Why are People Addicted to Porn? Why are We Addicted to Porn?

A few days ago, I ran into a friend. He is working as a sexologist in Los Angeles. We had a casual conversation and later during the night, he threw a party. We had really good time. In general terms, he revealed that several adult men who are mostly fit and healthy are his regular visitors. A vast majority of his patients suffer from ED- Erectile Dysfunction. This can be attributed to regular and daily porn consumption. Addiction to internet porn isn’t healthy.

This article throws an insight into why are people addicted to porn and ways of overcoming porn addiction. Before delving deep into why is porn so addictive, let’s first understand the stages of porn addiction.

Stages of Porn Addiction

Early Exposure

One of the major factors that impact the sexist attitude of men is the young age at which they are exposed to pornographic content. Many men are exposed to porn at a very young age of 15 -17 years.

Addiction

Very often, they keep visiting adult tube websites. They tend to explore various porn niches

Escalation

Their sexual cravings intensify and they resort to excessive masturbation.

Desensitization

In this stage, the addicts are no longer receptive to ethical porn. They are just receptive to violent and extreme porn, degrading porn fetishes, etc. They now want to try and experience violent and arousing stuff. They become uncontrollable and may resort to unhealthy and unethical practices such as rape and murder women.

Science behind Porn Addiction

Why is porn addictive?

Porn addiction is similar to drug addiction. Too much of porn consumption affects the frontal lobe of human brain. The frontal lobe is responsible for actions such as decision making and problem solving. Owing to compulsive and consistent porn consumption, pleasure chemicals such as dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, and epinephrine are secreted in large quantities. Subsequently, the brain rewires itself to accommodate surplus quantities of pleasure chemicals.

When you make love with your girl-friend or sex partner, pleasure chemicals such as oxytocin induce the feeling of love and bonding. When you masturbate and ejaculate to porn videos, you are technically bonding with your porn collection. More importantly extreme levels of dopamine create dependency. This is the biological reason porn is addictive.

Disadvantages of Porn Addiction

Make no mistake – porn addiction has several worst after-effects. Marital infidelity rates and very high incidence of divorce in Western countries can be attributed to porn addiction. Couples lose interest in natural sex. Relationships are gone for a BIG toss. People lose interest in loving their better half.

Here’s another major disadvantage – Addicts fail to perform to the best of their capacity in jobs. Therefore, it’s not uncommon to see sex addicts and porn addicts suffering major financial and job losses. What’s even more disturbing is the fact that they develop negative perceptions and aggression towards their opposite sex. Attitude is no longer good. It’s terribly toxic. The all-pervading loneliness and depression can be observed.

Porn addiction destroys marriages, families, relationships and careers. Overcoming porn addiction is easier said than done. There are several porn addiction help centers and Sexaholic Anonymous (SA) groups with fantastic resources and guides on why we are addicted to porn and how to overcome addiction.

Read on to gain an insight into overcoming porn addiction.

Overcoming Porn Addiction

The first step is to convince yourself and your mind that porn addiction is dangerous and is often associated with many ills. Talk to your best friend who empathizes with your problem. When you are in a committed relationship, share your concern with your partner.

It’s not possible to permanently distance yourself from TV, laptops and smartphones. However, you can take your laptop and smartphone out of your room. Just socialize with your friends and family. If you are staying alone, go to the nearest public library or a movie theatre. Never stay alone.

And yes, install porn blockers such as K9 web protection and Net Nanny. Truth be told, porn blockers do not block 100% adult content. However, a vast majority of go-to porn sites are blocked. It’s important to have extraordinary will power.

The next step is to delete any existing adult content from your hard disks, pen drives and cloud storage. To reverse the damage done by porn, focus on two routines – meditation and exercise. Cold showers are immensely helpful and so are long walks.

Remember, it’s all about coming clean one day at a time. There may be a few setbacks. But don’t give up. You may share your progress with members on forums such as Reddit and NoFap. If you have any questions or suggestions, you may post the same on discussion forums. As an alternative, you can download apps such as Brainbuddy to track and measure your progress.

There are quite a few rehabilitation centers. If nothing works in your favor, you should definitely consider the option of joining a rehabilitation center.

Found this write-up on How does porn become so addictive informative? Do share your thoughts in the comments. If you have any queries or doubts, shoot them in the comments. I shall reply in a day or two. Cheers!