Sam's fight with Mr. Hyde (38 M)

Journal
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Still here! I got a big chunk of work done over the past couple of weeks and am preparing for the final defense of my PhD. It will sure be nice to be done with that.

Also, I had the interview today with the overseas Missions place that I almost chickened out on. It was a bit intense, and the guy I interviewed with did want to talk about some personal things, including my history with pornography and masturbation. I was honest about the masturbation, but I struggled a bit about what to say about pornography. I really don’t know what to call this “pseudo-p*rn” thing I get into. Generally, it wouldn’t be considered pornography, and I said pornography hasn’t been an issue for a long time. I don’t really know if that was an accurate answer, but it was kind of worded as a “yes or no” thing and I wasn’t sure what else to say. If I said I was struggling with pornography, that doesn’t really seem like it would have been accurate either.

So, I’m drafting a follow-up message to try to explain my “pseudo-pornography” struggle in a little more detail, trying not to sound completely bizarre. My worry is that the guy will want to do a follow-up phone call to discuss it, which seems like it would be a horrifying experience: “Hello, let’s discuss your experiences looking at women’s shoes and masturbating”… Although, it probably wouldn’t be like that.

But - this might be the way that God is delivering me once and for all from this habit, whether or not I get the job. I used to struggle with envy. Then I started confessing my envy to the people I envied and asking their forgiveness, and the struggle evaporated. Maybe this will be a similar experience. Anyway, sooner or later, I have got to stop letting fear and shame push me around. I’m almost 40 - I’m a grown man!

I realize that people outside of the faith might think that a job interview where you talk about masturbation is really weird. But this is a Christian ministry, and they want to know where I am spiritually and emotionally - I think partly so that they know whether or not I’m prepared for potentially challenging situations. Honestly, I don’t know if I am. But it’s their call, I guess.

Edit: I just sent the follow-up message. It almost kind of hurt a little when I pressed send - this stuff is hard to admit to. Probably the right thing to do though.

The thing is, I have a big presentation due tomorrow, and I’m way behind. Crazy day - trying to get this done and wrestling with my inner self at the same time.

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Tell them the truth, that you are overcoming this pornography issue. Trust your judgement and don’t go with your gut. Pray to Jesus for the answers and He will give you the answer that you need.

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Thought I would check in with an update. I sent off a clarification email to the guy I interviewed with. Kind of a painful thing to do…the whole interview was pretty intense really. For someone with a touch of social anxiety anyway. He emailed back with basically a “thanks for the clarification and honesty”, and something about being in touch again after I send my references. Maybe it was TMI on my part and “struggling with masturbation” was enough to answer the question. But I figure, it’s his job, so I’m not going to worry too much about it. If he didn’t want details, he shouldn’t have asked me about pornography and masturbation :joy:

Anyway, this level of vulnerability (outside of an anonymous forum) was something at the edge of what I thought myself capable of, and I feel somewhat happy about that. God has been answering my prayers, I think. Also, I think the cold showers and workouts might have been somewhat effective. I have gotten a little more used to doing things that hurt or are uncomfortable, and of not giving in to the urge to run away.

And then today, I presented my PhD thesis. I don’t actually defend until next Tuesday, but this is another big milestone. Not sure how that fits in here, but I thought I would share it. I was kind of nervous, but after the earlier part of this week it seemed like less of a challenge than it might otherwise have been. I didn’t have to tell anyone that I sometimes masturbate to women’s shoes.

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Well, I passed the defense today. Still a lot of editing to do, and I actually feel kind of dumb rather than smart, considering all the questions I couldn’t answer, but somehow I passed.

Thought I would share that here, since you all are starting to become family to me.

Lots of things to process…it has been a little bit of an intense experience, and I’m almost finished with something that took over 5 years to complete.

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Congratulations!! I can’t imagine how hard it must have been to work on your PhD thesis and then presenting it. This is definitely one of the hardest thing to achieve in life. I’m guessing it must have been pretty intimidating having to defend your thesis. You should be very proud of yourself. Go and celebrate this great milestone.

God bless you brother.

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Congratulations brother. Its not an easy feat that you have accomplished. It’s worth celebrating. But celebrate after you have finished your work lol. BTW if you are comfortable sharing, can you tell me what was your research area in phD?

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Congratulations! No you are just getting smarter than a crazy person. Just be strong in the Lord and praise the Lord for this than giving yourself the praise. Without God nothing is possible, but with God all things are possible.

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Congratulations, man! I’m glad you passed! Thanks for sharing the good news with us! :smiling_face:

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Thanks all! @PrDr my research focuses on burrowing animals.

Now is a time to be vigilant. I have read, and I think I have experienced, that after a stressful time the urges can be stronger. I have been feeling some temptation lately now that I am under less pressure.

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Well, I relapsed again last night. The post-stress urges can be pretty strong. Also, I joined the NNN challenge. I really like the idea of the challenges, but it seems like it makes it harder for me to not relapse when I join one. I suspect it is because it puts the idea of a relapse in my mind, and instead of looking back and seeing how far I’ve come I look ahead at how long I have to go. Also, there is the feeling that relapsing is almost expected - you “win” if you don’t relapse, so it must be the exception. Even labeling it a “challenge” might feed into this - it makes it seem hard.

Going forward, I want to stay in the mindset that a relapse is not the norm, and that avoiding PMO is not terribly difficult. After all, I can go for weeks at a time without being too tempted to masturbate.

Also, I want to try to regulate my dopamine-seeking. I think that feeds into it some. I seem to struggle with urges more during those times that I also get sloppy about giving into distractions - surfing the internet when I should be studying, checking out dating sites, etc. I have been spending a lot of time sitting and making thesis edits, and there is a temptation to look for entertainment. Meanwhile, even though I passed the defense, I’m still under some stress to get this done in time. Maybe I need to find some healthy ways to relieve this tension rather than look for escape and distraction.

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Answer these questions truthfully and honestly

Who made me do this?
What happened to me?
When will this ever end?
Where will I be in 50 plus years?
How can I break this habit?

Me and @user1234567890 have already answered these questions and I think that it has helped us both out. I think that it will help you too.

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OK, I’m back! Don’t worry, I didn’t get discouraged and quit. I had a whole lot of work to do revising my thesis, and the past couple of days and nights have been pretty grueling.

@Prayer_Warrior I have been pondering the questions. I will try to answer them over the next couple of days.

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Okay Brother just take your time and don’t rush your answers. God bless you Brother and don’t give up hope. Keep fighting and know that our Redeemer lives.

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OK, first question. I might answer these separately over a period of time.

Who made me do this?

That’s a tricky question. The seemingly obvious answer is me. The trouble is, relapsing is not something that I usually want to do. It’s something I spend a lot of time trying to avoid, and then one day it’s as though the urge overwhelms me. Usually, as a result of a thought process. I mentioned before that I sometimes convince myself that it probably isn’t a sin to masturbate per se. My rationale usually doesn’t convince me though, and I try to stay away from it. But thinking differently once in a while is enough to lead to a relapse - plus, having an urge to do something kind of tips the scales when it comes to trying to think logically about it. But, if it isn’t me who makes me do this, who is it? Satan? I should have power over Satan through Christ: “greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world” (1 John 4:4). For who made me do it, “me” is the easiest answer.

I may revisit this question in the future as thoughts occur to me.

Anyway, happy birthday to Robert Louis Stevenson, author of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I identify so much with Jekyll sometimes. I sometimes wonder if Stevenson had an addiction like this. Or maybe the feelings are common for anyone struggling with a habit they don’t want to have.

I don’t want to say too much more about it, because it occurred to me that there might be people in this forum from other parts of the world where Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde isn’t a part of their pop culture and don’t know the story. It would be a pretty interesting read if you didn’t know what was going on from the start.

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It’s definitely a tricky question to answer. I know that when I went through it, one question I had was, “Did the ‘devil make me do it’, or is it my own fault?” I mean, I know that the devil exists, and he tempts us, but at the same time, we have a choice, and like you said, we should have power over satan through Christ. I think of a quote from C.S. Lewis on that subject, where he said, "There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them.”

Cool! I didn’t realize it was his birthday today! Happy Birthday, Rob! :smile: :birthday: !

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Update on the overseas mission: they called me the other day to offer me the position. I have been struggling a bit with this again. I feel like I have worked through a lot of my self-doubts and feelings of inadequacy (or rather, learned to rest in Christ more despite my inadequacy), but now I’m feeling torn with my responsibilities here in the US. I don’t know if I should pack up and leave the country for a year or two with my family situation as it is. My mother and my grandmother are both alone (my grandmother is a widow, and my Mother is divorced through no fault of her own), and we tend to have close relationships. I’m the only one in the family with the freedom to spend significant amounts of time with either of them. My mother has some health problems, but she has told me not to make my decision based on her. Still, I don’t know if I can not do that. It would be painful for both of them.

And then there is my Church and community here. They both have a lot of work needing to be done, and now that I’m finishing graduate school I will hopefully be more free to help.

And I don’t honestly know if I’m called to go overseas right now. It sounds really fun and exciting, but it might just be my own selfishness. Maybe I shouldn’t leave the ministries I have been given here to go elsewhere. But then again, we were commanded to go and “make disciples of all nations”. Then again, again, there are so many people here in the states that don’t have a clear picture of the gospel. And we are also specifically commanded to take care of widows, and 1 Timothy 5 warns: “But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”

Anyway, I was going to meet with them tomorrow and give an answer, but with all of the thoughts I have going on I’m trying to see if I can postpone the decision for a couple of days.

Back to @Prayer_Warrior’s questions.

Second question: What happened to me?

I’m not exactly sure what is meant here. There seem to be a couple of interpretations. What happened to me when I relapsed? It’s been a while, and I’m starting to forget the details. I think it was probably one of those social media search things. Which made me feel the urge to masturbate later.

On a bigger scale, there is the question of what happened to me since before I started doing this at all. I remember the first time I saw something sexual on TV. I clicked away from the program thinking to myself that “I shouldn’t be watching this”. But the scene stuck in my mind. And eventually, I began to seek out more of it when I was alone with cable TV. And I started to feel the urge to touch my genitals while watching it, which eventually led to masturbation and outright PMO. But, I suppose all of that would have been an expected progression considering that I wasn’t particularly active in Church or in the faith during my teenage years.

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Maybe it would help if you talked to @Green_Lantern he is going overseas in December. He is going to a poor community that doesn’t even know Christ and don’t even have a church. I hope that you have a chance to talk to him. If you want send him a message through this app.

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It has been a rough couple of days. I relapsed twice in one night Thursday night/Friday morning, and again last night.

Third question: When will this ever end?

Good question. I wonder sometimes if it ever will. I have been fighting this for 25 years, and it doesn’t seem like much has changed except that I don’t willingly go after pornography now. I wonder how many people have actually quit masturbation, aside from getting married and making it somewhat of a moot point. Surely a lot of people have conquered this if it is a sin - people tend to grow in holiness as Christians. I rarely (almost never) hear about long-term singleness or things like masturbation talked about in the Church. The site gotquestions.org suggests that if someone is having trouble with masturbation, it might be an indication that they are not meant to be single. The trouble with that idea is (1) one does not simply walk into marriage, (2) “Because I couldn’t stop masturbating” doesn’t seem like a satisfying answer if my kids ask me some day why I married their mother, and (3) if I want to pursue marriage, I don’t have much of an option outside of the dating sites. And I seem to be getting into trouble with the dating sites. Browsing tons of photos of hot women, not all of whom are modestly dressed, does not help me combat urges.

I feel a bit pessimistic these days. The answer that keeps coming to my mind about when this will end tends to be either (a) when/if I get married, (b) when/if I get too old to have sexual urges, or (c) when/if God chooses to deliver me from this some other way. I know God’s timing is perfect and 25 years isn’t the same to Him as it is to me. I just wonder sometimes if this is ever going to end this side of eternity.

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Is that an LOTR reference? (I’m getting Boromir vibes from that line :smile:).

But on the serious side, you’ve got some valid points. That second one, I’ve never thought about that before, but yeah, I see what you mean. On the 3rd point, it’s definitely a scary world with online dating. But I also know of at least a couple of guys within the last year that tried online dating with apps like Upward that are more Christian-oriented in dating, and actually just got married. They’re definitely not perfect, and if you’re still concerned, I can’t really fault you on that either.

I certainly can relate to you, Brother, because I’ve got a healthy dose of optimistic pessimism myself (or as some people call it, Murphy’s Law). I know that you’ve had some ups and downs, and sometimes it seems like the number of downs outweigh the ups. But trust me, the ups do outweigh the downs. I’m proud of you, and I’m praying for you daily. Just to see you fighting this thing, rather than just giving in to your every desire like millions of men out there, makes me happy, and gives me inspiration to keep on fighting as well. It may sound like a cheap motivational quote, but I once read where someone said that the person who’s moving slowly is still moving faster than the person who’s sitting still. Even on your worst days, you’re still important. You’re important to us on here, and most of all, you’re important to your Father in Heaven! God Bless You, Brother! :smiling_face:

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It was, actually. Or, more specifically, it’s a reference to the LOTR meme, since I haven’t seen all the movies (though I have read the books).

Thanks for the words of encouragement.

Relapsed again last night. Not that it was an ideal situation, but at least I wasn’t looking at pseudo-pornography while I did it. It still doesn’t feel good, but there seems to be less shame involved.

I accidentally deleted the rewire app from my phone again, so I don’t know what my streak says (if it’s even visible anymore). I haven’t re-installed it yet, partly because I want to see if it will help to be less focused on the numbers.

Anyway, question 4: Where will I be in 50 years?

I will be 88 in 50 years. Hopefully I will be in good enough health to be living independently. Sometimes I daydream about opening a diner on the moon if we have advanced in space exploration that much in my lifetime. With the way things are going, I think that isn’t out of the question in the next 50 years, and I think running a diner could be manageable for an elderly person. “Doc’s Lunar Diner - great food, but no atmosphere”…I at least hope to have some exciting stories to tell by that time, and a long white beard. But I also hope to be a strong man of faith by then, to be much further along in sanctification, and to be effectively sharing the gospel with people. Or, alternatively, I hope to be in paradise with the Lord.

As far as the addiction goes, I’m not sure. I don’t know if men in their late 80s still have those kinds of urges. I hope I’m not struggling with this for the next 50 years, anyway. Maybe I’ll be married by then. Which I realize wouldn’t automatically fix everything, but I have an idea that I might at least have different issues to struggle with in that case.

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