strawberrymasquerade

[strawberrymasquerade]

1/9/19 Prayer

God,

Life has been really tough recently, but not because it’s inherently tough. It’s because I’ve been making it tough on myself. I haven’t been eating right which causes me not to sleep very well, I haven’t been working out which causes me to be lazy, and I haven’t been sticking to my goals very well, which causes me not to improve. I believe that people should always be improving at all times, and I ask that you could lend me your strength so that I may get back on the path of improvement.

I want to be a good role model for those around me I don’t want to feel like I’m lying to anyone when I say I’ve improved. Especially regarding my sexual sin and my lust. I just met a guy, and he seems really great. He’s kind of a unicorn and we share all kinds of hobbies. It’s rare to find a guy that will hunt but also watches anime. I get this strange dejavu around him too. It’s hard to explain but I feel like it’s coming from you for whatever reason. Obviously, me being a romantic, I want to jump to stupid conclusions like “is he the one?”. I just pray that even if he’s not, that this time could be special and that I could learn something from him.

At the very least he has made it so that I have something to think about while I work towards improving myself. I have come to realize in the past year that all this sexual sin will ruin my future relationships unless I can really get my act together and correct it. It’s hard to think about doing it for myself or for you, but when I realize some of the reasons behind the rules you’ve set in place, it helps me move past that and work on it regardless.

God, I just pray that I could be the best I can. That you might lend me your strength and give me a new heart. I ask that you could give me more insight on how to be a good leader and make something spectacular out of the young adults group at my church. You’ve put me in a position where I could really change lives and I ask that you would help me take advantage of that.

Help me to stay clean and organized. I’m typing this while staring across my kitchen table which is flooded with junk. I want to be able to live in a clean environment.

Please help all the people around me. My mom and dad, my two sisters, my friends... I pray that even though I may have made some wrong choices in the friends that I have made, that their lives might still be able to be changed by me.

Most importantly... Thank you God. Thank you for being there for me. Thank you for all of your forgiveness and kindness. Despite how totally messed up I am, you still want me, and that’s something that’s hard for me to grasp. Thank you for this amazing life that I was blessed with. Please help me not to take advantage of it and to still act as though I was raised in poverty. Thank you for amazing parents, and extremely caring sisters. Sometimes I don’t understand completely why you let me mess up, but I thank you so much for giving me the free will to do so. Thank you. I’m sorry I forget about you so much. I need you, I cry out for you. Please help me God, and I ask dearly for your forgiveness.

[strawberrymasquerade]

2019 New Years Resolution

It may sound stupid, but in the last year I learned that progress truly isn’t linear. We fail nonstop, sometimes we have to get a little worse in order to get a lot better. We have to fail to learn the next lesson that we need to improve further. For the longest time I thought I totally failed last years new year’s resolution. However, if I analyze who I was last year vs who I was today. I’m a completely different person. I’m going to continue last years resolution, but I learned there is something more I could do to improve my life.

My new year’s resolution is to make 3 small goals a night for the next day. These goals must answer the question: “What are 3 things I could do to make my life better that would take only a few minutes”. Often times this might be ‘vacuum the carpet’ or some simple chore.

I think simply getting in the habit of writing down things I’d like to get done to make my life better will hold me accountable in some way. It’s a good habit to form .

[strawberrymasquerade]

Prayer for Young Adults Group

God,

I can’t thank you enough for the position you put me in. It seems like everything I wish for I get, even the horrible things. I once wished that I could have sex with someone really hot before I got serious about dating again, you knew that was bad for me, but gave me the choice to make that mistake anyway. It was a horrible decision and I need your help recovering from it. The point is, I can tell you’re answering my prayers and I really need to be careful what I wish for. About a year ago I had hoped that I could lead the group at my last church, but that didn’t work out. I went from being totally new at this church, do being one of the top leaders. People are putting a lot of trust in me and I pray that I can honor that. There are so many people that are currently looking up to me and I don’t want to let them down, I don’t want to tell them the wrong thing. I want to create a good environment that will love and honor you, even if not everyone there is a christian. God, please help me teach on the right things this Sunday. Help me speak to all these people and have them hear exactly what you want them to hear. Please help me not to be selfish, and help me not to become cocky just because I’m finally in a leadership position. You know that I’ve already abused that power some, and I instantly regretted it. I’m hoping it doesn’t all come crashing down on me because I messed up. I pray that you could make sure that doesn’t happen. Please help me “clean my room” before giving anyone else shit for it.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Dating Tips

Review this next time you're thinking of dating someone.

First. Have you known them for longer than a few months? If not, just don’t date them and stop reading.

Are you mentally attracted to them?

Does this person have a good personality? Are they nice? You want someone that feels comforting to you. They should be trustworthy and kind and bring out the good in you. It can be pretty easy to get caught up (especially with me) just by how 'hot' they are. You might get blinded by that fact and not realize that they are using you or being mean to your friends. This is a bit hard to know right off the bat, but if you're not sure you can always ask your friends what they think about them. Ask a friend you truly trust. This thing amazingly isn't viewed as bad, this is the most respectful thing to judge in a person, so don't worry about it.

Are you physically attracted to them?

I know you might feel really shallow not wanting to date them just because they aren’t attractive to you, but you're not. You're only shallow if you treat them poorly because you think they’re unattractive. At the end of the day being attracted to them will mean a lot in the relationship. It will make you want to do things to them that you wouldn't otherwise. You will want to give them a back rub just cause they are attractive and you want to feel them, but that might not happen if you don't find them attractive. They may want lots of kisses, but what if they have bad breath? Don't feel shallow for these things. They're important.

Do they accept you?

This may sound stupid and cheesy, but do they accept who you really are? I mean honestly. If you feel like you have to act like someone else around them, then it's not going to be a good relationship. They should be fully aware that you're a nerd, they should be fully aware that you like to work on projects. You need time to yourself in a relationship too, and they should understand this.

Can you tell them anything?

This is honestly something that will come after dating, but can you see it happening? The person you marry will be the person you trust with your entire life good and bad. If you're not even sure how to answer this question yet, then maybe you should get to know them a little better first before dating.

Are they a bit of a nerd?

Lets be honest, you want to date another nerd. They don’t have to be an engineer or anything like that, but they should still enjoy doing projects. Things like enjoying anime and playing video games are things that will make this relationship a bit better. You love those things, and you want to share those things with someone else. At the very least, if they’re nerdy about something else, are they willing to try these new things with you? Cosplay?

Are they Christian?

Yeah, you may hate yourself for not wanting to date someone because they're not Christian, but that's perfectly fine. What might not be fine is breaking up later with them because of that reason. It will hurt them and you knew all along you didn't want the person you marry to not be Christian.

Do they love you?

Obviously this isn't a thing you'll know right away. And they may even claim to love you for the entirety of your relationship and your marriage. But the problem is, if it doesn't /feel/ like they love you then it probably won't work out.

Are they high maintenance?

You're not an asshole for not wanting a high maintenance person. When someone is high maintenance then so are you (because you get drained by it) and if both of you have to work super hard to keep each other happy and healthy then you'll wear each other out. Find a person where it's always relaxing to be around them.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Necessities in a relationship

Shares common religious beliefs.

Believes that marriage is permanent.

Is intelligent.

Shares some of my hobbies.

Someone I’m attracted to.

Someone who is independent.

Can they take care of themselves?

Relatively emotionally stable.

Is not mentally or physically abusive.

Is able to have fun with anything.

Can get along with my family.

Will listen to my nerdy rants sometimes.

Someone who thinks I’m attractive.

We flirt, but don’t only flirt.

We have long conversations, but also times of silence.

Wants to have children someday.

Can I tell them anything?

Someone who can abstain from lust.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Re-Commit

I figured it was high time I make another post about this, especially since I’m still struggling with it. For anyone that keeps up with my diary you know that I’ve been trying to quit porn (images, fanfiction, chats...). However, if you keep up with my diary, you also know that I’m religious too. I don’t want people thinking that I’m just quitting for religious reasons. I think there are a ton of good reasons I should quit that stuff. I don’t want people just thinking ‘oh this person has no idea, they’re just twisted by religion’. To prove it: I have had sex with 8 different people and sexual relations with another 3 on top of that. My first 2 times were sexual abuse. After that, I just gave up on trying to ‘remain a virgin’. 2 of those people were because my partner wanted to have a threesome at the time. I blame myself a lot for not making it clear that I couldn’t emotionally handle this. So 6 of these 8 people were people that I had no emotional connection to whatsoever, and will always regret. The other 2, both I knew I never wanted to marry, and 1 cheated on me. The other of these 2 would actually encourage me to look at porn. I should have made it more clear with them that I had a problem. Maybe I didn’t at the time, I’m not super sure.... Needless to say, I have not had very good sexual experiences. Of all of these 8 people I can never say I truly loved any of them, despite saying it to 2 of them. The one person I can say I actually had feelings that I would say are the closest to ‘love’ is now married. I only ever kissed him. So why am I quitting? It gives me a very unhealthy view on sexual relationships. Sure I have a high libido but that doesn’t mean anyone and everyone is a sex object to me. It doesn’t mean that I want to hook up with anyone. It doesn’t mean I don’t feel emotionally too. Just because I have a high libido doesn’t give me an excuse to look at porn and masturbate all the time.

It damages future relationships

Believe it or not, anything regarding relationships that one sees affects how we will act in a relationship later on. It affects how we will choose partners and it also affects the conditions on which we choose to stay with them. For me, I don’t want a guys dick size or large muscles to be a deal breaker. Sure, there are things that I find attractive and things that I find unattractive, and that’s fine. I’m seeking a relationship that can result in a life-time marriage. If that’s the case, then the important thing is not all of the short term things. Believe it or not, our bodies are short term. 

It damages my own body and mind

When I finally do get into sexual relations, I’ve noticed that I just don’t get turned on as much. I am more turned on then when I’m reading any kind of porn, but I’ve noticed It’s much harder for me to get wet, and more often than not I find myself leaving a sexual encounter more frustrated. Believe it or not, there have been nights where I have trouble sleeping, so I decide to masturbate, I have found myself struggling to get off when I can’t look at porn. I have lost my own imagination just because of porn. Not only that, but even when I’m miserable and sad, I then ‘reward’ my brain for feeling that way by getting off. I’m tricking my own body into thinking that I’m doing what I was made to do (reproduce) as a result of my recent actions. It’s a downward spiral.

It���s an addiction

This is often debated a lot. I’m not going to try to argue if it is addicting or not, but there are common traits associated with addiction: An inability to stop using, use and abuse despite health problems, using it to deal with problems, obsession, taking risks to obtain, larger and larger doses, avoiding responsibilities to use. The biggest 2 for me are using it as a way to deal with problems, and avoiding my responsibilities to use it. After all, my brain thinks it’s the better alternative than being stressed and working hard.

There are better things I could do with the time

When I read, watch, listen, or look at it, it’s not normally a short 5 minute thing. It’s gotten to the points where I have to ‘get ready’. I’ll lay down a towel underneath me on my bed in case I get too wet, so I gotta make up my bed. I like to sleep after I finish so I’ll make sure my alarm is set and whatnot. More often than not though, I’ll spend hours using it and then it will be 3am, the next day will then be awful cause I’m so tired.

There is so much more... but I don’t want this post to go on and on.

Instead I want to tell you all my biggest strategy: avoid my phone.

More specifically: avoid time wasters. This would seriously improve my quality of life (and has). The best thing I ever did was removing my phone from my room and getting a real alarm clock. Really I challenge you. Don’t take your phone to bed. Avoiding Facebook and Reddit at work will help me get more done and help me avoid triggers.

[strawberrymasquerade]

The Wall

My journey on self improvement was going so well. I made it about 40 days without looking at any lustful images or reading smut, but something happened and I just broke. It felt like I was back at square one, I would struggle every single day, and I could hardly make it to 3 days. I remember I just kinda gave up for a while, and during that period, when i wasn’t thinking about it, I went for about 7, 8, or 9 days without failing... But I did this without thinking about striving for success. I even stopped improving myself. I just lost the fight in me. I’m not quite sure what happened, if I got exhausted and I hung up the towel or what.

I’ve also been scared to post here. I sent the link to this page to a few people that know me in real life. So it scares me that they could be reading something that is so personal to me. However, I also realized that nobody really cares about other people, at least not in the same way they care for themselves. Even if it’s in a totally innocent way. I’m always thinking about what I’m going to eat when I get hungry, but I rarely even think /if/ somebody else might be hungry. I think the world would be a better place though if we did think that way. Then again, it’s not really a sustainable way to think. So that being said, I can’t expect my roommates to come up to me and ask what I’m cooking and if they can try some if I don’t even offer, they’re not thinking about me, they don’t know that I’ve spent the last 2 weeks learning how to cook the perfect egg.

Anyway. Point is, I failed. I’m doing everything I can to avoid saying it. But I did look at porn, and I did smut with some people online. I want to keep fighting. I don’t want to give up.

I will break past this wall.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Another attempt at poetry

I see it there beyond my reach.

But I can not do what I preach.

My heart aches for another chance.

But I can’t keep up this dreaded dance.

When I think I’ve made it past the finish.

That’s when my will starts to diminish.

Tremors, sweating, nightmares.

Loneliness, depression, despair.

It’s not just a wish.

I still have a solid stance.

There is a happy end.

What a God-send.

[strawberrymasquerade]

My commitment to pornfree

I made a post on Reddit not to long ago, and I wanted to put it in my diary (this blog) as well:

After my longest streak, 40 days, and finally making it a full month, I relapsed. The fact is, having my name on the year long challenge was a big motivator for me, and now I feel lost, I feel like I don't have that motivation anymore.

However, I also know that thinking this way is bad. I know I should learn from my mistakes and I should press on no matter what. Just because I have to reset my counter does NOT mean I've failed. I am improving.

So, for me, here are some things I learned, some tips, and, my commitment to staying porn-free.

When do I fail? (What counts?)

I've found that my definition on porn was bringing me to failure. Porn isn't just seeing nudity, that's not the only thing I need to change in my life to bring improvement into my life.

I fail if I purposefully seek out lustful images.

This means making any search online for some lustful image, I'm not allowed to seek out cute lingerie, cute guys, anything 'lewd', or anything of that nature. If I'm looking at something that I wouldn't be comfortable looking at in front of my parents, then I shouldn't be doing it.

I fail if I purposefully seek out lustful writing.

Writing includes browsing personals, reading fanfiction, roleplaying with people online, reading erotic fiction, anything 'smutty', and anything of that nature. I think the same rule can apply here for me. If I can't send it to my parents, then I probably shouldn't be reading it. I tend to create alt accounts and hide behind a mask. I will not allow myself to do this.

Things I'm going to avoid

NOTE: These are just things that I'm going to try to avoid, they're things that usually help me, but should not be the primary focus. The best way I've found to improve is to make sure you have that primary focus, don't let other minor things distract you from your true goal, even if they do help you achieve that goal.

If I masturbate, I've found that my current state of mind wants me to think of pornographic things to 'finish'. I've had quite a bit of sexual experience, so I have a lot of things to think back on, but in my opinion, that's very unhealthy. In the past I've learned that completely giving up masturbation will eventually lead me to failure, so I'm not going completely PMO, but I will do my absolute best to avoid it.

I will avoid masturbation so that I will also avoid lustful thoughts while I reset.

One of my failures was because I got in a state of mind at night while doing my business, and eventually convinced myself it was okay to roll over and open my phone. "This is such a harmless and innocent image" I would think, but that thinking is wrong.

If I have to take care of business, then I will do it with no screens nearby.

I've found that if I stand up and have to take a walk somewhere, I will come to my senses enough to know I shouldn't go grab my phone. However, if it's close enough to me, then I may not make the same logical decision.

I will avoid having screens in the bedroom.

Not only is this good for the changes I'm trying to make in my life, it's good for sleep. I won't go into details, but Google it, it's healthy to avoid screens in the bedroom even for people that don't suffer from the same things as us.

I think it's just beneficial to me to avoid anything that I know will bring me to a state of mind where I'm more likely to make poor decisions.

Avoid alcohol if I'm going to be alone.

It's just easier to give up if I'm tipsy or drunk. If I'm with friends, I do okay, but then as soon as I'm alone, but still tipsy, I make poor decisions. On the health rant, I've found that it helps me to avoid unhealthy foods as much as possible.

Avoid processed sugar.

I'm making it a rule to myself that I'm not allowed to buy processes sugar, if it's at a party I'll eat it, sure, but I'm also going to try and avoid it at home too. (Plus, I have been feeling a little chubby lately)

Good things I'm going to add/change

My excuse for everything right now in life is often 'I don't have time', but for some reason I've always found time to look at porn when I wasn't on this journey. I'm sure if I can avoid mindless internet and all the lustful content I look at, I'll have a lot of time.

Keep a journal/schedule.

It helps me to look back on the progress I made, it helps to see the state of mind I was in when I wrote an entry, and above all it helps me remind myself why I'm doing this. Keeping a schedule is just something good to do, and something I'm going to try to add into my life.

No matter what stage you are in life, I am sure that hard work will always pay off.

Train my dog more often.

I love my dog, and I would like him to be the best possible dog ever. I want to take him to more classes, and just occupy my time with that. I've also found that if I stay busy, I won't find the time to 'be bored' and do things that I'll regret.

Work out everyday, even a small amount.

Working out is always something I've wanted to do every day. I think people always think to big and make things look to daunting, but it's all about one step at a time. Start with one push up a day for a week, and gradually ramp up.

It's the same with diets, I've noticed that I (and others) tend to give up easier when it's a hard and fast change from what we are already doing. When I was really successful with my diet I started just by not buying sugar, then avoiding eating it, then not eating it at all, then avoiding dairy and gluten, and eventually going full paleo.

However, I've found the most important thing to my health is water.

Drink lots of water each day.

This one actually really surprises me, when I get dehydrated I feel a lot of brain fog, and I don't even think I'm dehydrated. It's very hard for me to know what dehydration is without feeling 'thirsty', which happens all the time. Drinking tons of water really helps me succeed.

However, sometimes it isn't dehydration, and it's just that I haven't been getting enough rest.

Get to bed at a reasonable time.

I need to keep a consistent sleep schedule. I get very drowzy and have horrible days if I wake up at weird times, but if I can maintain an 11-7 sleeping schedule, then I think I'd be much happier every day.

I have a lot of dreams and ambitions, I've recently been working on making those a reality, but it includes going through some online lectures.

Replace unhealthy internet time with time to learn.

If I replace all my unhealthy internet time by watching these lectures, then I'd be pretty good at a lot of things!

I've found that referring to porn as an addiction gives it too much power. It makes it feel like something I can't escape from and makes me shameful. In lieu of that:

I will not call porn the addiction, dopamine is and porn is the unhealthy method to exploit dopamine release.

It took me a while to believe, but I can escape from porn. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, it's not something I will suffer from forever if I don't want to. It's going to take work.

I've also found that I seek this dopamine release in other unhealthy ways. I believe I browse the internet mindlessly too often. I'll scroll through Facebook, and spend a worthless hour on Reddit. Browsing will often lead me to something 'sexy' on accident too, which will also lead me to failure.

I will browse the internet with intent and purpose. When I go online I will have a goal, then go offline as soon as that goal is complete.

The just of all this is honestly to get rid of the temptations in my life, and to do everything in my power to make sure that those temptations can't enter. Weather it be through poor health, drunkenness, boredom, or whatever, I will not let temptations flood in.

Stay strong brothers and sisters. We can do this. Hang in there and don't let a failure hold you back. Keep pressing on and keep trying every single day. Life is not easy, but that doesn't mean you can't be proud. Remember to reward yourself for your small successes. Stay happy, wholesome, and positive and you will reach your goal in no time

[strawberrymasquerade]

Why video games matter to me

First, why am I even writing this? Of course, anybody that meets me will know that I like to game. However, most people don’t know how much it means to me. Many perceive it as just something to burn your time, but it’s so much more than that.

“Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become." - C.S. Lewis

Gaming seems to have this weird stigma. Its’ stereotype includes angry, lazy, antisocial, unhealthy, unhygienic, and even mentally ill people. Some industries pay a lot of money to fund research against video games, to say it’s the cause of a lot of the new violence in our world. When I go into a job interview, I avoid saying I like games because of this stigma. I’m attempting to write this to convince you that gaming is not bad and it does not deserve this ugly brand that the world keeps giving it. On an even deeper level, though, I’m here to convince you to try a few more games. Games can twist my emotions, they can guide me to a new stage of self improvement, they have helped me through school, and shown me not to give up. Games are a new medium to story-telling that the world does not understand yet, and it very much saddens me when people say they dislike all video games.

“A fine work of art - music, dance, painting, story - has the power to silence the chatter in the mind and lift us to another place” - Robert McKee

To me, saying you dislike video games is like saying you dislike books, it’s like saying you dislike music, or even like saying you dislike sports. One of those things might even resonate with you, but I promise I can find a book you like, a song you’ll dance to, a sport you’d love, or... yes... even a video game you’d cry over. I remember when I was a kid, I really didn’t like reading. I was convinced that nobody would ever find me a book that I liked. This very much concerned my parents because they wanted me to speak English well, write well, and communicate on an intellectual level, and books are very good at teaching these kinds of things. Then, one day, my Dad showed me his comic book collection. I spent the next few months obsessing over this. I read every single comic book, and my parents were just happy that I was reading. Eventually, I wanted to know more about the universe that these comic books took place in, and my Mom took me to the library to buy a book, yes, a real book without pictures, so I could read more about this universe. At this point, I believe that my parents learned that the trick to getting me to read was just to find something I liked instead of trying to shove the recommended school books down my throat.

“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” - Thomas Merton

I digress, the thing is, people seem to be more open if I pester them to read a book than if I pester them to play a video game. Often times the game I’ll want them to play will only take an hour! With a book, my friends will spend hours reading it then come back to me wanting to chat about it for hours on end. However, when I try to suggest a game to somebody, they’ll usually never do it unless they have shown interest in games in the past. This kind of hurts me, not because of their refusal to play, but because I feel like I have thousands, no, hundreds of thousands of hours put into video games. This is an entire portion of my life that I can’t share with the people around me, entire conversations that I can’t have with the people I love. There have been times that I’ve gotten so desperate to have these conversations that I end up just chatting someone’s ear off, and I believe, I just turn them further away from video games.

“A picture is worth a thousand words”

The more I write, the more I realize how much longer I need to make this. I’ve already spent 3 hours coming up with different drafts for this and realized that I’m just going to have to make a part 2. I realize I haven’t really answered the question, so I’ll try to do so in short: games matter to me because they were like a 3rd parent to me. They taught me how to manage my emotions, how to see the beauty in the world, how to express myself. Games taught me to be confident, to keep pressing on, they’ve helped me form bonds with others, and are always there for me when the world isn’t.

[strawberrymasquerade]

First Poem

I don’t think I’ve ever written a poem out of my own free will. It’s always been for some grad-school class. So, Inspired by Doki-Doki Literature Club, I’ve decided to try writing a poem.

And of course, my golden rule “first draft, last draft, get it out the door”. So yeah, This’ll be unedited.... Here it goes!

The wind pushes the boat

The current carries the fish

But neither are the way we wish to go

The boat changes its’ sail

The fish swims harder

With hard work

Each reaches their treasure

There you go. I feel just as clueless as the main character in this game.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Story of how I came to end my sexual addiction

So I'm a 24 year old female that's been addicted to sex and porn since early high school. I was exposed to it in elementary school, but knew it was wrong for me to look at. In middle school I was exposed to it yet again. In a typing class there was a student who would sit in the back corner and find erotic images behind the teacher's back. Of course, everyone was curious and would watch him. The internet was still very early so most adults didn’t even know it was a thing. I remember thinking that if I could look like those girls then I might get some more attention.Moving on, here is my very long story about how sex and porn have negatively affected my life.

I completely fell in love with a guy at the end of middle school but didn't ask him out because, well on top of me not feeling like I wasn't good enough due to recently viewing pornography, I was young enough that dating really wasn’t a thing (However, I did go to a fairly corrupt middle school where a girl got suspended for giving a guy a blowjob in the gym teacher’s office). We'll refer to this guy as Casey, because, well, that was his name, and because I'll be referring to him a lot in my story. Instead, a few months later, I ended up "going out with” a guy that I found very fun and attractive, but knew we didn't have much compatibility. It was cutesy and dumb, but it was enjoyable to have him to hang out with for a time. He had blind parents and it was really interesting to learn how he interacted with them. Anyway, I ended up breaking up with him to have a chance with Casey.

In high school I began, essentially, studying the girls online and wondering what it would be like to be in their position. The addiction kept evolving and growing throughout high school to the point where I preferred to climax while looking at girls and guys online (I didn’t know this at the time, but looking back on it now I believe it was the case). The first real relationship I had was just for fun, it wasn't for love, and I was still to young to even consider sex. I was still at the stage where holding hands would make my heart completely race. However, I was completely cruel to Ken and ended up telling him that I was breaking up with him to have a chance with Casey. Unfortunately, after breaking up with him I found out that Casey was in a relationship (which I learned he only got into because I was taken).

It was at this time that I started getting very addicted to my online internet persona. I had parents that didn't let me go out much compared to my friends and I got really used spending time alone on my own at my computer. I had a bunch of good internet friends, and one guy, James, that I actually met on a plane while on a trip with my family. I remember feeling so corrupt and so different from anyone that I'd talk to people anonymously to see if they were corrupt like me. I'd ask them if they masturbated, what they did it to, and just have anonymous erotic conversations. I would stay up till almost 3 AM every night writing and reading fan-fiction and browsing certain sites. My parents would wonder why I was so tired at school every day.

Then came the thing in high school that I regret the most out of anything in my life. Ken had a friend named Eric, and I started talking to him anonymously. Originally I started talking to him to see if Ken was okay, to see if Ken was moving on alright, but Eric revealed to me that he thought I was a different, much more pretty, girl. That conversation evolved to the point where he said he'd do anything to be kissed by "me" (the person he thought I was, named Paige) in public. I got too curious and asked him for nude pictures. He sent them to me, and I feel most addicts would've stopped there, but I didn't. I panicked at 3 am with all these nude pictures of him on my desktop. I sent anonymous emails to all of Paige's friends to see if there was a chance at getting her to kiss him in public. One thing lead to another and it ended with me basically bartering the nude pictures of Eric to get Paige to kiss him (which never happened). Long story short, I took Eric's nude pictures and sent them to a few of the other girls in the school. Story spread around the school but eventually faded out until it didn’t have any influence on me (socially). I remember I had a good friend Rani, that had a harsh verbal fight with a group of guys defending the fact that I wasn't the one to distribute these pictures.

This began to haunt me for the rest of my life. I never felt good enough in anything I did. Three years in a row I got the 'Heart and Soul' award in marching band for the efforts I put in to help with the band equipment and the extra hours I put in. Sadly, this award meant almost nothing to me because of how little I valued myself. I began seeking verification from others in a way that wasn't healthy, I couldn't see who my true friends, were, and because of this I lost a lot of friends during high school and college. I did have great friends, but I just didn't, couldn't see it. Although this isn’t really what happened, it helps me to think of it this way: I kind of developed a split personality. One part of me would do anything to help keep anyone happy, I’d serve people until I was totally exhausted, I’d let anyone cheat off my homework, but it made me feel good to do it. Then I had another side of me which came out late at night, or when I was really sleepy, and I’d be cruel, evil and corrupt. It was absolutly insane how separate and different these two people were...

About a year after the event with Eric, I got so self deprecating that I would search for anything and everything that someone could say that was positive about me. One night I was so desperate that I sent a nude picture to a guy. I kind of forced it on him looking for some kind of affirmation. It was the only nude picture I /ever/ sent of me, but I sent one to a really good christian friend of mine. He hated receiving it and didn't give me any of the verification that I had desired. I felt uglier than ever and had even burnt the bridge that I had built with him. I couldn't stand to talk to him, and basically stopped going to church because of that.

At this same time my church was going through some big changes. The size of the church had grown enough that they wanted to split into two campus'. A big portion of my friends ended up going to the campus that my parent's weren't willing to drive me to, and I completely lost touch with them. However, because of Casey I didn't completely stop going to church. I still thought I had one more chance with him, but when I saw him that week he said he couldn't start a relationship with me because him and his parents were moving out of state. I always wanted Casey to be my first kiss, but I guess it just wasn't destined.

The first person I ever kissed was with Jared. I didn't want to have sex with him and at the time was still very sure I would be saving myself for marriage. While I didn’t have sex with him I believe porn twisted my views of sex and I ended up doing things, that, if I'm honest to myself now, wasn't comfortable with. At this point I was viewing porn weekly. The relationship was one of the best I had, but it ended very poorly and he slept with one of my best friends only a week before I broke up with him. I don't know if this makes it better or worse, but I didn't know he slept with him until about two years after the fact. Actually, if I really analyze the relationship, it probably wasn't one of the best I've had, or rather, I’ve never really had a good relationship. Weekly when I walked with him in the hallway he would talk about how this other girl, Zoe, was so hot. I brushed it off because everyone around us said we were perfect together and talked about how well he treated me.

The entire Eric scenario and I was still doing everything I could in person to be ‘good’ to people, to understand people and to really be in their shoes. I would really put myself out there to understand someone. I met this one guy who I learned would cut himself for depression. I remember going home that night depressed and thinking “I’m going to try this out so I can understand him better”. I cut myself pretty bad using a broken apart razor blade. I can now understand the relief of it all, and understand why he did it. It definitely made him easier to connect with, but hanging around him wasn’t making my situation any better.

A little while after Jared, I started chasing a really hot band guy. He eventually became drum major and was super popular. He made fantastic grades and really knew how to talk to all the teachers. He showed a ton of interest in me and would play games with me like stealing my hairbands and not giving them back till the end of the day. However, I promptly stopped chasing him when Casey told me that she'd be coming to town. I spent that summer texting Casey almost non-stop because I had just gotten my first phone. One of my best friends, Lauren, knew how much I liked him and basically ended up setting us up on a date without either of us knowing. We were romantically walking down the river together and we sat on a rock and shared the most perfect kiss I've ever experienced in my life. It was at this moment I realized how much I really loved him. It wasn't cause I was physically attracted to him (like most of my relationships had begun) but because he genuinely made me feel like a whole person. He was a God-loving man (which I find very attractive) and would make me feel closer to God as well. Unfortunately, He had to go back out of state, he was only visiting, and we knew we couldn't do a long-distance relationship.

After a few months had passed I learned that Casey had gotten into a relationship, so I started to chase the hot band guy again. I think he had gotten popular enough though, that he didn't care at all about me. We shared a few make out sessions and had fun steaming up the car without our parents knowing, but then he VERY quickly moved onto another girl since we had never 'established the fact that we were dating'. That hurt, but I moved on. I think my addiction to pornography was really starting to affect me at this point and I didn't think as much of him moving on so fast. After all that, My addiction ramped up exponentially, I wasn't in a relationship and my hormones were driving me absolutely wild. My usage went from weekly to about every other day and I began to see the world much differently. I began to strive for attention more, and I remember when this guy (that I found /very/ unattractive) starting hitting on me over text, I told him he could come spy into my window and watch me masturbate. As guilty as it made me feel, I was desperate for some sort of confirmation that I was attractive or had a hint of 'good' in me. Looking back I can see that it wasn’t logical at all, but I guess that’s what this kind of addiction does to the brain.

The week before graduation day a guy named Nick started flirting with me over text. He told me he didn't want to date and was just interested in the physical stuff, and for some reason I still expressed interest. The day before graduation he wanted me to sneak out of my house to make out with him. I adamantly told him I couldn't and that my parents would find out, but then he sent me a text saying he was waiting outside in his car. I felt like I had no choice. I went out to his car and we made out in his back seat. I remember he went down on me and for some reason I was very impressed by that. The next morning I woke up with a HUGE hickey on the side of my neck. I had never really been that big into makeup so instead of covering it up I wore this nice dress with a collar that could somewhat hide it. Something funny about that though, My sister ended up giving me 50 extra bucks in my graduation present because I had an 'epic hickey'. Well I hated it. It completely ruined graduation day for me.

The summer transition between high school and college was actually one of the better times I had during my addiction. I attended church more and worked hard to become a better person. Unfortunately, my church had nothing for college students, after high school, there was no program of any kind set up, no life groups, no study groups, nothing. Everyone was just expected to go to the big service and that’s all their was. About half way through the summer I was kicked out of the high school youth group and just stopped attending church all together. During a desperate night I was messaging someone from a different high school over Facebook about how my hormones were driving me crazy. He basically told me he’d set me up with a guy, Larry, he knew that was looking for someone. The entire summer was basically just me trying to date him, and even though I’ve never seen harry potter, I bought Larry this cool wand because I knew how much he loved it. It was actually kind of a funny scenario at the time, because my best friend, Lauren, didn’t want to get into a relationship at all, but Larry’s best friend, Ren, did want a relationship. Meanwhile, I really wanted a relationship with Larry, but he didn’t want that at all. Ren and Lauren ended up having loud sex every time we all gathered at Lauren’s house, and I was trying to do all this cutesy stuff to date Larry. I took him to a meteor shower and would rub his back and stuff, but he still didn’t want to date. At the end of the summer I found out he had sex with the same friend that Jared had kissed. I think it’s needless to say, but I felt very very betrayed.

Then when college started, I felt very much like I was kicked out of my church. For the first year of college I tried attending some of the on-campus christian groups, but they felt so culty and ended up just sticking to my D&D group. In the D&D group I met a guy named Sam. It ended up being another very shallow relationship. We dated for 3 months, Lauren offered up her house so we could sleep together (not sex) without being in the dorms. Another funny thing though, I remember my dorm roommate walking in on me and Sam making out on the floor, and I wasn’t even embarrassed. Sam started to get a little crazy and ended up allegedly faking mental problems in order to get out of the school without taking any permanent marks. Our relationship ended pretty fast. Since I had a dorm-mate my porn usage actually wasn’t very much and I moved my focus more towards video games.

Sophomore year of college I got an apartment with a high school friend of mine. The layout of this apartment was very weird it consisted of two giant rooms with bathrooms attached, and the rooms were connected by a shared kitchen. She was the most anti-social introverted person I knew. So between the layout of the rooms and her anti-socialness, I basically had a room completely to myself. Once again my pornography addiction ramped up hard. I didn’t have many people to play video games with, and I had exhausted all the single player games I had. So I ended up making my internet persona bigger than it ever was before.

At the end of high school there was this guy named Sean that, I think, three of my friends had sex with (two for sure). He started messaging me late one night and my hormones were just so high. I desperately biked over to his house because I was horny. I tried so hard to block this out of my head, but I remember being on top of him when I lost my virginity. I don’t want to be too graphic, but there wasn’t even a full thrust before I started crying and putting my clothes back on. He was so completely confused, I biked home, and I haven’t talked to him since. I tried so hard to convince myself that I hadn’t lost my virginity.

Then Nick, the guy that gave me the hickey, ended up coming over one night, and that’s when I could no longer lie to myself that I had lost my virginity. I remember him begging me to tell him how I was his first and how he was the one to take my virginity to him. I lied to him because I had been lying to myself. I cried that night. Hard. In front of him. After that I changed is name in my phone to “thedevlidonottalk” because that’s how he made me feel. I believe it was because of my addiction, but the feeling of shame and guilt quickly wore off, and I went back to pursuing people online and fell back into the depths of my addiction.

In high school, even though I had this big crush on a guy, I refused to date him because he was two years younger than me and I was scared of what people would say about me. The crush kind of crept back up on me and I invited him over to my place. We made out and we ended up having lots of skype conversations over the year, he was more comfortable to be around because he wasn’t trying to have sex with me, but he still satisfied that sexual desire I had. I was actually pretty bummed at the time that he just kind of stopped talking to me. After that, I felt like I was just running out of friends, and my current roommate didn’t have the money so she was going to live with her parent’s the next year. Even though I was an introvert I kind of stuck my neck out and became good friends with a girl in the D&D group, and it was through that connection that I was able to have roommates for the next two years of college. And it was through that connection that I met the next guy I was going to date for the next three years. His name is Roger, but we didn’t start dating until after this next story...

The roommates I had were not healthy for my addiction, one of them would just pull porn up willy nilly in front of everyone, and everyone that was there didn’t even care or seem to be phased by it. We kind of had a party house and all of us would always be inviting people over for various things. While I finally didn’t feel lonely, I felt very desperate because all of my friends had boyfriends and were constantly having sex in the rooms next to me. So then one night, Nick texts me (the guy that gave me a hickey) and I see the notification pop up as ‘thedevildonottalk’. I don’t reply, but then he texts me freaking out about how his drunk friend crashed the car up on a curb. For some reason Nick knew where I lived and knew I was really close. So I let him and his friend into my place at like 2 AM. I’m trying not to let anything happen but they’re being very pushy. I tell them they can go use my bathroom to clean up and stop freaking out. I stay downstairs, and it takes them a while, so I finally go up and they’re both naked making out on my bed. Long story short they’re basically begging me to join in. I end up naked but I just can’t get turned on even though Nick’s friend may have been one of the hottest guys I’ve ever seen. Not getting wet made me feel very self conscious about myself, and they just wouldn’t give me any attention. I think they just expected that I’d be all ready to jump in and have sex with them. So they were like giving each other oral and whatnot, and finally they just got fed up with me and left. I then hid their keys in my mailbox and texted him early the next morning telling them where they could get it. Even if it was a horrible experience for me, I at least like to think that I saved some lives by preventing them from doing any more drunk driving. I felt so ashamed and when i woke up the next morning of course my roommates asked about it, and for some reason they were jealous, but I was just hating myself.

A few weeks past, and whenever I got horny I sort of texted this guy that I didn’t find super attractive. I would message him anonymously and told Roger he needed to be more confident and forward. My intent behind that was to see if I could get him to kiss me without me doing anything. However, it didn’t work and he ended up finding out who I was. I felt so guilty for hitting on him even when I didn’t like him all that much, that somehow I let him start calling us boyfriend and girlfriend. So next thing I know, I guess we’re dating.

This relationship was the least healthy thing for my porn addiction out of almost everything so far. He would encourage me to look at porn, he liked to see the kind of stuff I was into, and when I was at work or school he would prepare some stuff for me to look at. Our relationship, to me, was really only built on the fact that we shared a lot of common interests/activities, and that we were very sexually compatible (even if I wasn’t super attracted to him). My views were twisted so much that I even remember telling Casey that I thought sexual compatibility was super important in a relationship. At the time I thought it was up in the top three most important things. I feel like my brain got so twisted dating Roger.

I don’t want to get into any descriptive details, but basically, Roger and I tried basically every fetish out there, we had a plethora of sex toys between us, and we would have sex and look at porn or read some fan fiction almost nightly. This went on for 3 years. He would encourage the behavior that I hated about myself and tell me how it was okay. I don’t want the relationship to sound all bad though, because he truly treated me like a goddess. He would stand up for me whenever anyone talked crap about me, and he would give me these really long massages almost weekly when I had a rough day. He liked to dress up in cosplay with me and he taught me that two people can play a single player game together.

Although he didn’t know it, the last 6 months of our relationship was kind of rocky. He had caught me role playing with a guy online and completely freaked out about that (rightfully so). I remember that night vividly and he just felt cheated on. It was this moment that I was /not/ the person I ever wanted to be and that I needed to make some changes in myself. However, as time passed, I realized that It would be very hard to make these changes with Roger in my life. So that, on top of him not being Christian, and me not being super attracted to him (even though he is an attractive person), all just kind of added up and I knew I had to end things with him. It took me about 3 months to do it. I just didn’t have the guts, and I couldn’t break up with him on valentines day, and then only a month later was his birthday, and I couldn’t break up with him then. 

Well I finally did it. I broke up with Roger and I hated myself. I was crying myself to sleep every night and looking for anybody to comfort me. I was begging for help and nobody was there. I thought Roger would take me at least a year to get over, but Cody, that high school crush I was talking about, texted me to fill in the hole of loneliness I was feeling. We ended up sleeping together, and then despite not wanting to date, we ended up dating. I hid this from Roger by making sure he couldn’t see my relationship status and none of his friends could either. I felt guilty about it, but It did help me get over Roger faster. I know it was a rebound relationship, but I think I would’ve gone crazy drowning in loneliness.

During this time of my life I had also spent a LOT of my time taking care of a very close friend of mine, Isabelle. Since it’s all very personal to her, I won’t go over the nitty gritty details, but basically she had been on house arrest and had the big court hearing (with the jury and all) in about 4 months (time referenced from when I started dating Cody). I took way too much vacation time over the lasts 6 months, and even more while dating Cody, just to make sure Isabelle was okay (I have a hard time talking about this part of my life without crying), to make sure that I could make every single game night at her house, and that I could keep her company and be a good friend. Isabelle, if I’m being completely honest, has never been the greatest friend to me, so I’m not sure why I love her so much, but I do, and I did everything I could to introduce her to new people and new guys (cause she has a wild libido like me). Isabelle was kind of in this hole where she thought nobody would ever like her again and that her life was ruined.

At this time it was time for Casey’s wedding too. I didn’t mention it before, but part of my “rush” to break up with Roger was because I really really didn’t want a date to Casey’s wedding. I didn’t realize I still loved him, I thought I had logically justified why we wouldn’t work out, and I had, but logic does not trump emotion. I ended up drinking a bit too much at Casey’s wedding and Cody had to come make sure I was okay. It was at that point that I realized I should probably break up with Cody because I guess I still loved Casey. And now I couldn’t tell Casey that, I just had to move on.

About 2 weeks after Casey’s wedding, Cody told me she wanted to have a threesome with his best friend. It’s like I haven’t learned a Damn thing, because, even though I said ‘sure’ I knew I didn’t want it. I remember not being sure if it was just ‘fantasy talk’ or if Cody was actually going to make a move on him. Then while we were drinking at his friend’s house Cody leaned over and said ‘I dare you to kiss him’ I don’t know if it was the social pressure or the alcohol, but I did.... Next thing I know, I’m not turned on, I’m not getting wet, and there is a naked guy on each side of me. One eating me out and one making out with me. I woke up the next morning regretting every bit of it.

Anyway, Cody broke up with me about a week before Isabelle’s hearing. Even though I had been planning on breaking up with him, it hit me harder than I thought. My sex addiction was really high at this point too, and a few weeks later he texted me wanting to know if we could hook up. I idiotically let it happen, and even though there was more pain then pleasure, enjoyed it while it lasted. We did some kinky stuff. Unfortunately, I found out that he had also been doing things with Isabelle ever since she was proven innocent. Long story short, I’m pretty sure they’re dating now and I haven’t talked to Cody since, but I try to stay in contact with Isabelle as much as I can.

It was at this point that I realized how addicted I was to sex and pornography and how I really needed to make the effort to cut it out of my life. As soon as I made that decision, things went great. I basically made it 60 days without masturbation or porn! To this day I have no idea how I did it. I started getting super involved with a different church and making some huge changes in my life. I started working out and lost 20 lbs in a month. I then started gaining a lot of muscle weight and was actually a bit happy about my body.

I got so involved with this other church that I went on this huge retreat with them. It’s this giant convention for Christian’s called passion that happens in Georgia. I had thrown myself into this new church and despite going 3 times a week I didn’t really know anyone even after going for almost 6 months. This convention was my hope because we had to spend basically 24 hours on a bus with everyone else there and then back. Needless to say, I started making friends (was kind of forced to) and by the end of the convention had made really good friends with this guy Mark. We may have been a little too flirty, but I didn’t realize that until about 2 weeks after the convention. I made it clear to him that I didn’t want to date and needed to take time to work on myself and my relationship with God. However, he was pretty pushy and since he was moving very soon to go to college would basically say things like ‘I’ll be gone in a month, can’t you help me get just this one wish? Won’t you just give us a chance?’. I admit, it was very hard to say no. We had sex two times and I just felt so horrible about it. I don’t know why I can’t ever keep my ground and just keep saying no. However, Mark is still one of my better friends and I can talk to him about anything. He was one of the first two people that I ever told about the Eric thing that I feel so horrible about.

Mark moved out of state to go to college in July of 2017, just after I turned 24. Once again I was left alone and with nobody to talk to. To make matters worse, I decided to leave my toxic friend group and live with my Sister. I only realized after I moved in with her that she was just as toxic, but not in the same way. My sister is very depressed and is working hard to move through it. At this point in my life I’m making it about 20 days at a time without doing anything sexual. I’m also trying to figure out what made the first 60 days so much easier. Despite my greatest efforts it’s like this addiction just had this hold on me that I can’t explain. I’d relapse and it’s like it was completely out of my control.

The house I was living in wasn’t totally full of toxic people. I had one roommate who I thought was my best friend. For 3 years we had shared very personal things to each other and were always there for each other. Part of the reason I left is because she said she needed to move out to do other things. It’s now that I should tell you that Nichole is very good friends with Roger and was going over to see him almost weekly. They would do anime nights and stuff together but I feared that Roger was probably saying bad things about me. It hurts me and haunts me, I feel like I did nothing but love Nichole, but on the day of moving out she told me she never wanted to speak to me again and she was ending our friendship. Later I found out that she moved in with Isabelle and deleted a plethora of numbers from my phone. this included Roger, some of Roger’s friends, and herself. I felt like I was as loving and as Godly as I could have been. I kind of desire an apology from her, though I know it probably wont’ ever happen. Regardless, I forgive her and will be there if she needs me.

I was involved in a life group now at my first Church, and realized they had made a ton of changes (they must have realized not having a college program and doing the church split had a negative impact on a lot of people). This was really helping with my addiction, and I even got to reconnect with a few of the people I lost during my high school to college transition. It’s at this point that I have to tell you all how much of a romantic I am. My absolute biggest dream in life is to fall in love with a husband that loves me just as much, raise some kids, and just have fun together. When I was young I’d play house with some of the other neighborhood kids and I loved being in the wedding. I want to be good to him, I don’t want to ever view pornographic material while with him, and I want to be the wife that God wants me to be for him.

That being said, it’s hard for me not to think of the future when I see someone cute. I’m like ‘ooh, what if we got married? Could we get married? What are the deal breakers here?’. Anyway, I moved on from wanting to change for my future husband, to wanting to change for myself. This helped quite a bit. As I continued my journey of change I realized I should do it for God, which has been the biggest help.

After Mark, someone I knew way back from high school contacted me completely out of the blue. I decided to respond and ended up getting a bite to eat with him. Matthew and I started being real flirty with each other. It’s something I need to fix, but I’m super susceptible to flirting. If someone flirts with me, I’ll pretty much instantly develop a crush on them. Matthew is one of my best friends, but I started flirting back, and then we ended up having sex. Which broke a 30 day streak of mine. After the incident with Matthew I told him that I couldn’t date him. It’s true that I didn’t feel a spiritual connection, but the biggest reason was that I still needed to work on myself. As you can read throughout this story, I haven’t really been single all that much. Matthew made me realize that I needed to be aggressively offensive with my addiction. That I needed to work much harder on myself than I ever have.

I know it’s absolutely crazy, but I had this dream that I can’t help but think it was from God. He told me I’d get married when I am 2 years clean of my addiction. Something about it just resonates with me and feels true. So I’m here working on myself hard. I made it another 30 days and failed just before new years day.

It’s now 2018 and I stand here with the goal of not letting my sexual and pornographic addictions affect my life. It WILL NOT have control over me any longer.

I know this is very long, and a lot to take in, but it helped me organize my thoughts. My addiction to sex and pornography turned me into an entirely different person. I would react to things poorly, I’d jump into relationships for the sex, and I would do things I didn’t want because I had trained my brain to think sex was one of the most fulfilling things. I learned how to forget things because of the shame and guilt I felt through this whole journey. I kid you not, there were some names in here that I honestly struggled to remember (one of which I dated). I’ve gotten so good at blocking out certain memories that it really does make it feel like another person. On top of the concussions I had in high school, parts of this story were very difficult to put together.

That being said. I’m going to end with a letter to my sex and porn addiction.

Dear sex and porn,

I don’t need you in my life, I don’t want you in my life. You have corrupted me for too long, you’ve lured me into doing things that I don’t want and I’m tired of the lies you keep telling me. I’m on to your tricks and I want you to know that you are defeated, that I’m never speaking to you again. I don’t want you in my life, and it’s finally my turn to take the wheel. What you had to offer was the exact opposite of happiness. While pleasure may be nice, it’s never fulfilling. True happiness comes from hard work, dedication, and a passion for healthy things. So please, don’t come back, don’t talk to me again. I’m now bold enough to go out and ask for help, so if you ever come back, you’re going to have to answer to my friends. It won’t be pretty, and they know how to hide a body without getting caught.

Goodbye.

[strawberrymasquerade]

New Years Resolutions

So there is a lot of research on how many things you should work on at a time. And the consensus is... one. Focus on one thing at a time to improve on. My one true new years resolution is to not seek out anything lustful ever (pornography, fanfiction, facebook, etc). With that out of the way though, while trying to think up one, I came up with a bunch of others that I want to work on at some point int he future. they may not  be my true focus but it’s nice to be aware of them. Even though I know nobody I know reads this diary, it’s still hard for me to admit some of the addictions I have, but I’m going to: I have a pornography addiction that I’m struggling through. I’ve seen all the research on how horrible it is, and I’m trying so hard to quit. My last streak was about 30 days, but I failed right before the new year. I’m hoping I can make it the magical ‘90 days’ when things are supposed to get astronomically easier.

I need to be more punctual. I’m freaking late to everything. I don’t know why. Part of it is definitely the fear of being early though, I don’t like to be early because of the social pressure (either having to wait around awkwardly, or being put in a situation where I have to talk to one other person). Sometimes I’m purposefully late just because the guilt of being late is less than the pain I feel from getting there early. You might as, why not just get there on time? Well it’s because I know none of my friends will get there on time, so I show up even later. And as my friends learn that I show up late, they also show up late. Recently the guilt has started to outweigh the social pressures I feel. This is because I love my friends and I want to express that love.

I want to give up processed sugar. I just want to be a healthy person, and I eat WAY too much processed sugar, it’s kind of a coping mechanism. I want to get back into my habit of working out and training/walking my dog.

I need to take more time just for myself, I need to be a bit selfish. I need time to recharge, to do things just for me, but I feel so guilty if I have to say no to somebody, tell them I’m busy, or even tell them I can’t. I even feel guilty if I really can’t do something. Recently I’ve had a friend constantly asking to hang out, or come drive to me, but I literally can’t, and I feel horrible for saying no to him. Part of taking time for myself is to learn. There are these online lectures that I like to do and I’d like to do at least one daily. Another thing is keeping up this diary!

Facebook and Reddit. I want to give them up. I have so much time wasted by these things, I’ll waste time at work, I’ll waste an hour in the morning when I get up... It’s getting pretty serious.

Finally... I just want to express my Love. And I want to get better at expressing it.

[strawberrymasquerade]

How to not lead people on

Despite the title of this entry, I have no advice here. I know it’s something I need two work on, but I have no idea how to do it. If you’re familiar with Meyer-Briggs, I’m an INFJ. I feel bad cutting people out of my life and feel very guilty for basically /not leading them on/.

I have this guy that is currently head over heels for me and I don’t know what to do about it. I like him as a friend, but nothing more, I don’t want to date him and I know he’s not ‘the one for me’. But I admit, I made the mistake of sleeping with him. And I made a bigger mistake of telling him I loved him while we were sleeping together. The thing is, this is true, but I meant as a friend. If I knew it wasn’t going to lead him on and hurt him, I’d probably tell him I loved him again. However, now this has spiraled out of control because he asked me why I only said it when we were sleeping together, and he’s hung up on that...

So yeah, I need to work on not leading people on, I need to work on putting up the boundaries, because when I find the guy that I want to marry, I want there to be clear boundaries in place for any other guy that comes into my life. It’s a habit I need to work on.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Is Dopamine A Drug?

Yes. That’s my short answer at least. Dopamine has been shown to stimulate the same areas of your brain as cocaine (and if you don’t believe cocaine is bad then maybe you should stop reading this post, I don’t think I have anything new to offer you). It turns out that overstimulating your brain with dopamine (or really any drug) decreases the effectiveness of your frontal lobe.

Note: Most sources say it decreases the size of your frontal lobe, but this isn’t true.

The brains frontal lobe is responsible for decision making which is really the source of an addict not being able to quit. Despite knowing it’s bad and not wanting to do it, their brain gets cloudy and they do it anyway.

Does this at all sound familiar? It does to me. After the industrial revolution, humanity reached a point where we could refine things down to the huge dopamine spikes that they give us. Food has refined sugars and fats. We know it’s bad for us to eat all this processed food but do it anyway. Many people have eating disorders because of this and true addicts end up going to therapy or just straight up killing themselves through bad health.

Workout-junkies can now strain their muscles much faster than they used to, getting an entire days worth of working out in just 30 minutes because of the weights and machines we’ve designed. If you don’t believe that working out can be addictive, then just talk to some body builders. It’s proven that working out releases dopamine in the brain.

But now I arrive at the one that bothers me most. Humans were made, male and female, for sex. We are made to reproduce. This causes our brains to release dopamine when we see a potential mate. What happens if we can see 10 times as many potential mates in the same amount of time? Well, we’ve come to the point where we have basically hacked our brains. Our brains are no longer doing their job well because we have out-smarted them. We can give our brains exactly what they want without giving them the result that they think they’re getting.

I have been addicted to all of these at one point or another. Take a step back and think about things that give you a dopamine fix. Are you addicted?

[strawberrymasquerade]

Things I shouldn’t do

I need to work on a few things in my life. With stress that’s a little hard though because a lot of the things I need to work on are stress relievers for me. I need to work on more healthy ways to deal with my stress. I often spend too much time before bed and after I wake up browsing my phone or my computer. This isn’t healthy, it’s not like I’m reading up on Wikipedia or doing homework, I’m slacking off, reading fanfiction, or feeding a porn addiction. In fact, a lot of the things I shouldn’t do are just around the internet. I often slack off at work by taking a “short” break to browse Reddit or look at Facebook. This is completely pointless. Reddit is just full of memes and pointless gifs, none of it improves me or makes me even the slightest bit happier. Generally I can rely on friends to send me the funniest of gifs. Facebook is just feeding the terrible idea that everyone is always happy. The thing is, people feel like I do a lot. People feel like all of their friends are leaving them and people are just as stressed out. The things people go through are never small, but mostly everyone wants to hide that.

It’s not not all about what I shouldn’t do, I should drink more water, I should eat healthier, and I should be working out. However, that’s not the title of the post. I think it’s better to work on one thing at a time, so I’m going to make it real small and until finals are done I will not bring any screens into the bedroom.

[strawberrymasquerade]

Prayer About Stress

God,

Things feel really rough right now. School is overwhelming, I feel like I have too much to do in the time period that I have to do it in. I’m already behind in the classes that I’m taking and I don’t even know how I’ll also fit time in there to study. I ask that you might help me organize my life so I can get everything done in a timely manner and learn everything that I need to so I can pass both these classes (maintaining the GPA I need to stay in graduate school).

On top of that, buying a house has been really stressful. Jen, my realtor, feels like she’s almost pushing me to buy a house and get my crap together. I know she’s good hearted and good willed, so there is a chance that it could just be how stressful the housing market is right now. Frankly, people are buying up houses that are pieces of junk, and I can’t compete with that. Would you please guide me towards the right house? I’d like a house and a location that would help me serve you better.

Next, my puppy has actually been really stressful. I love him to death, but with everything building up I haven’t had as much time as I would like to spend time with, and train Zant. This makes it so he gets a little bit antsy. Not only do I feel bad, but he does too because he doesn’t get the proper exercise he needs. Please help me figure out this situation so I can be the best puppy mom that I can possibly be!

My family continues to weigh on me. My sister has been going through some rough times, and as you know, I’m living with her. My drive time to work is very long and that’s starting to get to me. With all of the stress weighing down on me, having my CD player break today was almost the straw on the camels back. Thank you for helping me hold my composure and push through it all. I ask that you would give my sister hope of the gifts you have yet to give her. I ask that you would help me be a good sister.

You tell us not to worry, so please help take some of this burden off me and push forward. Tonight in life group they were talking about how I need to get my energy from you. Please teach me how to do that so I can keep moving on.

And God, please let me do your work. Please reveal the paths you want me to take. I’m blind deaf and dumb when it comes to seeing you so I ask that you would reveal yourself and your plan to me in some obvious ways. God, I want to do your will, so please use me and guide me. Come into my heart and help me in this life.

I can’t do it without you,

And your blessed name,

Amen.