hey Wolf what is your contingency plan for when you have flashes?? brem

I don't know about anyone else, but from a post a read...somewhere, I got the idea of once I start to have a flash I mentally tell myself "stop." I then imagine a stop sign in the place of the flash. I've been doing this since day 1, and 9 days later it's already becoming habitual and is great to stop the fantasy before it gets out of control.

Keyblade

brem,

Whenever I have had triggers, I stop altogether and do something else. Either take a few deep breaths, take a walk, stop what I am doing and count to ten. But for this, you have to be present always and be aware of how your body reacts to outside stimuli, as it were.

These days however, since I have been sober for a year and a few months, I have small triggers so I simply ignore them and feel the feeling and do nothing about them, that is to say, I surrender and allow the urge to go through me.

For this though, you have to identify your triggers, that is anything that happens to you in ways of emotion that causes you to want to indulge in your addiction. For me it was my boss yelling at me, my father dying, my sister freaking out, my insect of a brother demanding crap from me, in short anything that would cause me to have a highly charged emotional reaction.

In time, since I learned to address these emotions in a healthy ways, that is by not indulging my addiction but addressing them accordingly, by seeing what I was really needing at the time, I either called a friend to vent or simply as I said, let the emotion go through me.

So now, I simply feel them and that's it. In short, naming your triggers, making a contingency plan when they arise and addressing them as they happen is what needs to be done right now for you. Eventually, you'll do it enough times that you'll do it in your sleep, as they say.

Hope this clarifies it for you,
Wolf

thanks Keyblade and Wolf thats great advise ........ another thing is you go to the lake and of course your doing just great handling your self and four girls show up at the beach and ya they look good and your handling it well but is it against the addiction law to look these things is all ways have a question in my head...........but just to let you know that what ran though my head left and there was no thoughts of acting out and i like that feeling i hope i am no blabbing again.....Brem

brem,

There is no law that says you cannot look but if you were to look and then run home with those images because you could not wait to act out, then that would be a problem indeed.

One can look but one cannot fantasize and therefore act out, that part of it is most unhealthy. It is the acting out , the frenzy aspect where the issue lies.

Hope this helps,
Wolf

thank god wolf thats is what im looking for you answered that for me thanks brem

I'd like to throw out a couple of different approaches to sexual addiction. While wolfie's approach worked well for him, it is not the approach that I took. Although there are no right or wrong answers when it comes to recovery, different recovery techniques can offer the recovering individual options. That way, if one technique doesn't work for them, they will have options.

My mode of recovery involved the Twelve Step programs (similar to Alcoholics Anonymous) which have been designed specifically for sex addicts. In these group meetings, I learned what they call "The Three Second Rule". When a pretty girl passes by, you are allowed to look at her for three (3) seconds ONLY! That is long enough for you to appreciate her beauty so you don't feel like you're depriving yourself, but it isn't long enough for you to begin to obsess or fantasize about her, thereby keeping your addictive urges in check. This process has worked very well for me for the past 22+ years that I've been in recovery.

Another thing that helped me was to read a bit about sexual addiction so that I had some idea what I was up against. I guess I'd suggest you consider trying that as well. There are lots of excellent books available today that deal with sexual addiction, but I'd suggest you start with two (2) basic primers. The first is titled, "Out of the Shadows: Understanding Sexual Addiction", by Patrick J. Carnes, Ph.D. and the other is titled, "Lonely All the Time: Recognizing, Understanding, and Overcoming Sex Addiction for Addicts and Co-Dependents", by Ralph Earle, Ph.D., Gregory Crow, Ph.D., and Kevin Osborn. Both of these books can be purchased from: www.amamzon.com.

I have a few more ideas, but I'll leave things here for now. If you'd like a few more suggestions, let me know. I'll be happy to help in any way I can. Best of luck to you!

thanks charli that is very good advise .......brem

Good job on eliminating porn from your life. That is awesome. I am very jealous but happy for you. If you can do that you can apply the same principles you used to eliminate the rest.

jdm,

While recovering from a porn addiction is rather difficult and at times very frustrating, there is no reason to feel jealous, in fact, jealousy is an extreme negative emotion and such types of emotions keeps you from moving forward in your recovery.

Jealousy is rooted in the erroneous belief that you want or desire something that you think someone has, I am here to tell you why such emotion is useless simply because no matter what that is, once you have that thing, your experience of you having it will not be the same as someone else's. In other words, it is the illusion that keeps you stuck not the reality. As they say, as you think so you shall be.

So, as you can see, now that you know that you too can succeed, you can say goodbye to jealousy in all areas of your life and move towards a brighter future for yourself.

If you are not in recovery, consider trying Recovery Nation, some of the members of this particular group have had success with it and it's free and online.

Hope this helps,
Wolf

Hey wolf just to touch base on my recovery im on the site recovery nation and to start on the lesson i went to so of the treads of the others and holy man they go so deep into there self to find the 15 things to heal there self, my problem is thinking and putting it to words is my difficulty, my education is very little and allways bin like that all my life,i don't no what to do it's overwhelming typing out your feelings.................brem

bremer,

We again are having a problem in communication. Can you rephrase your question so I can help you better? I think I know what you are asking but I'm not entirely certain.

As an aside, it's not a matter of lacking education but more a matter of being able to express oneself, it's a skill that can be achieved if you work at it. What has helped me when I am stuck is to say it as I feel it without thought of censoring myself because I am feeling like I am not doing a good job.

Hope to hear from you,
Wolf

sorry im trying to take 15 reasons why i want to heal my self from this addiction and to put it into words i feel like if i don't come up with 15 reasons im doomed to fail as i read in recovery nation or am i reading it wrong.................its hard doing a work shop and putting it into words.........i hope i explained myself better...........brem

Brem,

Thanks for the clarification. I can see why they'd want you to list 15 reasons why you'd want to overcome this addiction, so that the more reasons you have, the stronger the motivation to stop.

I do not think that if you do not do all 15, you'll fail. In my own recovery program, I had to list as many as I could, no less than five, I ended up listing ten if I recall correctly.

But I digress, perhaps you could view the question differently, list 15 ways you see your life could improve if you stop this addiction. I'll help you with two, you'll have to come up with the other twelve:

1) I want to heal from this addiction because I no longer want to see women as sex objects but see them as the human beings they are, with feelings and opinions.

2) I want to heal from my addiction to porn because I no longer want to waste any more time on something that has done nothing but make me feel bad about myself.

As I said, you'll have to come up with the rest but you get the idea. Again, I think the more reasons the better, and when you are done, you can always print them out as reminders.So list the other twelve so that'll work to work your advantage.

Hope this helps,
Wolf

Hey wolf how do i start on the treads in the recovery nation do you sign in or just start typing in the threads???.....brem