Another One Bites the Dust 🏄🏻

Relapses
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Thank you @DungeonMaster for texting me. Otherwise, I may have not come back so soon.

Well everyone,

I wiped out. I bit the dust. I acted out with both porn and MB.

I was craving a lot. And the cravings were intense and weren’t going away.

On Sunday, November 3, my phone locks had a window to allow me to go online for work. Unfortunately, I was not in clarity. And I took advantage and disabled my locks completely at that time.

I played around with YouTube that day. I continued to other sites and viewed some pretty graphic material. By Monday evening, I lost my sobriety.

But the next day, Tuesday, November 5, really sealed the deal. I was acting out with both hardcore porn and MB. I skipped my CR meeting that evening to act out instead. I had a moment of clarity at 9:30 PM, and reapplied my locks.

I was getting high, getting my fix. This has happened so much in my life that the guilt fails to appear anymore.

The next day, I felt like in a complete stupor. What was going on with me? Felt some sorrow that I just blew up 230 days of sexual sobriety. I guess I was just white-knuckling it. Constantly craving hoping “This Too Shall Pass” and leaning on my boundaries didn’t work this time.

Not to say that my locks weren’t helpful. They kept my 24 hour relapse from turning into one that lasted several months.

I’ll reiterate. I was craving badly. Fantasizing way too much. I was contemplating acting out at a massage parlor, a behavior that I haven’t done in 15 years.

Finally, came to terms with the FACT that I was not going to further jeopardize my family, my marriage, my health, my freedom and wellbeing. So having an affair or using a prostitute wasn’t going to happen.

Which leaves me to masturbating to porn in an empty parking lot.

Such a sad existence.

One person asked me and others why I lust after other women knowing that I’ll never have any chance of hooking up with any of them.

For me, the honest answer is that it doesn’t cross my mind that I’ll never have sex with any of them. I entertain the idea that I actually do have a chance (even if it’s a very small one) of having sex with all of them. I’m addicted to a fantasy; I’m addicted to a lie.

Every relapse originates in the heart. That means that I think it before I act it out.

This is where my addiction separates from others. For an alcoholic, one has to drink alcohol to get drunk. Looking at it or thinking about it doesn’t give the same result.

Obviously, looking at porn will clearly get me high. But even thinking about it gives me a high. Getting high off fantasies is what I’ve gotten real good with over the course of my life. With the fantasy, comes a rush of dopamine to my brain. And according to Annie Grace, dopamine doesn’t do so much to augment pleasure as it does to augment cravings.

In other words, the more I crave, the more I crave.

I recognize that in order for me to get any better, I’ll need to take custody of not only my actions, but also my eyes and mind.

To take control of thoughts seems like an incredibly daunting task. But you want to know what’s challenging?

Fighting cravings for 7 months straight. All of you witnessed this.

I haven’t craved for the past seven days now…

That’s the longest I’ve gone without craving for over 2 years. Pretty nuts, right? And the experience feels kind of…

refreshing

I want this feeling to continue.

Because I recognize that I can no longer allow my eyes and mind to have free reign to do whatever the heart desires while I fight the craving to act out. If I continue to fantasize about acting out, I’m eventually going to do it.

Starting to make more sense to just stop craving altogether. I must take ownership of that. I do have more influence on my thinking than what I gave myself credit for.

And where does it begin?

In my case, it begins with saying, “No,” to the first look; the first thought of lust; the thought that matters. (Thanks @Yoda-Stevie)

230 days was a pretty long stretch. I can be a pretty good white-knuckler, can’t I? But there is a better way.

I did go to my CR meeting yesterday and came clean to all of them. I’m celebrating day 7 today, soon to be day 8.

Thanks everyone for your patience with me. Sorry that I went MIA for a week. All of you are very dear to me.

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Glad to see you back @KevinesKay! Glad to hear you’ve got some clear sights set for the future. On to the next day together.

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Welcome back. Glad you are back. Hey, you had I slip up. You did two good things imho… admitting you slipped up here to us and dusted yourself off and got up to fight another day. You need to use ALL the weapons in your sober tool box to wage war against your addiction and continue your journey. Best of luck for you in the future. We all just have a bunch of day ones strung together. Don’t be too hard on yourself. You know what it takes. #ODAAT

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2018 was a good year for me. I joined TS and found a sense of community here. That was a huge factor into why I attained 211 days of sobriety. It fell apart for me because i hadn’t planned for what i would do when the cravings struck. When they did, it was like a rocket passing by. I was left wondering how it had even happened.

What i concluded was that my negative behaviors hadn’t changed. I had changed a lot to allow me to achieve that bit of sobriety, staying away from triggers, working a program diligently, etc. But, I never really changed anything from the inside. As soon as opportunity struck, I fell hard.

A year has past since that relapse and I’ve relapsed another 5 or 6 times. I feel like I’m learning more with each of them though. I’m being more accountable and looking into what I did wrong.

I absolutely must reject the first thoughts of fantasy. Fantasizing is what brings my cravings on. If I can stop fantasies first, the waves wont knock me down. I try to fill my empty time with good things, other than my own poor thoughts. Unless it’s a dedicated time for meditation and prayer.

I’m hopeful more now than I have been in years.

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Thanks @TheJK.

I’m definitely making some changes in my life.

Been doing a lot more positive behaviors this week. And that will continue. I want to see each day as more a gift than a checkmark that I have to endure.

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Thank you.

Never give up, never.

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Rob, your friendship during this journey has been priceless. I appreciate that very much. We’ve both learned a lot. I guess getting there is half the fun.

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It’s an uphill battle, right? My hope is that if I never stop fighting, I’ll grow into the person that I want to be. If there’s any silver lining on the mess I’ve made of my life, it’s that the suffering has molded me into a much better person, more caring, more loving, more understanding. Maybe it’s better this way? No. Yes? No? I dont know.

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Glad you’re back Kevin, sorry about your relapse. But hard work pays out and you are working hard to get were you wanna be. You will get there! :heart:
2%20steps

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Sending you lots of love and strength Kevin x

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Hey Kevin, I’m glad you’re back in the moment with us. If you need an ear to listen please let me know.

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Thank you everyone.

I do feel in a good state right now.

Major learning experience here. God is more concerned with the lesson to be learned than about the sobriety. And this lesson is a big one to Him.

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Glad you’re still with us @KevinesKay!

My last relapse started much the same way and lasted almost 2 years. I didn’t learn much from my relapses except that I’m an addict who needs daily recovery to stay alive. Your courage and determination inspires me to keep going. Looking forward to more inspiration!

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Well done for getting back at it :smiley:

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Hello @KevinesKay,

I am so sorry to hear about your relapse. And please forgive me for not being there for you half as much as you have been for me. I wanted to reach out but I thought your silence was because of the decision to cut down on the time being spent on the TS. Glad to know you are back and stronger than before. Much love and best wishes from over here.

We shall definitely overcome.

Your brother in the same battle,

Optimistic.

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Thanks Moses.

You’re awesome.

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Reflecting in this, I so appreciate how honest, how raw, how frustrated I described my state of condition.

I didn’t have any real plan on how I was going to ultimately maintain custody of my eyes and mind. Certainly, white-knuckling my sobriety using willpower with the hopes of my mind catching up to my behavior wasn’t working. After this relapse, I carried on doing the same white-knuckle approach for 293 days until I relapsed again in October 2020. I was craving on 90% of those days.

What I’m sharing below is simply my experience. It may not reflect the experience of anyone else on this forum.

It took a move of God to steer my path so that I could redefine my sobriety and boundaries to reflect the state of my mind. And then to uncover the toxic shame that I was carrying which undermined and sabotaged my previous recovery efforts. And then, to reveal the enormous high amount of value that I was placing on porn.

This process included rejecting 12-step teachings that I held onto. For example, step 1, powerlessness. While coming to God, instead of having Him zapping me back into sanity. He guided me to a method that ultimately led me to recanting step 1.

Instead of saying I’m powerless over porn, my new belief has been

porn has no power over me

Because what I understand now, is that porn has no value. And if it has no value, then it has no power. How can something with no value have any power? The only value porn has is the value I assign it. The only power that it has is the power that I give it.

Because by admitting powerlessness, I was assigning power to porn, and thus value.

Porn may be cunning and baffling. But I no longer believe it to be powerful.

And this idea that porn was sooooo powerful and this recovery was going to be sooooo difficult that I was going to need all the help from God and others to defeat it. And I was going face this uphill climb up Mt Everest that was going to last the rest of my life because I’m always going to be an addict for the rest of my life and never be cured and good luck with all that!

This thinking has been helpful to some, but for me, all teachings that implied value to porn had to go. Otherwise, custody of my eyes and mind would be impossible for me.

I don’t struggle with cravings anymore. I can finally say that I have custody of my eyes and mind. Over the past 80 days, I’ve craved on less than 10% of them. I don’t want to use. I finally feel the freedom that others talk about. Recovery is no longer difficult. In fact, it’s now easy and fun. :blush:And the idea of relapse seems distasteful to me. I’m done. And I can understand those that say,

Relapse is not a part of recovery. It is a part of addiction.

But many those here that say that already have little desire to use again. They already have full custody of their minds. And some go on to say that recovery doesn’t really start until that occurs.

But I like to see this moment for me as a chapter, a milestone in my recovery; not simply the beginning.

And I can understand why many avoid saying,

Relapse is a part of recovery

because we don’t want to steer anyone to relapse and justifying it.

But I look at all of my recovery journey throughout the decades; the good, the bad, the relapses. And since God used all of those relapses to steer me into the best path for me, I look at them with gratitude. For without them, I cannot imagine myself being led to such a great state of freedom.

Relapse is not part of recovery?

Not always true. Because it certainly has been for mine. :slightly_smiling_face:

I look at relapsers with empathy, patience, no judgement. I understand. For decades, I was trapped. I was in recovery, but still trapped. It taken me a long search full of dead ends. Kind of like a maze. And what’s worked for some, has not worked for me. But I finally feel I have something that works for me. I’m free. For those still searching, my advise is to keep searching and keep seeking God for guidance. And if something isn’t working or has stopped working, stop trying harder and start trying different.

In TS, I’ve learned so many ideas that simply were outside of my scope. God used everyone here to expand my mind for solutions that I was unaware of. For that, I owe a big thank you to all.

Happy sober Wednesday everyone!

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That’s awesome, Kevin! I hope that I can gain control of myself as well. I do have control for the most part and go a long time without any cravings or desires to use. Then suddenly without warning, it’s like a wave hits me and that’s all I can think about. I recall prior abuses of my DOC, lust after the women I see, and it doesn’t go away for a few days. Using doesn’t make it better either. It prolongs that wave hitting me. After some time, it ebbs and I return to “normal”. I don’t like this cycle, but this is what I’m currently dealing with.

Last cycle I had like this I was able to gain enough perspective and focus that I could work through it without relapse. I think that is a huge part of recovery for Sex/PMO Addicts. To quote you:

This is what got me through my last bout of cravings. I considered it. Realized that my brain was amping it up to be something that it was not, that it would only lead to frustration and bitterness. Once I thought through what was happening within me, at least to a degree, it lost power over me. I’ve just got to keep working this view on my addiction. I do have power over it, it cannot just sneak up on me.

There’s so much out there in the world that competes for our attention. All that extra stuff can crowd out your view of what is truly important. Perspective is what I’m trying to keep.

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Good share, Rob.

If you haven’t read Easy Peasy yet, then please do so. It’s helped some of us to understand the lie of porn and not crave it. It’s for free right here.

Frasier Patterson wrote this hackbook based on Allen Carr’s The Easy Way to Stop Smoking. He did such a great job that I now consider EasyWay a major foundation of my recovery path.

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THIS^^^

You put words to feelings I’ve felt for so long and been incapable of verbalizing!

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