Another sob story. But this one is mine.

Submitted by gabeb1920 on Sat, 07/01/2012 - 13:55

gabeb1920's picture

Hi.
My first time posting here so we'll see how it goes.
I suppose I'm just after a place to vent some pent up feelings. Maybe some feedback that I'm not alone in these issues and any advice on what I could do to achieve some 'normalcy' would be great.

Current situation:
25 year old male
Socially shy and awkward
Frequent user of pornography including bondage and torture pornography Frequent visitor of prostitutes
Lives alone
Little in the way of friends
Over weight and self conscious

Things I'd like to change:
I want to develop a 'real' relationship with a girl
I want to be less dependant on pornography and prostitutes for output of my sexual feelings
I want to be able to develop real affection for a girl. Maybe even love?

History/How I got here:
I was born and raised in a very religious household. Sex was taboo, only to be expressed in marriage and something very mysterious to me. I didn't really know where it fit into a normal human existence.
I began masturbating before puberty. I don't remember exactly when this started but I was probably around 8 or 9 years old. I would masturbate up to 4 times a night until I was too tired to continue. There was no orgasm as I think I was still too young. Because of continued masturbation I didn't experience 'wet dreams'. Instead, it was during one of my nightly masturbation sessions when I first experienced ejaculation.
I started looking at pornography on the internet at age 11 and it quickly developed into an addiction. Every moment I had alone in the house I was on the computer looking at pornography while masturbating.
I kept this a secret from my parents but of course I was eventually found out. My parents tried to talk to me about the reason pornography was 'wrong'. They consistently told me that God disapproved of what I was doing and that I should stop because God didn't like it.
I told them I had stopped, trying to lie to them in such a way that it seemed that I had gradually weaned my self off it, when it actual fact nothing had changed. I did try to stop but found the urges to be too strong. I just couldn't help myself.
I began to find myself drawn to bondage/S&M pornography. If fact, my father tells a story of me playing as a child pretending to have one of my female cousins tied up under my bed.
I also experimented with phone sex, pornography magazines and 'sex-ting'.
In an attempt to ease my guilt for the things I was doing and in the false belief that it may help me to stop the habit I threw myself headlong into my religious activities. At 16 I left school and decided to pursue a career of volunteering within the congregation. I progressed up through the hierarchy and gained a large amount of respect from the other members of the congregation. All the time I was continuing to view pornography and masturbate.
When I turned 18 I decided I wanted to take things even further sexually. I decided to visit a prostitute. I had some money saved as I was working part-time. I found a brothel which advertised in the local newspaper and nervously made my way to the front door. I went inside and had a woman perform oral sex on me. Such was my first real life sexual experience.
I progressed the very next week into full intercourse and lost my virginity to a prostitute when I was a young 18 year old.
While maintaining my persona of a highly respected member of the congregation I continued to see prostitutes on a regular basis. Average around once every 2 weeks but sometimes as often at twice a week. I also continued to masturbate to pornography.
This went on until I was 23, approximately 15 years of masturbation, 12 years of pornography, 5 years of prostitutes and $20 000 debt later. While driving home from work one day I came to the conclusion quite suddenly that this hidden lifestyle was not sustainable and that it wasn't making me truly happy. I wanted more out of life. I felt that pornography and visiting prostitutes was inhibiting me from developing a normal, healthy relationship with girls. I decided to approach the elders in the congregation and seek their help in breaking the addiction as I was quite obviously not capable of breaking it on my own.
The elder I initially approached informed me that this was a serious sin and that it would need to be handled in a judicial way. Eg. I would stand trial before 3 elders and they would decide a punishment for my wrongdoing.
After 3 weeks of this trial, meeting with the elders several times they decided that I was to be 'disfellowshipped' (the equivalent of excommunication). I was announced to the congregation in July of 2009, when I was 23, that I was no longer a member of the congregation.
It was a devastating blow to me. I was brought up in the congregation and taught that anyone who wasn't part of the congregation was basically evil. So all my friends were part of the congregation. In the time it took the elder to announce their decision these people went from being my friends to people who would not talk to me. My younger brother and sister disowned me. I have not spoken to my brother in the 2 years since the decision was announced.
Telling my parents was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. It was heart-rending.
Fortunately they were more open minded than my brother and sister and they continued to speak with me, albeit on a more constricted basis.
The next 2 and a half years have brought me here. I have made many changes.
I have studied a computer course and begun working full-time in IT.
I have gained acceptance into university and begin studying in February of this year.
I have drastically reduced the amount of time and money I spend on prostitutes to the stage now where I visit approximately once every 2 months. (a marked reduction for me)
And yet there are still some things I want to improve:
I have not had sex with a girl that I didn't pay
I have not had a girlfriend
I have not had a 'hook-up' or 'made out' with a girl which I haven't paid
I have trouble associating sex and love in my mind
I have trouble feeling let alone expressing affection (I feel desire no worries but rarely affection)
I still rely on pornography almost every day (I say 'rely on' because when I don't use pornography I feel stressed, anxious and distracted)
I still visit prostitutes when I want to feel close to a girl rather than seeking a healthy relationship with a girlfriend

So that it the sum of it. That is where I am. I have taken some steps towards a better, more fulfilling life but I still have many more to go. And if I'm honest, I don't know how I am going to get there. I don't know the way to achieve the goals I set out at the beginning:

I want to develop a 'real' relationship with a girl
I want to be less dependant on pornography and prostitutes for output of my sexual feelings
I want to be able to develop real affection for a girl. Maybe even love?

interesting, similar in some respects to my struggles, i share your pain.

it sounds as though you are/were a witness of jehovah? it's a shame that they practice this "shunning" thing, i can imagine it makes you feel very isolated and alone.

i too have a problem with escorts, or at least 1 escort in particular that i can't seem to break the habit of seeing on a semi-regular basis, every 2 months actually!! like yourself.

just to say, you are very much NOT alone in this battle, your story is shared by thousands and thousands of blokes your age in the UK (i'm slightly older, 30) but we're on the same page i reckon.

i think the main thing to remember is that porn destroys minds, and once your mind is gone what is there left? i wish you all the best to come out of the trap, god knows i'm trying myself.

cheers!

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Hi and thanks for the support.

Yeah I was one of Jehovah's Witnesses. It is a shame that I had to be shunned but looking back I really don't think I could have continued to be part of the congregation while still doing the things I was/am doing. In some ways leaving was the best thing I could have done because it has given me a chance to grow and explore my sexuality without the negative view of the congregation.
I'm obviously still not exactly happy with where I am but feel I am headed in the right direction.
Do you have any thoughts on things I might be able to do to help me develop relationships and/or to break the habit?
It's nice to know that I'm not alone. Good luck with pursuing your goals. Let me know how you go. I hope very much that we can both break the habit!

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hi gabeb, i can't offer advice really as i'm in the same boat as u! i'm struggling with this problem myself, i'm not out of the woods yet so to speak although i feel i'm making progress all the time.

i think the thing is to remain busy and active as much as possible, try to limit your time spent on laptop and stick to it, and also to try and remind yourself how disgusted and appalled you'll feel after looking at porn.

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how are things with you lately?

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My own sad story...

It's 5.30 am.

I can't sleep.

I thought I'd visit this forum, which I've known about for some time, to gain some strength.

I was keenly interested in your story gabeb. I don't have the energy to tell my story in explicit detail (I don't think, maybe I do) but I very much share your pain, and more I think!

I haven't created an account here yet, so hope my post will register OK.

I feel I just want to get this out there ...for the first time in my life! For my own sanity's sake.

My situation:
Male
42
Sexuality - confused
Virgin
Ignorant about sex until my first, and only sexual encounter ...being abused by my older brother.
I was 10, he was 12.
Even to this day I can still see his erect penis. He forced me to masturbate him and perform oral sex. I can relive the whole experience vividly. He prompted me to masturbate him faster and faster. It felt weird. I didn't understand it. I remember clearly him ejaculating. I thought he was in pain.
The experience was 'burned into my brain'.
I believe this experience created an 'arousal template' ...basically predisposing me to homosexual tendancies. I was very young and had a mind like a sponge. I had never had any 'girlfriends' by this age.
There were other incindents. I remember he took me to a secluded spot in some local woods. He induced me to do the same again ...including simulating anal sex (on each other).
Again burned into my brain.
I struggle to remember anything else ...I wonder if other things happened, and I've shut it out. Or maybe that was all. But the damage was done.
My parents had never taught me anything about sex.
I was also exposed to porn, found my dad's collection. My uncle had a collection, which I also discovered. And I found a discarded porn mag at a local dumping ground. Was with a friend and he claimed it for himself. I was filled with envy that I didn't have the strength to keep it for myself.
However I caught a glimpse of a guy's erect penis. There was a naked woman, but my interest was on the guy.
He was circumsized. And I was amazed. Couldn't understand what I was looking at! My brother and I were non-circumsized.
Any porn magazine I looked at I was drawn to the male gender.
All this happened about the same time.
I discovered sexuality.
But my sexuality's begining was self serving - deviant - abnormal - secret - dirty and shameful.
I was on course to a secret, internalized, self obsessed road to a very lonely and sad isolated life.
I had not masturbated to orgasm until after these events.
But when I discovered it, I became obsessed with the feelings.
Nowhere in my mind were there any female images, or heterosexual thoughts. I was draw into repeated self obsessed acting out behaviours which were completely solitary. These included compulsive masturbation - using mirrors (I would see my brother's reflection), masturbating in public, voyerism, exhibitionism. I would cruise around male toilets hoping for a glimpse of a guy's penis. And discretely look at guys in changing rooms. I would read the hand written scrawls in the cubicles and fantasize about making contact with the gay men that wrote the messages. I never did.
I would frequently visit wooded areas, scouring for discarded porn mags and used condoms.
I feel disgusted reliving this!
I would use these - which ultimately I would find - in acting out behaviours.
On other occasions I would strip off my clothes and hide in bushes masturbating. Feeling excited and scared if any dog walker should walk past.
I can't recall EVER feeling sexual attraction towards a female. A complete mystery to me.
I would perform sodomy on myself.
These behavious, and increasingly depraved variants - all solitary - all secret and shameful - would haunt me through 30 years of my life?
I thought this behaviour was normal, didn't question it.
I didn't understand child abuse had damaged me.
I compartmentalized my compulsive addictive behavious.
Sectioned them off into a completely seperate hidden part of my life. A shadow self.
But the other part of me appeared to be normal, well rounded. A typical guy. But missing something.
These behavious continued through my teens, twenties, thirties.
But in my 'normal' life I considered myself heterosexual, or maybe I should say the influences arround me made me believe this is what I was, or should be. Although as of today I don't know what I am ...asexual ...a closeted homosexual ...a lost heterosexual?
I struggled to find the feelings to be attracted to women. And fear the thought of being attracted to men. And throughout the years feeling compelled to appear normal, along with my peers, I would, occasionally, date women.
But ultimately these relationships came to nothing.
In my core I was abhorrent. It was all a lie.

This has been my life pattern ...and internet porn was waiting for me.

It was inevitable.

And for 10 years now, I've been a gay porn addict.

This has been my only sexual companion, in all my life. Except my brother. Who's now dead.
So I can't even ask him why?

I want so much to be free, and find what I desperately need to be human. To be loved. And to be healthy in my sexuality. To have a family.

I continued on in this pattern of behavious until ultimately I injured myself.
I was devestated.
I can't tell the details, but I've been obsessed with my own genitalia, obsessed with changing myself. That I'm defective.
So I fell into a form of self mutilation.

I was gutted when I realized I didn't function the same. Couldn't feel the same.

My world imploded.

Depression overtook me.

This happened about 3 years ago, age 39.

After all this have I now sabotaged my only hope of future happiness?
I became more obsessed with porn ...it was the only thing which would turn me on now.

My reflexogenic erection is shot. Only my psychogenic erection remains. And the feelings are only a fraction of what they used to me. Now with out Porn ...I have nothing!

I just want to die.

The twist in the sad tale of my life (and where my similarity to yourself lies, gabeb) is I am also a Jehovah's Witness. A poor excuse of one!

Ironically, at age about 12/13 My family became involved with the Witnesses (they are good people), and I was included in the activities. It became part of my life. And I learned the bible's teachings and moral codes. I became baptised and followed the path of a Witness.

Somehow I managed to live my double life. My depraved shadow self totally seperate from the chaste, squeaky clean character I presented to the congregation.

But it's killed me, inside ...ultimately.

The organization's strict high moral code (which I'm not neccessarily disagreeing with) has prevented me from finding out what my true sexuality really is. I've not been able to live a 'normal' sexual life. Instead I've be squeezed, compacted into a very sad and pitiful psychological trap. An unopened box in my head!

Trapped - between my solitary promiscuity and an inpenetrable spiritual wall, solidly standing in front of my sexual freedom!

I've felt I would go insane.

But am I blaming Jehovah ...no.
Am I blaming my bother ...no.

It's just a sad unfolding of events that's led me to this horrible, terrible nightmare of a place.

So where do I go from here ...is there a way out? Other than ending it all?

I want to end this sad tale with a glimmer of hope.

I've not had the courage to tell my complete story to anyone, especially the elders. I feel so ashamed. And over the past three years I've been drifting further away from the congregation. But out of desperation there is one place that I've found something that might just give me the strength that I need to overcome my sex addiction.

Because that is what I am ...a sex addict.

I didn't realize this until in one day in desperation, after acting out, I searched online for an answer.

I discovered SAA.

Sex Addicts Anonymous.

I made the call, couldn't believe I was doing this. And the call was answered.

I found the courage to go along to my nearest group. It was like I had come home.
For the first time in my life I was with people that understood my pain ...and were in a position to help me. Wanted to help me!

I could open my heart and not feel ashamed.

Maybe this was Jehovah's doing ...maybe he eventually answered my prayers. For I do believe the moral code in the bible is ultimately for our well being. I don't believe God is cruel.

We can all choose whether or not we live by his standards morality.

So how I'm going to move forward in my faith ...my sexuality ...who knows.

But for anyone here who can't find a way out of their sex addiction ...for that is what we are ...sex addicts ...maybe the SAA is the answer to your hope for recovery.

So as of today I'm 30 days sober from my compulsive sexual behaviours. An unbelievable achievement!

After about 3 months of attending SAA meetings - and struggling still - I opted to take a sponsor, someone whome I am accountable to. So far making good progress.

I can't lie though, depression is very much a problem. And the loneliness is often almost unbearable. But my hope is, if I continue to make progress in sobriety ...I can be healed, one day at a time.

...and ultimately be free to find the love I so desperately need to live happy and fulfilled for the remaining days of my life.

Thank's for reading.

Hoping you find happiness gabeb.

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