colliding views

colliding views
I am proud to have opened this thread. I am proud of everyone who is brave enough to write here. I am proud of those who have the courage to read it, and identify with it.

None of us were allowed to develop proper boundaries. Now, as adults, we have to re-learn for ourselves. Frankly, the only people I trust to help me learn those boundaries are you guys.

Man, that last sentence was so hard to write. I had to write the word 'trust' about strangers. Seems absurd, but it isn't. Seems like I should qualify or limit that trust, but you know what? I am not going to. I am just going to enjoy the idea that I have a think tank to help me work through issues.

Peace
 
men:

i am back and enjoying this post and all replies. i am now at the point where i have not rented any "fresh" porn in 1 year and 4 days. i have not masturbated to porn in i can't remember how long. (i haven't masturbated period.) and, i am wondering if i have a problem.

am i a sex addict? i am struggling with this right now. i have no partner in my life now nor have i ever had one. porn and masturbation has been my only release for the 20 years of my adult life. i do not know if i can live a life without it. am i a sex addict? i don't know. do i feel i can live a healthy life and include porn in it? i do not know. i truly do not know.

when i ask myself why i am not using it my answer is: to not pay the costs. these costs are both financial and emotional. the shame, the deep hurt, the sadness, and i believe i am starting to feel the anger. just starting but, i think it is there just under the surface.

and, i ask myself how long can i go without it? when will i give in and use it again? orgasm is a vital human need. when will my need become too great and i will have to act on it? i do not know men. i do not know.

it just really pisses me off that the people who wounded me to the extent that i am not not able to trust and experience intimacy, those mainly 2 people, my parents, are going on and living their lives.

do we have the right to hold those people responsible for our present day struggles? more importantly, will doing so help me any? really, will it help me today? i think not.

i think the only thing that matters is what the crap are we gonna do about it? that's the only thing that matters. what are we gonna do about it?

are we going to do everything possible to heal and improve our life? or, are we gonna keep on doing what we have been doing and keep getting what we have been getting? this is the most important point. the only point that really matters.

men, i have a lot of work to do and a lot of praying. a lot of work and a lot of praying. wow men, i feel grateful for being honest with all of you. and, grateful you all are there to read this. i think this is all for today.

i hope this post continues to grow. i wanna read more great replies to it. take care men. and, may our Gods bless us and strengthen and heal us all.

bec
 
am i a sex addict? i don't know. do i feel i can live a healthy life and include porn in it? i do not know. i truly do not know.
Click to expand...
Oh man, do I understand this. These words could be mine, they are mine.

What am I allowed? I feel like I need to eliminate these things - porn and masturbation -from my life, yet i feel as though i am burying something by doing that. I am ignoring something i need to confront.

Am I now rationalizing in order to get turned on in a fucked up way? What is the difference between a healthy release and something more sinister?

And I ask this in OUR context, the context of being a survivor. For others it may be different...
 
1. Sex is an instinct.
2. It doesn't need to be ignored.
3. Abuse has warped our attitude toward sex.
4. Abuse has warped our sexual expression.
5. Porn and masturbation are symptoms of abuse(for us at least)
6. Porn & masturbation are substitutes for intimacy.

Address the cause, not the symptoms, and the symptoms become easier to deal with.

Personally, my guilt over these issues kept me from being truly intimate.

We men are really dumb at times. Persistent, but dumb. If at first we don't succeed, we try again. We're to dumb to realize when we are trying the wrong thing. Attribute that to the abuse. Huh? I'm wondering what that means too.
Maybe its this: Porn & masturbation provide that release we want, but not the satisfaction we need. So we try harder. As we try harder to be satisfied, we get farther from what we really need.

If man evolved from the "primordial soup" none of this should matter or bother us. That's one reason I believe we were created. The need to become one with a woman is God given.

We're back to instinct & that's where I started. Since I've come full circle, I'll go now.
 
About the porn: I could spend hours on the net. I didn't know what I was looking for--I was just looking. As soon as a picture loaded, I clicked on another.
Click to expand...
we never do know what we're looking for, in the instant the picture flashes onto the screen we think it's the ultimate one. But seconds later we move on....and on.....and on.....

Lloydy :confused:
 
Frankly, the only people I trust to help me learn those boundaries are you guys.

Man, that last sentence was so hard to write. I had to write the word 'trust' about strangers. Seems absurd, but it isn't. Seems like I should qualify or limit that trust, but you know what? I am not going to.
Click to expand...
Way to go Cement !!

Lloydy :D
 
Cement,

I'll tell you how I look at it, see if this helps. First comes the relationship you have with your wife. If you are communicating well, understanding and supporting your individual and mutual goals and the sex is generally good, then why not supplement things with a jack off session with a good porno now and then. Let's be real here, after you're married and monogamous for a few years, it's normal to desire some variety. Porn and your own fantasies can be an outlet that does not violate any agreements with your partner. So far, so good. We get into trouble, however, if the quest for porn and excessive masturbation starts to interfere with other parts of our life. Does it interfere with the sex and intimacy you share with your wife? Do you avoid obligations, committments, or social activities so you can "do your thing"? Does it interfere with your job or relationships with others?

I think if you, I, we, deal with and feel our feelings directly and honestly, the compulsion to act out sexually in any way will find some level of resolution so that it does not hold power over our lives. We have to be careful, however, because we may always be vulnerable in this area and have to keep a watchful eye on what we are doing. We must be willing to seek help if things start to get out of whack. If the time you spend with your dick in one hand and the remote in the other is sporadic and fairly brief, then you're ok. If you find yourself needing it more, looking forward to it, planning on how to get away with it, then you might be headed for trouble and need to get in touch with what's really going on. In addition, and I think this is a big one, find healthy alternatives for dealing with life stressors, both internal and external.

I say all this because I lived it. There was a time in my life where I would be in bed, lights out, and be absolutely compelled to get up, get dressed, and leave the house at midnight in search of sex at adult bookstores or bars. I would stay out until 3 or 4 in the morning even though I had to be at work for an important meeting at 8 am. I had no control over it whatsoever, like someone was controlling me via remote control. It was awful and I was so ashamed. I eventually combined that addiction with alcohol and drugs, and then pretty much got focused on the drugs with sex as a nice accompaniement. Now that I am in recovery and dealing with my life and feeling my feelings I feel free to pop in a porno and ... . You get the picture. I actually enjoy it more because I finish after an hour or so and get on with my life. It also doesn't happen very often, so I'm free of all the shame and guilt I used to feel that probably used to set me up for the next time. Anyway, it's been working for me for a year.

If you are really worried about it, there are two good programs in southern California that I know of that deal with sexual recovery issues. Del Amo Hospital in Torrance, and the Sexual Recovery Institute in Beverly Hills. Each of these has a website where you can get more information like referrals, books to read, etc. Hope this helps, and keep at it. Sounds like you are doing pretty well and that is good news!
 
For me this is the final frontier, and not even Spock's logic can make sense of it.

I can deal with the abuse fine. What happened to me is consigned to the dustbin of history. I very rarely get flashbacks any more, I can talk about it. Tomorrow I have to work in the street where one of my abusers lives - and I will sleep ok tonight I promise you.

But the fantasy / masturbation thing still lingers on. And the hard part for me is that a normal sex life with my wife is suffering for it.
I don't get the day in - day out fantasy and dwelling on sex I used to get, that's 90% gone now as well.
I haven't looked at online porn for over a year.
But I still feel the need to crank one off most days. And it's bloody hard work !!
The fantasies are shit, and I can't find - no - I don't want new ones, and it makes my arm ache.
It's a bag of shite, but I still have a compulsion towards it.

Do old habits die hard ? is it that simple or am I missing something ?

Lloydy
 
Thank you Cement for starting this thread. I've reread my post as well all that followed. I don't know what to say. Here I am in "short order" with a ton of sexual tension, at work, sick daughter and wife at home. There have been many times when I've been totally stressed and would masturbate everyday to get the high. I didn't know it then, but I would actually dissociate and lose touch with everything around me. Everyone's talked about their fantasies and I guess I feel like I want to come clean too. I very much like my dick. I don't have trouble touching it, feeling it; you get the picture. It's taken me awhile to get here, but I'm darn proud of it. A few years ago I began reading some Tantric literature and it gave a new perspective on masturbation, the erect penis "Jade Stem." It has been a challenge to reconceive the sexual tension as something to redirect and feed off of as opposed to something to be relieved of...which is how I dealt with it as an adolescent and young adult. I didn't learn to do anything constructive with the tension. Sexual abuse by my brother(s) and mother preempted any choices of what to do with the tension. When the abuse stopped, the tension got bottled up. The overt abuse by my brother ended when I was eight. The covert abuse by my mother continued until I got married. I experienced my first wet dream when I was thirteen. I remember it today. I was dreaming about a girl I had a crush on at the time. She kissed me, and I came! But the borrowed sweat pants of my second oldest brother were now soiled. I hid them for months in a closet, so ashamed was I. He discovered them and humiliated me. I did not masturbate until I was seventeen years old. I had a wet dream probably every other night since I was thirteen, and just stuffed toilet tissue in my pants in preparation for the eventual spill. I experimented and successfully kept my shorts clean. I took control of the emissions. It became habitual. I realize now that it was to release not just sexual tension, but also anxiety. And then when I was depressed, it made me feel better. I don't recall specifically fantasizing about anything or anyone when I was younger. There was a small magazine photo of a naked lady that I kept under a rock in the backyard that I would visit. But I would just stare at it. Sort of just trying to figure it out. Like, what's this all about. I certainly never actively fantasized about girls or women then or now. They were off-limits. I remember lifting up a little girls dress when I was in second grade, being reprimanded, filled with shame, first communion time, and girls are off limits. I did look at Playboy and Penthouse as a teenager, but that totally conflicted with the good Catholic boy image I had developed. I was gonna be a good boy. Fast forward to my current fantasy world and it's pretty straightforward, just me and a guy masturbating together. I think this is about wanting to be close to men, reenacting abuse, etc. I'd like to explore more of fantasy life that includes women, but I feel like I need permission. Even when I used to act out, etc., it was much more o.k. for me to be with a guy than to do such exploitive stuff with a women. They're to be preserved. Having said all this, I'm realizing my best hard-ons are with my wife, but they're just not frequent enough. Lifestyles of 46 year old men with three children don't accommodate a lot of phallic activity. Which brings me to today. I think I'm o.k. with gay images, fantasies. To me, it's a little homeopathic. A little bit of the thing that ails you can help you. I'm not talking about abuse, exploitation. There is something to being with myself, my Phallos, and pleasing it, being with it, meditating and breathing, and being mindful of its power that is spiritual and not in any way corrupt. Making love with my wife is one thing, being with myself is another. I believe both can be good, correct, and unspoiled. The fantasies might be good for starters, but they can subside to a mindfulness of the energy being drawn from below through your chest and into your head. Feeling, believing, knowing, what you hold in your hand is the important thing. My struggle is using it wisely. I don't want to control my sexual energy, and fantasies into extinction. I don't want to be a eunuch. I want to take what was a misuse of my sexuality, reclaim it, and use it as I believe it will serve me and those I love. I don't want quick release with myself, my wife, or with anyone else...this is not something to be dispensed of. I want to enjoy it and be empowered by it, not shamed and deflated by it. I would like share more of this with my wife. I think it could really be beautiful. I envy those of you who have taken the risks to share your stuff with your wives.

I just wanted to share some of this with you. Some of it's practical and some of it's philosophical.

Thanks for reading.

JM
 
Wuamei
That hit the spot, but it's late and I need to think properly about what you said.
Catch you tomorrow.
Lloydy ;)
 
ok, let me try this..

Wuame - your post today helped me at a difficult moment.

Roy - I want to believe that what works for you will work for me, I am just not quite there yet. Philosophically and intellectually, I feel there has to be a release of sexual energy; it's a guy thing, biological, instinctual, right? I don't know if I am comfortable sorting out the consequences yet. I am still re-learning my sexual behaviors. But man, is it hard to resist a simple, naked girl picture right now.

JM - I have to argue that the sex industry is not always or exclusively exploitative of women. This doesn't excuse the use of sexual images for the purpose of masturbation, but maybe it removes some of the guilt associated. Or do I digress?

Lloydy again hits it on the head. The logic of this all doesn't work. There is no zero sum, e.g., "I jerk off, therefore I cannot perform with a partner," or "I have been clean of all pornography, etc. and haven't masturbated so everything is fine." Neither of those is true...yet some portion of both is true.

I cannot say that I understand any of it. Holding off from masturbation and porn gave me one of the best, most intimate lovemaking sessions I have ever had with my wife. I must also say that, now, just a few days later, I am experiencing a strong desire to women in general, and I cannot distinguish the feelings of horniness, guilt, shame and instinct, and that bothers. me.

I have guilt about this, and the guilt hurts. but without the guilt, might I act out? So the guilt is serving a purpose?

My head is swimming with this, because, rather than to apply logic (another trait we share, the desire to make things work logically, is it our attempt to find pattern in the chaos?), I am trying to blurt out what I am feeling, raw and generally unedited.
 
Ah, sex and acting out as a drug and its attendant adrenaline rush. I know it well, as we all do. Someone posted about how it numbs the other stresses and pain away.

I have felt that way, too.

At least the surge and retreat of the pain, shame and guilt of acting out was predictable, like the tide. It had a rhythm, it ebbed and flowed, and I knew that rhythm. I could hold my breath at high tide and wait. The waves would recede, and the softening crash would reveal the beach, hard-packed and smooth, new again.

Now I feel like I am standing in the middle of traffic, angry horns bleating all around me, and I can't concentrate enough to know which way to go.
 
Cement,

Your own words:
I cannot say that I understand any of it. Holding off from masturbation and porn gave me one of the best, most intimate lovemaking sessions I have ever had with my wife.
Click to expand...
Your own abuse:
Now I feel like I am standing in the middle of traffic, angry horns bleating all around me, and I can't concentrate enough to know which way to go.
Click to expand...
Even when we know where we want to be, our abuse takes us back to where we were.

You are on the right path. Don't get lost now.

Devon
 
JM wrote: "Sexual abuse by my brother(s) and mother preempted any choices of what to do with the tension. When the abuse stopped, the tension got bottled up."

Damn! Another man incested by his mother! I hurt with you, man. Yeah, it bottled up a lot of tension in me too. I'm finally, slowly but surely, learning how to release it properly in healthy intimacy & sexuality, as well as in, as someone said earlier, "finding better things to do with my hands," like typing this!

Take care JM

Wuame
 
The adreniline rush I could create was huge and could last for a few hours. At it's height it was better than cocaine. I ruled my world and became invincible.
I've multiple rolled a 4x4 down a mountainside more than once, and that doesn't come anywhere near the rush, which is a bit odd because a big part of my acting out was the danger element.
I've acted out in the most public places imaginable, and that was a part of the rush.

The increased heart-rate before the acting out and the high were everything to me.
And even now when I know I'm driving in a dangerous situation I cant get that level. Maybe it's because the 4x4 is a specially built machine with a steel cage and full racing harness etc so I know I wont get hurt. I know that failure just means lost points and some stick from the other guys. At worst it's a bit of mechanical damage and a stiff neck !

Getting caught acting out was the biggest risk I ever took, I stood to lose everything - my wife, family and friends. Probably my home and job as well. How much risk did I need ? Lot's of it apparently, because the rush was addictive and I didn't have the tools in place to stop it and deal with the root cause.
Now, although I remember that level of high I don't need or want it anymore. I recognize it for what it was - sheer terror !

But also I wonder if perhaps I'm missing this association of excitement and sex in some way, has sex become boring ?
Is it something as simple as trying to get some different, and acceptable, excitement back into our sex life ? Perhaps I should suggest a moment of unbridled passion in the back of the car the next time we're on the supermarket car park :D

Or is that illegal ??

Lloydy
 
Here's another perspective. Make of it what you will. It makes me angry and sad.

I stopped all acting out that involved other people 16 years ago. I just finally knew that it was destructive. I didn't fully understand why, but I knew.

That was also the end of my sex life as most people would define such. So, if it wasn't for fantasy and masturbation, I would have no sexual activity or release at all, if you can call it that.

Does it ever get out of control? Have I been up until 4 am, when work started at 6, cruising the net, and doing my thing for 6 or 8 or 10 hours?

Yes.

Will that happen again?
Maybe.

Am I a sex addict?
Doubtless.

Do I sexualize everything?
I did. More so the younger I was. But I don't take credit or blame for that. I put it right on the perpetrator who started that train running when I was three. Over all, I've gotten better in this area. Maybe it's middle age.

Do I think some things are off limits?
Well, maybe not in thought. Unless I think it should be for some reason. The limit is in the boundary. I don't have a partner, but I don't think I would share every single thought, sexual or otherwise, that might cross my mind if I did. On the other hand, I have a friend who I can, would, and have told some pretty PERSONAL FANTASY material to. In context, it just made us closer friends. Maybe not the same, because we don't and never have had a physical relationship, but my point is, I knew that talking about it would not be damaging with this person.

Nature?
Hell yes. Hormones and instincts. If I don't "take care of business" for too long, it becomes very, very obvious, and yes, necessary.

Now to Lloydy, you wrote this:
The fantasies are shit, and I can't find - no - I don't want new ones
Click to expand...
I just think that is the wrong idea. I think it is wiser to replace them with better ones, however you wish to define better. I mean, short of brain dysfunction, we will always have fantasies, dreams, imaginings. I think they can be re-programmed, just as was discussed in the affirmations thread. And the ones that can't be gotten rid of, well, we don't have to act on them; we can learn to distract, divert our attention elsewhere. It can be done.

So the sum total of what I'm saying:
Fantasy and masturbation are neutral things. Neither good or bad in and of themselves.

Fantasies will happen. Observe them for what they tell you about yourself and thought processes. They may be the legacy of SA, or they just may be a true desire. Acknowledge them for whatever they are, if you can. And then, either enjoy them or work to change them to ones you do enjoy. Consider carefully before they are shared with partners. Be sure you know why you are sharing them. It's very common for survivors to do or say things like that in order to get just the reaction we later bemoan. It's a passive agressive move that confirms our own self defined defects. Don't fall into that trap.

And masturbation. If it's a problem, out of control, obsessive, well then work on that. You don't worry about exactly where and who gave you a cold, you do what you must to take care of yourself and fight it. Why do any less for something so much more important?

Sorry if any of this comes across as preachy or impatient. I'm feeling weird lately, but I wanted to put my 2 cents in too.

Later,
Donald
 
Don
I guess you're right there, now it's pointed out clearly. Thanks for that friend.

I suppose what I don't want to replace my old fantasies with is more of the same.
I don't want fantasies that might take me back.

If I can fantasize over a pretty girl, and erotic scene in a movie or even regular sex porn, I wouldn't be bothered. But I just can't get that to kick in.

It's as though I've thrown the baby out with the bathwater - my old fantasies have gone ( mostly ) and the ability to use any fantasy seems to have gone with them.

I KNOW that logic says to me that fantasy is fantasy, it's what goes on inside my head and can't really hurt me.
If I fantasize about sheep shagging - so what ?
As long as I don't get a job as a shepherd nobody gets hurt.
And masturbating, that's the same - who cares if I crank one off in the shower ?

That's the reality - I know it.

I think I'm frightened that it'll come back, if I just let it get a foot in the door and allow it to give me pleasure will I be back out there cruising the toilets ?

No, I don't honestly believe I would - but I just can't convince myself 100 %
I know what it did to me, and the thought of doing it again terrifies me.

Logically, if I learned to do away with it all, I should be able to learn new stuff. Maybe I'm a slow learner. But I'll try, I promise I will.

Lloydy
 
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