masturbation relapse and consequences

well actually not really relapsing but rather for "rewarding" myself for a record i finished yesterday, i masturbated 5x in 2 days after beeing abstinent for almost 5 months (only twice during this time)

after relapsing and comparing to how i was before i now can feel exactly what (over-) masturbation does to you.

what i experience is:
-sunken reddish watery eyes
-worn out skin, big pores
-dry lips
-tired overall appearance
-bad taste in mouth
-problems focusing, finding myself walking around like a tiger in a cage forgetting what i wanted to do
-pain seems more intense
-weakness in legs, knees
-hard to radiate high self esteem even when i have to (meeting my new neighbors)
-cold ends of extremities
-weak voice
-blurred kind of tunnel vision (you won't recognize it when you don't know the "before" state)
-high light sensitivity
-catching myself stopping breathing
-feeling absolutely powerless
-can't make myself exercise
-almost blacking out when getting out of warm bathwater fast.
- very nervous outside in traffic

only the first 2 of those orgasms were good, rest was just not worth it.
so I'm done with masturbation.
if you have sex or masturbate multiple times during only a few days or even a week, you are constantly weakening yourself.

Hey.
Thanks for sharing your experiences. Nice experiment.
What about hair? Did you see any difference?

I didn't experience the same symptoms after breaking my 170 day (226- 1 time only) streak, altough it felt extremely bad psychologyically. I felt some kind of pleasant numbness after the first one, but after that it felt a waste of time and somewhat unsatisfactory. Before the relapse, i felt more vigilant maybe, but thats all. Masturbating certainly drains your energy, and that alone is something that should be enough to go on another streak. It couldn't hurt my hair and prostate i guess.

irfoc wrote:Hey.
Thanks for sharing your experiences. Nice experiment.
What about hair? Did you see any difference?

i started brushing at the same time 5 months ago and 3 months later detumescence so it's hard to tell the influence on my hair. i'm getting terminal + vellus regrowth in temple area and i contribute this to detumescence. but I'm 100% sure masturbation affects hair in a negative way and has had its part in my hairloss. i noticed my beard, eyebrows, chesthair growing stronger and my voice getting deeper, so i think abstinence was definetely helping.

Wlac89 wrote:I didn't experience the same symptoms after breaking my 170 day (226- 1 time only) streak, altough it felt extremely bad psychologyically. I felt some kind of pleasant numbness after the first one, but after that it felt a waste of time and somewhat unsatisfactory. Before the relapse, i felt more vigilant maybe, but thats all. Masturbating certainly drains your energy, and that alone is something that should be enough to go on another streak. It couldn't hurt my hair and prostate i guess.

when you relapsed, did you do it multiple times? after the first time  it wasn't that bad, but after the 3rd time i felt like i was on drugs, it felt exactely like a few years ago when i was smoking pot

So, you say that we should not have sex at all then, even not to masturbate while we having sex?
The age is an important factor - I read articles about the Indian and Chinese approach to orgasms - basically the idea is that you should save them as they contains the life force - that is why there are so many negative side effects. when you age you should do and less less sex. The western approach claims that even when you are 50,60 and older you should enjoy from an active sex life, and that's against the nature of the body.

BelieveInIt wrote:

Wlac89 wrote:I didn't experience the same symptoms after breaking my 170 day (226- 1 time only) streak, altough it felt extremely bad psychologyically. I felt some kind of pleasant numbness after the first one, but after that it felt a waste of time and somewhat unsatisfactory. Before the relapse, i felt more vigilant maybe, but thats all. Masturbating certainly drains your energy, and that alone is something that should be enough to go on another streak. It couldn't hurt my hair and prostate i guess.

when you relapsed, did you do it multiple times? after the first time  it wasn't that bad, but after the 3rd time i felt like i was on drugs, it felt exactely like a few years ago when i was smoking pot

Yea, i did it multiple times. The first time was awesome, maybe even the second one. I felt like a man again. During the abstinence period, i didn't feel anything down there, except for morning woods (flatline?) - then i got hardons that i used to have before. However, after the first 1-2 masturbation, numbness stayed, satisfaction was gone. I felt tired. Though i have to say it did not seemed to affect me the next, so it seems to me that i can sleep it through altough I'm sure it will deplete me again in the long run.

For anyone interested, I received an email today:

"Hey man,Im 16 and started fapping around 13 and noticed i started to get a receding hairline. it was gradually getting worse and as soon as i found out what caused it from your post, i immediately stopped and started taking vitamin b12 and saw palmetto. Its been a week and i see tiny hairs regrowing. This hairline was ruining my life, just wanted to say thanks for sharing the info bro"

16 was the age I started noticing recession also, although I didn't have a scooby doo what was causing it at the time. It wasn't until I was around 24 that I made the connection, but by then, my hairline was pretty receded, and it took me half a year to see any regrowth.

I suppose the earlier you treat it, the faster the results will be.

P.S. I don't know if his eyes were playing tricks on him (seeing regrowth after a week), but that's what he is claiming.

I thought I was seeing regrowth back in 2012 as well, turned out those were just my hairs miniaturizing... not growing back. Looks pretty similar unless you take pictures often.

DeadlyDevice wrote:I thought I was seeing regrowth back in 2012 as well, turned out those were just my hairs miniaturizing... not growing back. Looks pretty similar unless you take pictures often.

For me, personally, I did achieve some regrowth. I'm in the process of doing it again to see if it will yield new hair again. I don't know about abstaining for one week and seeing results, though.

Some other guy emailed me to claim the same thing, but he said that he changed his lifestyle to becoming more proactive for most of the day and started using some aloe vera topical on his balding areas. Nevertheless he seemed to be over the moon with joy at seeing new hairs sprouting.

Weird.

BelieveInIt wrote:what i experience is:
-sunken reddish watery eyes
-worn out skin, big pores
-dry lips
-tired overall appearance
-bad taste in mouth
-problems focusing, finding myself walking around like a tiger in a cage forgetting what i wanted to do
-pain seems more intense
-weakness in legs, knees
-hard to radiate high self esteem even when i have to (meeting my new neighbors)
-cold ends of extremities
-weak voice
-blurred kind of tunnel vision (you won't recognize it when you don't know the "before" state)
-high light sensitivity
-catching myself stopping breathing
-feeling absolutely powerless
-can't make myself exercise
-almost blacking out when getting out of warm bathwater fast.
- very nervous outside in traffic

Masturbation in a "healthy" person doesn't cause any of this. Maybe investigate your prolactin, parathyroid, or serotonin values and see if any of them are high. Carbon dioxide, which is stimulated by thyroid hormone, tends to regulate those substances, so measuring that might be good, too.

Roddy, I was always of the opinion that high blood C02 is bad and causes acidosis if not expelled from the lungs properly, but I've just been checking your site out and see how much you believe it benefits someone suffering from hair loss.

Also if I've been sleeping in a poorly ventilated room in which I have been breathing in the C02 which I have been breathing out, then I will always feel scalp inflammation. The same thing occurs if I'm on a long train journey with lots of commuters who are a) breathing in lots of oxygen b) breathing out waste C02.

Edited:
"Inadequate ventilation of the lungs causes respiratory acidosis. The rate at which carbon dioxide is eliminated from the body fluids through the lungs falls. This increases the concentration of carbon dioxide in the body fluids. As carbon dioxide levels increase excess carbon dioxide reacts with water to form carbonic acid. The carbonic acid dissociates to form hydrogen ions and bicarbonate ions. The increase in hydrogen ion concentration causes the pH of the body fluids to decrease. If the pH of the body fluids falls below 7.35, symptoms of respiratory acidosis become apparent."

I'm not saying you're wrong, but what do you say to these symptoms and the conventional knowledge on C02?

This is where I find Peat, not to be wrong, but myopic.

The idea of simply increasing respiratory rate with no other consideration is something that doesn't sit well with me. I'm not demonizing carbohydrate intake or his theories. I just think he ignores that the natural metabolic rates of individuals vary. Its not simply a matter of add more substrate and the reaction proceeds faster and all is good.

There are individuals who oxidize carbohydrate too quickly. They're called "fast oxidizers". I don't like the term because its been adopted by fad diet bloggers, which has kind of cheapened the value of this perspective. Increasing respiratory rate in these individuals is only going to increase CO2 and increase the acidosis problem, further increasing the respiratory rate to clear the excess carbonic acid. The result is inefficient use of carbohydrate energy. You get great big bursts of energy followed by crashes from the insulin activity. You also get a lot more oxidative stress from the proton leak. Telling these individuals to consume more carbs is a bad idea. What eventually happens is the level of oxidative stress at the cellular level leads to desensitization of insulin receptors and then fat buildup...these people are getting plenty of energy without the ability to use it. On a macro level their intake is fine, but the cell is starving. Welcome to modern obesity. (I don't want to ignore Peat's points though that carb type is really key here, because I agree with that)

Slow oxidizers are much less efficient at oxidizing carbohydrate, but it results in more efficient energy usage overall. Higher levels of CO2 are not as big of a problem for these people, and increased carbohydrate is actually superior to fats. Ketogenic diets and lack of b-vitamins ruin these people. Alkalosis is a bigger concern for these individuals, and sometimes you see them do worse on protein rich diets because the ammonia levels make the issue worse.

Again I'm not expert, so I'm not trying to be the Peat debunker because I actually think carbohydrate used properly is a good thing. I just don't think carbohydrate oxidation can be treated as equal across populations. In other words, for me solving the cellular energy problem is not about just supplying more energy. Of course, increasing thyroid increases the rate of oxygen/carb utilization, which increases respirator rate, but the missing part of the equation to me is that if energy requirements do not meet these levels, an energy excess can paradoxically lead to an energy starvation from desenitization to insulin.

That's my outlook anyway. If thyroid hormone is the spark plug, insulin is the gas pedal....it doesn't really matter if you've got the means to ignite your fuel if the fuel can't get into the cylinder.

Ah, Peat. I've been following his advice for around 15 months. I like the fact that he shoots at different targets than the mainstream, and he gets a lot of things right, but he still falls into his own patterns of thinking where he just doesn't take some really important things into consideration.

For example, the thyroid-centric view on health. Now, the thyroid is obviously important. Very. But not only is it but one gland of many (that must act in harmony with the other glands), it's that his idea basically boils down to whatever metabolic problem being there, will get better if you just take some thyroid. Thyroid freaking fixes everything, it's the holy grail in Peat world.

But there are so many questions unanswered there that it doesn't really help anyone get better. As far as thyroid disease the only point where he diverges from the mainstream is that he recommends taking T3 as well. And that's it. (Yes I know the dieting aspect and avoiding PUFA is supposed to help the thyroid work better but let's just say the end result of that is highly inconsequential if you have large scale hormone problems). For someone like myself his advice does not really help one identify the causes of his own individual hypothyroidism (which I view more as a state than a disease - unless you have your gland taken out or severely damaged).

My gland is perfectly intact, my hypothyroidism was caused by fasting and very low calorie dieting. But even after resuming eating in full force for over 15 months I am still hypothyroid and none of my symptoms resolved despite implementing all the Peat advice in the world.

And just like you say, pushing the thyroid without trying to fix the underlying problem has backfired on me terribly. Whenever I even touched anything with T3 everything got worse. Clearly, the body does not want to increase the metabolic rate. But there is no explanation for that in the Peat-prism. The parts that I adopted from Peat-world are eating a lot of carbs (fruit, not grains), eating raw dairy, avoiding most vegetables and PUFA, etc. The other things I patch together from my own devices, he is against most supplementation which I don't think I can get better without, he has an anti stance on iodine which I disagree with, and some other things.

His biggest contribution to me would be how he opened my eyes to a really indepth presentation of biology and made me question virtually everything that comes from the mainstream mouth. His articles caused a paradigm shift in me, even if I may not agree with everything he states.

I think the fact that he was kind of a clamoring voice against carb-phobia is worth it, in and of itself. The fact that carbs are not the real problem, that the body's mechanisms for dealing with energy are the real issue.

But that's where I think he shoots himself in the foot, because he treats every human being as equals regarding energy production. And its an issue of being a researcher versus being a clinician, in my mind.

The inability to apply Peat's principles universally becomes apparent in a clinical perspective. As a research biologist/biochemist who isn't exposed to hundreds and hundreds of real life cases, the situation permits making population-wide assumptions about the chemistry. In the Peat view we are all the metabolic sum of an identical set of chemical processes which suffer from lack of substrate, and whose rates are all assumed to be equal, and the consequences of these rates are assumed to be the same for everyone . It might work on paper, but we've all seen reports of the Peat diet.

I'd say from what I've seen about half of people thrive on it, and it fails for the other half. And this should be expected if we're taking a clinical perspective, because nothing will ever be the answer for everyone. So I guess what I'm saying is biovariability isn't a huge focus in Peat's framework.

This isn't to take away from what Peat's work does do well. I totally agree with him on the consequences of inadequate thyroid function and the stressful state that occurs when the body is "captained" by the pituitary. But again, the feedback of the body on energy status can't be ignored, we can't ignore how our body adapts and "talks back at us" about the energetic state. The body does adapt to cellular redox status by augmenting cellular energy uptake, and I believe that happens regardless of the ambient thyroid hormone levels, and simply increasing concentrations on that side of the equation doesn't mean you'll push the equilibrium the other way.

In other words, the body is far, far too complex that we could override its autonomous energy balance mechanisms, that we could "outsmart" it by simply shoving more substrate in. If the insulin signalling isn't there, its again equivalent to putting more fuel in the car and replacing the spark plugs, but not being able to depress the gas pedal.

There are individuals who oxidize carbohydrate too quickly. They're called "fast oxidizers". I don't like the term because its been adopted by fad diet bloggers, which has kind of cheapened the value of this perspective. Increasing respiratory rate in these individuals is only going to increase CO2 and increase the acidosis problem, further increasing the respiratory rate to clear the excess carbonic acid.

And from my observations, it would seem that the general tightness of the scalp and it's capillary network slowly releases C02 gases, causes them to accumulate, where they then mix with fluids and form into acids. The problem is made worse, I believe, by pillow compression, as this would further slow down the release of C02 gases from the scalp.

I personally believe that there is a reason why we expel C02 when we exhale, in the same way we expel feces and urine: all are waste products. The fact is, I have had innumerable firsthand experiences from breathing in high C02, and those experiences were not good at all. Aside from the scalp inflammation, high C02 caused me to develop a terrible stutter, terrible headaches, and serious anxiety issues.

Isn't it also interesting that if I am on a high carb diet that I will start stuttering again? Likely IMO due to so much C02 in the blood.

Interesting observations. Makes sense.

Yes.

I've been interested in metabolic acidosis for a little bit now. I'm not talking about the kind people suggest we get from too much red meat haha.

But in bowel disease or inflammation, people often get a form of metabolic acidosis because intestinal inflammation often results in bicarbonate loss. If you've got bile in the stool, or if you have regular diarrhea, you are losing large amounts of bicarbonate.

The slight acidosis that results has pretty big inflammatory consequences. Lower growth hormone. Insulin resistance. Decreased thyroid hormone. Increased cortisol.

I think this is one of the big mediators in why we have the inflammatory state experienced in diabetics and pre-diabetics. And my thinking says that this initial mild acidosis might be one of the reasons for development of type 2 diabetes initially.

Fast oxidizers tend to lean toward acidosis.

Xenon, a lack of bloodflow could potentially lower the rates of CO2 clearance from any tissue that wasn't receiving adequate flow. RBCs are the main CO2 carrier, to my knowledge. They dissolve the CO2. This is basically what stimulates them to release oxygen in the tissues that need it.

CausticSymmetry wrote:Interesting observations. Makes sense.

Yes, CS, it's not my intention to prove droddy wrong, I'm just simply pointing out the problems high C02 caused me. Yet when I realized that my bedroom was high in C02 and started ventilating my room properly, all of the nasty side-effects began to disappear.

Surely that can't be coincidence.

P.S. for anyone interested, here is a pdf health risk assessment on C02. I found it pretty interesting:
http://www.blm.gov/pgdata/etc/medialib/blm/wy/information/NEPA/cfodocs/howell.Par.2800.File.dat/25apxC.pdf

Xenon wrote:

CausticSymmetry wrote:Interesting observations. Makes sense.

Yes, CS, it's not my intention to prove droddy wrong, I'm just simply pointing out the problems high C02 caused me. Yet when I realized that my bedroom was high in C02 and started ventilating my room properly, all of the nasty side-effects began to disappear.

Surely that can't be coincidence.

Brother, none of your assertions about the room you sleep or the train you commute on has anything to do with what I'm talking about. Carbon dioxide is probably a major—if not the the largest factor in "MPB," in addition to its role in maintaing the entire coherence of the organism by allowing oxygen to disassociate from hemoglobin (i.e., the "Bohr effect") better allowing cells, tissues, and organs to absorb it.

Without thyroid-driven respiratory energy, and the subsequent production of carbon dioxide, there is an increased reliance on lactic acid, which displaces co2 via the lactate paradox, and a "higher functioning" of the adaptive "anti-hair" substances are needed—which IH has been talking about for more than a decade (e.g., prolactin, estrogen, aldosterone, etc.).

Danny,

Here is another issue I have with Peat's perspective, and that's the CO2 issue. But I'm not a biochemistry expert, so correct me if I'm wrong in my thinking on this subject.

But CO2 is, in and of itself, a rather "toxic" metabolite of oxidative respiration. The body has tightly controlled mechanisms for excreting it. It wants to get rid of it, and one of the unique ways it is able to do this is because of the natural equilibrium CO2 has with water. But that is the point too. CO2 freely interconverts with H2O to form H2CO3, which has a pKa of about 6.1. So at physiological pH, CO2 is constantly generating HCO3- and H+. This process decreases serum pH and releases oxygen from hemoglobin to raise the pH. CO2 in a physiological environment is acidic. Granted, it generates a natural buffering system, but it is increasing the acidity of the serum to release oxygen.

CO2 is the waste product. More oxygen has to be used to get rid of CO2's effects. So we are constantly in this state of flux where we are consuming oxygen, generating CO2, and using more oxygen to get rid of the H ions, just to generate more CO2.

But then lactic acid is suddenly a toxin due to its acidity? Its simply a process for energy production occurring where there is relatively less oxygen. Lactic acid, with a pretty low pKa generates even more oxygen release than carbonic acid.

So to me, the issue of oxygen release is really an issue of pH and an issue of partial pressure of oxygen. Where the tissues need more oxygen, they will get it.

And thyroid hormone increases the energy demands of the cell because it promotes growth and increased mitochondrial activity. So the increase in respiration caused by thyroid hormone is what results in the increase in CO2, which demands the increase in O2.

So I think of it like this: let's say when we burn substance A, we generate substance B. Substance B is bad, but we need to burn more of substance A to get rid of B, because burning substance A is the only way to generate adequate energy to get rid of substance B. But in the process we generate more substance B.

Looking at substance B and saying its valuable because it insists on more use of substance A would be illogical.

In this light, increasing thyroid hormone levels for no other purpose that the generation of CO2 and increase in O2 levels seems like its increasing metabolic rate for the sake of itself. Is there any evidence out there to show that an elevated metabolic rate (an increase in overall energy flux in and out of the system) is better for longevity in an organism? I'm asking seriously here. Because I've heard the assertion that a lower overall metabolic rate tends to increase lifespan because you are generating less oxidative stress. This would be akin to the less you run an engine, the longer its likely to last. Now when we are talking rate of living theory, we have to address the excess generation of ROS. A general increase in metabolic rate increases oxidative stress. The body would have to have an equally proportional increase in antioxidant capacity to offset this.

If you check out Demetrius' theory on Metabolic Stability versus longevity, I think its valuable to consider the equilibrium, that the ability to resist changes in the steady-state concentration of cellular metabolites is one of the key factors in our longevity. Basically not only the generation of ROS, but also in our specific maintenance and repair mechanisms.

To me, thyroid hormone is itself an adaptive response element. When the cell realizes a need for increased energy production or an increased level of energetic substrate, I believe thyroid hormone is a means of adapting to the new flux of energy required to maintain homeostasis in the presence of these increased metabolites (carbohydrate substrate or CO2). So yes, increasing carb intake increases thyroid hormone because an increase in energy flux is required to maintain balanced "in vs. out" in a homeostatic way. You see an increase in thyroid hormone during puberty because of the growth factors released in the body. Growth is an inflammatory/oxidative process. There are studies that show hyperthyroidism is not compensated by increased antioxidant enzyme in humans. There are also studies showing that an increase in metabolic rate in humans correlates to increased oxidative stress.

Increasing the absolute metabolic rate is not compatible with steady-state stability. For a species who faces stressors, especially changing food intake/availabilty, an increased metabolic rate should not stabilize metabolism but rather destabilize it.

If I saw evidence that our antioxidant systems bumped up proportionately to increased metabolic rates, I'd heavily rethink this. But for now this is where I'm at.

AS54, I really appreciate your responses, but it would literally take me hours to provide references for everything you're asking/saying. I would just link you articles I've written, which contain references, but that seems a bit lame.

"CO2 is the waste product."

Without CO2, respiration goes awry (look up the Bohr effect and beneficial effects of altitude on health, e.g., mitochondrial biogenesis, faster recovery from exercise, remission of cancer, etc.), turning pyruvate and fatty acids into alternate "oxygen sinks" leading to oxidative stress, increased lactic acid (increases the prostaglandin that makes estrogen from testosterone, pge2), and an overall "energy deficiency," leading to a "higher functioning" of the adaptive stress hormones—that are all associated with baldness—especially the pituitary variety, which A.V. Evert and D.W. Denckla found that suppressed respiration and mobilized free fatty acids—which can spontaneously break down into prostaglandins (remember pgd2? why do you think this is elevated in balding men? Genetics?) and other anti-respiratory metabolites.

You mentioned Raymond Pearl's "rate of living theory" in your comment. To say that idea is complete trash is an understatement. I wrote about it my book (which is free), but I'll leave it for you to investigate if you're interested. Also, I would love to know how Raymond Pearl's theory in any way, shape, or form can be used to support the integrity of the hair follicle—which like all other tissues is dependent on metabolic energy to maintain its structure.

Also, Peat's work is simply and aggregation of research from older awesome scientists, such as Albert Szent-Györgyi, Gilbert Ling, Otto Warburg, Harry Rubin, Hans Selye, and others. Older scientists were fuckin' bad ass and seemed to actually care about solving the mystery of life, rather than proving that we were all "lumbering robots" being controlled by "the genes."