Hello community,

On a burner account for anyone curious as to why my account is such a clean slate.

Here’s the bibliography on my teenage long addiction with porn and masturbation.

Always been interested in sex, porn and masturbation. I must have been 11 or 12 when I first started masturbating and have been interested in everything around it since I was like 8 or 9. For a long time I was chronically addicted to both watching porn and masturbation, doing both daily, some days even more. I’ve always known porn had been awful for me however through all the research I conducted (though limited in scope) masturbating didn’t really have any end all be all consequences if done within moderation and didn’t affect day to day life. I had tried to stop both with no luck and couldn’t last more then a couple days and honestly that’s stretching it.

That being said I recently got in my first loving relationship with my current girlfriend in the middle of June 2023 and apart of getting in a relationship was me taking baby steps as to quitting porn and masturbation. My girlfriend didn’t really care at the start and understood that my recovery would be a journey. During this whole process we were actively having sex, masturbating one another and generally exploring our sexuality. Given those events I hadn’t really cared about quitting porn nor masturbation as my biggest concern (not being able to please her while watching porn and masturbating) wasn’t really an issue as I was both able to please her sexually while also taking care of my own “needs” while away from her.

In May of 2024 I had really started getting hard on myself about quitting and began devising a plan of action on how I would quit. While doing so I rationed that if I could quit porn that would be the ultimate win and the act of masturbating wasn’t much of a problem (even though I did to it frequently) in the grand scheme of things. I told myself and continue to tell myself that either way I am going to get pleasure weather it’s from my girlfriend or by my own hands so really what’s the issue with masturbating. Going into June I began putting that plan into action. I told myself I would wean off of it which had been my tactic times before where I said I would quit which ultimately led to multiple relapses. Around the middle of June I distinctly remember telling myself, fuck this I am just going to go cold Turkey and quit, no weaning, no maybe half naked, nothing I was just going to quit watching and viewing porn. I can now happily say I have been porn free since sometime in the middle of June (I don’t keep count as I find it to be a means of rewarding thy self and truthfully I don’t think getting off of porn should be a rewarded as by nature I shouldn’t have been doing it in the first place). I’ve had one almost relapse at the end of July where I viewed a onlyfans girl out of curiosity and that was an honest to god isolated event in which it depicted images of her in skimpy clothes.

Now that the whole lore is out of the bag it’s time for me to ask the ultimate question that’s been lingering throughout the entire story… what about masturbation?

Well I still hold that same philosophy about masturbating not being a dramatic issue as like I said I’ll get it from my girlfriend anyways (which I still do and reciprocate when we see each other). I will admit I do it quite often and do really enjoy it. I do so while reading erotica / real sex stories which has helped me tap into my curiosity without having to watch some naked women get blasted upside down in some unrealistic way.

My question for the r/NoFap community is; Is my philosophy wrong and created on the basis of coping with an addiction and are there more real consequences of masturbating by myself?

Thanks for reading, Reddit User