Good for you! Are you in any kind of recovery program? Having support is so vital and also a great way to get some tools to help you cope when you feel overwhelmed with the urge to act out.

i am so glad that reading posts from us spouses helps you, gives you the motivation you need....i say whatever it takes to get kick started in recovery. This addiction is destroying men and women, their marriages, relationships with friends, and children. 6 days is a great start!!!!

Wow! Well done! Keep up the good work! Six days is a lot to someone who has viewed bad content regulary, and to not cave in is brilliant!

What my partner has done was get a peice of paper, write down the amount of days he has gone without and the changes he has seen in himself.

I too also got a peice of paper of the change I have seen in him and by me doing that made him feel so proud and to continue his recovery!

Remember, it will hurt really bad for now.... but in the future? It will be so damn worth it for you and your partner! You will no longer have to be paranoid, feel guilt/shame or scared. You will finally be you again and to be able to enjoy life healthfully!

I'd really suggest that you go to the gym or dancing lessons with your partner. Some one on one time with eachother. You will enjoy yourselves and get so damn tired in the end you will want to go to sleep!

Horse riding together, bike riding etc are all good and great for couples to bond and have a good laugh. If you do this, your addiction will be faint voice in the back of your head.

Again, well done!

Thank you to everyone who responded to my post.

Shanas1254, I am not in a program. DS is my first attempt to reach out to others to help me with this addiction. I agree that it is wise to lean on others.

Candycin, thank you for your encouragement. You are right - this addiction causes destruction in many ways and affects more than just the addict.

Ardara, your enthusiasm for my progress made me smile huge! I also took your advice and wrote in my journal here on DS about this past week. This is worth it. I have gone to the gym with my wife. It is a lot of fun. Don't take my man card away, but we even did a menstrual yoga routine that I found online to help her with her cramps. We often find workout routines online to do together, especially since going to the gym together isn't always an option with young children.

Juftak

I am so glad you're doing that with your wife! And of course not, yoga is supposed to be great! Doesn't make you any less of a man!

Just remember, you have some guts and a lot of will power to cut that stuff out. It wont be pretty to start with, it will be a real pain in the butt, you will probably cry, shout and scream but this time by next year, it will be a distant memory and trust me, your marriage will flourish!! Even more than ever before!!

And I agree, when you have children you're really tied down. I'd suggest to put them into day care, or after school clubs or just clubs in general so you and your wife have at least an hour to yourselves. Or even to family if they're up for it.

I also hear boxing is very good. My partner bought a punching bag and when he feels the "urge", he uses his anger, tension etc on the punching bag and really lets it all out on that and afterwards, he feels such relief.

Oh and dont get the standing up punching bag. The bag done more damage to my partner than he did to it.

One last suggestion, is to write your wife a letter. I kept suggesting this to people on here but I cant express it enought. It works wonders. Write down your fears, your woes, your anger, your needs. Tell her you love her, that she is beautiful, she is your wold, your everything and you want this to work. That you want this to stop, but cant do it with her and her help.

This will make her feel good and for you too.

Keep up the good work! Don't give up, your wife, family and you are worth more than that! It will get better, just you wait and see!

Juftak thank YOU.

Keep at it sir. And remember, it is not the strength of the urge that gets you, it's the falacy of it's permanence.

Congratulations on you first six days (now 8, hopefully, since this post is 2 days old)! And you are wise to be on guard against the "one more time" temptation. Even on yourbrainrebalanced.com, I would see posts from men who'd gone a week, two weeks, a month, and found themselves thinking that maybe one last time would make it easier. And of course, it never does -- for the same reason that the hundreds or thousands of times you indulged in the past were never enough -- you can't get enough of what can't satisfy you.

One thing that helped me when I did feel strong urges was to think about how I would feel AFTER giving in. I'd remember the sense of despair I felt in the midst of addiction, and realized that "one more time" was my ticket right back to that pit.

Well done! Keep it going.
You will feel urges..we all do several times a day but in time they gradually get less.
Remember, this is an addiction we are dealing with. We have to go through the pain in order to gain peace.
When you get that thought "' Oh, one time more isn't gonna hurt you"' recognise this is your limbic brain throwing out an urge for sensation.
Remember the proverb "'One time is TOO Many..and a THOUSAND NEVER enough"'
Try hard not to go down that pointless path, the endless cycle again that flash floods the brain with Dopamine.
Take care and thank you for your honesty.

Thank you everyone. It has been difficult the past few days. Lately, it seems as though the further I get away from viewing and engaging with porn, the more my brain seems to try to trick me into thinking that it is ok to give in every once in a while. I know rationally that is not true. I am determined, however, to fight! If any of you believe in prayer, please pray for me today. Regardless, I appreciate everyone who has been supportive of me thus far!

As soon as I finish this message, I am shutting this computer off to spend some time in prayer. (I need to anyway.) I will definitely include you in my prayers.

I know from experience that recovery is not always linear -- people have ups and downs in their cravings, and that's a normal part of recovery. Sometimes a person will go a week, and that week might not seem to bad, but then find themselves feeling strong urges and wonder if they are doing something wrong. You aren't -- it's just part of recovery.

I like to think of it as a dragon in the basement. If you continue to feed the dragon, he'll grow stronger and stronger and eventually kill you. If you stop feeding him, he'll throw temper tantrums, figuring you'll give in and at least throw him a snack at some point. If you do, he'll calm down for while, but then he'll be emboldened, and next time he'll demand an even bigger snack, repeating this process until he's back on his regular, ever-growing feeding schedule.

The only way to weaken the dragon is to starve him completely, and keep starving him until he's too weak to bother you much, even if he's never quite dead.

It's also like taking porn out leaves a hole that's aching to be filled, and it's used to being filled one way only. And I don't just mean time -wise, but also emotionally, mentally and spiritually.

Courage.

Thank you for sharing. Pornography is a easy thing to get addicted to. Pornography is all over the place, these days. When I watch movies with my father sometimes there are pornographic scenes in movies. I dislike watching movies, more and more. I haven't viewed pornography for about 6 months, but today I looked at a sexual video. I think that even though I had a slight lapse I'm still improving because I haven't visited a pornography website. The video I watched had no nudity and I don't know if the woman had even been candidly doing anything sexual. But it looked like she was having sex while speaking to the camera, you just coudln't see if she really was. I said this is an improvement, at least, because there was no genitals showing or nudity.

I realized recently that looking at pornography has caused me emotional trauma. I think about women that I've been attracted too, and then thinking about sexual acts, like porn, makes me cringe at the thought of them having sex.

It really does hurt, and I think that if we look at porn then we are only hurting ourselves. I often think that one time isn't going to hurt me either.