am in no way drawn to porn or masturbation at the moment. I am every bit as determined, as I was on Day 0.
Week 3
The increase in libido has vanished. I have absolutely no desire to watch porn, masturbate, orgasm or even to have real sex. The only thought that I find appealing right now, is being close and intimate with a beautiful lady without any sexual intent.
Week 4 – Reuniting Introduction Post:
Before I get to the specifics of my situation, I want to give you some background. I am a 27 year old male, I live in Europe and I lead a fulfilling life by objective standards. I have experienced much love from my family and my friends throughout my childhood and youth and continue to do so to this day. I am very grateful for this. I have done well academically and in my career so far. My intention here is not to brag but to state that I have no apparent reason to be addicted to pornography.
Nevertheless, I have been watching porn for years now and my addiction became worse with broadband internet and having the privacy of my own home. Along with this came free internet sites with an enormous variety of pornography. I never considered my pathetically enthusiastic consumption of porn to be harmful until I started developing copulatory impotence – or erectile dysfunction as it is euphemistically called. I had experienced trouble “getting it up” before but dismissed the experience from my thoughts, justifying my lack of excitement with the supposed unattractiveness of my partners or even the hot weather on that particular day. Don’t get me wrong, these girls were outrageously attractive (at least to me) and the erection of a virile man in his early twenties should endure the bit of heat a summer day in Germany has to offer. I realize now that I was only making up excuses. I never attributed my lack of sexual interest in women to my extensive porn use.
Thanks to yourbrainonporn and the content of this forum, I realize now that all my shortcomings as a lover have been due to fantasizing about women I could never be with and situations that were unlikely to occur in my life. In retrospect, I do not even desire intercourse with these women, nor do I wish to be in the situations that fueled my fantasies. Thanks to the extensive research of the aforementioned bright people, I now understand that I have altered my brain and need help. Understanding this was the first and most important step in my recovery.
I have now steered clear of porn and masturbation for over a month. I have not set myself a time-frame for recovery and I am appreciative of every bit of progress that I achieve. I am very determined but try not to place too much focus on my task of overcoming this addiction. I realize that my absolute resolution will be imperative in order to avoid pornography but I will consciously try to do this casually. No porn blockers, no counting days, no “checking if the equipment’s alright”.
With the realization of what has been harming me these past years came the determination to change my life. Since deciding not to indulge in pornography and masturbation, I have had no cravings and absolutely no desire to go back to my old habits. I have simply decided that “PMO” will no longer be part of my life and this thought alone has gotten me quite far.
Anatomically, I have not quite recovered from my addiction as of yet but I do feel some obvious changes in my personality and overall well-being. I do not consider myself to be healed or even insusceptible to relapses. Thanks to numerous, sharing predecessors in this forum I know that drawbacks are common. Yet I am very determined and more than willing to overcome this.
Last but not least, I am not a native English speaker and I am anything but sober at the moment, so please excuse any grammatical or spelling mistakes I am likely to have made.
Week 6
Well over 30 days of no porn or masturbation for me at this point. However, last night I couldn’t fight the big O. As I had mentioned in my first post in the forum section, I have been seeing a few girls recently. Although I would consider myself to be in the middle of a rough flatline, I couldn’t resist this beautiful woman yesterday. I cooked dinner, we ate, we listened to music and our kissing and touching gradually escalated. We took it very slow on our first few encounters of this type and we just kissed and touched for hours this time as well. However, it seemed natural to undress and progress in our making out. I was only semi-hard (at most) during all this but when the moment for penetration came (ironically the moment my erection would fade before my reboot) I was as hard as a rock with only minimal touching. I pulled out before too long though and came without even touching myself,. We’re talking seconds here, not minutes.
I felt this was a pretty sorry performance on my behalf, so I had to come clean. We have been friends for a while so it was somewhat easy for me to confide in her. I told her that this was my first ejaculation in close to five weeks. She naturally asked my why and I carefully told her about my “reboot”. She seemed intrigued by my experiment and I think telling her this brought us closer. Plus, there won’t be any pressure next time I see her
I have had no “chaser effects” and I feel as asexual as I did before last night.
Week 7
Week 7 now and there is no change in sex drive. I don’t desire sex, masturbation or porn. Still dying to get my libido and erections back. On the upside, the magnetism has been insane lately! Strangers approaching me, girls overtly flirting with me. Even girls from my past who previously showed no interest in me seem to be all over me at the moment. I was very sceptical when I read about benefits like “better connection with people, especially women” and “deeper voice” but I am experiencing this myself and it is mind blowing! This allows me to trust the process and be patient. The other benefits will hopefully come soon!
Week 10
I feel like I haven’t contributed much to our forum lately but I can’t stress enough how much it helps me to read about your experiences. Please keep up the honest and insightful posts. We are in this together.
My personal situation has been somewhat strange these past couple of weeks. I’m not necessarily experiencing all the benefits others are reporting. I have always been a sociable person and never really withdrew myself even during my PMO days – so not much has changed in that regard. However, in the past I always felt like my connection with men was much stronger than with women. There was always some kind of sexual attraction involved in my relationships with women. Even to the point where I didn’t care to be friends with girls who I didn’t feel attracted to. This was never a conscious stream of thought but I now realize that I missed out on some great (platonic) relationships because of these underlying subconscious thoughts.
Since quitting porn, I feel like I can neutrally talk to women. In a friendly and warm manner, like I tend to interact with my male acquaintances. At the moment there is no initial sexual intent involved on my behalf, regardless of how attractive I find the woman I am talking to. This has lead to far better “game” (for the lack of a better word) in the recent past. It just seems like I am projecting my calmness, thereby making my potential mates more interested. Not watching porn gave me the confidence I need when talking to the opposite sex. Or to anyone for that matter I guess there was always some kind of guilt involved when I was watching a lot of porn. I never realized at the time but I guess it’s understandable that one can’t look a pretty lady straight in the eyes half an hour after having furiously masturbated to movies that anyone in their right mind would find repulsive!
In terms of physical manifestation of brain changes: I do feel like I am past the worst part of my flatline phase but I would not consider myself one hundred percent cured. I have a girl in my life who I get along with very well and she’s very accepting of my current condition. We haven’t been seeing each other frequently but when we do, we have a close physical connection. I don’t feel very emotionally drawn to her but we both enjoy being close to each other. Okay, that was some of the cheesy background. Now to the actual physical changes you are probably all wondering about: My erections have been A LITTLE better. I have never had wet dreams before PMO, I still don’t have them during this reboot. Not worried about that. However, I still don’t get morning wood often and barely have any spontaneous erections. Another thing that bothers me, is that on the rare occasions that I have had sex lately, my performance hasn’t been nearly what it used to be like before PMO. Still takes too much stimulation to get me aroused and it takes way too little to have me at half mast again. Damn it!
Well, I hope I continue to feel a little better and my sex life continues feeling a little healthier. And of course, I wish you all the same!
Week 12
I will have to keep it short since I’m in a bit of a rush! Just thought I should share this with my community:
I did it!
Although I still don’t feel like I am fully recovered yet, I had some pretty awesome sex with a beautiful lady. We had attempted to have sex previously but I had always had trouble with my erection and pretty much blew my load within seconds every single time. She was very understanding and patient throughout all of this and I think she collected the rewards this weekend.
I feel really good about my achievements so far and I am more determined that ever to NEVER WATCH PORN AGAIN!
(Sorry about the caps but I can’t stress this enough!)
As a reply to another poster:
Hey fixme,
don’t worry about your recent performance in bed! I had the same issues when I first had sex during/after my reboot. Struggled to get hard, then blew it within seconds! It feels like my brain was already moving at 200 miles per hour while my penis hadn’t even seen the light turn green When my penis finally caught up with my mind, I was so aroused that I could not stand much stimulation. even if my erection was only at 70%! What I want to say is, that I can relate to you very well!
Here comes the good news: After a few attempts much like the one you just described, I finally managed to have satisfying intercourse! It still wasn’t porno style hour long banging but I doubt that’s what either of us ar aiming for. It was just the kind of sex that both partners can enjoy – with a pretty solid erection, if I may say.
I agree with other posts here: I think our post-reboot performance has a lot to do with anxiety (possibly the fear of replicating previous failures in bed) and of course the fact that we haven’t drained the pipe in MONTHS!
Just try to focus on the beautiful sensation of being so intimate with a beautiful woman and things will come naturally. One more thing I want to mention: My successful attempt came within hours of multiple unsuccessful ones with premature ejaculation. So it may have actually helped that I was a little less sensitive.
Just continue trying. Having a premature ejaculation while inside a hot lady friend still beats chokin’ the chicken all by yourself – at least in my book!
End of Reboot
It’s been almost three months since I’ve looked at porn or masturbated. Like I had stated in my first journal entry on Day 0, the only sexual stimulation I received was from the partners of my choice.
Just last night I finally felt what It is like to have a healthy erection again. Even during my last attempt at intercourse which I had declared a success, I still wasn’t at a hundred percent. Last night, however, I finally felt like my body (and especially my penis) was “in synch” with my mind. Great sex. Finally! 
I know from experience that this reboot can be a strenuous task. There are some pleasurable highs and some demotivating lows. It has been over three and a half months since I decided to quit watching porn. My initial motivation was to get my erectile strength back. Over time, I came to understand that quitting porn is about nothing less than reuniting with your sexual self.
While reading others’ stories and gathering information on yourbrainonporn.com I realized that my views about sex and even relationships had been seriously influenced by my over-use of pornography. Not only had this habit, along with my excessive masturbation, caused me to have copulatory impotence, it had also greatly raised my expectations in terms of sex. Just to avoid misunderstandings: I have always loved sex and I still do. I think it can be a satisfying and overall valuable aspect of life. During my years of excessive porn use, however, I expected there to be some kind of sexual tension in almost every interaction between men and women. I never consciously thought of it this way at the time but in retrospect, it seems understandable that watching so much porn and masturbating all the time seriously affected my views. I thought sex was the essence of life and that I needed it as a form of acknowledgment or approval. The best example of this, is my expectation in terms of dates: In the past I always considered it a failure when I didn’t get any action. Now, I don’t put as much pressure on myself or the date in general. I simply enjoy the friendly interaction with women – thereby raising my success rate with them considerably! I also have been able to “perform” (for the lack of a better word) when it was needed.
It. Was. Awesome!
If you’re sitting in front of your screen, thinking “Well, that’s not me! I don’t think of sex and women that way despite watching porn all the time!” Let me tell you, you may have some other issues related to your PMO habit. It seems to be different for everyone but so many men claiming to notice highly desirable changes can not be wrong! I never would have recognized my aforementioned flaws during the time of PMO. Even if I did, I would not have attributed them to my PMO habit. I guess that’s an addict’s way of thinking.
What I want to say is: You can overcome this addiction and it will be well worth your current suffering! Trust the process even in the most difficult of times and stick with it! You will get much more out of this than just healthy erections. You will be more capable of reconsidering some of your views and in the best case, you will even get a healthy sex life out of this!
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