Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Your Brain On Porn
Your Brain On Porn
GARY WILSON
Your Brain on Porn
Commonwealth Publishing
commonwealth-publishing.com
For A. Masquilier, whose selflessness and foresight made possible the open
dialogue that continues to fuel recoveries by the thousands.
Contents
Introduction
Concluding Reflections
Neuroscience, the Internet and the Good Life
The human mind is shaped by the intersection of two powerful forces: biology and
culture. Cultural changes, in particular technological innovations, profoundly alter
how we think. Yet these changes do not occur on a blank slate. The brain is a
highly plastic, flexible organ. But it is also an accident of evolution, with numerous
constraints. The written word, for example, has transformed our ability to
understand the world, greatly accelerating changes in technology and
fundamentally changing human consciousness. Yet, unlike verbal language,
reading and writing do not emerge spontaneously from human sociability. Literacy
only reliably arises as the product of well-organized social institutions dedicated to
education.
Literacy requires training that alters the basic wiring of the brain. It takes serious
work to organize neurons into a highly efficient specialized system that links visual
processing to the verbal language system and manual motor outputs. Sustained and
guided attention changes the structure of the brain and endows it with new powers.
The great promise of the rapidly advancing field of human neuroscience is that it
can help us to understand how cultural contexts interact with the brain to create the
mind - how behaviours and ways of thinking inscribe themselves inside our skulls.
It gives us a new way to put human consciousness under the light of scientific
understanding. Neuroscience offers guidance that can help us fulfill our potential
and avoid pitfalls along the way.
But we mustn’t fool ourselves that this emerging science will deliver quick and
easy fixes – fixes like taking a pill, having surgery, or passing laws severely
restricting what others are allowed to do. The best way to train our plastic brains to
work effectively in their cultural context is through education, inquiry and
contemplation, a process that takes a lot of time and patience.
In recent years there has been widespread concern about the impact of the internet
on our social lives. The internet offers wonderful opportunities for people to
connect in new and meaningful ways, yet it also threatens to make us socially
disconnected. Many of us have hundreds of ‘friends’ on Facebook whom we
interact with online at the cost of face-to-face interactions. Research has shown this
often has a negative effect on our well-being. Technology is in danger of making
us impersonal, of dampening our capacity and tendency for human connection.
Perhaps the most important example of the way that digital technology allows us to
withdraw from ordinary interaction is pornography. In a healthy relationship, sex is
associated with the highest levels of intimacy and trust. It is, or at least can be, the
culmination and expression of our closest human connection. It not only helps to
reinforce this connection, it also creates entirely new life. Evolution shaped this
basic human drive to build families: sexual desire is one of our most powerful
motivational forces, and has been essential to the flourishing of the human race.
Yet pornography transforms that drive into a force that primarily motivates the
completely solitary and unproductive activity of masturbation.
Pornography has been present since before the dawn of civilization, and can be
found on the walls of cave dwellers. Yet, it has never been less social, or more
pervasive. It is well known that pornography has been the single most influential
economic engine that has fuelled the expansion of the internet, including internet
commerce. It is accessed in massive quantities on both computers and, more
recently, smartphones, not just in the USA but increasingly across the entire world.
Finally, pornography represents the most important cautionary tale of how the
internet can make us impersonal because of a great irony. It turns out that sex is
such a personal issue that we are reluctant to speak about it in public. We don’t like
to say so out loud, but the internet exists in its current form because it is, in large
part, a collection of technologies that make access to pornography more
convenient. Pornography is shaping the private consciousness of people all over
the world, probably including most of the people you know, in a way that is
quantitatively and qualitatively different from the past. It is past time for that
private influence to become a subject for public deliberation.
Let me take a moment to clearly state what I believe is the best approximation of
the truth, on a topic where objectivity is notoriously difficult. Addiction to internet
pornography is a very real phenomenon with a very real impact on well-being. It is
a phenomenon which has grown exponentially in the last decade, even though it
has remained largely invisible and undetected by society. Tragically, its risks
continue to be ignored or actively denied by all but a few enlightened medical
professionals. It is a phenomenon that is not just here to stay, but also likely to
increase. It is almost certainly the cause of the widespread sexual dysfunction
found in recent studies of late adolescence.1 It is a problem that is most likely
impacting you, or your loved ones, without you even being aware of it.
The core of this book comes from the blend of two things: scientific evidence and
human experience. Pornography is as old as civilization, but this book provides a
scientific account of why internet pornography is having a qualitatively and
quantitatively different effect from most prior pornography. This scientific account
is made vivid by the first hand reports of people who have been badly impacted by,
and found a way to help resolve, their addiction to internet pornography. The
account that you will read is solid. I am a professor in the fields of neuroscience,
psychology and ethics. I have more than 20 years of education and research
experience in those fields, acquired at world leading institutions in both Europe
and the USA, and I actively teach and do research. Writing this foreword is an
accident in my career – something I stumbled on by chance and which grabbed me
when I realized its significance. I have never even met Gary Wilson, but I have
paused to study his work and the academic literature carefully. I vouch for his
account without hesitation. It is the most considered, thorough and accurate
account of internet pornography addiction that exists at the time of writing.
Gary’s account isn’t the last word, and he would never pretend it is. However, it is
far more insightful than accounts I have read by tenured professors at major
research universities. Furthermore, unlike many of those accounts, Gary’s account
is very readable. To be clear, both Gary Wilson and I feel very strongly that more
research is needed, into the neuroscience of this particular addiction, and into
effective therapeutic responses. Nonetheless, it is already evident that pornography
poses a significant threat to the emotional wellbeing of many of its users, and it
would be irresponsible not to acknowledge that threat as real and pressing.
The threat that internet pornography poses can be traced to the effects it has on the
reward circuitry of the brain. This reward circuitry comprises a remarkable and
complex system. It learns and changes with experience, and it is sensitive to many
different sorts of rewards. The central nexus of this reward circuitry is a set of
subcortical structures that lie just above and behind the eyes. These structures are
usually referred to collectively as the ventral striatum, and activity in these
structures indexes the degree to which a stimulus or behaviour is rewarding to the
individual. Some rewards are very concrete. You won’t be surprised to learn that
the ventral striatum fires when people eat chocolate and when they look at pictures
of attractive scantily clad people. These are obvious atavistic rewards. Evolution
shaped us to desire calorie rich foods and fit mates – we wouldn’t be here if our
ancestors hadn’t been motivated to seek those things. Similarly, it isn’t very
surprising that cocaine activates the ventral striatum – cocaine would never have
become a popular drug of abuse if it didn’t.
However, the ventral striatum is not merely activated by drugs of abuse or stimuli
whose associations with reward were hard wired into our brains long ago by
evolution. The ventral striatum is strongly connected to and modulated by regions
involved in social processing, and it is strongly triggered by rewards which depend
on social context. For instance, stimuli which signal financial gains and increase in
social status also activate the ventral striatum. It is very important to appreciate
that the ventral striatum is not just associated with self-serving rewards, but also
motivates prosocial behaviour such as charitable giving. The ventral striatum is
highly sensitive to genuine empathetic social connection, including looking at a
photograph of a family member, falling in love, altruistic acts, and even the simple
feeling that someone has listened to you.
Great care needs to be taken when we move from talking about reward to
addiction. When addiction is being discussed in a clinical context, for instance
relating to substance abuse or dependency, then by definition it means a tuning of
the reward system that is dysfunctional. That is, the medical phenomenon of
addiction occurs when the reward system loses its balance and becomes over tuned
to prefer a type of reward that is demonstrably detrimental to our wellbeing. But
the mere fact the reward system of an individual has become very strongly tuned to
particular type of reward does not mean any dysfunction is present. In ordinary
language, we recognize this fact. We might say that a friend is addicted to exercise,
addicted to nature, addicted to reading literature, or addicted to charitable service
work. Such ‘addictions’ can certainly exist, in the sense that people can have
reward systems that are very strongly tuned to the rewards associated with these
activities. Provided the tuning is not so strong that other important behaviours are
completely displaced, these ‘addictions’ are far more likely to be healthy and
functional, rather than unhealthy and dysfunctional. In particular, a great deal of
recent research suggests that the more that people’s reward systems are tuned to
forming social connections with others, the more likely they are to be both more
physically healthy and more psychologically well balanced. This is what makes
internet pornography addiction so troubling. It represents a tuning of the reward
system from a very healthy type of reward, that of forming a genuine and intimate
connection with another, into a type of reward that removes the user from social
contact, and often leaves them feeling lonely and ashamed rather than connected
and supported.
The first-person accounts you will read in this book and collected on Gary’s
website of the same name will, and should, trouble you deeply. It is truly
frightening to learn the degree to which internet pornography can damage and
alienate individuals who have become badly addicted to watching it. At the same
time, one of the most striking features of these reports is how they reflect a reversal
of the damaging effects of internet porn addiction. It is truly beautiful to see people
who have lost themselves in this addiction turn their lives around. Instead of
compulsively masturbating in private, they have come to find meaning and genuine
social connection through selfless attempts to help others caught in a similar trap.
It all happens on the internet, both good and bad. Within this same technological
medium, a medium which often threatens to make us impersonal, this group has
found a way to move from an activity which is completely solitary and detached to
something that is deeply altruistic, brave, personal and meaningful. It is time that
the rest of us took note of what they are saying. Many physicians and researchers
have dismissed and undermined these reports. However, that strategy is simply not
ethical. We must respect the wisdom of their experience and the humility they
show by sharing it. Anyone who pretends to care about the social and sexual health
of others has a duty to better understand this phenomenon and find creative ways
to reduce the damage it is doing.
Dr Anthony Jack
Professor of Philosophy, Psychology, Neurology and Neuroscience and Research
Director at the Inamori International Center for Ethics and Excellence, Case
Western Reserve University
Introduction
I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his
enemies; for the hardest victory is over self. Aristotle
You might be reading this book because you're curious why hundreds of thousands
of porn users around the globe are experimenting with giving it up.2 But more
likely you're reading it because you are engaging with pornographic material in a
way that you find troubling. Maybe you have been spending more time online
seeking out graphic material than you want to, despite a settled determination to
cut back. Maybe you are finding it difficult to climax during sex, or you're plagued
by unreliable erections. Maybe you're noticing that real partners just don't excite
you while the online sirens beckon constantly. Maybe you've escalated to fetish
material that you find disturbing or out of alignment with your values or even your
sexual orientation.
If you’re anything like the thousands of other people who have realised that they
have a problem, it has probably taken you a while to connect your troubles with
your porn use. You might have thought you were struggling with some other
disorder. Perhaps thought you had developed unaccustomed depression or social
anxiety or, as one man feared, premature dementia. Or maybe you believed that
you had low testosterone or were simply getting older. You might even have been
prescribed drugs from a well-meaning doctor. Perhaps your physician assured you
that you were wrong to worry about your use of pornography.
There are plenty of authoritative voices out there who will tell you that an interest
in graphic imagery is perfectly normal, and that therefore internet porn is harmless.
While the first claim is true, the second, as we shall see, is not. Although not all
porn users develop problems, some do. At the moment, mainstream culture tends
to assume that pornography use cannot cause severe symptoms. And, as high-
profile criticisms of pornography often come from religious and socially
conservative organizations, it's easy for liberally minded people to dismiss them
without examination.
But for the last seven years, I have been paying attention to what people say about
their experiences with pornography. For even longer, I've been studying what
scientists are learning about how our brains work. I am here to tell you that this
isn’t about liberals and conservatives. It isn’t about religious shame or sexual
freedom. This is about the nature of our brains and how they respond to cues from
a radically changed environment. This is about the effects of chronic
overconsumption of sexual novelty, delivered on demand in endless supply.
Until about half a dozen years ago I had no opinion about internet porn. I thought
that two-dimensional images of women were a poor substitute for actual three-
dimensional women. But I've never been in favour of banning porn. I grew up in a
non-religious family in Seattle, the liberal Northwest. ‘Live and let live’ was my
motto.
The symptoms these men (and later women) described strongly suggested that their
use of pornography had re-trained, and made significant material changes to, their
brains. Psychiatrist Norman Doidge explains in his bestseller The Brain That
Changes Itself:
The men at their computers looking at porn ... had been seduced into
pornographic training sessions that met all the conditions required for
plastic change of brain maps. Since neurons that fire together wire together,
these men got massive amounts of practice wiring these images into the
pleasure centres of the brain, with the rapt attention necessary for plastic
change. ... Each time they felt sexual excitement and had an orgasm when
they masturbated, a ‘spritz of dopamine’, the reward neurotransmitter,
consolidated the connections made in the brain during the sessions. Not only
did the reward facilitate the behaviour; it provoked none of the
embarrassment they felt purchasing Playboy at a store. Here was a
behaviour with no ‘punishment’, only reward.
The content of what they found exciting changed as the Web sites introduced
themes and scripts that altered their brains without their awareness.
Because plasticity is competitive, the brain maps for new, exciting images
increased at the expense of what had previously attracted them – the reason,
I believe, they began to find their girlfriends less of a turn-on ...
As for the patients who became involved in porn, most were able to go cold
turkey once they understood the problem and how they were plastically
reinforcing it. They found eventually that they were attracted once again to
their mates.
The men on the forum found such material and the research underlying it both
comforting and helpful. At last they understood how porn had hijacked the
primitive appetite mechanisms of their brains. These ancient brain structures urge
us toward evolutionarily beneficial behaviours including an appreciation of novel
mates, helping to discourage inbreeding.
Armed with an account of ‘how the machine works’ that drew on the best available
science, former porn users realized their brains were plastic and that there was a
good chance they could reverse porn-induced changes. They decided it made no
sense to wait for an expert consensus about whether internet porn was potentially
harmful or not when they could eliminate it and track their own results.
These pioneers began to take control of their behaviour and steer for the results
they wanted. They saw the gains from consistency without panicking about
setbacks, which they accepted with greater self-compassion.
Along the way, they learned, and shared, some truly fascinating insights about
recovery from internet porn-related problems – brand new discoveries that made
the return to balance less harrowing for those following in their footsteps. That was
fortunate because a flood of younger people, with far more malleable brains, were
about to swell the ranks of those seeking relief from porn-related problems.
In May, 2014, the prestigious medical journal JAMA Psychiatry published research
showing that, even in moderate porn users, use (number of years and current hours
per week) correlates with reduced grey matter and decreased sexual
responsiveness. The researchers cautioned that the heavy porn users' brains might
have been pre-shrunken rather than shrunken by porn usage, but favoured degree-
of-porn-use as the most plausible explanation. They subtitled the study "The Brain
On Porn."5
Then in July 2014, a team of neuroscience experts headed by a psychiatrist at
Cambridge University revealed that more than half of the subjects in their study of
porn addicts reported
that as a result of excessive use of sexually explicit materials, they had ...
experienced diminished libido or erectile function specifically in physical
relationships with women (although not in relationship to the sexually
explicit material).6
But the pioneers I'm describing didn't have the benefit of any formal confirmation.
They worked it all out by exchanging self-reports.
Now, how would a guy know if his sluggish sexual performance is related to his
porn use or stems instead from performance anxiety (the standard diagnosis for
guys without below-the-belt problems)?
1. First, see a good urologist and rule out any medical abnormality.
Compare the quality of your erections and the time it took to climax (if you can
climax). A healthy young man should have no trouble attaining a full erection and
masturbating to orgasm without porn or porn fantasy.
- If you have a strong erection in #2, but erectile dysfunction in #3, then you
probably have porn-induced ED.
- If #3 is strong and solid, but you have trouble with a real partner, then you
probably have anxiety-related ED.
- If you have problems during both #2 and #3, you may have progressive
porn-induced ED or a below-the-belt problem for which you will need
medical help.
I begin the book with an account of how internet porn addiction first became an
issue as massive numbers of people with access to high-speed porn began talking
about the problems they felt it had caused. I'll include first-hand accounts of how
the phenomenon unfolded and the symptoms people commonly reported.
Chapter three recounts various commonsense approaches people have used to get
clear of their porn-related problems as well as some pitfalls to avoid. I don't offer a
set protocol. Everyone's circumstances are slightly different and there are no magic
bullets. For example, tactics that work well for single people may have to be
adapted by someone in a relationship. And younger guys who develop porn-
induced ED sometimes need longer than older guys. Often several different
approaches are helpful, concurrently or in sequence.
In the conclusion I'll consider why a consensus about porn's risks is still in the
future, and which lines of research are most promising. Finally, I'll consider how
society might help porn users to make more informed choices.
One final thing before we start. I am not saying that you should have a problem
with porn. I am not trying to start some kind of moral panic, or to say what is and
isn’t ‘natural’ in human sexuality. If you don’t feel you have a problem, then I am
not about to argue with you. It’s up to each of us to decide what we think about
graphic sexual content and the industry that produces much of it.
But if you do feel that pornography is harming you, or someone you know, then
read on, and I will do my best to explain how internet pornography can produce
unexpected effects, and what you can do about it.
1: What Are We Dealing With?
It is not the answer that enlightens, but the question. Eugene Ionesco
Now, taking those symptoms into account, people figured they'd desensitised
themselves to real women by escalating to evermore extreme genres of porn
and masturbating [such] that no woman's vagina could match the
stimulation. They hoped/guessed that if they'd stop watching porn and
masturbating for a significant amount of time this desentisation might be
reversed.
I'm one of those guys. I'd had several failures with women, starting in the
middle of puberty. This had become the single most devastating thing to my
psyche. In this modern world, where there's hardly a commercial, a movie, a
TV show, or a conversation without sexual innuendos, I was constantly
reminded of my weirdness. I was a failure as a man on a very fundamental
level and I seemed to be the only one.
A year before I [quit porn] I'd even gone to see psychiatrists and
psychologists, who diagnosed me with severe social anxiety disorder and
depression, and wanted to put me on antidepressants, which I never agreed
to.
When I found out that the central problem of my life that was on my mind
24/7 could be reversed, the heaviest rock was lifted from my heart. When I
went on my first NoFap streak (cca 80 days) I started noticing similar
superpowers as reported by others. Is that really so weird? The central thing
destroying my confidence and making me feel alone on the planet of 7 billion
was being reversed, and it turned out to be very common.
Today, on my 109th day of a streak, I feel happy, confident, social, smart,
capable of meeting any challenge, etc., etc.
The earliest people to report porn-related problems in online forums were typically
computer programmers and information-technology specialists. They had acquired
high-speed internet porn ahead of the pack – and then developed uncharacteristic
sexual tastes, delayed ejaculation or erectile dysfunction (ED) during sex.
Eventually, some experienced ED even while using porn. Nearly all were in their
late twenties or older.
As one such forum member noted, internet porn was different, oddly irresistible:
With the magazines, porn use was a few times a week and I could basically
regulate it 'cause it wasn’t really that ‘special’. But when I entered the
murky world of internet porn, my brain had found something it just wanted
more and more of. I was out of control in less than 6 months. Years of mags:
no problems. A few months of online porn: hooked.
A bit of history gives us some clues as to why today's pornography might have
unexpected effects on the brain. Visual pornography entered the mainstream with
magazines, but users had to content themselves with static erotica. Each
instalment's novelty and its arousal potential faded fairly quickly, and a person
either had to go back to fantasizing about his hot neighbour, or make a substantial,
perhaps awkward or costly, foray to obtain more material. There were a few x-
rated movies and some of them were big commercial successes. Dedicated fans of
hardcore could also find sexually explicit clips in adult bookstores. But supply was
still restricted to a handful of public or semi-public venues and most people didn't
want to spend much time in movie houses or peepshow booths.
Then came video rentals and late-night cable channels. These media were more
stimulating than static porn7 and much less awkward to access than a film at the
cinema. Yet how many times could a person watch the same video before it was
time for another trip to the video shop (and a break)? Viewers often had to watch a
story line with an erotic build-up before getting to the hot stuff. Most minors still
had very limited access.
Next, porn viewers turned to dial-up: private, cheaper, but mostly stills ... at first.
People could access it more easily, but it was slow. Material could not be
consumed at a click:
You had to download the video, then open it and risk getting a virus.
Sometimes you didn't have the right software, so you spent a lot of
time making sure it was what you wanted to see before downloading it
and 'enjoying' it, or you would go to a specific site whose content you
liked, watch the one or two new videos and leave it at that.
In 2006, high-speed internet gave rise to a whole new creature: galleries of short
porn clips of the hottest few minutes of an unending supply of streaming hardcore
videos. They are called ‘tube sites’ because they stream like YouTube videos. The
world of porn has never been the same. Users describe the transformation:
I'd looked at pictures for years (well over a decade), and video clips
from time to time. But when the tube sites became my daily fare, it was
only shortly afterward that I developed ED problems. I think the tube
sites, with their endless clips immediately accessible, threw my brain
into overload.
*
On a tube site you go straight from 0 to 140 kph. Arousal isn't a slow,
relaxed, teasing build-up of expectation. It is straight to full-on orgasmic
action. Because tube clips are so short, you do a LOT more clicking to novel
clips for various reasons: One is way too short to build up arousal; you
don't know what will be in the clip till you watch it; endless curiosity, etc.
Tube sites, especially the big ones, are the crack cocaine of internet
pornography. There is so much of it, and so much new content every day,
every hour, every 10 minutes that I was always able to find constant new
stimulation.
*
*
Before I discovered I had ED I had escalated to tube-site compilation
videos, each consisting of the hottest few seconds of dozens of
hardcore videos.
*
Deep in a primitive part of the brain, surfing tube sites registers as really valuable
because of all the sexual novelty. The extra excitement strengthens brain circuits
that urge you to use porn again. Your own sexual fantasies pale in comparison.
According to one German research team8, users' problems correlated most closely
with the number of screens opened (variety) and degree of arousal, not with time
spent viewing online porn.
'Alien' is the word I’d use to describe how it felt when I tried to have sex
with real women. It felt artificial and foreign to me. It's like I've gotten so
conditioned to sitting in front of a screen jerking it, that my mind considers
that to be normal sex instead of real actual sex.
During real sex viewers aren't in the position of a voyeur, let alone a voyeur of a
particular body part or very specific fetish that many of them have been viewing
for years before they connect with a partner.
At the end of 2010, my wife suggested I set up an online resource about this new
phenomenon. By then, her forum on sexual relationships had been overrun by men
seeking clues about their porn-related problems: loss of attraction to real partners,
delayed ejaculation or complete inability to orgasm during sex, alarming new
sexual tastes as they escalated through porn fetishes, even unaccustomed premature
ejaculation. She felt they needed a dedicated website where they could read each
others' self-reports and keep up on the new research on internet addiction, sexual
conditioning and neuroplasticity. From this came the website Your Brain On Porn
(YBOP).
Curious as to who was linking to the new resource I began tracking my visitors. I
was astonished. Links to the new site popped up in threads all over the web, often
in other languages. Men worldwide were looking for answers. At present, YBOP
gets as many as 20,000 unique visitors a day. Forums for people quitting porn are
popping up and growing rapidly. The largest and oldest English-language forum is
Reddit/NoFap (2012) with some 116,000 members at present. Reddit/PornFree
boasts 17,500, NoFap.org 21,000, and YourBrainRebalanced 11,600. The same
phenomenon is occurring internationally. For example, in China, two forums
combined currently have more than 800,000 members struggling to recover from
internet porn's effects.10
Wherever men congregated one could find them debating porn's effects. Threads –
sometimes thousands of posts long – appeared on websites for body-builders,
‘pick-up artists’, university alumni, those seeking medical advice, car enthusiasts,
sports fans, recreational drug users, even guitarists!
Most guys could not believe porn was the culprit behind their symptoms until
months after they quit:
After years of porn, I was having trouble with erections. It had been
getting worse and worse for a couple years. Needed more and more
types of porn stimulation. I was really worried, but the anxiety just
pushed me deeper into more extreme porn. Now, the more I go without
porn, masturbation, fantasy and orgasm, the more difficult it becomes
to not get an erection. LOL. No ED problems or weak ejaculations like
I had just a few months ago. I have healed.
Even after quitting and seeing improvements, many were still sceptical. They
returned to internet porn – only to see their problems gradually (or swiftly) recur.
And even though anonymous online forums were buzzing, no one wanted to talk
about it publicly:
Here's what I'm dealing with: irritability, fatigue, inability to sleep (even
sleep aids don't help much), trembling/shaking, lack of focus, shortness of
breath, and depression.
I've battled a few addictions in my life, from nicotine to alcohol and other
substances. I've overcome all of them, and this was by far the most difficult.
Urges, crazy thoughts, sleeplessness, feelings of hopelessness, despair,
worthlessness, and many more negative things were all part of what I went
through with this porn thing. It's a wicked awful thing that I will never have
to deal with ever again in my life – ever.
If you don't realise such symptoms are connected with quitting, but you do notice
that returning to porn relieves them, then you are strongly motivated to keep using
porn. I'll come back to the withdrawal-symptom hurdle in the recovery chapter.
Most alarmingly of all, those with erectile dysfunction who quit porn often
reported temporary, but absolute, loss of libido and abnormally lifeless genitals.
Even men with no ED sometimes experienced temporary loss of libido and mild
sexual dysfunctions soon after they quit:
Unless guys had been warned about this ‘flatline’, fears of permanent impotence
sent them rushing back to cyberspace to attempt to salvage their manhood.
Escalating to more extreme porn, even with a partially flaccid penis, seemed a
small price to pay to stem the total loss of libido. Porn use seemed like a cure.
Many, however, were horrified to discover that they couldn't override the flatline
by returning to porn. They had to wait until their libido returned naturally – which
sometimes took months.
Interestingly, male rats who copulate to sexual exhaustion also show evidence of a
mini-flatline11 before their libido returns. Is the porn-induced flatline biologically
related? Researchers study rats because their primitive brain structures are
surprisingly similar to ours. As developmental molecular biologist John J. Medina
PhD says, animal research ‘acts as a guiding “flashlight” for human research,
illuminating biological processes’.12 In other words, researchers aren't studying
rats to help them with their addictions, erections and mood disorders.
Happily, once warned about the possibility of a temporary flatline, most guys
powered through it with relative equanimity:
About my flatline. When people say they feel like their cock is dead, they
aren't exaggerating. It literally feels lifeless. It feels like a burden to have to
carry it around.
As tube sites became more popular and more widely accessed, a flood of younger
guys in their early twenties and late teens arrived with the same sexual
dysfunctions as the older visitors. Rapidly, they comprised the majority of visitors
to the websites where men were complaining of what they understood to be porn-
induced sexual dysfunctions.
In 2012, guys their early twenties began to set up online forums dedicated entirely
to experimenting with giving up internet porn in hopes of reversing porn-related
problems. Often they found that it helped to cut out masturbation temporarily too.
Indeed, many were unable to masturbate without porn, at least early in the process.
Their goal was to give their brains a rest from chronic overstimulation via internet
erotica. They called their approach ‘rebooting.’
As part of this grassroots movement, largely beneath the radar of the mainstream
press, thousands of people worldwide have undertaken the groundbreaking
experiment of giving up artificial online sexual stimulation (internet porn, web-
cam encounters, erotic literature, surfing escort ads, etc.,). Many have shared their
results over a period of months.
Obviously, ‘subjects’ are not randomly chosen. They are people who want to
experiment with giving up porn. Also, the vast majority are digital natives, so, as a
group they say nothing of the general population. Moreover, although membership
on these porn-challenge forums has mushroomed since the first one started in
2011, they tell us nothing about overall percentages of people with porn-related
problems in any age group.
Sceptics sometimes claim that people who experiment with quitting must be
motivated by religious reasons. Yet all of the forums named above are secular. The
largest of these new forums, and likely youngest in terms of average age,
conducted a self-poll a couple of years ago. Only 7% had joined for religious
reasons.14
The information these online forums and threads generate is anecdotal, but it
would be a mistake to dismiss it without further investigation. For one thing, the
people quitting porn and seeing benefits are surprisingly diverse. They come from
different backgrounds, cultures and degrees of religiosity; some are on
psychotropic medications; some are in relationships; some smoke and use
recreational drugs; some are bodybuilders; their ages cover a wide range, and so
forth.
For another thing, in this informal experiment the subjects generally remove the
variable of internet porn use. With the exception of one 3-week, formal
experiment, "A Love That Doesn't Last: Pornography consumption and weakened
commitment to one's romantic partner",15 no academic studies have ever removed
the variable of porn use. Other porn studies are correlational. They can tell us
interesting things about what conditions are associated with porn use, but they
can't show us what shifts when users remove porn. The latter is one way scientists
verify a causal connection.
Existing studies do find that frequency of porn viewing correlates with depression,
anxiety, stress and social (mal)functioning,16 as well as less sexual and relationship
satisfaction and altered sexual tastes,17 poorer quality of life and health,18 and real-
life intimacy problems.19 But so far, researchers seldom, if ever, ask about other
phenomena seen regularly on the forums, such as impaired motivation and
confidence, brain fog (inability to focus), loss of attraction to real people, sexual
dysfunction, escalation to what users themselves describe as more extreme material
over time, and so forth.
In any case, people who have been using porn heavily since puberty rarely make
the connection between their porn use and symptoms such as anxiety, depression
or weak erections until after they stop using. No matter how miserable they are,
porn seems like a way to feel good – a solution rather than a source of problems.
Meanwhile, there's little point in a researcher asking such people if their porn use
has caused their symptoms. Porn users have not been given any reason to consider
that possibility. Society has already put their problems in neat little boxes that do
not take account of internet porn use. Today's porn users are regularly diagnosed
with – and prescribed medication for – social anxiety, low self-esteem,
concentration problems, lack of motivation, depression, performance anxiety (even
when they also can't achieve an erection or climax on their own – unless they use
porn), and so forth.
Some quietly suffer with panic that their sexual orientations have mysteriously
morphed, or that they must be closet perverts because they eventually can only get
off to fetish porn, or that they will never be able to have sex, and thus intimacy,
because of their sexual dysfunctions. Not to be alarmist, but I read far too many
recovery accounts that mention earlier suicidal thoughts. Disturbingly, recent
research at Oxford University found that moderate or severe addiction to the
internet was associated with increased risk for self-harm.20 Here are comments by
three guys:
As a child I was highly athletic, smart, and sociable. I was always happy
and had a million friends. That all changed around age 11 when I
downloaded KaZaA and progressed to nearly every type of porn imaginable
(dominatrix, animal, amputee, etc.). I started having severe depression and
anxiety. The next 15 years of my life were completely miserable. I was
incredibly anti-social. I didn't talk to anybody and sat alone at lunch. I hated
everyone. I quit all the sports that I played even though I was top rank in all
of them. My marks plummeted to barely passable. As much as I hate to think
about it now, I had even started thinking about planning my own 'Columbine
style' exit to this world.
After people quit using porn, the benefits they report are often staggering.
Indirectly, their experience suggests that some brains have been profoundly
affected by today's superstimulating high-speed porn. As we'll see, formal research
is now starting to bear out their reports.
Given the weight of first person testimony from these forums worldwide, the
emphasis should be on further research that sheds light on the mechanics of what is
actually happening. Research could also help sort the porn-afflicted from those
with other disorders, such as those stemming from childhood trauma and
attachment problems. It goes without saying that not everyone's problems can be
traced back to internet porn use. It also goes without saying that an attraction to
transgender people, an interest in being dominated, and any number of other
things, can form part of a durable and happy sexual identity. The problem is in the
effects of porn on the brain, not in any particular aspect of human beings'
astonishing diversity in matters of desire.
Common Symptoms
Although most early trials in giving up internet porn were desperate ploys to
reverse deteriorating sexual function, today many people make the experiment in
order to gain a whole range of benefits. In this section you'll find a sprinkling of
self-reports describing improvements after quitting porn, broken down into
categories. But many users see a wide range of diverse improvements. For
example, this ex-user wrote:
- Depression alleviated
- I had no girlfriend.
- I was not living life, but I was not dead either. I was a zombie.
People naturally wonder how such disparate symptoms could be associated with
internet porn use, and what physiological changes might be behind the
improvements. They also wonder why some users see different results or no
results. Solid research on internet porn's effects is just beginning, but in the next
chapter I'll hypothesize based on the abundant relevant science already available on
brain plasticity and internet use.
Meanwhile, let's take a closer look at people's accounts of what they're
experiencing.
Inability to control use and use that interferes with one's life are two cardinal
signs of addiction. Priorities have shifted due to changes in the brain that
we'll look at later. In effect, life's natural rewards, such as friendship,
exercise and accomplishment, can no longer compete. Your brain now
believes that IT – in this case internet porn use – is an important goal, and
equates it with your survival:
Most days I would wank so much that by the end of the day when I
orgasmed nothing would even come out. ED my first time sent me into
a porn spiral. I would literally wake up, roll over and masturbate,
masturbate all day, then at night masturbate and go to sleep. 6 times a
day or more, no joke. Safe to say my life was an absolute mess, all the
bad effects of porn x 10. I knew that the porn and masturbation was
affecting me but I was in denial, masturbation is good for you right?
You can’t be addicted to porn.
My lowest point was when I lost out on my pharmacy diploma and lost
my girlfriend on the same day, due to porn and procrastination.
Before I quit I felt like shit 24/7. I had zero energy, and zero
motivation. I was lethargic for every hour of every day. I didn't eat
right. I didn't exercise. I didn't study. I didn't care about personal
hygiene. And I could not care. In the state that I was in, it was
extremely difficult to stand for more than 3 minutes, let alone do
something productive. I’m over a month now and I feel so much
better.
*
Everything from my social life to my physical health has been
damaged by this addiction. The worst part about it was that I
constantly justified it in my head by saying it was ‘healthy for me’ and
‘at least it isn't a drug’. In reality, this was worse than any drug I
have consumed and the least healthy activity I was participating in.
Years of porn use can cause a variety of symptoms, which when examined,
lie on a spectrum. Often porn users report that delayed ejaculation (DE) or
inability to orgasm (anorgasmia) was a precursor to full blown erectile
dysfunction. Any of the following may precede or accompany delayed
ejaculation and erectile dysfunction:
A few examples:
I'm so happy right now! I'm a 25-year old male and until last night I
had never orgasmed in the presence of a female. I have had sex but
never, ever been close to climaxing through any stimulation
whatsoever. I started out like most of you, using internet porn from
around the age of 15. If only I'd known what I was doing to myself.
I’ve lived with delayed ejaculation all my life and I’ve never found
anyone (including docs) who are familiar with the dysfunction or have
any suggestions for improving it. I began using Viagra and Cialis to
help me keep it up long enough to have an orgasm – often well over
an hour of intense stimulation. I thought regular doses of porn were
also necessary. Good news: by staying away from porn, I am now
experiencing some of the most satisfying sex of my life with no ED
meds; and I’ve got two decades on most of you. My erections are
more frequent, firmer and longer lasting, and our lovemaking is
relaxing and lasts as long as both of us want it to.
I can tell how much porn a man watches as soon as he starts talking
candidly about any sexual dysfunction he has. ... A man who
masturbates frequently can soon develop erection problems when he's
with his partner. Add porn to the mix, and he can become unable to
have sex. ... A penis that has grown accustomed to a particular kind of
sensation leading to rapid ejaculation will not work the same way
when it's aroused differently. Orgasm is delayed or doesn't happen at
all.
High rates of limp penises and low sexual desire in teenage males should
make everyone take notice as being extremely surprising. Imagine how
unheard of these conditions would be in young bulls and stallions. Yet the
sexologists conducting the research were ‘unclear’ why they found such
high rates, and didn't even mention internet porn overuse as a possible
influence. The recent Cambridge study by addiction neuroscientists found
that almost 60% of the addicts they examined, ‘experienced diminished
libido or erectile function specifically in physical relationships with women
(although not in relationship to the sexually explicit material)’ as a result of
excessive porn use.22
I have seen two diverging patterns of recovery. A few men bounce back in a
relatively short time: about 2-3 weeks. Perhaps their difficulties are due to
psychological conditioning, excessive levels of masturbation (fuelled by
internet porn), or a minor case of desensitisation (an addiction-related
change we'll discuss in the next chapter).
The vast majority of guys need 2-6 months (or longer) to fully recover. Most
‘long-rebooters’ experience a variety of withdrawal symptoms, including the
dreaded flatline. Typically, they are younger guys who started early on
internet porn. I suspect that this unfortunate trend is the natural outcome of
highly malleable adolescent brains23 colliding with internet porn:
When I lost my virginity it really did not feel that good. I was
bored actually. I lost the erection after maybe ten minutes. She
wanted more sex, but I was done. The next time I tried to have
sex with a woman was a disaster. I had an erection at first, but I
lost it before I ever penetrated. Condom use was out of the
question – not a hard enough erection.
*
I never had a problem getting hard for porn, but when it came to
the real thing, I started taking Cialis. Over time, I took more,
and even then there were times when it would only partly work.
WTH? Yet I could still get hard to porn.
In contrast, most older guys began their solo-sex careers with a catalogue, a
magazine, a video, grainy TV porn, or amazingly (to today's young guys),
their imagination. They also generally had some sex, or at least courtship,
with a real partner before they fell under the spell of high-speed porn. Their
‘real sex’ brain pathways may temporarily be overwhelmed by
hyperstimulating internet porn, but those pathways are still operational once
the distraction of porn is removed:
(Married, age 50) I never thought I had ED. I managed to have sex
with my wife. Boy, was I wrong! Since my recovery, my erections are
way bigger, fuller and longer and the head is flared. My wife
comments each time. I also remain erect even after orgasm, and think
I could keep it up for a loooong time. My morning wood is also bigger
and fuller. I really had ED and was too caught in my addiction to
realize it. Keep in mind I am 50, though in pretty good shape for my
age and clean living.
The reward for 4 months of no porn has been an improved sex life
with my wife, and after nearly fifteen years of being together, that is a
considerable reward. Hurrah for plain ‘vanilla’ sex. I seem to feel
more than I used to.
Here's a guy in the middle, who started out on internet porn, but not high-
speed:
What about women? Porn use also seems to affect the sexual responsiveness
of some women:
I was going out with my now ex-girlfriend for 2 years before we broke
up. I never had any sexual problem (be it ED or PE). I wasn't
addicted to porn, although I masturbated to it occasionally. After we
broke up, I used porn regularly and started going to massage parlours
with happy endings. After 6 months, I got back with the same girl, and
I somewhat reduced the frequency of my other activities. The sex was
awful with my girlfriend (or at least it was for her). I didn't have a
problem with getting it up (except maybe a couple of times), but I
couldn't last for over a minute. The relationship endured a year,
during which, I didn't, not even once, make her orgasm from
penetration. The same girl I was giving multiple orgasms 6 months
earlier.
Once upon a time, men could trust their penises to tell them everything they
needed to know about their sexual tastes or orientation. That was before the
internet.
Brains are plastic. The truth is we are always training our brains – with or
without our conscious participation. It's clear from countless reports that it's
not uncommon for porn users to move from genre to genre, often arriving at
places they find personally disturbing and confusing. What might be behind
this phenomenon?
Never before have developing adolescents been able to switch from genre to
genre while masturbating. This casual practice may turn out to be a prime
danger of today's porn:
I'm tired of hearing, ‘You like what you like’ from people. A lot of the
things I look at I don't like. I just can't get off to the normal stuff
anymore. I never thought I'd wank to girls pissing on each other – and
now it doesn't do it for me anymore. Sexuality is tricky and I think
we've only begun to look at the effects that internet porn has on
human beings. All of us are test subjects and from what I've read over
and over, people are noticing changes.
I can say with absolute certainty that the fantasies I had about rape,
homicide and submission were never there before hardcore porn use
from 18-22. When I stayed away from porn for 5 months all those
fantasies and urges were gone. My natural sexual taste was vanilla
again and still is. Thing with porn is you need harder and harder
material, more taboo, more exciting and 'wrong' to actually be able to
get off.
I never thought that I'd be able to have normal sex. I always thought
that my brain was just hard-wired to only be turned on by my femdom
fetish [female-domination porn that humiliates men], similar to the
way a gay guy can only be turned on by cock and cannot appreciate
sex with a woman. Little did I know that the fetish I thought was hard-
wired, was simply the result of my porn-viewing habits. It was a hell
of my own making. After 3 months of no porn, my latest sexual
encounter has removed any doubt about the effectiveness of quitting.
As any porn junkie knows, the more porn you watch, the more you
need and the more hardcore porn you need to feel fully aroused. At
my worst I was dabbling in bestiality, frequent incest scenes, or other
hardcore porn. Actual vaginal sex was never too arousing for me.
Oral or other types of non-vaginal sex were way more appealing.
They made the woman just a pleasure-giving object. After months of
‘mental detox’, if you will, and multiple real-life partners, I've lost my
fixation to alternative types of sex. I'm actually attracted to vaginas
now. Sounds funny, doesn't it? I still enjoy other types of sex on
occasion, but the intimacy of being inside of a woman is second-to-
none. Seriously, it's way, way more sexy now. This is obviously a win-
win in real life. And my urge to watch porn went from a constant roar
to an occasional whimper. This is not an exaggeration.
Men have long believed that what arouses them to orgasm is ironclad
evidence of their sexual orientation. Therefore, it can be especially
distressing to escalate through shifting porn fetishes that ultimately cast
doubt on sexual orientation. Yet such escalation to unexpected tastes is
surprisingly common today, especially among young people who grew up
dabbling in ‘anything-goes’ tube sites from an early age:
Worse yet, there's a widespread meme online that internet porn is enabling
users to ‘discover their sexuality’. Some bold young explorers industriously
seek out the hottest material they can find in the belief that it reveals who
they are sexually. They don't realize that a boner isn't the only measure of a
person's fundamental sexual proclivities.
For example, the addiction process itself can drive escalation to more
extreme material, while making porn that used to seem hot appear
confusingly unexciting. Also, anxiety-producing material pumps up sexual
arousal.24 As one researcher explained, a quickening pulse, dilating pupils
and clammy skin – the body's reaction to adrenaline – can be mistaken for
sexual attraction. ‘We misinterpret our arousal. It is an error of
presumption’.25 A review of existing research confirms that sexual interests
are conditionable (changeable),26 and different from fundamental sexual
orientation.27
By following their erections from genre to genre, some young users migrate
to content that they feel is at odds with their sexual identity:
I'm gay but porn can get me sexually interested in females. Well ... not
breasts, but the other female parts become arousing. Porn is an overly
charged erotic atmosphere. All inhibitions are down and the desire
for arousal becomes dominant.
In the beginning it was just porn stars. But as the years slipped by
gonzo simply wouldn't do it anymore. I added a collection for soft
core first. The girls that I liked when I was 18-19 were interesting
again. And then they weren't. So I added a collection for new soft
core. Then Hentai. Then Dancers. Then KINK /BDSM. Then spanking
/ caning. Then Futa / Shemales. Then finally recently, although I
never added a collection for it, I actually looked at gay porn. Not
because I found it arousing; I don't. I'm not attracted to men. I looked
at it because I was bored. It was like, here I am, 28, and I've seen all
the porn on the internet essentially, so I might as well look at gay
porn. I think that was the moment the seed was planted in my brain
that said to me 'This is seriously f--ked, you need to stop this'. Of
course I didn't then.
Any form of OCD is potentially a serious medical disorder. Whether you are
gay or straight, if you have these symptoms, seek help from a healthcare
professional who thoroughly understands that OCD is a compulsion to check
constantly to reassure yourself, and who won't jump to the conclusion that
you are in denial about your sexuality.
‘Young Japanese men are growing indifferent or even averse to sex, while
married couples are starting to have it even less,’ reported the Japan Times,
citing a 2010 poll that revealed a striking trend. More than 36% of men aged
16 to 19 had no interest in sex, more than double the 17.5 % from 2008. Men
between 20 and 24 showed a similar trend, jumping from 11.8 % to 21.5 %,
while men between 45 and 49 leaped from 8.7 % to 22.1 %.28 Japan isn't
alone. In France, a 2008 survey found that 20 percent of younger French
men had no interest in sex.29 Something peculiar is afoot.
It is not unusual for people on porn recovery forums to ask the question, ‘Do
you think I am asexual?’ When asked if they masturbate, the answer is
usually, ‘Yes, 2-3 times a day to porn’. Are they asexual or just hooked on
porn? Its never-ending stimulation can provide a buzz long after real-life
partners begin to pale.
I'm not asexual strictly speaking, as I still find women beautiful. But
I'm no longer attracted to them, either sexually or romantically,
though I consciously know they are attractive. Do you guys get that
painful feeling when you look at a hot girl? You would like to be
turned on but you just can't. It makes me angry.
(Age 19) For years, I thought I used porn because I was horny. I
thought that if I could get a girl to have sex with me, I wouldn't have
to fap. But I recently passed up having sex with a woman I work with
twice! And then I f--king went home and fapped while fantasising
about having sex with her. The most messed up thing about this is
that I didn't realize how f--ked up this was until yesterday. I mean, if I
had actually been fapping because I wanted to have sex, I would have
just gone through with it, right? I was in denial.
(Day 46) For the last three days I have felt that strong, natural sexual
attraction to real women while out and about. I just naturally notice a
woman's figure and it turns me on without me having to think about it.
Duh, that's how it's supposed to work! Damn, it's amazing how porn
screws you up! My penile sensitivity has been off the charts, too. I
honestly don't remember ever feeling like this.
*
Relationships, too, are affected by porn use, which makes sense. Too much
stimulation can interfere with what scientists call pair-bonding, or falling in
love. When scientists jacked up pair-bonding animals on amphetamine, the
naturally monogamous animals no longer formed a preference for one
partner.30 The artificial stimulation hijacks their bonding machinery, leaving
them just like regular (promiscuous) mammals – in which the brain circuits
for lasting bonds are absent.
Research in humans also suggests that too much stimulation weakens pair
bonds. According to a 2007 study, mere exposure to numerous sexy female
images causes a man to devalue his real-life partner.31 He rates her lower not
only on attractiveness, but also on warmth and intelligence. Also, after
pornography consumption, subjects of both sexes report less satisfaction
with their intimate partner – including the partner's affection, appearance,
sexual curiosity and performance.32 And both men and women assign
increased importance to sex without emotional involvement.
*
(Age 19) Even though I watched porn I was never really one to want
sex. TWO guys managed to grab my interest. However, I think
porn/masturbation was suppressing my longing to be with either of
them. Since quitting, I suddenly had this intense realization that I
really like those two, and I could see myself completely happy in a
committed relationship with either. Suddenly it felt like...my heart was
reaching out for them. Instead of daydreaming, my body was like,
‘Let's go make this happen in real life.’ All of a sudden I felt this huge
wave of some weird attraction-type energy surge over me. [He soon
began a relationship with one of the men.]
(Age 30) In the past, sex wasn't emotional. On some level it was like
nobody else was there because I was in my own head the whole time
for one reason or another (fantasizing, DE issues, etc...). Girlfriends
during my mid 20's to early 30's just didn't arouse me anywhere close
to what high-speed porn offered, no matter how good they looked. I
didn't recognize these things at the time of course, but since beginning
this journey 4 months ago, I can honestly say I'm shocked how good
sex can be with your girlfriend when you eliminate the constant,
steady pattern of porn use.
(200 days) I now have an undeniable sex drive. I want my wife more
than ever. If a long time passes without sex, I feel this thing called
'sexual tension', which is apparently real. I notice things I never
noticed before. Hair tossing, quick glances, breathing patterns, body
language. It is a different world. And let me tell you – when you get to
this point, you really won't care about whatever super-specific porno
fetishes you thought were the only thing you could get off to, because
just the word WOMAN (or man or whatever) will make you feel urges.
Before realizing that porn was the problem, I used to think I needed to
get healthier fantasies. Now, almost 8 months after quitting porn, I'm
finding that the fantasies I used to have don't appeal to me
anymore...at all. What I found is that my wife and I both enjoy sex
much, much more when there is no fantasy involved; just the two of us
in the moment. I'm now able to make love to her without erectile
issues, face-to-face with eye contact.
As users manage to abstain from porn, their desire to connect with others
generally surges. Often, so does their self-esteem, their ability to look others
in the eye, their sense of humour, their optimism, their attractiveness to
potential mates, and so forth. Even those formerly suffering from severe
social anxiety often explore new avenues for social contact: smiling and
joking with work colleagues, online dating, meditation groups, joining clubs,
nightspots, and so forth. In some cases it takes months, but for others the
shift is so rapid that it catches them by surprise.
YBOP wasn't alone in chronicling this unexpected connection. In his famous
TED talk “The Demise of Guys”, well known psychologist Phillip Zimbardo
noted that ‘arousal addiction’ (porn, video games) is a major factor in the
increase in social awkwardness and anxiety and among digital natives.
Now that I look back at my life there has ALWAYS been connection
between porn consumption, masturbation and my social anxiety.
Before porn, I had a lot of friends, a couple of girlfriends, and I felt
like I was on the top of the world. There was nothing that could bring
me down. I felt like I had my own way to react to everything that could
happen. Then I got a new computer... After a year or two I found
myself in REALLY deep social anxiety, combined with too much pot
and nothing interesting to do with my life.
*
I'm not your generic self-diagnosed socially awkward penguin. I've
been to a psychiatrist, diagnosed with moderate to severe social-
anxiety and was put on medication. I know about the adrenaline rush
you get when a stranger gets near you, the almost heart attack you
feel when you try to talk during a class or a meeting (as if you ever
do), the long lonely walks you take not to deal with strangers, the
unfounded shame when you look another person in the eye, the huge
wall you put between strangers. Sweating, trembling, panic attacks,
self hate, suicidal impulses, I've been through it all. I've been
attempting quitting for two years now and this is the longest I've
abstained. I no longer experience the ‘torture’ I described above. No
I'm not a new person, not a social butterfly. I'm still myself but I'm
free of the shackles we call social phobia. In this past two years I've
made more connections, hit on more women, made more friends than
I did in my first 25 years. I feel content and comfortable in my own
skin, and the wall I put between myself and other people has
crumbled.
New people I meet tell me they like my confidence and they think I'm a
good speaker, compliments I would've never expected to hear just a
few months ago.
Inability to concentrate
Those who reboot commonly report that they have ‘better concentration’,
‘no more brain fog’, ‘clearer thinking’ and ‘improved memory’. Addiction
neuroscientists have repeatedly shown that internet addiction produces
memory, concentration and impulse-control problems in some users, as well
as corresponding brain changes.35 For example, researchers found that the
severity of ADHD symptoms correlates with the severity of internet
addiction, even when they take into account anxiety, depression and
personality traits.36 And, as we'll see later, German researchers recently
confirmed that moderate porn use, even by non-addicts, correlates with
shrunken grey matter in regions of the brain associated with cognitive
function.37
When I was [using internet porn] I had brain fog or a constant hung-
over-like feeling, which made it hard for me to concentrate, talk to
people or just do my everyday tasks. After 7-10 days without porn this
feeling went away. My mind became very clear, thoughts easily
controllable, and I became much more relaxed in general.
I am 34 and went on Adderall for the first time a few months ago. 2
months after quitting porn, I really don't even need it anymore. Some
of the benefits I have experienced: I can retain and remember
information a lot better. I remember events in my past life a lot better.
I am not irritable, and am more focused. I can execute tasks a lot
faster.
Memory – I always had a good one, but quitting put it through the
roof. I could enter a room of 15 people and learn + recall specifically
all their phone numbers in under 5 min. Marks perfect. Social anxiety
and BS negative thinking – > out with the trash.
For those of you who are in uni, NoFap is a miracle for the brain.
Before, I used to have to force myself to concentrate in class and
would still end up ‘zoning out’. Now, I can concentrate in a 3-hour
lecture with almost no issues (it's still improving).
I'm happier. Much, much happier. I typically suffer from SAD and was
diagnosed with minor clinical depression a few years back, but this
autumn/winter I'm feeling great. I have more energy.
As a man with genetic depression, being porn free has done more for
me than any drugs I have ever had to take. It is as if this makes me
more alert, attentive, and happier than Wellbutrin, Zoloft or the other
drugs I was cycled through.
I finally have energy again! I haven't felt this good since secondary
school. It's not like I'm Hulk or anything, but I finally have extra
energy to DO stuff. I spent most of my early 20's in a state of low
energy and mild depression. I attribute like 80% of it to the fact that I
was using porn twice a day. Now that I've stopped, I've been
exercising, being more social, and generally enjoying life.
Quitting isn't a cure all for your life problems – but it's the
foundation, a ploughed field in which you can sow seeds for a new
future that isn't bedevilled by the secrecy and shame that comes with
falling into the seemingly inescapable pit of porn-related despair that
so many of us know. A life of hope and strength – not jizzy tissues,
jealousy, bitterness, self-hatred, resentment and unfulfilled dreams.
In the light of this vast, informal experiment, it seems clear that the widely held
view of clinicians that pornography, specifically online pornography, is harmless
should be reconsidered as a matter of urgency. We can’t be sure that the thousands
of people describing their recovery from excessive porn use are mistaken.
As we'll see next, it is quite plausible that the symptoms they describe are real, that
online pornography use causes them, and that behavioural change can bring
significant benefits. In any case, porn users suffering from the kinds of symptoms
outlined above have little to lose from cutting out internet porn for a few months to
see if their symptoms resolve.
2: Wanting Run Amok
Ever heard of the Coolidge effect? It's a graphic example of how unrelentingly
sexual novelty can drive behaviour. The effect shows up in mammals ranging from
rams to rats, and here's how it works: Drop a male rat into a cage with a receptive
female rat. First, you see a frenzy of copulation. Then, progressively, the male tires
of that particular female. Even if she wants more, he has had enough.
However, replace the original female with a fresh one, and the male immediately
revives and gallantly struggles to fertilize her. You can repeat this process with
fresh females until he is completely wiped out. Reproduction, after all, is genes' top
priority. Just ask Australia's mouse-like antechinus, which engages in such a
furious mating frenzy that it destroys its own immune system and drops dead.
Obviously, human mating is generally more complex. For one thing we're among
the peculiar 3 to 5 percent of mammals with the capacity for long-term bonds. Yet
sexual novelty can enthral us too.
The Coolidge effect itself gets its name from US President Calvin Coolidge. He
and his wife were touring a farm. While the president was elsewhere, the farmer
proudly showed Mrs. Coolidge a rooster that could copulate with hens all day long,
day after day. Mrs. Coolidge coyly suggested that the farmer tell that to Mr.
Coolidge, which he did. The president thought for a moment and then enquired,
‘With the same hen?’
‘No, sir,’ replied the farmer.
An appreciation for a fine novel partner helps propel internet porn use. At its most
fundamental level, this impulse is evolution's way of discouraging inbreeding and
keeping the gene pool as fresh as possible. What powers the lure of novelty at the
physical level? Dopamine.
Primitive circuits in the brain govern emotions, drives, impulses, and subconscious
decision-making.39 They do their jobs so efficiently that evolution hasn't seen the
need to change them much since before humans were human.40 The desire and
motivation to pursue sex arises from a neurochemical called dopamine.41
Dopamine amps up the centrepiece of a primitive part of the brain known as the
reward circuitry. It’s where you experience cravings and pleasure and where you
get addicted.
This ancient reward circuitry compels you to do things that further your survival
and pass on your genes. At the top of our human reward list are food,42 sex,43
love,44 friendship, and novelty.45 These are called ‘natural reinforcers,’ as
contrasted with addictive chemicals (which can hijack this same circuitry).
Does this sound familiar? When Australian researchers displayed the same erotic
film repeatedly, test subjects' penises and subjective reports both revealed a
progressive decrease in sexual arousal.55 The ‘same old same old’ just gets boring.
Habituation indicates declining dopamine. After 18 viewings – just as the test
subjects were nodding off – researchers introduced novel erotica for the 19th and
20th viewings. Bingo! The subjects and their penises sprang to attention. (Yes,
women showed similar effects.56)
I always opened several windows in my browser, each one with many, many
tabs. The main thing that arouses me is novelty. New faces, new bodies, new
‘choices’. I very rarely even watched a whole porn scene, and can't
remember when I saw an entire movie. Too boring. I always wanted NEW
stuff.
With multiple tabs open and clicking for hours, you can 'experience' more novel
sex partners every ten minutes than your hunter-gatherer ancestors experienced in a
lifetime. Of course the reality is different. What feels like a cornucopia of riches is
only countless hours spent in front of a screen, seeking a reality that exists
elsewhere.
Supernormal Stimulus
Erotic words, pictures and videos have been around a long time –as has the
neurochemical rush from novel mates. So what makes today's porn uniquely
compelling? Not just its unending novelty. Dopamine fires up for other emotions
and stimuli too, all of which often feature prominently in internet porn:
58
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Anxiety (Using porn that isn't consistent with your values or sexuality.
In other words, instead of the instinctive response stopping at a ‘sweet spot’ where
it doesn't lure the animal out of the mating game entirely, this innate programming
continues to trigger enthusiastic responses to unrealistic, synthetic stimuli.
Tinbergen dubbed such deceptions ‘supranormal stimuli,’ although they are now
often referred to simply as 'supernormal stimuli'.
When we make an artificial supernormal stimulus our top priority it's because it
has triggered a bigger blast of dopamine in our brain's reward circuit than its
natural counterpart. For most users, yesteryear's porn magazines couldn't compete
with real partners. A Playboy centrefold did not duplicate the other cues earlier
porn users had learned to associate with real potential or actual partners: eye
contact, touch, scent, the thrill of flirting and dancing, foreplay, sex and so forth.
Today's internet porn, however, is laced with supernormal stimulation. First, it
offers endless novel hotties available at a click. Research confirms that anticipation
of reward and novelty amplify one another to increase excitement and rewire the
reward circuitry of the brain.63
Second, internet porn offers countless artificially enhanced breasts and Viagra-
sustained gargantuan penises, exaggerated grunts of desire, pile-driving thrusts,
double or triple penetration, gang-bangs and other unrealistic scenarios.
Third, for most people, static images cannot compare with today's hi-def 3-minute
videos of people engaged in intense sex. With stills of naked bunnies all you had
was your own imagination. You always knew what was going to happen next,
which wasn't much in the case of a pre-internet 13-year old. In contrast, with an
endless stream of ‘I can't believe what I just saw’ videos, your expectations are
constantly violated (which the brain finds more stimulating).64 Keep in mind also,
that humans evolved to learn by watching others doing things, so videos are more
powerful ‘how to’ lessons than stills.
With science-fiction weirdness that would have made Tinbergen say, ‘I told you
so’, today's porn users often find internet erotica more stimulating than real
partners. Users might not want to spend hours hunched in front of a computer
staring at porn and compulsively clicking on new images. They might prefer to
spend time socialising with friends and meeting potential partners in the process.
Yet reality struggles to compete at the level of the brain's response, especially
when one throws into the balance the uncertainties and reversals of social
interaction. As Noah Church puts it in his memoir Wack: Addicted to Internet
Porn, ‘it's not that I didn't want real sex, it's just that it was so much harder and
more confusing to pursue than pornography.’ And this finds an echo in numerous
first person accounts:
I went through a period of being single, stuck in a small town where there
were very few dating opportunities, and I began to masturbate frequently
with porn. I was amazed at how quickly I got sucked in. I began losing days
of work surfing porn sites. And yet I didn’t fully appreciate what was
happening to me until I was in bed with a woman and caught myself
furiously trying to recall an exciting porn image in order to get hard. I did
not imagine that it could happen to me. Fortunately, I had a long foundation
of healthy sex before porn and I recognized what was going on. After I quit,
I started getting laid again, and often. And shortly after that I met my wife.
These days, there's no end of supernormal stimulation in sight. The porn industry
already offers 3-D porn and robots65 and sex toys synchronized with porn66 or other
computer users to simulate physical action.67 But danger lurks when something:
Cheap, plentiful junk food fits this model and is universally recognized as a
supernormal stimulus. You can slam down a 32-ounce soft drink and a bag of salty
nibbles without much thought, but just try to consume their caloric equivalent in
dried venison and boiled roots!
Similarly, viewers routinely spend hours surfing galleries of porn videos searching
for the right video to finish, keeping dopamine elevated for abnormally long
periods. But try to envision a hunter-gatherer routinely spending the same number
of hours masturbating to the same stick-figure on a cave wall. Didn't happen.
Porn poses unique risks beyond supernormal stimulation. First, it's easy to access,
available 24/7, free and private. Second, most users start watching porn by puberty,
when their brain's are at their peak of plasticity and most vulnerable to addiction
and rewiring.
Finally, there are limits on food consumption: stomach capacity and the natural
aversion that kicks in when we can't face one more bite of something. In contrast,
there are no physical limits on internet porn consumption, other than the need for
sleep and bathroom breaks. A user can edge (masturbate without climaxing) to
porn for hours without triggering feelings of satiation, or aversion.
Bingeing on porn feels like a promise of pleasure, but recall that the message of
dopamine isn't ‘satisfaction’. It's, ‘keep going, satisfaction is j-u-s-t around the
corner’:
I would arouse myself close to orgasm then stop, keep watching porn, and
stay at medium levels, always edging. I was more concerned with watching
the porn than getting to orgasm. Porn had me locked in focus until
eventually I was just exhausted and orgasmed out of surrender.
Unwanted Adaptation: Sexual Conditioning and Addiction
But if you chronically overstimulate yourself, your brain may start to work against
you. It protects itself against excessive dopamine by decreasing its responsiveness
to it, and you feel less and less gratified.68 This decreased sensitivity to dopamine
pushes some users into an even more determined search for stimulation, which, in
turn, drives lasting changes, actual physical alterations of the brain. They can be
challenging to reverse. As one user said, ‘Porn goes in like a needle but comes out
like a fishhook.’
Sexual Conditioning
Most news stories about youthful porn use focus on conscious learning. The
assumption is that all we need to tell teens is that porn isn't like real sex and all will
be well.69 This remedy ignores the unconscious effects of porn viewing.
At the same time young Jamie is consciously learning that women ‘love’ ejaculate
on their faces, he may unconsciously be learning that ejaculating on women's faces
is sexually arousing. This kind of unconscious learning happens to some degree
every time he finds porn exciting.70 Of course, what turns Jamie on at 14 may bear
no relation to what he's watching at 16. He may have graduated to femdom or
incest porn.
Superficial conditioning (or learning) can be summed up as, ‘So this is how people
have sex and this is how I should do it.’ Unconscious sexual conditioning can be
summed up as, ‘This is what turns me on’ or, at a brain level, ‘This is what jacks
up my dopamine’. It could be as simple as preferring redheads. Or maybe dainty
feet or pecs appeal more than breasts.
However our preferences arise, our brains evolved to record what turns us on. This
phenomenon rests on a crucial neural principle: Nerve cells that fire together wire
together. Briefly, the brain links together the nerve cells for sexual excitement (in
the reward circuit) with the nerve cells that store memories of the events associated
with the excitement. For example, type in your favourite porn site and you activate
nerve cells that blast your reward circuitry. Up goes your dopamine.
Brains are plastic, and once you wire up a new cue you have no way of knowing
when it will trigger a future reaction. Much as Pavlov's dog learned to salivate to
the bell, today's porn users learn to wire unexpected stimuli to their erections. The
brain's primitive reward circuitry isn't aware that the bell isn't food, or that the
novel porn isn't ‘my’ porn. Its axiom is simply ‘Dopamine good’.
In 2004 Swedish researchers found that 99% of young men had consumed
pornography. That's ancient history in terms of porn's delivery, yet more than half
felt it had had an impact on their sexual behaviour.71
Even if you're watching tame porn and haven't developed any porn-induced
fetishes, the issue of how you get your jollies can have repercussions. If you use
internet porn, you may be training yourself for the role of voyeur or to need the
option of clicking to something more arousing at the least drop in your dopamine,
or to search and search for just the right scene for maximum climax. Also, you may
be masturbating in a hunched-over position – or watching your smartphone in bed
nightly.
Each of these cues, or triggers, can now light up your reward circuit with the
promise of sex ... that isn't sex. Nevertheless, nerve cells may solidify these
associations with sexual arousal by sprouting new branches to strengthen
connections. The more you use porn the stronger the nerve connections can
become, with the result that you may ultimately need to be a voyeur, need to click
to new material, need to climax to porn to get to sleep, or need to search for the
perfect ending just to get the job done.
Adolescents wire together experiences and arousal much faster and more easily
than young adults will just a few years later. The brain actually shrinks after age 12
as billions of nerve connections are pruned and reorganized. The use-it-or-lose-it
principle governs which nerve connections survive.
Once new connections form, teen brains hold tightly to these associations. In fact,
research shows that our most powerful and lasting memories arise from
adolescence – along with our worst habits.
Before 24/7 streaming porn, the usual sexual cues were other teens, or an
occasional centrefold, or maybe an R-rated movie. The result was pretty
predictable: Peers were a turn-on. Now, however:
I'm 25, but I've had high-speed internet access and started streaming porn
videos since age 12. My sexual experience is very limited and the few times
I've had sex have been total disappointments: no erection. Been trying to
quit for 5 months now and finally have. I realize that I've been conditioned
to the point where my sexual urges are deeply linked to a computer screen.
Women don't turn me on unless they are made 2-D and behind my glass
monitor.
If the majority of a teen's masturbation sessions are porn-fuelled, then brain maps
related to Jessica in algebra may be crowded out. Spending years before your first
kiss hunched over a screen with 10 tabs open, mastering the dubious skills of
learning to masturbate with your left hand and hunting for sex acts your dad never
heard of, does not prepare you for fumbling your way to first base, let alone
satisfying lovemaking.
Fortunately, brain plasticity also works the other way. I see many young guys quit
porn and, months later, realise that the fetishes they thought were indelible had
faded away. Eventually, they can't believe they once got off to X (and perhaps only
to X).
Adolescent sexual conditioning likely also accounts for the fact that young men
with porn-induced erectile dysfunction need months longer to recover normal
sexual function than older men do. This might be because the older men did not
start out wiring their sexual response to screens, and still possess well developed
‘real partner’ brain pathways, or brain maps. Typically they had reliable erections
with partners for years before they met high-speed tube sites.
Addiction
A second adaptation that may arise from excessive porn consumption is addiction.
Interestingly, scientists recently showed that methamphetamine and cocaine hijack
the same reward-centre nerve cells that evolved for sexual conditioning.73 A
second study by some of the same researchers found that sex with ejaculation
shrinks (for a week at least) the cells that pump dopamine throughout the reward
circuit. These same dopamine-producing nerve cells shrink with heroin addiction.74
Put simply, addictive drugs like meth and heroin are compelling because they
hijack the precise mechanisms that evolved to make sex compelling.75 Other
pleasures also activate the reward centre, but their associated nerve cells don't
overlap as completely with sex. Therefore they feel different and less compelling.
We all know the difference between munching on chips and an orgasm.
Just as drugs can activate the ‘sex’ nerve cells and trigger a buzz without actual
sex, so can internet porn. Pleasures like golf, sunsets and laughing cannot. For that
matter, neither can good old rock & roll. Just because something is pleasurable
doesn't mean it's addictive. Sexual arousal is nature's number-one priority and
raises dopamine the highest of all natural rewards.
How great is the risk of porn addiction? Well, it's common knowledge that
dopamine-raising substances, such as alcohol or cocaine, can create addictions. Yet
only about 10-15% of humans or rats that use addictive drugs (except nicotine)
ever become addicts. Does this mean the rest of us are safe from addiction? When
it comes to substance abuse, perhaps yes.
The reason that highly stimulating versions of food80 and sexual arousal can hook
us – even if we're not otherwise susceptible to addiction – is that our reward
circuitry evolved to drive us toward food81 and sex, not drugs or alcohol. Today’s
high fat82/sugar foods83 have hooked far more people into destructive patterns of
behaviour than have illegal drugs. 70% of American adults are overweight, 37%
obese.84 We don't know how many people are being negatively affected by internet
pornography, given the secrecy that surrounds its use, but the parallels with junk
food are both highly suggestive and deeply troubling.
These supernormal versions of natural rewards have the ability to override our
brain’s satiation mechanisms – the ‘I’m done’ feeling.85 It's hardly surprising that
unlimited erotic novelty is compelling for large swaths of the population, including
many who would not be susceptible to substance addiction.
I do occasionally drink but not too much. I have no addictions except porn. I
grew up thinking it was a normal thing and that everyone does it. I thought
that it might even be good for me.
I battled with porn addiction for years, whereas quitting smoking was a
single decision and I never looked back. Unlike smoking, porn addiction is
tied to an underlying biological need, which merges with the addiction and
makes everything more difficult.
For example, they have discovered that same molecular switch (protein DeltaFosB)
initiates key addiction-related brain changes (and thus behaviours) in both
chemical and behavioural addictions.86 These kinds of discoveries are the reason
that addiction experts have no doubt that both behavioural and substance
addictions are fundamentally one disorder.
Already, some seventy brain studies on internet addicts reveal the presence of the
same core brain changes seen in substance addicts.87 If internet use itself is
potentially addictive, then obviously internet porn use is too. Indeed, in a study
entitled, "Predicting compulsive Internet use: it's all about sex!" Dutch researchers
found that online erotica has the highest addictive potential of all online
applications (with online gaming second).88 This makes perfect sense because
addictive drugs only cause addiction because they magnify or inhibit brain
mechanisms already in place for natural rewards, such as sexual arousal.89
As yet, only two studies (both published in 2014) have isolated and analysed the
brains of internet porn users. The first of these looked at users who were not
addicts: "Brain Structure and Functional Connectivity Associated With
Pornography Consumption: The Brain on Porn". It was published in the prestigious
JAMA Psychiatry journal.91 In this study, experts at Germany's Max Planck
Institute found:
To sum up: More porn use correlated with less gray matter and reduced reward
activity (in the dorsal striatum) when viewing sexual images. More porn use also
correlated with weakened connections to the seat of our willpower, the frontal
cortex.
Keep in mind that this study did not examine causation, but rather correlation. The
researchers analysed the brain scans of 64 porn users in relation to a ‘pure dosage
effect of porn hours’. None were addicts. The scientists also carefully screened
potential subjects to exclude people with other medical and neurological disorders
as well as substance use.
However, the researchers didn't take the next step of having subjects remove porn
use for months to see if the changes reversed themselves. Nevertheless, extensive
related research (some of which has recorded improvements after quitting92)
supports the hypothesis that chronic overstimulation is the culprit. Lead researcher
Kühn told the press that the results ‘could mean that regular consumption of
pornography more or less wears out your reward system.’
There are clear differences in brain activity between patients who have
compulsive sexual behaviour and healthy volunteers. These differences
mirror those of drug addicts’94 … I think [ours is] a study that can help
people understand that this is a real pathology, this is a real disorder, so
people will not dismiss compulsive sexual behaviour as something
moralistic. ... This is not different from how pathologic gambling and
substance addiction were viewed several years ago.95
The Cambridge team discovered that, in addicts, the reward centre (nucleus
accumbens) showed hyper-reactivity to porn cues (hardcore video clips). This is
evidence of sensitisation, explained more fully below, which powers cravings in
addicts. Incidentally, women porn users also recorded increased cue-reactivity (as
compared with controls) in a recent German study.96
In contrast, when the Max Planck team (above) looked at non-addicted porn users'
brains they found less activation of another region of the reward circuit. This is
evidence of desensitisation, or a numbed responsiveness.
In analysing the Max Planck results, the Cambridge team hypothesised that the
brain responses to porn might differ between non-addicts and addicts. True. Yet
might the visual stimuli used in the two studies go far in explaining the
differences? The Max Planck researchers employed half-second exposure to still
porn images, which may strike today's porn viewer as ordinary, while the 9-second
video clips the Cambridge team used would arouse most porn viewers, addicted or
not. In short, perhaps the video clips were proper cues for today's users of
streaming HD hardcore porn while brief stills were a closer representation of
everyday erotic visuals.
In any case, both hyper-reactivity to addiction cues (hardcore video) and reduced
sexual responsiveness to tamer sexual visuals are not surprising in porn
overconsumers. Both cue-reactivity and a reduced pleasure response are often
seen in addicts of all kinds.
Readers interested in addiction science and its relevance to internet porn users may
want to have a look at this peer-reviewed journal article: "Pornography addiction –
a supranormal stimulus considered in the context of neuroplasticity".97
No doubt more brain studies on porn addicts are on the way, but already addiction
specialists maintain that all addiction is one condition. It doesn't matter whether it
entails sexual behaviour, gambling, alcohol, nicotine, heroin or crystal meth –
many of which addiction neuroscientists have studied for decades. Hundreds of
brain studies on behavioural and substance addiction confirm that all addictions
modify the same fundamental brain mechanisms98 and produce a recognized set
of anatomical and chemical alterations.99 (More on these in a moment.)
In 2011 the American Society of Addiction Medicine (doctors and researchers)
confirmed the addiction-is-one-condition model by publishing an all-encompassing
new definition of addiction.100 This is from the related FAQs:
Even the psychiatry profession's heavily criticised and obsolete bible, the DSM-5,
has grudgingly begun to recognize the existence of behavioural addictions.101
Charles O’Brien, MD, chair of the DSM-5 Work Group on Substance-Related and
Addictive Disorders said:102
Here are some brain changes that show up in all addictions, whether substance or
behavioural:
Cues, such as turning on the computer, seeing a pop-up, or being alone, trigger
intense cravings for porn. Are you suddenly much hornier (true libido) when your
wife goes shopping? Unlikely. But perhaps you feel as if you are on autopilot, or
someone else is controlling your brain. Some describe a sensitised porn response as
‘entering a tunnel that has only one escape: porn’. Maybe you feel a rush, rapid
heartbeat, even trembling, and all you can think about is logging onto your
favourite tube site. These are examples of sensitised addiction pathways activating
your reward circuit, screaming, ‘Do it now!’
Hypofrontality shows up as the feeling that two parts of your brain are engaged in
a tug-of-war. The sensitised addiction pathways are screaming ‘Yes!’ while your
‘higher brain’ is saying, ‘No, not again!’ While the executive-control portions of
your brain are in a weakened condition the addiction pathways usually win.
4. Dysfunctional stress circuits,114 which can make even minor stress lead to
cravings and relapse because they activate powerful sensitised pathways.
These phenomena are at the core of all addictions. One recovering porn addict
summed them up: ‘I will never get enough of what doesn't satisfy me and it never,
ever satisfies me’. Recovery reverses these changes. Slowly, the addict relearns
how to 'want' normally.
Withdrawal Many people believe that addiction always entails both tolerance (a
need for more stimulation to get the same effect, caused by desensitisation) and
brutal withdrawal symptoms. In fact, neither is a prerequisite for addiction –
although today's porn users often report both. What all addiction assessment tests
share is, ‘continued use despite negative consequences’. That is the most reliable
evidence of addiction.
This book has already offered many accounts by porn users who sought more
extreme porn as their brains grew less sensitive to pleasure (tolerance). What about
withdrawal symptoms? First, as stated, a person can be addicted without
experiencing severe withdrawal symptoms. For example, cigarette and cocaine
addicts can be thoroughly hooked but will typically experience mild withdrawal
symptoms compared with alcoholics or heroin addicts.115
December and January were tough, and I mean tough! I had serious
depression...absolutely no libido at all. Distressing thoughts would run
through my brain all day and night and I found myself crying like a baby.
My poor little man was a permanently flaccid, useless addition to my body
that simply didn't want or fancy real female attention.
Not everyone who stops using pornography will suffer withdrawal symptoms, but
some do:
*
My withdrawal symptoms are restless legs. My legs won't stay still when I'm
sitting in my chair. Disrupted sleep. I'm having trouble sleeping, or I wake
up in the middle of the night with my heart beating fast and can't get back to
sleep. Headaches. I have a sore throat and feel generally run down.
Excess consumption of food or sex signals the brain that you have hit the
evolutionary jackpot.119 This kind of powerful neurochemical incentive to grab
more is an advantage in situations where survival is furthered by overriding normal
satisfaction.120 Think of wolves, which need to stow away up to twenty pounds of a
single kill at one go. Or mating season,121 when there was a harem to impregnate.
In the past, such opportunities were rare and passed quickly.
Now, however, the internet offers endless 'mating opportunities', which a primitive
part of the brain perceives as valuable because they are so arousing. As any good
mammal would, viewers attempt to spread their genes far and wide, but there’s no
end to a porn viewer's mating season. He can keep going indefinitely by pumping
up his dopamine via anticipation as he surfs: viewing novelty, material that violates
his expectations, and driving for sexual arousal – the natural reward that releases
the highest surges of dopamine.
Click, click, click, masturbate, click, click, click, masturbate, click, click, click.
Sessions can last for hours, day in and day out, sometimes kicking the viewer's
evolved ‘binge mechanism’ into overdrive. Evolution has not prepared the brain
for this kind of nonstop stimulation. Experts Riemersma and Sytsma warn that
today's porn may cause ‘rapid onset’ addiction in some chronic users.122
You already know that dopamine sets off the neurochemical events that cause
addiction-related brain changes123. But the actual molecular switch that initiates
many of the lasting brain changes is the protein DeltaFosB.124 Dopamine surges
trigger DeltaFosB's production. It then accumulates slowly in the reward circuitry
in proportion to the amount of dopamine released when we chronically indulge in
natural rewards125 (sex,126 sugar,127 high fat, 128
aerobic exercise129) or virtually any
drug of abuse. DeltaFosB takes a month or two to dissipate, but the changes it
causes can remain.
Why am I telling you about DeltaFosB? Unlikely as it may seem, this single
neurobiological discovery dismantles the claim that porn addiction does not exist.
DeltaFosB accumulating in the reward centre of the brain is now considered to be a
sustained molecular switch for both behavioural and chemical addictions.
Dopamine is yelling, ‘This activity is really, really important, and you should do it
again and again.’ DeltaFosB’s job, as the construction worker, is to have you
remember and repeat the activity. It does this by rewiring your brain to want ‘it’,
‘it’ being whatever you have been bingeing on. A spiral can ensue in which
wanting leads to doing, doing triggers more surges of dopamine, dopamine causes
DeltaFosB to accumulate – and the urge to repeat the behaviour gets stronger with
each loop. When you think, ‘Nerve cells that fire together wire together’, think
DeltaFosB.
Wiring together everything associated with porn use to hammer your reward
circuitry via specially constructed pathways so that you crave porn is known as
sensitisation. And if DeltaFosB continues to build up it can also bring about
desensitisation, that is, you experience a numbed response to everyday pleasures.
Desensitisation is a reduction in the brain's sensitivity to dopamine.131 All of the
brain changes initiated by DeltaFosB tend to keep us overconsuming or, in the case
of internet porn, riveted to what the brain perceives as a Fertilization Fest.
This set of neurochemical dominoes certainly did not evolve to create addicts. It
evolved to urge animals to ‘Get it while the getting is good.’ But the point is that
the mechanism of elevated dopamine leading to DeltaFosB accumulation is the
same mechanism that initiates both sexual conditioning and addiction. Both start
with a Pavlovian super-memory of pleasure (sensitization), which then triggers
powerful ‘do it again!’ urges. Porn users would be naive to imagine that they are
impervious to this biological process.
The obvious question is: ‘How much is too much?’ The answer is simple:
‘whatever amount of stimulation causes the accumulation of DeltaFosB and
corresponding addiction-related brain changes.’ That will differ for each viewer, so
questions such as ‘does this visual count as porn?’ or ‘how much porn use will
cause addiction?’ are misguided. The former is like asking whether it's slot
machines or blackjack that causes gambling addiction. The latter is like asking an
obese junk-food addict how many minutes she spends eating.
The fact is, the brain's reward centre doesn't know what porn is. It only registers
levels of stimulation through dopamine spikes.132 The mysterious interaction
between the individual viewer's brain and the chosen stimuli determines whether or
not a viewer slips into addiction.
Interestingly, some people who claim not to be addicted, and who can quit with
relative ease, still experience severe sexual dysfunctions related to their porn
use133: delayed ejaculation, erectile dysfunction, inability to orgasm during sex or
loss of attraction to real partners. It's likely that the brain changes associated with
sexual conditioning are behind their symptoms.
The adolescent brain's over-sensitivity to reward also means its owner is more
vulnerable to addiction.138 And if that's not scary enough, remember that a natural
sculpting process narrows a teen's choices by adulthood.139 His brain prunes his
neural circuitry to leave him with well-honed responses to life.140 By his twenties,
he may not exactly be stuck with the sexual conditioning he falls into during
adolescence, but it can be like a deep rut in his brain – less easy to ignore or
reconfigure.
Addiction naysayers generally insist that porn users who develop problems all had
pre-existing conditions, such as depression, childhood trauma or OCD. They insist
that excessive porn use is the result, not the cause, of their problems. Of course,
some porn users do have pre-existing issues and will need additional support.
However, the implication that everyone else can use internet porn without risk of
developing symptoms is not supported by research. For example, in a rare
longitudinal study (tracking young internet users over time) researchers found that
‘young people who are initially free of mental health problems but use the Internet
pathologically’ develop depression at 2.5 times the rate of those who don't engage
in such use.141 (Researchers had also adjusted for potential confounding factors.)
The researchers compared the before and after scores on mental health in the
newbie addicts and found that internet addiction seemed to have caused significant
changes in their mental health. From the study:
- Before they were addicted to the Internet, the scores of depression, anxiety,
and hostility for students with Internet addiction were lower than the norm.
- After their addiction (one year later), the dimensions ... increased
significantly, suggesting that depression, anxiety, and hostility were
outcomes of Internet addiction, and not precursors for Internet addiction.
(emphasis added)
This study suggests that the students' internet habits caused their psychological
symptoms. More recently, Taiwanese researchers showed that there is a correlation
between teen suicide ideation/attempt and internet addiction, even after controlling
for depression, self-esteem, family support, and demographics.143
Even more recently, Belgian researchers assessed 14-year old boys' academic
performance at two points in time. They found that ‘an increased use of Internet
pornography decreased boys’ academic performance six months later.’ 146
These findings are consistent with the results informally reported by thousands of
recovery forum members who quit porn and experience benefits in mood,
motivation, academic performance, social anxiety, etc. Their severe symptoms,
followed by noticeable improvements, undermine the assertion that internet
problems arise only in people with pre-existing disorders or characteristics.
Research reveals that erections require adequate dopamine in the reward circuit147
and the male sexual centres of the brain.148 Not long ago, Italian researchers
scanned the brains of guys with ‘psychogenic ED’ (as opposed to ‘organic ED’,
which arises from issues below the belt). Their scans revealed atrophy of the grey
matter in the brain's reward centre (nucleus accumbens) and the sexual centres of
the hypothalamus.149 Loss of grey matter equates with loss of nerve cell branches
and connections with other nerve cells. Here, this translates into reduced dopamine
signalling (reduced arousal). It's like your 8-cylinder engine is now sputtering
along on only 3 cylinders.
As mentioned earlier, guys who started out on high-speed internet porn typically
need months longer to recover their sexual health than guys forty and older. Loss
of grey matter in the reward circuitry (desensitisation) appears to play a role
in porn-induced erectile dysfunction, but the fact that young guys often need
longer to recover points to deep sexual conditioning during adolescence.
Desensitisation and other brain changes arising from chronic
overconsumption can be picked up in brain scans, but sexual conditioning
doesn't show up in pictures of the brain. Confirmation of this effect must
come through self-reports of symptoms and recoveries.
As we saw earlier, adolescence is a key developmental window during which
mammalian brains are primed to adapt their mating behaviour to arousing cues in
the environment. Thereafter, brains begin to prune away unused circuitry – perhaps
the very circuitry related to the pursuit of real partners that these guys' adolescent
ancestors would have developed and strengthened as a matter of course.151 Here's a
typical account of a younger guy who had thoroughly wired his sexuality to
internet porn:
What you're likely wondering is, ‘For the love of god does the ED get
better or am I torturing myself for no reason?!’ I wondered that too.
The answer is 'Kind of,' then 'Yes!' What you're likely going to
experience once you do engage in sex is your brain saying, ‘what the
hell?’ It is not used to actual sex as its primary way of being sexual.
Real contact begins the ‘rewiring’ process. You will be re-sensitizing
yourself to actual sex. Sex after rebooting and rewiring feels WAY
BETTER. Can't even describe it in words. So there will be a rewiring
process where you may sputter and have a few backfires but
eventually you fire on all cylinders. These days? Zero ED, I don't even
have to think about it.
In the case of porn use, desensitisation could potentially account for lots of
symptoms heavy users report. A decline in dopamine signalling is associated with
all of these:
- Inability to focus,155 which can account for concentration and memory problems,
and
The flipside is that when dopamine and related neurochemicals are properly
regulated, sexual attraction, socializing, concentration, sexual responsiveness, and
feelings of wellbeing are more effortless. I suspect that a return to normal
dopamine signalling helps explain why many guys report similar sets of diverse
improvements after they unhook from excessive consumption of internet porn.
I don't think society knows what internet porn really does to a man. All they
really associate porn with is ED. Porn turns a man into a scared boy. I was
socially awkward, depressed, had no motivation, couldn't focus, very
insecure, weak muscle tone, my voice was weaker, and I had absolutely no
control over my life. Men are going to the doctors getting prescribed all kind
of meds, when really it often comes down to porn and what it does to your
brain and body. I'm off porn now and feel better than I felt in years.
*
[Day 91, after two years of striving to quit porn] As someone who has
struggled with diagnosed depression since my teens (YES, I see an
undeniable connection to porn and fapping), I can say that I am starting to
experience a better self-image, have been processing life troubles much
better. I don’t let stress make me hostile or hopeless like before. In other
words, I’m a lot less depressed.
As a man with genetic depression, being porn-free has done more for me
than any drugs I have ever had to take. It is as if this makes me more alert,
attentive, and happier than Wellbutrin, Zoloft or the other drugs I was
cycled through.
Evidently, healthcare providers are also treating some young men for erectile
dysfunction and delayed ejaculation who simply need to quit porn. In a single day,
I read two posts to this effect. The first young man's uncle was a psychiatrist, who
had told him porn-induced erectile dysfunction was impossible. The young man
experimented anyway and recovered. The other guy was a 32-year old man whose
doctor finally recommended a penile implant when injections didn't work (let alone
Viagra). He resisted, discovered the information on how porn can cause ED,
experimented and recovered. Another man faced a similar situation:
The medical profession is far behind the times. I spent thousands of dollars
on doctors, including a well known urologist specializing in ED (had to
travel hours for that one); thousands on tests; thousands on pills. ‘Erection
to porn means it's in your head ... take some Viagra.’ Not once did any
health care professional say to me, ‘Hey, watching porn too much can cause
sexual dysfunction.’ Instead, they offered other explanations, which are not
proven to be linked to ED and typically did not apply to me anyway (e.g.
anxiety, stress...even though you don't show any indication of either;
diet...even though your weight is normal and you eat a balanced diet; low
testosterone...even though low T hasn't been linked to ED except in extreme
cases, and your T is not really low).
Then there's absolutely horrible advice from ‘sexologists’ who are so bent
on being ‘sex positive’, they not only deny the potential negative
consequences of porn use, they actively ridicule the notion of porn-induced
ED.163 So, though I feel stupid for not making the link between porn and ED
myself, the fact is I sought professional advice and porn was never brought
up except in a positive light: ‘Everyone does it, it's normal...in fact, it's
healthy.’ I evaluated the possibility of surgical intervention. It would be
between $25k and $30k out of pocket and the results are not encouraging
(penile revascularization). The day after that appointment I stumbled on
this information. Oh my god...what a revelation and relief.
And it works. I'm not 100%, but I've improved dramatically and things keep
getting better. All I had to do was quit fapping to porn. Unreal. Honestly,
I'm a bit angry given that I sought solutions from professionals, including
specialists, who graciously accepted my hard earned cash yet gave me bad
advice.
How many men are getting outdated information and treatments they don't require?
Do their brains primarily need a chance to return to normal, and therefore to
pleasure and sexual responsiveness? For some, recovery from porn-induced
problems appears to be a natural outcome of giving up chronic overstimulation.
Bottom line, given what we know about the links between behaviour and brain
function, it seems reckless to prescribe psychotropic drugs to young people without
first addressing potential overuse of today's porn.
3: Regaining Control
Although people report many benefits from recovery, the biggest gift is regaining
control of your life. A recovered porn user explains:
Despite what some people say, quitting will not make you into a god of
confidence and ability, although for the first few months it'll really feel like
that. Quitting will give you more control of your own life. It's a little bit like
the transition from adolescence to adulthood. Instead of acting on impulse,
you'll be learning self-restraint and mindfulness with one of your most
primal instincts, which will flow over into every part of your life and make
your life's decisions be entirely up to you.
When I started this 500 days ago, I had trouble concentrating; I couldn't
commit to a goal for more than a week at a time. Whenever I had a day off I
wasted it in lazy indulgence, knowing that I could be doing more with my
time. Now, I can handle 50, 60 hour work weeks regularly without even
noticing it. Now, I can exercise regularly and stick to it. Now, I'm in a
relationship unlike any I've ever been in because I can finally treat my
partner as another human being rather than sometimes as an object of
desire (I now know firsthand that my own desires aren't as important as they
make themselves out to be). Now, I'm constantly improving myself instead of
just wishing I could.
The first step toward regaining control is to give your brain a rest from all
artificial sexual stimulation for several months. Shift your attention to real life.
Among other things, this will help you establish whether chronic overconsumption
of pornography, or some other issue, is underlying your symptoms. Ideally, an
extended time-out also allows you to:
- restore the sensitivity of your brain's reward circuitry so you can again enjoy
everyday pleasures,
- reduce the intensity of the ‘gotta have it!’ brain pathways that drive you to use,
- reduce the impact of stress such that it doesn't set off severe cravings.
Next, you stay consistent because it can take many months, or even a couple of
years, for the ‘I want to watch porn right now!’ pathways to fire less frequently –
and then die down.
Some people call this process ‘rebooting’. It's a way of rediscovering what you are
like without porn in your life. The idea is that by avoiding artificial sexual
stimulation you are shutting down and restarting the brain, restoring it to its
original factory settings, even.
The metaphor isn't perfect. You cannot go back in time to a ‘restore point’, or erase
all the data, as you would when you wipe clean a computer’s hard drive. However,
many people do reverse their porn-related problems by giving the brain a well
deserved rest from porn, porn fantasy and porn substitutes. And often the metaphor
is a useful part of the process. After all, the problematic behaviours and symptoms
of porn addiction are material in nature. They are inscribed in the structures of the
brain. By changing behaviour we change those structures. Over time new ways of
life are reflected in changes in brain function.
Through trial and error, rebooters have discovered that ‘artificial sexual
stimulation’ refers to more than internet porn. Surfing Facebook, YouTube, or
dating or erotic services sites for images is like an alcoholic switching to lite beer:
counterproductive. In short, artificial sexual stimulation includes anything your
brain might use in the way it has been using porn: cam2cam erotic encounters,
sexting, reading erotica, friendfinder apps, fantasizing about porn scenarios ... you
get the idea.
The goal now is to seek your pleasure from interacting with real people without a
screen between you, and awaken your appetite for life and love. At first, your brain
may not perceive real people as particularly stimulating in comparison with the
novelty-at-a-click furnished by internet porn. However, as you consistently refuse
to activate the porn pathways in your brain, your priorities gradually shift.
Rebooters make all kinds of interesting discoveries:
I actually went a full 6 months without even visiting a porn site. When I next
saw one I was surprised by how cheesy and corny porn looked. Since then I
really haven't had much interest in watching it. Porn is to sex what looking
at a photograph of a Ferrari is to driving one.
When I got back from a conference yesterday I was exhausted physically and
mentally. But this time I discovered an inner reservoir of energy I never
expected to find. The sex was incredible, passionate, and unbelievable. I felt
like I was 20 years old all over again. After 5 years of being ‘too tired’ to
have sex in times like these I now know the problem isn't about fading
chemistry with my wife but about wasting my sexual energy fapping to porn
all the time.
When you remove a source of pleasure from the brain, it is like taking away
the leg of a table. The whole thing becomes rocky and unstable. The brain
has two options: one, to make you hurt like hell in every way it can think of
to 'encourage' you to put the table leg back again, or two, to accept that the
table leg is really gone, and figure out how to re-balance without it. Of
course, it tries Option One first. Then, after a while, it gets to work on
Option Two, all while still pushing Option One. Eventually, it seems like the
brain re-balances, giving up on Option One, and fully succeeding at Option
Two.
In this chapter we'll start with standard tips that rebooters frequently share with
each other. Then we'll look at the most common rebooting challenges and pitfalls.
Finally, we'll address a few questions that often come up.
Keep in mind that brains, histories and circumstances vary. There is no magic
bullet that works well for everyone. Pick and choose the tips that might serve you
in retraining your brain. Do not get caught up in, ‘am I doing this right?’ It is you
who decide the length and parameters of your reboot, depending on your goals and
current situation. Many rebooters (without porn-induced ED) aim for 100 days or
three months, broken up into shorter interim goals. Those with ED sometimes need
far longer.
A reboot is your laboratory. If your plan isn't producing the results you want,
adjust. Recognize that it often takes a couple of months to know if any particular
approach is working, so unless you have fallen back into bingeing on pornography,
stay your chosen course for a couple of months at least.
It's amazing what you learn doing this. I think I now fully understand the
saying that 'knowledge is power.' Once you know how something works and
how it affects you, it's much easier to muster the willpower to make a change
if you wish.
Word to the wise: Rebooting doesn't guarantee that a person who has had porn
problems can safely return to internet porn in the future. Many guys learn this the
hard way. They assume their recovered erections mean they can use porn or porn
substitutes, only to end up with ED again. Deeply etched porn pathways can easily
spring back to life.
Recommended Suggestions
Here are some of the most familiar tips I see on the recovery forums:
Managing access
Delete all porn from your devices. It can be a wrench, but this action sends
your brain the signal that your intention to change is ironclad. Remember to
delete back-ups and the trash. Also get rid of all bookmarks to porn sites as
well as your browser history.
One guy claimed to have ‘heirloom porn’ that he absolutely could not part
with. He burned it to a disk, wrapped it, duct-taped the packet like it
contained the proprietary formula for Coca-Cola, and stored it in an
inconvenient, out of sight location. Once he recovered he chucked it away.
You can’t avoid yourself or move, but you can make some changes, and then
take care not to use porn in the new configuration. For example, consider
using your online devices only in a less private location, which you don't
associate with porn use. Or transform your ‘porn space’ environment. Get
rid of your ‘masturbation chair’ or simply move your furniture around, as
this guy did:
The reorientation of my apartment has been wonderful as I don't feel
any of the same associations that I did in the past set-up. It's weird
how moving everything a few feet and turning items a few degrees can
change the energy surrounding your attachment.
More ideas:
I put my desktop computer away. It's the one I've masturbated on for
years, and it's the one that's least reliable with the filtering. I don't use
it for anything but porn and wasting time. I can finish all I need to get
done on my laptop.
Porn blockers are not fail-proof. They are like speed-bumps. They give you
time to realize that you're about to do what you really don't want to do. Early
in the process of recovery, before the self-control mechanisms in your brain
are restored to full working order, blockers can be quite helpful. Eventually,
you won't need them.
- Qustodio - http://www.qustodio.com/index2
- K-9 – http://www1.k9webprotection.com
- Esafely.com – http://www.esafely.com/home.php
- OpenDNS – http://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security/parental-
controls/
Note: If you are a videogamer, using a porn-blocker can be risky. Your brain
is accustomed to getting some of its dopamine hits from finding ways
around obstacles. You may unthinkingly treat the porn blocker like just
another videogame quest. If this happens, delete your porn blocker and try
extinction training (below) or some other approach.
In any case, consider using an ad blocker. That way you won't have to see
wiggling images in your sidebar when making holiday plans or ordering
vitamins. Many guys find ad blockers extremely helpful in warding off
temptation. ‘AdblockPlus’ is free.
Consider a day-counter
Various forums offer free day-counters. Beneath each post you make a bar
graph appears showing your progress to your goal, and it updates itself
automatically. Some people, particularly men, find it very satisfying to track
their progress visually.
Counters get mixed reviews. The risk is that if someone slips back into porn
use, he may think of his days as game points, and use his newly reduced day
count to rationalise continuing to use porn for a while ‘because I won't lose
many accumulated days.’ Such binges erode progress more than isolated
incidents do, so if you get a day-counter, take a long-term view. Be pleased
with your overall count of porn-free days, without rationalizing about short-
term ‘scores’ or thinking it's safe to return to porn once your goal is met.
Ultimately, what matters is not days but brain balance. Brains do not all
return to balance on a set schedule, and while brains definitely need time to
reboot, accumulated days aren't the whole story. Brain balance also benefits
from exercise, socializing, time in nature, increased self-control, better self-
care and so forth.
Remember Pavlov's dogs? You may not realize it, but Pavlov didn't just
teach his dog to salivate at the sound of a bell. He later taught it to stop
salivating to the bell by ringing the bell and then withholding meat
(repeatedly).
This process is known as ‘cue extinction’. You weaken the link or pathway
between a stimulus and a habitual response. Some porn users are able to use
this same principle to strengthen their self-control:
Support
Don't fight this fight alone. In the end, you'll be the one pushing
yourself to success, but an online community can give you that little
bit of extra motivation when you're at your absolute lowest.
Addiction has a social context, as does recovery. Whether you find support
and recognition online or off is less important than that you find it.
The antidepressants have really helped. They kick me in the rear and
force me to look at my situation positively and not get so wound up in
it all.
Keep a journal
When the cravings were bad, I would look at my journal and see how
I’d come too far to quit. Put a password on it if you don’t want
someone else to find it.
Journals also allow you to get things off your chest that you would not feel
comfortable sharing with anyone else. Alternatively, you can share those
things in an anonymous online journal. Various forums allow you to journal
for free (NoFap.org, RebootNation.org, YourBrainRebalanced.com). The
added advantage of an online journal is that you and your peers can offer
each other support and advice based on journal entries.
Managing Stress, Improving Self-control and Self-care
Exercise is a solid mood regulator. Scientists surmise that it can help ease
addiction because acute bouts of exercise increase dopamine concentrations,
and regular exercise leads to sustained increases in dopamine and related
adjustments.165 This helps counteract the chronically low dopamine
signalling that haunts recovering addicts before their brains reboot.166 Here
are comments from two people:
*
Lift weights. It helps. If you’re feeling self-conscious use the machines
instead of free weights. The staff at the gym will help you if you have
no idea how to use the machines.
I'm on an 81-day streak right now, taking the coldest showers I can.
My desire to escape is strong, but I resist, and walk out of the shower
like I'm the king of the world.
Remember, it’s about finding what works for you. If a cold shower improves
your mood, and makes you less tempted to waste time slumped in front of a
computer, then it is useful, especially when your body is struggling with
withdrawal. It’s not a good idea to overdo anything, but you knew that
already.
Get outside
Researchers have found that time in nature is good for the brain. It boosts
creativity, insight and problem solving.168 Rebooters have noticed this too:
*
Get outside into the natural light and breathe fresh air. We weren’t
meant to look at glowing rectangles and breathe recycled air 24/7
Socializing
By the same token, connection is some of the best health insurance the
planet offers. It helps reduce the hormone cortisol, which can otherwise
weaken the immune system under stress. ‘It’s much less wear and tear on us
if we have someone there to help regulate us,’ explained
psychologist/neuroscientist James A. Coan in the New York Times.170
When recovering users force their attention away from their habitual ‘relief’,
their reward circuitry looks around for other sources of pleasure. Eventually
it finds the natural rewards it evolved to find: friendly interaction, real
mates, time in nature, exercise, accomplishment, creativity, and so forth. All
ease cravings.
There are a lot of places where you can get used to being out and
around people that are pretty nonthreatening. Hang out and read in a
library or bookstore, or take a magazine to a coffee shop or park
bench. Or take long walks outside. Making this a habit helps get me
out of my own head and makes me feel more like of a member of
society.
Whatever you choose, practice eye-contact with those you pass. Start with
older people. Make a game of it. See if you can improve your score each
time. Once you're comfortable, add a smile, nod or verbal greeting until your
natural charisma kicks in automatically.
Daily meditation can be very soothing for anyone struggling with the stress
of withdrawal. Research also shows that daily meditation helps the rational
part of the brain, called the frontal lobes, to stay in the driver's seat.171
Meditation thus strengthens what addiction has weakened, even as it quiets
the primitive parts of the brain that drive impulsive behaviour.
I heard that you should not think about quitting your addiction.
Instead you should learn how to meditate. The more you meditate the
stronger your mind becomes and the weaker your addiction gets. So I
have increased my meditation time. My thoughts about porn have
reduced drastically.
The first few weeks are primarily a battle of distraction. Put all your extra
time, energy and confidence to use on other efforts that keep you
preoccupied. A rebooter explained the importance of filling your time
differently by exploring and learning new things:
You can't expect to live the exact same lifestyle you've been living,
(i.e., get up, do a little work, surf web, do a little more work, surf web,
surf NSFW, do a little work, surf web, etc.) and expect anything to
change. That pattern won't magically disappear without conscious
effort.
Your brain will thank you. And, just like learning new things, creativity is
both a great distraction and inherently rewarding because of the anticipation
of achieving something important to you:
I enjoy music, and quitting has helped both my creative ability for
music, as well as my enjoyment of listening to it. I've probably
‘composed’ about 20 songs in my head in the last few months since
quitting. Also, I've found I'm much more creative with my jokes and
conversational threads. All of a sudden conversations feel like playing
music. It is both enjoyable and impressive, actually. I am planning to
join the Improv club at university, and see where I can take this.
Stage-performance doesn't seem daunting at all, anymore. Exciting, if
anything.
I'm a writer and musician, though I have let my art fall by the wayside
over the past few years as I retreated farther and farther into porn. I
thought that I was dealing with writer's block because I could not
allow myself to put words on paper or notes on strings. Since I started
this journey, however, I have recommitted myself to my art and am
now working on three songs with a fourth starting to work its way out
of me.
Many people report taking up hobbies, new and old, as they reboot. Here are
comments of three guys:
I've taken up cooking and baking. It's a great distraction, it's fun, and
I get a reward when I'm finished.
Yoga gets me out of the house and helps me burn off some steam. Lots
of beautiful women there too. Very beautiful women. Mmm...women.
Tip: Limit activities that cause 'empty' dopamine highs, such as frequent,
intense videogaming, junk food, gambling, trolling Facebook, Tumblr,
Twitter and Yahoo, meaningless TV, and so forth. Instead, steer for
activities that produce more lasting, sustainable satisfaction even if they
aren't as rewarding in the short-run: having a good conversation, organizing
your work space, receiving/giving a therapeutic massage, goal-setting,
visiting someone, building something or gardening. In short, anything that
gives you a sense of connection or moves you toward longer-term
objectives.
The better you feel, the less you need to self-medicate. Getting fit and
learning to eat healthily are a start. For thousands of years humans had to
wrestle with the challenge of maintaining brain balance without today's
drugs. Many left insightful, inspiring solutions that are now available to all
via the internet. There's no need to reinvent the wheel. Dig around. Think
big. Take the time to develop a philosophy of life. Act on it.
Those who reboot with relative ease keep a sense of humour, accept their
humanness, love sex but respect their sexuality, and gradually steer
themselves into a new groove. They don't bludgeon themselves, or threaten
themselves with doom.
Sex is a fundamental drive, and giving up the intense stimulation of regular
porn use is a big shift for your brain. It's best to ease your way through the
transition, forgive yourself if you slip, and keep going until you get where
you want to be. Think of snowboarding or surfboarding. Stay flexible.
Whether rebooters know a lot or a little about science, they generally value
learning how the brain interacts with a supernormal stimulus such as today's
internet porn. It explains how they got where they are and how to change
course:
Rebooting Challenges
Withdrawal
Perhaps because our culture does not yet appreciate the honest-to-goodness
physical addictiveness of today's pornography, the severity of withdrawal
symptoms can catch those who quit by surprise. The discomfort can easily
derail a reboot, as this guy warns:
Withdrawals suck. We don't talk enough about them. They are why we
fail. They are our brain's reward centre begging us, threatening us,
punishing us, pleading with us, rationalizing with us why we need to
use porn. Withdrawals are painful, they are physical, mental, and
emotional pain. They are the jitters, the shakes, the sweats, odd pains
in odd places, the brain fog we feel when quitting, and our brain's
way of telling us all that unpleasantness can go away with just a little
harmless fix. When going through withdrawal I felt I had a sinus
infection and my teeth actually hurt. I did not have a sinus infection
and my teeth were fine, but my brain, at some level, had to make me
feel bad to try and make me feel good through a porn release.
Let me tell you the truth right when you decide to take the challenge:
You won't be able to do it. Or, at least, that's what you're going to
think every single day, and it'll feel so true that you just can't take it
anymore. You will be going through the emotional ups and downs and
downs of withdrawal. You are like a man setting out to climb a tall
mountain who has never walked before. At first it will seem
impossible, but as you walk a little bit more each day, your muscles,
i.e., your willpower, will grow and it will become possible. So take it
one day at a time, always. Don't look at what you're doing as fighting
a war to quit for X days, or it seems too big to take on. Realize that
what you're doing is just saying ‘no’ once. When that urge comes up,
you say ‘no’, you scream into a pillow, you scream internally, you
throw those thoughts away, you distract yourself, you realise how
much better you've done without porn, and how much you have to lose
going back and starting over and maybe not even getting this far. You
don't let that urge go anywhere. You say ‘no’, that one time, and you
do that every one time that it comes up. That's it. Not X days of
constant willpower, just a subtle lifestyle change, a quiet ‘no’
whenever the random desire flickers up and tries to take hold.
My brain is like a see-saw right now. My day can turn from a great
one to a near suicidal one in the space of a few hours. It's difficult to
endure but it reassures me that something is trying to correct itself.
Not having had a major porn problem, I assumed the benefits would
be marginal. But if you think you don't have an addiction, try stopping
and see what happens. In my case, a period of quite punishing
withdrawal symptoms. They lasted for at least a month. Something
was clearly profoundly affecting me neurochemically, as within a
24hr period I might experience the extremes of a kind of shimmering,
exultant euphoria followed by a moribund depressive blackness.
Around the month mark I started feeling significantly better about
myself and things began falling into place effortlessly; people seemed
better disposed towards me, my body language improved, I started
joking around at work more and generally seeing the lighter side of
life.
Mood swings like a pregnant 13-year old girl. I'll see a neat-looking
tree and then cry about it. Intense, insatiable desire for human
contact...yet a terrible fear of actually getting it. Insatiable food
cravings...Almost ate an entire cake in 24 hours. I have a VERY
SHORT FUSE, you idiot! LOL I treat people like crap when I feel like
this. This is the worst symptom.
Flatline
Needless to say, some guys bail out of recovery at this point and rush back
to porn, afraid that they will permanently lose it if they don't use it. About
five years ago, however, a courageous 26-year old Australian kept going –
and discovered that somewhere around week seven, his flatline ended and
his libido (and erections) came roaring back.175 Since then, many guys have
braved the flatline and documented their recoveries.
No one yet knows what causes the flatline, but here's one guy's theory:
Tell your girlfriend. It takes the pressure off you and helps you to
avoid hurting her. PIED [porn-induced ED] is nothing to feel bad
about. Nowadays porn is really common and nearly every guy is using
porn or has used porn sometime (and I believe every girl knows that).
It could happen to anyone, as you don't have to be an excessive porn
user to get your brain messed up. My boyfriend really tried to explain
everything and I'm so thankful for that! It feels so much better to know
what's going on. It also brings you closer together when your partner
includes you in something like that because then it becomes a thing
you get through together.
Not every guy who quits porn experiences a temporary loss of libido
(flatline) during recovery. However, the percentage of those who report
flatlines appears to be rising as the guys who started on high-speed comprise
a growing portion of ED sufferers. As one guy said,
Some guys flatline a long time, some don't, some never get one.
It's difficult to gauge anything because this problem is so new.
Hopefully in a couple years we'll start to see some trends and be
able to give better advice to those who have just quit.
Unfortunately we're the pioneers in this.
Insomnia
It's important to stay well rested as fatigue can trigger porn use. However,
many rebooters have relied on their porn ritual as a sleep-aid for years.
Without it, sleep is elusive at first. (Insomnia is also a common withdrawal
symptom.) Find what works for you, and keep in mind that the problem will
fade with time.
I thought fapping was the only way I could sleep, but only 10 days in
I'm already sleeping great. Falling asleep when my head hits the
pillow is truly awesome.
Avoid replacing porn use with alcohol. Yes, it will help you fall asleep, but
alcohol can wake you up too early, not fully rested. It's also not a good idea
to replace an addiction with something else that is potentially addictive.
Here are some suggestions that have worked for others:
The first week was pretty rough for me in terms of sleep quality. One
thing I did to break out of it was not to use my laptop/read in bed. I set
it up on the kitchen table and would only lie down in bed when I got
tired.
Definitely get a reading lamp. Something about having just that one
light on in the room shining on your book will make you ve-he-heh-ry
sleepy.
I started running late at night. When I get back I take a shower and hit
the sack. It puts me to sleep instantly.
*
I turn on music I enjoy that my mind can focus on. Puts me to sleep
almost every time.
*
Get up earlier. It's also the best time to fit in a workout. You'll be tired
by the time it is time to go to sleep in the evening.
I usually put something over my eyes and ears like a rolled up t-shirt.
It helps me.
Lie on your back and list everything that you are grateful for. When I
first started doing this, my gratitude list was long. Now, I barely get
through being thankful for my friends and my dog and I'm dead
asleep.
Triggers
One man described triggers as, ‘the external factors that make you think
about porn.’ Common triggers include: TV shows and movies with erotic
content, porn flashbacks, morning wood, use of recreational drugs or
alcohol, words that remind you of a porn site/actor and suggestive ads. Said
one guy:
The only thing that feels worse than relapsing is relapsing because
you got too drunk or high to control yourself.
But states of mind can also be triggers: boredom, anxiety, stress, depression,
loneliness, rejection, fatigue, frustration, anger, failure, feeling sorry for
yourself, desire to reward yourself for an accomplishment, overconfidence,
jealousy, and being hung-over.
Procrastination also triggers many a relapse. The result has been dubbed
‘procrasturbation’. Keep a list of things you want to accomplish as well as a
list of risk-free activities for those moments when you just don't have the
motivation to do something productive.
Obviously, triggers are somewhat unique to each brain. Here are some less
common ones: hot showers, too much sugar or too many carbohydrates, too
much caffeine, Russian bride ads, websites like Stumbleupon, YouTube,
Imgur and Reddit, stalking old romantic interests on Facebook, being on the
computer for a long time without hourly 15-minute breaks, videogames, a
full bladder, self-absorption, handling one's genitals, clothing that rubs the
genitals, masturbation, smartphone, computer, waiting for code to compile
and hunger.
Triggers are both problems and solutions. They can drive you mad during
rebooting (at first), but they also show you when to be on high alert. Some
rebooters take drastic measures for a bit:
I refused to have an internet connection at home and a smartphone.
Both are relatively easy to live without for a month or two while your
body resets.
Triggers are what addiction experts call ‘cues’. How do they work? Your
brain has wired up nerve-cell pathways between your reward circuitry and
memories of anything associated with porn-arousal. Anything that activates
these pathways is a ‘cue’, or trigger. During evolution, the ability to react to
cues worked in your ancestors' favour by helping them not to miss valuable
opportunities.
In drug addicts the cue-induced spike can be as high as the spike from
actually taking the drug,176 and this is likely true for heavy porn users as
well.
I caught a glimpse of a porn pic the other day and there was a distinct
buzz in my brain, almost like a hot flash. Fortunately it freaked me out
enough to get away fast.
The bad news is that trigger-pathways sometimes stay around for a long
time, even after you are otherwise fully rebooted. They do weaken. For
example, an alcoholic who has been sober for 20 years may no longer be
triggered by beer commercials. Yet if he drank a beer his sensitized
pathways might light up causing him to lose control. Similar things happen
to former porn users. They become immune to cues that were formerly risky,
but if they use porn again they may binge.
You will need to be mindful of triggers for a long time, especially powerful
ones, so it pays to work out what they are and be well aware of them. You
also need to have a predetermined response in mind for when you face one.
With alertness, expectation and advance preparation, overcoming an urge is
do-able. They usually pass if you can distract yourself for about ten minutes.
- Where I am?
Could you go for a run, prepare a healthy snack, learn a new word in another
language, work on that novel you've been meaning to write or call a friend?
Choose a response that furnishes a sense of accomplishment, connection or
self-care.
Finally, once you have identified the trigger and decided upon an alternative
reward for that situation, record your plan, ‘When _____ occurs (trigger), I
will ________ (new routine), because it gives me ____ (the reward)’.
Rewards might be more energy, something to be proud of, better health,
feelings of happiness, the satisfaction of taking care of business, increased
confidence, better mood, improved memory, reduced depression, desire to
socialise, better erections, and so forth.
If you consistently ‘face and replace’, your new behaviour will eventually be
automatic. If for some reason you can't act on your new routine, do what
Olympic athletes do and visualize yourself acting on it in minute detail.
Emotions
People who quit porn often remark that they feel more emotions. Why is this
a challenge? Because unfamiliar emotions can be overwhelming at first,
especially if they are unwelcome. Here are some typical accounts:
You will encounter emotions you haven't felt for years, maybe never.
Girls that didn't matter to you before will all of a sudden be the
centrepiece to your f--king life. That exam you failed? You don't blow
it off; you worry about your grade; you worry about the final coming
up in two weeks. And this is good; hell it's great. This is the suffering
that you learn from, that lets you grow you as a person. But it will
hurt. At points you'll feel sad, confused maybe even depressed. Don't
fall into that trap. Emotions pass, memories fade, and you will come
out stronger for it. Remember, you have years of emotional growth
and maturity to come into. It might not be easy, you may not feel
comfortable, but it is worth it.
As this guy pointed out, you can't have the highs without being willing to
face the lows:
Chaser
The term 'chaser' is often used to describe intense cravings that sometimes
follow orgasm. Like withdrawal symptoms, it can derail a reboot in a
heartbeat. Two guys describe the chaser:
The chaser effect is counterintuitive but real. I had little urge to fap
while my girlfriend was out of the country, but as soon as we started
having sex again my urges to use porn became stronger.
*
Some guys also notice a chaser effect after a wet dream; others don't. In any
case, these intense, often unexpected cravings after orgasm can throw an
unwary rebooter into a binge:
*
*
After the relapse, the next two days were very difficult. I had extreme
difficulty focusing. I could really feel the dopamine withdrawal in my
head as my brain felt really slow and numb. My words were slurred
and I had difficulty communicating. The urge to masturbate and have
sex were a lot stronger than before.
Happily, sometimes the chaser can help kick-start libido after a long flatline:
Ever since I masturbated Sunday night with my first full blown hard-
on using minimal stimulation, no fantasy and surprising endurance to
orgasm, I have been feeling a bit more energized and horny. Clear-
headed, no real chaser. It's safe to say I am on the upswing.
Being that we just made sweet love last night, my wife decided to tip
toe down the hall, and see what I was looking at this morning. (She
knows about the chaser effect.) So I did as any warrior would do. I
showed her exactly what the chaser effect really is! I chased her into
the bedroom to demonstrate that I only chase HER now. Left late for
work...Worth it!
People often remark that they recall their dreams better after quitting. This
can be enjoyable or not:
Since I started with nofap, one of the things I have noticed is that my
dreams are back. When I was fapping like crazy during the last 10
years, I honestly didn't have one single dream, or only a few.
I had insane dreams again. Some definitely pornographic. But I'm not
even aroused by it. My brain is sorting junk out.
Porn flashbacks, too, are common during rebooting, and they can cause
extreme distress:
There are so many times I can't see a stranger or friend for who they
are. I just see flashes of them naked, girls or guys. I totally understand
that normal people fantasise about someone they really like (a
teenager boy who can't pay attention in class because he's thinking of
how his teacher looks naked, for instance). So it's not the fact that I'm
mentally undressing people that's upsetting. It's the fact that it
happens SO OFTEN and in response to such random occurrences,
triggers and unwanted triggers. Even when I don't find the person
attractive, or I don't want to find them attractive. Such as elderly
people or younger children. My mind is just so on the fritz. I can deal
with it if I'm just passing someone on the street and can quickly snap
back and forget about it. But if it's someone I'm actually engaging in a
conversation with it almost escalates in a panic attack. I end the
conversation quickly and find a quiet place like a bathroom or go on a
walk to calm myself down. It sometimes feels as if someone is
controlling how I think and I have no say in it. My old porn mind is
what's driving it I think.
Best to treat flashbacks like dreams. That is, regard them as mental
housecleaning rather than evidence that the reboot isn't working. Just
acknowledge them and let them pass without assigning them any meaning.
Note: Those with OCD tendencies may have a harder time dismissing
flashbacks. They assign significance where there is none.
Shame cycle
Many of today's internet porn users grew up with online erotica and are quite
blasé about its use. If they feel shame, it's about their inability to control use,
not about porn content or use. Their shame evaporates as they regain control.
With all that extra dopamine screaming, ‘Yes!’ it's easy for the primitive
reward circuitry of the brain to overvalue condemned activities. They
register as hyper-arousing, which means they also offer temporary
comforting oblivion when feelings of shame strike. This explains how some
users fall into a ‘shame-binge-shame’ cycle.
It would be reckless to claim that the full story is known, as far as the brain
chemistry of addiction is concerned. But this biological frame of
neuroplasticity – and the computer analogy in the idea of rebooting – gets
much closer to the facts of the matter than either conservative angst about
sexuality per se or liberal complacency about the innate harmlessness of
porn.
The key seems to be to channel lots of energy into constructive action and
self-compassion – and away from excruciating, yet arousing, inner battles.
Common Pitfalls
Edging
What derails more reboots than any other factor? Edging. That is,
masturbating up to the edge of orgasm, repeatedly, without climaxing (often
while watching something arousing on the internet). This practice is not
uncommon on ‘nofap’ forums where people sometimes persuade themselves
that ejaculation is the main problem and internet porn is secondary.
Instead of achieving orgasm and ending it, you train your brain to be
bathing in arousing neurochemicals for hours. It's the worst thing you can
do, bar none. The worst. I think most of us weren't addicted to porn, but
rather to edging to porn.
In men, edging stresses the prostate. Also, it does not prepare you well for
sex with a real person. It's typically tied to prolonged visual stimulation,
rapid-fire novelty, clicking from scene to scene, and your own hand (or sex
toy).
Dopamine is at its peak when on the verge of orgasm. Therefore edging also
keeps dopamine as high as it can naturally go, perhaps for hours. The brain
is getting strong signals to strengthen the associations between arousal and
whatever the viewer is watching, be it fetish or merely screen. Chronically
elevated dopamine also risks causing addiction-related brain changes, such
as the decreasing sensitivity to pleasure.
In the pre-internet days, guys would usually masturbate, orgasm and be done
with it within a matter of minutes. At orgasm, prolactin rises, which drops
dopamine to baseline levels and inhibits its release. That normally spells
some relief for sexual frustration. Placing your foot on the dopamine gas,
without ever hitting the brake (prolactin) results in a continuous state of
cravings without satisfaction:
What really got me going down the porn death path was when I
changed my habit from doing it for the orgasm to doing it for the
sensation leading up to the orgasm.
Be aware that, at first, you may not find a single climax without porn
satisfying, just as you may not find masturbation without porn stimulating
enough to climax. This is because your brain is not feeling rewards
normally. That can work in your favour while your brain is rebalancing
itself. More than one recovering user has commented that once he stopped
viewing porn, the urge to masturbate eased a lot, because without porn,
masturbation was not that interesting. No need to force yourself to climax.
Be patient.
Fantasising
Most people report that avoiding fantasy early in a reboot is very helpful –
including during sex with a partner – because avoidance actually reduces
cravings. However, if someone has little sexual experience, it may
eventually be helpful to engage in realistic fantasy about real potential
partners in order to help rewire the brain to real people (instead of screens).
After all, humans have been engaging in sexual fantasy for eons.
The key may be to avoid placing real people into your favourite porn
scenarios. Two guys share their advice:
Now that said, I don't think that all fantasy is bad and
counterproductive. I've found that during rebooting, pretty much for
the first time in my life, I've spontaneously begun to have another type
of fantasy that involves intimacy but not sex. These fantasies involve
things like exchanging smiles, holding hands, giving back or foot
massages. I know that may sound corny, but these fantasies are
actually very vivid and enjoyable. I don't think of them as weaker
versions of sexual fantasies since they are qualitatively different. I've
found this other type of fantasy actually has a positive effect. BTW, I
never edge or masturbate during such fantasies (if I did they'd
probably become sexual).
This is another easy way to derail your reboot. If you're trying to quit porn,
it's easy to rationalize looking at, say, pictures of women in bikinis instead.
After all, that's not porn, right? Actually, the primitive part of your brain
doesn't know what porn is. It simply knows whether something is arousing
(to you) or not. (Your brain is in good company. In 1964 Justice Potter
Stewart of the US Supreme Court famously claimed that, while he couldn’t
define pornography, he knew it when he saw it.) So if you find bikini shots
hot then they're also problematic.
1. Surfing a dating app while imagining sex with clothed people, as you
click from picture to picture, or
2. An afternoon in a nudist colony?
Either try to get laid (approach potential partners, set up dates, flirt,
contact friends, go out) or do something completely unrelated to sex
(work, study, exercise, hang out). The whole idea is to move away
from that artificial/fantasy world and into the real world.
Sure, we've had some lows. She's had some insecure feelings.
I've had some terrible evenings of feeling inadequate and
useless, but in the end we talked things through and came out
stronger. Then, last weekend I managed to actually get and stay
hard enough for sex. This is a huge step forward for me, the
start of a new sexual adventure, and it's fantastic.
If orgasm sets off noticeable neurochemical ripples (the chaser) or sends you
into a binge, don't push yourself to finish in the future. Keep your sexual
activity gentle and low-key, that is, free of all performance pressure, while
your sensitivity to pleasure returns naturally. It is better to leave wanting
more than to exhaust your sexual desire.
If necessary, ask your partner not to play porn star in an effort to heat you up
prematurely. Although dazzling foreplay and fantasy skills may produce the
desired fireworks in the short-term, they can ultimately hamper healing. You
can make up for lost time once you return to your studly self. The wait will
be worth it:
The belief that ‘I can't help my fetishes; that's just who I am’ can become a
serious stumbling block to quitting internet porn because it can feel like
you're abandoning your only hope of sexual fulfilment. The fact is, only by
process of elimination will you know whether you are dealing with a porn-
induced superficial 'fetish' or a true fetish arising from the core of your
sexual identity.
Obviously, if a fetish disappears during the months after you quit porn then
it wasn't integral to your sexual identity. In the meantime, your cravings for
past highs related to your tastes in porn can deceive you. Said one young
guy:
In summer 2011 I developed a new fetish, and oh god I could feel the
dopamine in my brain. I was so happy and excited when watching this
new type of porn that my body would shake. Since then I have been a
lot less happy and have never gone back to normal.
In all cases, it makes sense to rule out excessive porn use as a cause first.
The brain needs a rest not testing. This is accomplished by quitting porn and
porn fantasy for a few months. Watch out, because withdrawal discomfort or
flatlining may persuade you that you just need more extreme scenarios to
find satisfaction, when satisfaction actually lies in a balanced brain (the
opposite direction). This forum member shared his experience:
Pornography made me able to become aroused only when I imagined
extreme images in my head. I did a lot of extreme things with female
prostitutes, but was left wholly dissatisfied. Even with the
transsexuals, nothing they did aroused me. I had to force myself to
become aroused by thinking of extreme porn. I noticed that I was
switching between different sexual activities every few minutes at a
rate equal to how quickly I switched between porn videos at
home. During my porn use, I was unable to be turned on simply by
being near a naked woman (something I used to love more than
anything, and now love again). Today, after quitting porn, when I am
intimate with a woman it's an actual connection, an exceptional,
awesome feeling. No forced fantasies.
Today's internet porn users are demonstrating that human sexuality is far
more malleable than anyone realized. Viewers can use today's hyper-
stimulating content to produce supernormal arousal states, which they can
maintain for hours. As overconsumption leads to desensitization, the brain
seeks more dopamine via novelty, shock, forbidden content, kink, seeking,
etc. That's when earlier porn tastes may no longer do the job.
And of course, during puberty, all erotic memories gain power, and are
reinforced with each instance of arousal. Avid porn use in teens, whose
brains are highly plastic, can cause sexual tastes to morph with surprising
swiftness. Research shows that the younger the age people first start to use
porn, the more likely they are to view bestiality or child porn.179 In an
informal 2012 poll of (mostly young) people on r/nofap, 63% agreed that,
‘My tastes became increasingly “extreme” or “deviant”’.180 Half were
concerned; half weren't.
Yet porn fetishes often turn out to be superficial. Again, many who quit porn
(and porn-inspired fantasy) for a few months see their extreme tastes
dissipate.
The ideal time to deal with a bad urge is before it shows up. When you first
quit, plan ahead:
Make a list (now) of reasons you are avoiding porn and consult it when The
Urge arises. Better yet, write a note to yourself that you can read when
needed about what it will be like if you yield to The Urge, just as this guy
did:
You start some edging. Now there is no looking back. A little more ...
then a little more ... aaaand you're done. Most likely the orgasm won't
be very intense. You will feel a sense of relief more than anything else.
‘Now I can go back to my work’, you will say. ‘That wasn't so bad. I
don't feel any shame. There's really no point denying yourself to such
an extreme’.
By the end of the day you will have not completed your tasks for the
day. Your defence mechanisms for procrastination will kick in. Your
mental state is now completely at the mercy of external factors. How
much work can you accomplish the next day? Will you run into any
roadblocks? Depression kicks in. Your mind does not want to engage
with anything in case it makes things worse. You don't want to meet
people. Your brain is in shutdown mode. You decide not to give in
again.
Next, make a list of what you will do instead of use porn when The Urge
arises. Some people prepare by learning the ‘Red X’ technique:
If you don't know what else to do you can always wait and do nothing.
Think to yourself, ‘Here are cravings. They came out of nowhere and they
have no real power over me. I am not my thoughts; I did not summon them;
I do not want them; and I do not have to act on them.’ Typically, the thought
will vanish without a trace (for a time).
The fact is that all urges die down eventually, usually within quarter of an
hour. And if you can get through The Bad Urge you can do anything, as this
guy points out:
Once you learn that you are bigger than your urge and it always
passes by, you'll be well on your way to ridding yourself of porn use.
In my previous attempts, I would always give in to the one bad urge.
Once I finally fought it I realized that I could fight any bad urge that
comes. In that very moment when you feel you're weakest, when you
feel like the urge is gonna defeat you, that's the moment in which you
need to stay strong. On the other side of that urge is your
breakthrough. When you beat that one bad urge, you realize you can
beat them all. The key is to live one day at a time and stay diligent.
Don't discuss the situation with your brain. Your brain will try to
rationalize porn use because it desperately wants it. The key here is
not to argue with your own brain, but instead to simply acknowledge
that you're having the thought, or to answer with one word: ‘No’.
*
I just kinda hung my junk over in the sink and ladled cold water over
it with my hands. It definitely kills the cravings. Also helps with blue
balls.
I try to focus on drawing the sexual energy upward, into my chest and
upper body to ease the pressure in my pants. It makes me feel really
powerful. It relieves the need to masturbate, and kind of gives me this
super ‘ready for action’ feeling. Like I could tear down a house if I
needed to, or throw a girl around and have my way with her, in a
consensual, playful way of course. I like it.
Do you keep giving yourself an excuse like ‘I will do it one last time’
or ‘Today is the last time’? Change it to ‘Just today I am not doing it’.
When The Urge shows up, and you feel like you have no control, turn off
your device and think things through before acting on it. Even if you act on
it afterward, you will do so consciously and that is the first step to changing
behaviour.
Ultimately, the most important thing you can ever do is to never quit. I
don't care if you reset every other day for a whole month or two. Even
if that's the best you can do, you're now using porn half as often as
you did. The most inspiring story I ever saw was of a guy who had a
15-day streak...after 3 whole years of trying. As long as you keep
coming back, because you know how important it is for your own
good, you cannot fail. It is only a matter of time until you reset your
neural pathways and break free.
Common Questions
Think of a reboot as discovering what is really you and what was porn-
related, whether it be sexual dysfunctions, social anxiety, raging sex drive,
ADD, depression, or whatever. Once you have a clear understanding of how
you were affected by porn, you can steer your own ship.
It's up to you. Some people find a temporary time-out from all sexual
stimulation gives the brain a much needed rest and speeds recovery. On the
other hand, daily affectionate touch is always beneficial, with or without sex.
If you feel like the chaser effect is knocking you off balance after sex, you
might try gentle lovemaking without the goal of orgasm for a while. It gives
you the benefits of intimacy while still allowing your brain to rest from
intense sexual stimulation. However, if a reboot is taking a long time, some
rebooters report that sex with a partner helps return their libido to normal.
If you think you are experiencing porn-induced ED, you may see better
results if you don't force any sexual performance until you feel like your
erections are arising spontaneously in the presence of your partner.
Not necessarily. You can try cutting out porn, porn fantasy and porn
substitutes first. For some people that is enough to allow a return to balance.
Others find that masturbation is a powerful trigger for activating porn
pathways, so they do better if they give it a rest for a while.
Note: You don't want to force yourself to masturbate using fantasy or other
aids if it isn't yet happening spontaneously.
Obviously, there's no simple answer to this question as goals differ for each
person. Common goals include: return of healthy erections, normalizing
libido, diminishing of porn-induced fetishes, reversal of porn-induced sexual
tastes, ease in managing cravings, and so forth. It's not uncommon for
younger men to experience continued improvements long after the end of
their rebooting phase.
- You feel like flirting with potential mates, who look a lot more
attractive.
- Intercourse with a partner feels fantastic (Note: You may have a bit of
premature ejaculation or delayed ejaculation early on. Practice makes
perfect.)
My libido went missing on and off for 6 months. Yet when it returned,
it was a more wholesome libido. The desire for porn perving and
sexually staring at woman disappeared completely.
Give up porn and porn fantasy and see what your libido is like a few weeks
later. It has been surprising to witness that most rebooters have an easier
time eliminating masturbation than they do porn. For many guys,
masturbation is simply not that interesting without porn, and they are
amazed to discover that porn, not high libido, was driving their constant
search for relief.
Obviously, it helps to spend time around real potential partners and limit all
sexual fantasy to real people and realistic sexual scenarios. This young guy
shared his strategy for ‘rewiring’:
If you suspect your porn use might be adversely affecting you, by all means make
a simple experiment: Give it up for a time and see what you notice for yourself.
There's no need to wait until experts reach a consensus. Quitting porn is not like
engaging in an untested medical procedure or ingesting a risky pharmaceutical –
situations where definitive research is not only possible but necessary.
Medical research works at a snail's pace. With luck we'll be addressing this
in 20 or 30 years ... when half the male population is incapacitated. Drug
companies can't sell any medications by someone quitting porn.
We don't have to be quite that pessimistic. Even as I was putting the finishing
touches on this book, the first two brain studies on porn users appeared. Both were
excellent and published by highly respected journals. They aligned neatly with the
self-reports I've been tracking for years. Yet, the massive informal experiment now
going on in online forums (and summarized in this book) is some of the best
evidence currently available on the effects of porn – and quitting porn.
There’s much more to learn. But meanwhile, make your own experiment free of
everyone else's agendas. As one ex-user wrote:
Once you've experienced the truth about porn for yourself you can no longer
be deceived by propaganda about porn, whether it comes from the religious,
the liberals or the porn producers. They all have their agendas, but you have
knowledge and can create your own opinion based on what is best for you.
Understand the Science of Misinformation
If you're wondering why there's not yet a consensus on the effects of internet porn
despite the swell of warnings, you may find the history of the Tobacco Wars
instructive. Years ago, most everyone smoked including movie stars on screen.
People loved puffing. It calmed the nerves, offered a predictable buzz and looked
sophisticated. How could such a wonderful activity really be detrimental? Was
nicotine truly addictive? When tar showed up in cadaver lungs incredulous
smokers preferred to blame asphalt.
Causation studies could not be done because they would have entailed creating two
random groups of people and asking one to smoke for years while the other
refrained. Definitely unethical. Meanwhile, other kinds of evidence mounted that
smoking was causing health problems and that people had great difficulty quitting:
correlation studies, anecdotal reports from physicians and patients, etc. Prospective
studies, which compare a group of similar subjects whose smoking habits differ,
took decades.
During this time, studies fostered by the tobacco industry found no evidence of
harm or addiction. Predictably, every time new evidence of harm appeared, the
industry trotted out its ‘studies’ to create the impression that the authorities were in
conflict – and that it was far too soon to quit smoking. For example, the head of the
Tobacco Industry Research Committee said, ‘If smoke in the lungs was a sure-fire
cause of cancer we'd all have it. We'd all have had it long ago. The cause is much
more complicated than that’. He also dismissed statistical connections as not
proving ‘causation’.
Ultimately, however, reality could not be denied. Smoking claimed more and more
victims. At the same time, addiction research became more sophisticated and
revealed the physiology of how nicotine produces addiction. In the end, the
tobacco industry's spell was broken. These days, people still smoke but they do so
knowing the risks. Efforts to paint a false picture about the harmlessness of
smoking have ceased.
Meanwhile, much unnecessary damage had been done. Critically important health
information, which should have taken a few years to become common knowledge,
instead took decades – while fabricated uncertainty protected tobacco profits.
Big Tobacco's campaign to cast doubt on the link between smoking and disease is
now a classic case study in a science called agnotology: the study of the cultural
production of ignorance. Agnotology investigates the deliberate sowing of public
misinformation and doubt in a scientific area. As Brian McDougal, the author of
Porned Out, put it,
Is internet porn the new smoking? Almost all young men with internet access view
porn and the percentages of women viewers are growing. Whenever something
becomes the norm, there's an unexamined assumption that it must be harmless or
'normal', that is, that it cannot produce abnormal physiological results. However,
that proved not to be the case with smoking.
And, just as with smoking, causality studies cannot be done. It would be unethical
to create two groups of kids and keep one group as ‘porn virgins’ while setting the
other group free on today's internet porn for years to see what percentage lose
attraction to real partners, can't quit, or develop porn-induced sexual dysfunctions
and extreme fetish tastes.
Studies that follow porn users and non-users over years may never be done,
especially in those under 18. Even finding a group that doesn't use porn and
another group who accurately report their porn usage would be quite challenging.
In contrast, studying smoking was easy. You either smoked or you didn't, and you
were perfectly happy to say what brand of cigarette, how many per day, and when
you started.
Meanwhile, other kinds of evidence are mounting that some internet porn users
experience severe problems. Researchers are reporting unprecedented ED in young
men,183 184 185 physicians are reporting that their patients recover after they give up
internet porn,186 and brain scientists are seeing worrisome brain changes even in
moderate internet porn users187 as well as porn addicts.188 Addiction treatment
facilities are seeing increases in internet porn-facilitated addiction. Lawyers are
noting a rise of divorces in which internet porn use is a factor. Young people are
reporting surprising changes in fetish-porn tastes, which often fade if they quit
using.
While that sounds rigorously scientific – who, after all, could be against something
as scientifically respectable as the ‘double-blind’? – it is in fact profoundly silly.
‘Double-blind’ means that neither the investigator nor the subject knows that a
variable has been altered. For example, neither knows who is receiving drug or
placebo. ‘Single-blind’ means the investigator knows but the subject doesn't. It
should be evident that neither type of study is possible in the case of porn use. The
subject will always know that he or she has stopped using porn. If you hear anyone
calling for ‘double-blind studies’ in this context you can be sure of one thing: they
don't know what they're talking about.
As I say, the best causation experiment currently possible is being done right now
by thousands of people in various online forums. Porn users are removing a single
variable that they all have in common: porn use. This ‘study’ is not perfect. Other
variables are also at work in their lives. But that would be equally true in a formal
study testing the effects of, say, anti-depressants. Subjects will always have
different diets, relationship situations, childhoods and so forth.
Some experts believe that porn-addiction deniers are not unlike the shills of the
tobacco industry.190 The difference is that their motives often appear to stem from
uncritical 'sex positivity'. They also deny the complaints of internet porn users
experiencing unprecedented 'sex-negative' dysfunctions, such as delayed
ejaculation or inability to orgasm during sex, erectile dysfunction and loss of
attraction to real partners.
I am sceptical about the limited existing research that finds no evidence of harm
from internet porn use for several reasons:
What happened when researchers recently asked questions based on teens' reality
instead of researchers' theories? The data promptly line up with the anecdotes in
this book.
A new study on anal sex among men and women ages 16 to 18,195 analysed a large
qualitative sample from three diverse sites in England. Said the researchers: 'Few
young men or women reported finding anal sex pleasurable and both expected anal
sex to be painful for women.'
Why were couples engaging in anal sex if neither party found it pleasurable? ‘The
main reasons given for young people having anal sex were that men wanted to
copy what they saw in pornography, and that “it's tighter”. And ''People must like it
if they do it” (made alongside the seemingly contradictory expectation that it will
be painful for women).'
This looks like a perfect example of adolescent brain training; 'This is how it's
done; this is what I should do.' Also at work is a desire to boast to one's peers about
being able to duplicate the acts seen in porn.
However, as hypothesized in the Max Planck study,196 today's porn users may also
be seeking more ‘edgy’ sexual practices and more intense stimulation (‘tighter’)
due to reduced sensitivity to pleasure. In the latter event, teens need more than
‘discussions of pleasure, pain, consent and coercion’ (recommended by the anal-
sex researchers). They need to learn how chronic overstimulation can alter their
brains and tastes.
Already, teens are figuring out that porn is having unwanted effects on their lives.
A June, 2014 poll of 18-year olds from across the UK197 found the following:
Is it possible that the teens who grew up with streaming porn and then watched the
effects of smartphones on themselves and their peers know more about the impact
of internet porn than those who are endeavouring to educate them? Only 19% of
teens saw something wrong with watching pornography, but more than two thirds
perceived porn's harmful effects. These results suggest that many young people
don't fit into the accepted frame for debates about porn. They don't think it's wrong
to watch pornography. That is, they (presumably) don't reject it on puritanical
grounds or out of 'sex negative' shame. Yet many of those who have no objection
to porn as such can see that it causes serious problems. It seems futile to try to keep
adolescents away from explicit material altogether and recklessly irresponsible not
to inform them properly about its potential for harm. This is a theme of this book:
we need to listen to today's users and their peers because the phenomenon is
moving so fast.
So what do we do to prepare (potential) porn users so, like smokers, they can make
informed choices? Perhaps you've heard that education is the solution. I agree, but
such education needs to inform all ages of the symptoms that today's internet porn
users are reporting, as well as teach people how the brain learns, how chronic
overconsumption can alter it for the worse, and what is entailed in reversing
unwanted brain changes (sexual conditioning, addiction).
Furthermore, everyone can benefit from knowledge of how the primitive appetite
mechanism of the brain, the reward circuitry, has priorities set by evolution:
furthering survival and genetic success. It votes ‘Yes!’ for more calories or more
‘fertilization’ opportunities regardless of the potential consequences.
People also need to know that reward-circuitry balance is indispensable for lifelong
emotional, physical and mental wellbeing because of its power to shape our
perceptions and choices without our conscious awareness. And to be informed of
methods that help humans steer for balance in the reward circuitry: exercise and
other beneficial stressors, time in nature, companionship, healthy relationships,
meditation and so on.
Once we begin to think clearly about neuroplasticity we are inevitably drawn to the
question of what we want from life – what we consider to be a good life. Each of
us must answer that for ourselves. But we are best able to do so when we
understand the threats that some substances and behaviours pose to our capacity to
live the lives we want. Self-determination requires that we understand ourselves as
best we can.
When we are dealing with young people we have an even greater responsibility to
understand the risks that explicit sexual material can pose. Adolescents cannot
decide for themselves what constitutes the good life and there are grounds for
thinking that disruption of their reward-circuits can take more of a toll than in
adults. So I would also like to see widespread education about the unique
vulnerabilities of the adolescent brain with respect to sexual conditioning and
addiction.
Instead, you sometimes hear that schools only need to teach kids how to
distinguish 'good porn' from 'bad porn'. For example, in 2013 the Daily Mail
proclaimed, ‘teachers should give lessons in pornography and tell pupils “it's not
all bad”, experts say’. The claim is that all one needs to know to enjoy both is the
difference between fantasy and reality.
Sadly, there is not one shred of scientific evidence to support the idea that pointing
kids to ‘good porn’ will prevent problems or prepare them for today's
hyperstimulating environment. Such thinking actually runs counter to dozens of
internet-addiction brain science studies, which suggest that the internet itself – that
is, the delivery on demand of endless enticing stimulation – is the chief peril. Porn
users can keep their dopamine at artificially high levels for hours simply by
clicking. Even if they confine their excursions to ‘good porn’, they still risk
conditioning their sexual response to screens, voyeurism, isolation and the ability
to click to more stimulation at will. Two porn users comment:
Videos and pornography don't do it for me. The fake look of porn and porn
actresses turns me off. I just use stills of athletic women. But I'm looking for
that right girl or image that gets me off, so I view hundreds per session. My
current girlfriend actually fits what I would masturbate to. While I'm very
attracted to her I'm noticing weak erections. I believe my brain rewired to
the ‘searching’ aspect as well as the variety and the comfort of not having to
please anyone but myself.
As a matter of science, an attempt to sort good porn from bad is futile. The brain's
reward circuitry, which drives sexual arousal, has no definition of 'porn'. It just
sends a ‘go get it!’ signal in response to whatever releases sufficient dopamine.
It should also be evident that teaching ‘realistic sex’ doesn't stop teens from
accessing extreme content when left (literally) to their own devices. Teen brains
evolved with a penchant for the weird and wonderful; they are powerfully drawn to
novelty and surprise. Such a naive policy would be like handing a teen an old issue
of Playboy and telling him that the only suitable content is on pages 5 through 18.
As a teen, which pages would you have turned to first?
Incidentally, the good-porn-bad-porn proposal may arise from less than noble
intent. It lays the groundwork for endless debate about values. It is an invitation for
the most vocal to lobby for the suitability of their preferred types of porn while
maintaining that critics are trying to impose their arbitrary moral standards. What
any group thinks is bad another will argue is vital.
Yet frankly, type of content and orientation of the viewer may be of little import
compared with today's delivery. Since the advent of streaming clips of porn videos,
escalating, morphing sexual tastes, a range of sexual dysfunctions and loss of
attraction to real partners appear to be affecting a percentage of all groups: gay,
straight and in between. It is the way that users can maintain a prolonged dopamine
high from endless novel content that seems to create the problem.
Debates about good and bad porn are beyond the realm of science and can never be
resolved. Meanwhile, they distract everyone from the mounting scientific
evidence, and still needed research, on internet porn's actual effects on users. Let's
steer the debate away from unscientific distractions and back to the effects on porn
users and the hard science that helps explain what they're experiencing. In the
process, we can all learn a lot about human sexuality.
In the end, such a focus will also serve porn users. Like smokers, they will be able
to make informed choices about pornography use with full knowledge of its risks
for plastic brains like ours.
Burnham, Terry and Phelan, Jay, Mean Genes: From Sex to Money to Food Taming Our Primal Instincts,
New York: Basic Books, 2000. Funny, informative book about how the reward circuitry of the brain
drives us to do things that are not always in our best interests.
Chamberlain, Mark, PhD and Geoff Steurer MS, LMFT, Love You, Hate the Porn: Healing a
Relationship Damaged by Virtual Infidelity, Salt Lake City: Shadow Mountain, 2011. Practical guide for
married couples where one partner was deeply upset by the other partner's porn use.
Church, Noah B.E., Wack: Addicted to Internet Porn, Portland: Bvrning Qvestions, LLC, 2014. Brilliant,
readable, personal account of a 24-year old who recovered from porn-related sexual dysfunction.
Doidge, Norman, MD, The Brain That Changes Itself, New York: Viking, 2007. Fascinating book about
brain plasticity, with a chapter on sex and porn.
Fisch, Harry, MD, The New Naked: The Ultimate Sex Education for Grown-Ups, Naperville:
Sourcebooks, Inc. 2014. Standard-issue self-help book for couples with porn-related problems.
Hall, Paula, Understanding and Treating Sex Addiction: A Comprehensive Guide For People Who
Struggle With Sex Addiction And Those Who Want To Help Them, East Sussex: Routledge, 2013.
Practical guide for therapists and porn-afflicted alike by UK therapist.
McDougal, Brian, Porned Out: Erectile Dysfunction, Depression, And 7 More (Selfish) Reasons To Quit
Porn, Kindle ebook, 2012. Brief, useful book by recovered porn user.
Maltz, Wendy, LCSW, DST and Larry Maltz, The Porn Trap: The Essential Guide to Overcoming
Problems Caused by Pornography, New York: Harper, 2010. Practical guide for therapists and porn-
afflicted alike by US therapists.
Robinson, Marnia, Cupid's Poisoned Arrow: From Habit to Harmony in Sexual Relationships, Berkeley:
North Atlantic Books, 2011. Discusses the effects of sex on the brain and relationships, with a chapter on
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et
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