ED Recovery Stories 3 is part of an 8 page series containing shorter accounts.
For longer, more detailed ED accounts see Rebooting Accounts and External Rebooting Blogs & Threads
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Felt Like Giving an Update
Hey everyone, just thought I’d drop in to give an update. Well, it was nearing 4 months of no PMO for me, and possessing the extreme logical mind I have I felt like I really had to undergo some testing to see just how much I have changed over this period of no PMO. So, last night I decided to masturbate right before sleeping. The important caveat here is that I used no porn (obviously) nor any sort of fantasy. Just my hand, and very light strokes at that. None of that anaconda gripping that so many who masturbate use.
The point of this test was to see if I could get hard without any sort of external stimuli besides the feel. A while back when I started on this journey, I read several reports where a good indicator of some recovery was the ability to masturbate with just experiencing the feel of your hand. Well, I was VERY surprised trying this out. I was hard after about 2 seconds, and I mean really hard. I didn’t last very long during this session. I was hoping just for some response at all with no porn or fantasy, and wow I guess the response was too much.
I wasn’t convinced, however, because I haven’t masturbated in almost 4 months. Perhaps I didn’t last long because I haven’t done it in a while. I decided to try again today, this time with a condom. Before getting to the results, I have to say there were no “chaser” effects from last night. No desire to look at porn or fantasize about porn today. Well, today’s session was just as fast as yesterdays. I put the condom on no problems, was still extremely hard before and after, and had no problems finishing off with the condom on. The kegel exercises definitely pay off too. I noticed an extremely harder erection right off the bat, and it was significantly easier to stop myself right at the point of orgasm than from what I remember in the past. That should make the future girls happy
I really wanted some sort of confidence indicator that I was getting better before getting in bed with a lady again, and I think this definitely gave me that. I count this as a success, and it’s always preferred to have your most recent memory a successful one rather than unsuccessful. I’m not going to binge on masturbating again either, in fact I plan on stopping again for a while (maybe a month). I’m going to carefully watch myself during the next few days for any chaser effects like a strong desire to watch porn. So far I don’t have any which is just great.
Maybe my brain has healed itself but I won’t really know for sure until my next girlfriend. I’m moving in a month so I’m not looking for dates at the moment as I’m over the whole casual sex thing (that’s another topic) and I don’t want to start a relationship and then abandon it by leaving the state. I am talking to a girl who lives near where I will be living, so hopefully I’ll be able to start the final test soon I do have this to say, my fears have shifted from not being able get an erection to not lasting long enough.
I’d say that I was mostly cured my now. Went 30 days without P&M (way back when – see earlier posts) but now M regularly, maybe once a week, but do not watch porn. Porn is the real killer here IMHO. Also, if condoms are killing your erections, make sure you have the right size ones! Mine were too tight and cutting off the blood supply, so I got bigger ones. If it feels tight, it probably is!
I reckon 6 weeks not P&M and then M once a week should sort most men out just fine!
Signs of improvement from PIED?
Hey guys so I’ve been struggling with PIED for quite a while now. The last girl I was with I could only get it up when she blew me but the moment I was putting the condom on it would just go limp. I’m 22 now and have been watching high speed internet porn since I was about 13. Currently on day 56 of hardmode right now, although I did take a glimpse of nude photo’s a few times on this journey. Most recently I have been getting some of the hardest boners I’ve ever had since my early high school days. Can anyone tell me if this is a sign that my PIED is slowly being cured? Would love to hear about your stories and experience.
Right so I’m cured and having sex regularly but my new issue is premature ejaculation, I last about 2-3 minutes and probably a bit more if I have sex again like half an hour later, was just wondering if this will go or I need to do something?
I missed checking in at 120, thought I’d skip it until 150 but something notable happened recently. Background: I’m 40 and doing nofap to cure my ED. I was a forever alone type with little sexual experience. I’ve had an SO for a while and we always use ED meds to have sex. After 90 days I didn’t get the reboot so kept it going.
Still have the ED but my SO was able get me off via a handy the other day. This had never happened before, a girl getting me off manually, so I call that progress. I’m also starting to get some spontaneous half erections, no full erections yet though.
Anyway, hang in there brothers, it gets easier as you go along, but we must be ever vigilant!
Day 10: The Washington Monument
Really happy with the results, I’ve never seen my little man so strong and healthy looking. Stay strong it only get better!
Seven weeks in today with no mb or p. Five weeks to go, I’m sooo, ridiculously sexually frustrated it drives me crazy. I am seeing killer results. This process really, really works. All I have to do is think about a sexual act and it gets hard… harder than it was before… and that was with physical stimulation. So the results are very good, and I know I will make it the end and I won’t relapse, but it is just so annoying not being able to orgasms. Honestly this process gets more difficult as more time is elapsed, you see better a better results each week. And if I am having these great results now imagine what it will be like when i complete the whole 3 month sprint, but the frustration does build and build and build. The difficult part isn’t staying away from porn it’s the not mbing. I know this post has a negative underlying to it but I just wanted somewhere where I could post my frustrations- haha. Keep strong guys, I’ll see you on the other side.
Masturbation isn’t the whole story, or even the biggest part of the story. I’d be willing to bet money that most men masturbate to porn, rather than without it. Take away the porn and masturbation frequency goes down. I’ve also come to the conclusion that masturbating without porn is pretty harmless to the sex drive. It’s porn plus masturbation that is the libido killer.
(Age 20) 17-20 has the most. Even though there has only been three hundred something votes out of what could be eighty thousand plus. Even if there was just two votes. I’d still be in complete shock.
Ever since I was 15 up until 3 months ago (when I discovered nofap) I thought the only person experiencing these problems was myself. I know thats kinda nieve to let myself believe that , but a teenage kid having an erectile dysfunction is kind of unheard of. I’m so glad and thankful that I discovered nofap because I was able to rid myself of the porn induced e.d I suffered from for 5 long years. Its a beautiful thing to have all of this support on here.
As someone who spans the gap between the pre-Internet porn era, and the high speed porn era, I can tell you I had no problems including both sex and masturbation in my routines in the early to mid nineties. When I started getting into Internet video porn in the late nineties and into the oughts, that’s when my dysfunction developed. Delayed ejaculation was a huge problem: I could no longer orgasm from oral sex and I sometimes had difficulty with orgasm in a vagina. I found myself having to masturbate after sex with my wife because I couldn’t get off any other way, and sometimes even masturbation didn’t work all that well. In the pre-internet era, when I had only my mind’s fantasies, masturbation was something I did frequently, but high speed porn changed everything–I was doing it more than once a day. If I didn’t feel like masturbation, but wanted to relieve stress or go to sleep, porn helped me get aroused. I even found myself looking at porn prior to sex with my wife, in order to get aroused because she just couldn’t do it for me, anymore. Once I eliminated porn from the equation (which hasn’t been easy), my masturbation frequency dropped and my sex life improved.
I can say without a doubt it cured my porn induced ED. I’ve had a few 90 day streaks, and I went over 100 fairly recently. I can have sex with my wife more than once in an evening and have no problem getting an erection. I had years of ED problems prior to find the YBOP site. I’ve also been at this for over 2 years now. My first year was a real struggle, and I wasn’t completely cured of ED until this last year.
I actually had a prescription for Cialis a couple years ago and I hated using it. Even going to the doctor’s appointment made me so ashamed because deep down I think I knew it was the PMO causing the problem, and this was before I came across yourbrainonporn.com.
Hi everyone,
I would like to make an update of my situation, as I think it could be encouraging to some of you. I will try to keep it as short and easy to read as possible.
I discovered this thread on the 3rd of January – date of my first post – and on that day I decided that I would go for at least 2 months without any porn or masturbation. And so I did; 2 and a half months to be exact.
During this period my libido was extremely variable. Most of the time it was non-existent, but then, every 3 weeks or so, it would rise to unprecedented levels and I would feel incredibly horny (just the act of getting naked to take a shower would get me HUGELY hard). This would last for 3-4 days, then libido back to zero. I remember being sad at this. “What’s the point of abstaining, if my libido is down like 90% of the time?”
After this period I came back home (I was working abroad), which meant coming back to my girlfriend. And other things coming back with it – the feeling of my man-hood being put to the test, anxiety and even suicidal thoughts before meeting her, etc.
The first sign of change was the libido. From being on a high every 3 weeks, it started being on a high every week.
Then, on the 2nd April, that is 2 weeks ago, the most wonderful thing happened. Against my own expectations, and following an evening of doubts and negative thoughts even while being with her), me and my girlfriend had… sex! I mean penetration. After fooling around in bed my penis was half hard. She still managed to insert it a bit, but once she did it and began moving up and down, it was incredible – I ejaculated in 15 sec. To all of you who still haven’t tried it, I tell you that the stroke of a vagina can be something so, so good. It’s like it was built to make a penis ejaculate.
After this my libido continued high for long periods. It was bulging all last week, and Friday I met my girlfriend, and again we managed to have very satisfactory sex. Ejaculated twice, the second time as a result of penetration. The following morning, I had one of the biggest woods I have ever had. The strong libido and very strong woods have continued throughout the weekend and during today.
This is the story so far. Here are my main points:
1) A 2-month period of no porn and no masturbation seems to be essential for recovery. It was very difficult at times, but I could master myself to do it. I was busy with other things at the time, which helped my mind stay away from thoughts.
2) During this period, libido displayed extreme values, from sky-rocketing to non-existent. I believe this is normal and it’s just a reaction of the body to the sudden lack of P&M stimulus.
3) After the 2-month period, libido seems to return to normal, that is relatively high, or even very quite high most of the time. A big change I noticed is that, thanks to no-porn policy, so many girls on the street look attractive and just made me want to have sex with them. This didn’t happen as much as when I viewed porn. And I feel more ready to accept and enjoy a “normal” girl’s body, and I’m even more comfortable with my own body.
4) After the 2-month period, I relapsed to porn only once, and I now intend to go on for a longer time without it. As to the masturbation, I have been doing it roughly once a week. I think this is not harmful, it may even be beneficial to “keep the machine working”; although I could perhaps go on a longer cycle, say every 2 or 3 weeks. When I masturbate, I use a very light grip so as to not desensitize the penis.
5) Having a supportive girlfriend was decisive; it is very helpful if one is to succeed and, if anxiety symptoms are present, as was my case, I believe it is essential. She made it clear she would stand by me and didn’t put any pressure on me whatsoever. Plus, she lives alone (her parents are away most of the time), which means we could use her place for our nocturnal voyages of discovery into each others sexuality, without hassles.
So what’s my point?
My point is that it is possible, guys. I don’t think I’m completely out of the woods yet, but I feel immensely better. The recipe is getting a girl, stopping masturbation for 2 months then doing it every now and then (frequency will depend on the person; the aim is to maintain your libido high), and staying away from porn, if possible forever. Forever. All it does is harm.
YOU CAN DO IT.
I’m on day 70. If I look back at myself honestly, I have to admit that when I started this process I was probably most interested in being able to “perform” again. I wanted my raging libido back, and I wanted to be ready for action.
But today, over two months later, I find my libido isn’t raging.
I feel a little sad about it, because there is that infantile part of me which really enjoyed constantly fantasizing about every woman I met, and getting so turned on by the special kind of porn I liked, and edging, edging, edging, and feeling like I was melting because I was so horny.
I see now–all that was infantile. It’s infantile to be so preoccupied with ones own sexual release. Afterwards, all the fantasies evaporate, and if you don’t love the person you are with, you immediately notice the crud in their eyes, because the angel dust that got sprinkled all over everything by millions of years of evolution goes….POOF…and you are staring at real life, which isn’t always beautiful and pleasing.
For you young whippersnappers, “angel dust” is a drug, and I think it’s a good idea to think of arousal as a drug. Because it distorts reality. And we rebooters all got addicted to it. And then habituated to it. And then certain basic body functions got screwed up, and that’s why we’re all here chatting on this site.
But the point is, I feel like my levels are evening out for the first time in my life, and my relationship with my sexual nature is changing for the better. “Hey, sex wasn’t supposed to swallow up my entire personality! It’s just a part of life!”
Don’t worry though, horndogs. The machinery comes back even if you’re a pansy like me. These days, sometimes I have to stay in the car for a minute or two when I arrive somewhere because, well, I am a little too ready for action. This kind of thing hasn’t happened for a long while. Other things happen now too, but I’m not going to write about all that, because it’s not the most important thing in the world.
Hang in there and you’ll get there. Be vigilant about it. I hope you will find a new balance too, because you will feel stronger, and more at ease with yourself, and more in control of yourself, and, man, that is really sexy.
[Added] I am of the opinion that long period of total abstinence is the best way to go. I sort of inadvertently did the intermittent reboot thing. I would do PMO or MO for a few days, then go a week or two without. Back and forth for a year or so. Saw no improvement at all. I think it actually got quite a bit worse.
I didn’t start feeling like things were healing up until I totally stopped PMO and went through a flatline period. After a month or so I started noticing some positive changes. Now I’m two months along and have had more improvement.
(Day 44) Everyday, my morning erections get firmer and firmer. When I wake up, I’m basically drunk with horniness. This is an entirely new feeling to me; I’ve never felt this way before. When I wake up my hands are basically on autopilot but I somehow control myself and avoid masturbating. On day 40 I had the strongest erection I can ever remember having in my life. It was GLORIOUS!!! Unfortunately, I couldn’t resist my urge to masturbate, and I went to orgasm (no porn of course). The rest of the day, and I felt my hormones playing havoc with my emotions, too. I was kind of down and grumpy on day 41, almost a little depressed. That’s a mental state I haven’t been in since I started this challenge, but now that I look back at my life when I was PMOing I was in it a lot. My mood perked up on day 42 and I guess time just flew by since then because apparently today is day 44. I woke up with an erection again today and I just couldn’t help laughing out loud. I feel so mischievous, life shouldn’t be this easy, but it really is and the solution was right there in front of me the whole time!!! DOH =)
[More details] I think I’m still in my flatline period, although I’m beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I’m 1000% committed to not using porn. Honestly, I simply couldn’t do that to myself now, having seen the positive changes that quitting has brought about. When I woke up with the erection, I just needed to find some release. I couldn’t remember ever having an erection that strong, and I didn’t know what to do with it. As I continue this path I think I’ll learn how to cope with them. I’m 22, and have watched porn since 15, so basically as long as I’ve been sexually active. It’s crazy that my erections are stronger now than they were in high school, but I really believe porn did a number on my neurochemistry while growing up.
I know I’m still in my flatline because that’s what I’m intuiting from my body. When I’m ready, I’ll know. My flatline was rough for my penis. I don’t think I had erections until day 30 or so, and then too only in the morning. The first 2-3 weeks it shrunk but I didn’t pay too much attention to it. If you recall, I struggled with quitting porn a couple times before this effort, so I remembered the initial stages, which were identical. Over time though, I started getting erections again, just at random times, not triggered by anything. And my penis dropped down again and regained girth. The erections got stronger and more veiny. Day 40 I woke up and could have stabbed somebody with the thing. And that simply wasn’t in my concept of reality until now.
Since day 40, my mood bounced back really quickly, and I redoubled my commitment – no excessive touching of my penis for a few days, period. I think the exercise is really helping in that regard. However, my erections haven’t returned to the same strength, which is frustrating, but I’m waiting. I’ve also been drinking poolside all day everyday this week, so it could be stemming from that. I’m not much of a drinker. I’ll be able to tone down the drinking next week so we’ll see what happens then.
I’ll check the energy circulation and masturbation guidelines out, but I’m probably going to be hands-off for a little longer. When I started this I thought there would be no way I could hit even 30 days, but now I’d like to give some love to my body and give it as much time as necessary. Socially and emotionally, I’ve been killing it, so I am in no rush whatsoever.
[March] Started masturbating when I was around 12-13 years old. My family broke up at the same time and I probably used masturbation as a way to escape reality. I have always been quite shy with the ladies but apparently been quite popular. Somehow I think this addiction has a link to my fear of real intimacy.
My last girlfriend was really hurt when she found out that I had a porn collection. I defended my self and said that this was normal, but then she got really upset when she found a bill for phone-sex. The relationship ended after 5 years and my addiction really worsened after this. I am now 31 years old and experiencing ED and anxiety when trying to have sex. Stopped cold turkey 2 weeks ago after another failure in bed with a really nice girl.
I also stopped using nicotine 2 weeks ago so I am experiencing double withdraw symptoms: Restless-legs, bad sleep, anger, depression and loneliness. On the positive side I am: training more, earlier to bed, more focused and more energy. It seems like my feelings are both through the roof and down through the floor.
[May] This is my second real attempt at rebooting, and I lasted around 4 weeks the first time. During my reboot I took better care of myself both physical and psychological. It might sound silly but somewhere in that time period I started to respect my self again. People noticed that and I had quite good feedback from friends, family and girls. This time around I will quit alcohol entirely during rebooting. I`m not taking any chances this time by making stupid choices when intoxicated.
[End of July] I have now been PMO free since the first of July, yeah almost one month. It’s funny how this works, but I have had much more attraction going on with the girls. I met a real cute girl 2 weeks ago and we ended up having great sex without orgasm. My ED problems were just gone and it happened SO naturally.
We met and took a swim together at a beach a couple of days later. I had to stay alone in the cold water after we kissed for about 5 minutes, before I could walk up on the crowded beach. She was laughing and enjoying the scenario fully aware of me trying to lose my erection.
This reboot has been much easier than the first one, and I’m getting close to the old record of 4 weeks PMO free. I had a strange feeling of movement in my testicles the days after O-free intercourse, but this has now gone away.
One of my colleges said that I seemed to have a lower frustration level (she doesn’t know about this process of course) but that she also likes this side of me. Maybe this PMO thing just paralyzed me into being a nice and depressed pussycat? This fall I am going back to school to finish my masters degree.