Pink Tuesdays

I was one among the many who thought Biblical rules were restrictive. The lack of them is liberty, freedom. Doing as you please, being a libertine - somehow, that’s freedom. Be a good Christian, I need to give up my liberty, my freedom. Oh, silly me. Today is the 7th day without masturbation, without sex, without pornography, or anything related. Considering the hard time withdrawing, I must say, I was wrong.

Quite simply my sexual urges, my lust - they were masters of me. When I “rebelled” against my “masters” - they try to cling on to me, maintain their power over me. You see, masturbating daily for 6 years wasn’t a habit - like brushing your teeth, waking up in the morning, fighting with your brothers - it was an addiction. Don’t brush your teeth for a few days, you would become uncomfortable. But you don’t have constant mental imagery of brushing your teeth, where at every waking moment, you have the urge to put your brush in your mouth.

It’s unhealthy. It’s not normal.

I thought I was the only one, until I read Irene’s blog. She sent me a email just this afternoon, and she’s going through the same problem as I have. If this isn’t addiction, what is this? When I quit drinking coffee (I was a coffee addict), I had the same feeling.

My mind, in the last 7 days have become mush (the every-waking-moment bit, remember?) trying to figure out how to get over it. And so often I catch myself trying to rationalize the “one last time” - “Pink, you never really had a one last time, you owe it to yourself”. As someone who have for the large part of my life been perpetually fat and not too proud about it - one last time doesn’t work. One last fattening meal before a diet doesn’t work. One last day of rest before your exercise regime starts doesn’t work. Especially when you have already started your diet/exercise regime.

Ask those people trying or already quit smoking - that one-last-time also broke it for them countless times. There is no one-last-time. The one last time should be before you make your decision. That last time you ate 3 scoops of ice cream with extra whip cream and nuts should be before you bought a diet and exercise book from MPH.

And quite almost as constantly is how my idle mind trying to plot my “fall” so to speak. Everyone has fall, so to speak. Just a break from the program. One night of passion. Blah blah blah. It seems so illogical - who plans to fall? - yet the lure is so strong. Look, I’m not purposely going out of my way to be tempted, to go as close as possible to temptation, right at the edge where I’m most at risk from falling in. If I do fall, which I hope and pray I won’t, I don’t want to be planning it weeks in advance. Pretending as if it was some spontaneous thing.

And if I do fall, the first thing I’ll do, right after calling Try, is blog about it.

After this week, I cannot go back to my old lifestyle, where the first thing after coming home from church is go to the latest gay porn site I’ve found. After seeing it is I that have been a slave all this time, I don’t want to be enslaved again. I don’t want to make the past week in vain. I don’t want that life, where I live from orgasm to orgasm. Before this week, it is hard to see how being ex-gay means liberty, now it is painfully clear. I am, currently, a slave.

Today, things are better than the first day. Today it wasn’t so hard to live the day without thinking of sex all the time. Perhaps this is the sign of things to come. Perhaps my addiction is about to be broken. Perhaps I’ve just about to be emancipated. Pray for me.