Off for Christmas

I'm down as much as I'm up at the moment, dragged along helplessly in the wake of my wife's moods.
On a downer this morning I dug up some semi-erased stuff from my hard drive, and indulged myself for a short time before finally and totally trashing it.
In a good moment my wife has come to appreciate what I try to do around the house for her and the baby, starting to put to rest one of my ongoing bugbears in our marriage.
Today is my last day at work for a couple of weeks; Christmas is going to be a time with much less PC and TV than usual, and hopefully I'll find time among our manic home life to reconnect with God - it's amazing how easily I leave that part of the process out at the moment, and that's a big part of why I can't really get going again.
If I don't post until the new year, it will be because I'm doing OK, and getting a head start on a more successful 2006.
Like I said, I'm up as much as I'm down at the moment.

A Near Defeat

Yesterday was not so good.

No porn or MB, but I did find myself closer to the edge than I should have been. There's some very thin ice out there that my filter will let through quite happily...

I know what I need to do today - and what I need to avoid doing.

A Minor Victory

Waiting for a take away over the weekend, the person in the queue in fornt of me was reading one of those tabloids that will, given the flimsiest of excuses, run a lavishly illustrated double spread on lingerie. (I know this only because that was the page he had it open at.)

I picked up a copy of the local paper and sat down. His meal was ready, he put the paper down and left. The thought occurred to me to swap papers - after all, I had a copy of the paper I was reading in my living room.

But it occurred only fleetingly. I would, in a past life (ie last week) have done so, and skimmed through the tabloid until I got to the lingerie feature, or some other excuse the editor had found for a glamorous girl to appear scantily clad in the news...

I left the low quality tabloid, closed, next to me, and read the local paper until my take away was ready.

So, Thursday to Sunday, 100% clean, and a small victory to boot.

The Easy Road, or the narrow track?

Crikey, I really told it like I saw it yesterday.

Thankfully, I'm seeing things a little brighter today. I got through yesterday 100% clean - and after the previous couple of days, it felt good. I'm sure that was thanks in no small part to the prayers of John, dewde & the others - friends I am truly thankful to God for.

So I've taken the turn. I'm off the Easy Road that porn offered, and on my way down the narrow track. The going's tough at the moment, and I can still hear the traffic freely thundering down the Easy Road, and feel the nagging temptation to get back on that road.

But I don't really want to go that way. The route I've chosen seems difficult now, but I've realised one thing: Doing it the Easy way is always harder.

Crossroads

Well, after a pretty good start, this week has rapidly become the worst I've had in a while.

My wife took a turn for the worse, which affected me badly.

On the outside, I'm putting on a brave front. I'm trying to retain some sense of normality for the sake of our baby. I must be doing OK - at least, my wife thinks I'm coping well with her downs and deeper downs.

In truth, I'm a mess. I've got my own crap to deal with, and this whole situation is exacerbating all the negatives that have driven me to porn in the past. A complete lack of intimacy, appreciation or, at times, even acknowledgement form my wife. I've almost forgotten what it's like to have a wife - at least, what the good bits are like. I know only too well what the needy, whiney, making a mess of my home and leaving me to clear up after her bits are like.

Inside, I'm lonely and I'm pissed off.

And, though it pains me to admit this, the only way I have coped so far is by burying myself in my little fantasy world of porn.

It's like I'm not allowed to have my own problems at the moment. I have to be strong for my family. And doing that makes me weak for myself. Porn gets the better of me.

So here I stand, at a junction in my life. I can carry on down this road, spend another day indulging my demons and forget about the shit that's going on around me.

Or I can turn back to God, where I should be, find a friend, some constructive release, and someone who can actually help my wife and myself through this.

Smart money's on porn at the moment. It's so much more accessible than God.

Focus not returned

I wish I could say something else, but I can't.

The focus has not returned.

I would still rather escape my family problems by running back to my old friend porn.

Hmmm.

However, I know what I'm doing, I know the problems I'm trying to avoid, and I can take steps to confront them instead.

And I can decide not to let this slide; today I may have slipped, but I'm not going to fall back into an mb cycle as before. I will pick myself up and move on.

I'm back!

Well, I stayed off-line for as long as I could, but ultimately there is paperwork to be done, e-mails to be sent, research to be, er, researched, and I need the internet again.

Annoyingly, the temptations returned almost immediately (in fact, I think they started before I even switched the PC on...), and the dreams returned last night, and it was they that triggered my last slide, so whether the break has increased my strength and focus will be tested as I work through today.

Anyway, temptation aside I have been no porn and no MB since 26th November.