I just  found the chart below online the other day and I thought I would share it. 

But first, a note about me and my addiction:

 I got my first "hit" of pornography when I was just a kid...like 5 years old, and no one told me, heck, I don't think anyone outside the psychiatric community knew that it could be addictive.  As a teenager, I had bishops tell me that I just needed to be stronger, and that I wasn't serious about repentance.  

I remember being at a fireside on BYU campus and the speaker was talking about eating disorders and pornography addiction. We were in a large auditorium that seats about 700.  The speaker had 1/3 of us  stand up. She said, "You who are standing up, you represent the 1/3 of BYUsudents who suffer from an eating disorder or pornography addiction."  

At the time I was fairly under control --not acting out or actively seeking pornography--but I remember thinking then, "Wow, I have a real problem," because I think I'd always known, or at least a part of me had always known, that I was addicted.  I knew what compulsive behavior was and I knew my desires to seek out pornography were not "normal," that the "need" was much different than my need for food or sleep.

But I didn't know how it worked on a chemical level.  

And now I do.  And it has helped.  I am sober and have been for a while, but every few months I go through a mini version of the acting out cycle wherein I begin to seek out pseudo pornographic images on the web--celebrity photos, swim suit models, etc.... and then I turn off the computer and walk away.  

This always brings out two emotions.  First, a sense of failure that I even went looking, and second, a sense of relief that I was able to pull back from the edge before I'd indulged in anything "really bad."  

Of course, both these emotions are false.  On the first count, I have an addiction, so feeling temptation will always be a part of my life.  To feel like a failure because I felt tempted isn't very helpful. And on the second count,  to feel a sense of relief because I "pulled back," is to fool myself into thinking that for someone with an addiction,  the line between pornography and not-pornography is blurry, when in reality, if I want to be healed, the line must be black and white.  

I imagine its the same as an alcoholic who can't walk past the liquor store or who can't go out to eat at a a bar.  At some point, If I want to be completely healed, I have to be willing to extricate myself from the situation.

Of course, I can't just stop using a computer. But I can keep my office door open.

But I was talking about addiction knowledge and how that has helped. 

This is one way.  When I am tempted to act out, when I venture into the blurry boundary that surrounds obvious pornography, I can feel that chemical high and now I know what it is. When it goes away and I feel empty and I want to replace it with more porn, I know why.  And depending on how far I venture down that path, it can take a day or two or longer for that chemical "need" to wear off.  And I see how this effects the way I view women on the street, the way I interact with my children, the way I treat my wife. 

Knowing I have an addiction has given a face and name to the compulsion and I can longer pretend that its "me," or that its just "who I am," or that I am powerless. Instead I can recognize whats going on and I can focus on clearing my system. 

I can stop blaming my wife for not meeting my "needs" and start repenting for creating artificially inflated "needs" through my pornography addiction.

I can take action to combat the chemical "need" through prayer, through exercise, through breathing exercises, through writing, through service, through talking with a trusted friend.  When I do these things (especially when I'm feeling vulnerable and weak and compulsive), I feel myself becoming stronger, I feel myself gaining more control, and I feel myself healing, or rather, I feel the Lord healing me.  

I think the process of healing from pornography starts with knowing about addiction.  Without that, a person struggling with pornography will think its merely a matter of will power, which is a battle against the self...And pornography addiction isn't about battling the self, its about discovering the self buried beneath the addiction. Every bit of self-discovery, every bit of knowledge that I am a child of God, that I am in control of my future, that I am okay, that I am good, every bit of that is a bit of healing.

And that is a wonderful thing.

I hope that you are healing today in some way.

-AC

The dangerous power of a single image

So I'm sitting at work trying to work, and in a moment of weakness I went hunting for some pornography online.  I did this in a typical, shy and round about way, telling myself that I didn't really want to look at pornography, but was just curious about what was out there.  And in that process viewed one image that wasn't even by itself pornographic, but rather suggestive (a video clip, actually, that would have turned pornographic if I hadn't turned it off).  And now I've spent the whole day wrestling with that one image--some animal part of me wanting to seek it out again, the rest of me resisting it, recognizing that following through with the desire would leave me empty, and feeling guilty.

And yet, I find myself distracted, unable to focus at times because of that one image.

Ridiculous.  Not exceptionally new though.  There are images from 25 years ago that are still ablaze in my mind, and if  I entertain them, I can render myself pretty useless pretty quick.

This is what they mean when they say, once an addict, always an addict.

So what is to be done? Well....a few deep breaths.  A thinking through the action as I am doing now, a recognition of the lie behind the emotion (no, my body does not need that image, no that image will NOT fulfill me), a prayer...and distance.

Ultimately the most significant part of getting rid of the distraction (and ulitmately, the addiction) is to give it time. It's like a weed that has taken root. It doesn't require much water to survive, and the only hope of killing it is to starve it to death.  Without a chance to detox, the addiction will flourish like a mold, and I'll be stuck in a cycle of acting out, or almost acting out, of skirting around the edges of genuinely bad behavior.  Stupid, wasteful, and all part of Satan's plan to keep from being who I need to be.

So, you seductive image that I allowed into my mind, I can't do anything to get rid of you, but I can ignore you, starve you, and smother you.

And that is what  I will do.

-AC