Hey folks, I recently opened a thread about Pornography and Sexual confusion. Had some really awesome conversation from that thread and saw many people have issues with porn and other things. I have a problem with porn, I can and do binge on it. I have spent countless hours edging, viewing porn, hook up ads and erotica online. I have recently been trying to stop all porn, erotica, internet sexual release. I find that when I have not used porn or... Released in several days I feel free from anxiety. I have also been questioning my sexuality and basically when I'm not engaged in arousal i feel more comfortable, I feel normal and at ease. My record for abstinence sucks, I recently fell on my 6th day and now back on day 1. The porn that I seek always features and older man. I basically like watching old men involved with sex with women and bi situations. I am not really into invasive gay stuff at all (did not mean that offensive, I just do not like m2m "proding".). I suppose I started questioning my sexuality because of the older man infatuation. Wondering why I was so into it. Basically I am now fearing that maybe I am just avoiding arousal and "pleasure" because it spikes my anxiety about my sexuality. I in no way want to pursue a gay lifestyle, I have never had feelings for a man romantically and don't really want to be sexual with men either. I just enjoy watching an older man and young woman together, I find them both pleasant to look at and watch. And the only time I really think about being sexual with a woman is when I'm viewing porn and fapping. I have a girlfriend whome I love and she is aware of what I am going through. She is awesome and very supportive. When we first got together, we had no problems with sex. However, now I feel best when not in a sexual situation. For months I have been pinging so hard about my sexuality. It seems I am most comfortable when I have abstained from porn, masturbation, and feel no pressure to perform sexually. However, each time I fall I face terrible anxiety and fear. I don't know what my deal is, I've been using porn for so long. Like before puberty even. It's almost like I don't want fo participate in sex, just watch others and pleasure myself. I'm 23 yo and afraid for my sexual health, sexual future and relationship.
You want to stop, but you can't. It's causing you all kinds of stress in your life. It's now impacting your relationship with your girlfriend... You didn't manage to stop drinking on your own - you got help. What makes you think you're going to be able to stop this on your own? I've suggested previously that you should probably set an objective of abstaining totaly for at least 90 days. No sex with yourself or with your girlfriend. No viewing any kind of sexual material. How to do that? Well, it might be worth finding a support group - a 12 step group for sex addicts. That and / or therapy. Once you've got the compulsiveness under control, you might start to get some clarity around what is really driving this. Did you suffer any kind of trauma as a kid? Any kind of sexual abuse at the hand of an older man? Is there anything like that you need to work through? I have to think that you are drawn to older men for sexual stimulation for a reason. One of those reasons might be that you're gay. But it could be any number of reasons. But I'll say that I never considered myself gay or being attracted to men in real life all the while I was simply using gay pornography. But I am gay - I just wasn't ready to admit or accept it. And of course, all the time I'm not willing to accept something, I'm going to continue acting out. From an addiction perspective, that's pretty clear. None of us know why you're into looking at older men in porn. But for your sake I hope you make the effort to figure it out for yourself.
Jim had a great post that pretty much sums up what I wanted to say. We can't tell you anything in these situations, we can only help with encouragement and direction. It's up to you to really figure out these things about yourself. My best advice is to keep open minded. Don't worry about the older men thing, it's a common thing amongst gay men just like with women. While there could be a psychological reason or factors to it, that could simply just be one of the things you prefer. Preferring blondes or blue eyes doesn't mean that there's necessarily a deep psychological reason for it. Neither does preferring a certain age group.
There's nothing wrong with porn itself (when it doesn't interfere with your life, such as watching it excessively or avoiding real relationships), however people with lowish testosterone levels may benefit from short periods of abstaining from sexual release. Abstaining from ejaculation for 6-7 days raises testosterone levels above baseline by as much as 47%.. Low testosterone is associated with symptoms of cognitive and physical fatigue, anxiousness, low-confidence, etc. However, don't take this study the wrong way, ejaculating does not cause low-testosterone, it's just that in people who tend to have slightly lower levels than normal, cycled periods of abstinence (including from masturbation) can raise their testosterone levels back up to normal temporarily. A person with healthy levels of testosterone probably won't benefit a huge deal from abstinence, though their testosterone levels will raise above normal, that will probably just make them slightly more aggressive and amp their sex drive up.
