u/Icy_Lie_3749

We as men are special. Yes - you read that right on the first go - special.

If this goes against the "equality" principle - so be it.

Women do not have the ability to retain sexual energy and are compulsed to retard their essence via either pregnancy or menstruation and I am done pretending that this act of intense material and logistical commitment of resources from the human body is sans of any consequences.

Men do.

When you're young - "retaining" is... Absolutely a brutal slufgest fighting against your own basal impulses.

If you're candid enough - there are no "basal impulses". It's just you. Wanting to get physical with more women.

That's the point.

The more difficult the urge to get across - the more the rewards of retention.

An 80 year old man can retain for 700 days but it would have zero benefits. An 18 year old man can retain 700 days and it would turn his life upside down.

Please - for fuck's sake - do not get intimidated by the level of conquest you're going to attempt.

Your endeavor is the habit of gods - and I won't be lying about it.

This sexual energy you cultivate (if not wasted in frequent Wet Dreams) - builds up in multiples of 6 months, exponentially. Yes the 6 months is an arbitrary period - but you get the point. You can't "nofap 30 days" to build an empire. Things take time. A lot of time.

They cannot take this essence away from you. They cannot tax it. They cannot mandate a forcible contribution by you. That is why they invented high speed internet pornography (and now - VR porn combined with AI porn).

Belittle this energy all you want. Call it "baby batter" - call masturbation "healthy" or whatever fuck suits to ameliorate your bruised ego. There's no denying that this is the highest concentrate of life force.

Thus - retain.

In fact - what you call as "retention" assumes that draining it every week is a "normal" thing to do. It ain't.

Thus - I'd say - and I stand corrected - be in harmoney with yourself and do not unnecessarily drain yourself.

The reason I am writing this post is I've gone beyond the point where regret shapes my future. Yes - no shit I cannot go into the wayback machine and change my past. But - I can, and I will - hammer in this point into your goddamn basal ganglia - that retention is absolutely worth it. Especially young people.

Why young people only ? Because they've been born in a degenerate world - without cues that tell them what behavior is healthy and what is not.

We old people already know what it is to see our potential lost in fruitless pleasures. Myself included.

TLDR - demonize gooning if you must - but please, for heaven's sake - do not do this vice. Especiall not this vice.

That' the natural progression to all addictive behavior. When you reach to the fourth stage - when life's become a nightmare and you NEED PMO to not feel terrible - is the point you KNOW you need to change ASAP.

Remember this feeling of rock bottom. Don't forget it easily. Unpleasurable experiences can be useful.

You deserve better than feeling terrible and full of self conscious guilt all the time. I hope we all succeed.

So there's this scene I quite resonate with - pertains to Tobey Maguire's character in his characteristic black symbiote suite literally having to tear the symbiote from his body atop a massive church bell since the symbiote is prone to sound waves.

After spending a decade and a half to this absolute stupidity of an addiction I feel the same way. Lust has become so ingraned in me that it has started to become a significant part of me.

This symbiote first feels like a godsend, but later reveals itself to be rather a parasite.

Been addicted 18 long years (multiple times a day) and its taken so much from me I'd write a book about it.

Compulsiveness dialed to 11.

I want to desperately not die an unhealed addict. But how long does it take ? Years ? If yes - how many ?

Any help would be much appreciated.

Lets say you're the subset who was introduced (unfortunately) to PMO at an early age. This continued on for a decade and a half. Now you want to get better and adopt SR after multiple failures.

Is it possible to substantially heal after adopting complete abstinence and cleaning up the diet to include only whole and natural foods ? How long does it take ?

Your personal experiences would be very much appreciated.

Thanks

This is a vent. Can't bottle it in. Relating to past vices.

2 years of Covid and 4 years of a dead end job were enough to cultivate a masculine charge full of virility and vitality. But I gave onto the urges and relapsed multiple times. Covid was a nightmare, exacerbated with PMO caused issues.

But these 4 years - they were predictable. Doable. And I had lost there too. As I complete 4 years in 2026 - only 2.5 of them would be on retention of multiple month streaks stringed together.

Had it been 3 it would still have been fine. 3.5 - even better.

Fuck.

Life situation is so bad I feel like a wastrel. Its... not cool. Heck - even a gaming addiction was better than this PMO addiction.

I wish I was never introduced or stumbled upon this shit. Worthless piece of shit this is. Pleasure on the outside - rot on the inside. Total evil.

I had already told in one of my earlier posts that its a highly competitive dog eat dog world where people are trying constantly to get one ahead of you. If I recall the sheer amount of insults and humiliations I had to suffer just because I was too engrossed in PMO - that would be a reason in itself to quit.

Let alone sex being the sacred act of bringing another soul into this world - it was marketted as a must do recreational activity without any consequences.

Have your fill - ad infinitum and ad libitum; was the motto. An utterly absurd proposition, if you think in retrospect.

Releasing is fun, releasing is normal and anyone who doesn't do it is either gay or has issues.

All this bullshit being peddled to "relieve stress" was another factor.

High Speed Internet just complicated things further. While smoking, drinking - have been there for thousands of years; high speed internet porn has been there only for 20 years. Whilst smoking and drinking do not capitalize on any fundamental urge - porn feeds on the urge to procreate (which is perhaps the most driving factor for a male).

All this has given us is awkward high school years, failing college grades and underperforming dead end careers with poor sleep patterns along with no prospects.

We are the generation raised on porn.

I have a desk job with highly limited scope for intense physical activity. To the extent my joints are starting to get affected. But when I am on a decent period of abstinence - say more than 3 months; my knees stop hurting completely. Like zero pain even though my weight is obese class.

But right after 3-4 days of daily relapsing - Lo behold the devil strips my knees of all cartilage and I have severe knee pain.

This could be dismissed as a co incidence - but it's not since it has happened the third time in 2 years.

There's no supplement in my opinion to replace the life you lose whilst ejaculating.

You may have all the Zinc, Selenium, Pygeum, Magnesium, Vit D, Vit E and K along with Chromium and Molybdenum - double your stack or triple it; follow X/Y/Z relapse protocol; you cannot escape the consequences of release. Especially when your body clearly gives signs to stop. Take an analogy.

The supplements are akin to paints and the vital life force is akin to the painter's mind. Unless the intangible energy used to re arrange these raw minerals into this complex fluid is present - there's no semen produced.

Some people do not have knee pain but report gastrointestinal problems like a rumbly stomach, irregular bowel movements, etc.

Brain fog and anxiety are just the tip of the ice berg. When the damage is advanced - the body suffers too.

Have started exercising and sleeping a bare minimum of 7 quality hours a day as a result and have changed my diet to real foods. Hope this gets better. And obviously - have left all and any sort of conscious ejaculation as well.

This isn't placebo - its reality and now I am burdened with the truth since now I have a prerogative to obey this rule.

What I've realized is that 99% of the time - the only reason for my relapse (which occurs after months of semi decent and hard mode streaks) is that I have no reason to continue.

It feels that all is lost, there's no point in retaining; might as well as relapse another time.

If this percentage was smaller; skipping this step would still make sense. But now it doesn't.

Would practice compassion towards myself (this comes after a lifetime of being extremely harsh and unforgiving inner voice). Lets see where this takes me. Being hard on myself definitely didn't take me anywhere.

For me, forgiving myself would be tougher than having a long abstinence period. In fact - it feels neigh impossible. Would report on how this goes.

Most people here report benefits (tangible ones) - in a couple of weeks. There's still 20 weeks left. Other men will find reasons to relapse - especially near the start of the new year whereas you would be beginning with a decent 20 week abstinence period.

I did not mean to sound unnecessarily competitive - but this has become a cut throat dog eat dog world in 2026.

This is a very good opportunity to practice radical forgiveness; forgiving all your past relapses and completely accepting them - and ultimately moving on and making SR a lifestyle.

20 weeks isn't 6 months - and its definitely not a whole year. But its a solid concrete period to practice abstinence long term. Hope this helped.

I've been hooked since I was not even 10. And now I am approaching 30's. I seem to have exacerbated health issues which I surely believe was caused by losing excessive life force - like the numbers which make you vomit. Waiting for the diagnoses and I pretty sure some fucked up condition awaits me in my late twenties.

Lads - start young and stay on the narrow path. You will figure out other ways of having gun and feeling relaxed -- but don't fall for the PMO shithole.

Long story short - my largest streaks were 24 months and 9 months long respectively. Both the streaks were broken by not setting boundaries and cutting triggers - and being complacent that I had moved beyond SR.

Nope - then reality hit hard. Bad luck, misfortunes - although touch wood they weren't that big - or I think so.

There's never such thing as "moving beyond SR" - you have to build a system to stay on it for long periods of time to get benefits - possibly ending in release only when you find "the partner".

Complacency cost me both of my streaks in which benefits were actually racking up.

Had watched this popular horror summer flick before; and now that my 6 month period of abstinence from this fake filth is complete - I cannot help but feel like Nikki from Obsession.

It's like when I was on PMO / K O R N - some other personality had taken over my body. And now that I've stopped watching it; I see the damage it has caused. Forget about the dopaminergic consequences - I don't even feel myself anymore.

I am just like - WTF ? (As this "streak" spiralled me back into my pre frontal cortex which I suppose had been offline for all these years because of this dumb shit).

I feel like I was under the sway of this habit for so many years and now that I've abruptly quit it - I am back online. But I do not resonate with my friends, career or hobbies anymore. It's like a totally different spirit had taken over me when I was watching porn.

I've taken in from this sub what I could, and after long time lurking it's time to leave. My only advice is - don't feel down when you do not feel the benefits not kicking in. Its your brain recalibrating from years of PMO abuse and it will take time. The second you relapse you put yourself back in the hell you climbed out of.

More so over - the benefits appear only after a relapse when you are able to compare the after / before situation.

Stay tight. Unless supplements are verified to contain what they contain - and are super cheap - stay off them. The seed is enough.

And yes - SR is nothing without deep restorative sleep. Gotta give yourself the shuteye. Hope this helps.

The reason my mind craves caffeine is simply because I've grown to like stress. Get a kick out of it. Can't be alert without it.

Rather play a stressful FPS than relax and just be. How does this connect to PMO ? Before PMO I thought this was normal. It is not. Was stuck in the cycle of PMO making me stressed bout everything - and this carried on for so long it became my actual state.

TLDR = I have forgotten the skill of just letting go and relaxing without PMO.

M 28 5ft 11 - 100 kgs weight. Have fasted earlier with mixed results, always rebounded. One of the remarks from my co workers made me reflect how I've become so docile because of the weight gain.

Today I begin OMAD, eating in the noon. Let's see how far this goes. Will add comments to this post instead of creating new ones. Any tips for afternoon OMAD'ers would be appreciated.

Right now - I am exploding with energy. Not the physical kind of energy which can be expended in a workout but rather a mental edgyness - like a mania. How do I ground myself ?

The usual sperm cycle is about 70 days. You'd need about 5-10 cycles of pure retention to notice the magic. Thus - the bare minimum of difference at this rate would start at 6 months. Grow TF up and abstain longer instead of whining.

Got back morning wood after 5 months of cold quitting. Good sign. Was a PMO addict since 10 yrs of age. This is worth it.