HELP! I quit porn, but my potency, genital size, and libido are decreasing

This is normal. It’s a typical phase of recovery in men who have porn-related erectile dysfunction, delayed ejaculation or just plain porn addiction. We call it “flatlining.” It’s temporary, but it can be very disconcerting, because it makes stopping porn seem like the cause of ED instead of the solution. (See accounts below.)

The good news is that it will pass, and your libido will come roaring back. Everyone's recovery is a bit different, though, and it is not necessarily linear. Even after you start to notice signs of life, it's quite normal to see them followed by phases of sleepy-libido before you are completely back to normal. A few men with longer reboots experience a return of libido for a few weeks, followed by a few weeks of flat-lining libido.

The bad news is that this unnerving “flatline” phase can last six weeks. (Or, in rare cases even longer.) However, we know of no one whose sexual performance issues are related to heavy porn use, who hasn’t ultimately improved—provided that he avoids intense sexual stimulation (ideally PMO and sexual fantasy) while allowing his brain to return to normal sensitivity. For the science behind your condition, and why it’s necessary to avoid intense stimulation, watch this video series Erectile Dysfunction and Porn.

If you want to shorten the misery, here are some tips that others have recommended:

Be consistent.

Those who recover fastest (“reboot”), are consistent in avoiding porn, masturbation, sexual fantasy, sexting with Facebook hotties, and orgasm during the reboot period. If you choose to mix in occasional sex with a partner, that’s great, but some men find it sets them back early in their reboot. At first, any orgasm or intense arousal can trigger a powerful “chaser effect," and the result is a binge, which slows recovery. Occasional masturbation is even more likely to trigger a binge, as it usually involves porn flashbacks. If you can masturbate based on physical sensations alone, without intense stimulation, it is less problematic—especially later in the process.

Edging to porn without orgasm is particularly detrimental, because today’s porn is hyperstimulating. It releases way more dopamine into the brain than static porn of the past—or even good old masturbation without porn fantasy. Dopamine levels that numb the pleasure response in the brain are closely related to porn-related sexual dysfunction (as explained in the video series above). One man reported that he ejaculated only once every ten days (because he saw benefits from conserving his sexual energy). Yet he still watched Internet porn every day…and developed ED.

Do not test.

When your libido flatlines, or you have other symptoms, such as “lifeless penis,” it is easy to panic and want to test yourself with porn to see if you can still force an erection. This tends to slow your recovery. Be courageous and patient. Remain in “The Void” until your body gives you signs that your brain and sexual responsiveness are back to normal.

Do not compare yourself with others.

It’s true that those who started masturbating long before high-speed Internet porn, and those who only started watching high-speed fairly recently tend to recover from porn-related sexual performance problems the quickest.

However, the severity of the problem is also tied to less tangible factors. First, brains differ in their sensitivity and response to excess dopamine (stimulation). Your brain may have adapted more quickly, and may need more time to return to balance. Second, the numbed pleasure response, which is the cause of your problem, doesn't appear to be directly tied to hours of viewing according to research. It's tied to "intensity of experience."

This can obviously vary for people. This guy even got lucky and recovered without much in the way of symptoms:

I really never had any withdrawal symptoms . I may have had blue balls for 10 minutes once. Other than those ten minutes, nothing. ED is as bad as it gets...always working to stay hard, not enjoying the sex. Man, I am glad to be over it.

Another guy:

Not everyone has a flatline, and it doesn't always begin around the same time. Most have it happen after about a week, but others (myself included) may have it much later. For the longest time I figured I wouldn't have one at all, but I ended up having a short one for most of week 7. It can also vary wildly in terms of length. There are many theories about why one experiences the flatline, but nothing is certain. Personally, I believe the flatline is a transition stage as you start giving up on the porn and stop thinking about it at all. Because you aren't sensitized to real-world cues yet, the libido plummets as neither real-world nor porn thoughts stimulate your brain. (I really noted a strong correlation between the beginning of my flatline and the disappearance of any porn-related cravings.)

If recovery is taking a long time and you started on highspeed porn early in your life...

consider some of these suggestions.

Flatline Symptoms

• My flaccid size has decreased dramatically. Since the second or third day since starting this (I'm 30+ days in now), I haven't had any morning response. I don't know if it's endocrine or neurologically driven.
• After a few days of brain tantrums (cravings), flatline for several weeks. Basically I just felt totally indifferent about girls, sex, everything. There’s a little nagging voice from the PMO beast that nagged at me in the back of my mind, but mostly, I just didn’t care. And my penis was just very lifeless and small. It was like somebody just pulled the plug on whatever machines provides my sex drive. No libido at all.
• I flatlined for 3 weeks. My penis was completely dead and useless, but now it's big and firm.

• Day 6 - As for raw, physical observations regarding my penis; since the start of my streak, I haven't had one full erection, no morning wood, and it looks smaller (like when it's cold out or when you get out of the shower).

• It has been 2 weeks since I used porn or orgasmed. I just had sex with my girlfriend, and wasn't feeling very turned on. Lackluster erection and early ejaculation. I used to be rock hard for hours a few years ago! Will this get better? I'm worried.[A few days later] It really helped to clarify how common these symptoms are! I am seeing positive signs: morning wood twice and a middle-of-the-night erection last night, both of which felt about 70-80 percent full! It's great to see these physical changes early. I'm also past the dead penis stage, which was pretty weird. My penis just feels fuller at all times. I am beginning to feel stimulated and get half hard without touching, and only thinking about my girlfriend. All good signs; I'm on the yellow brick road!

• After 1 week, it felt as if my penis had no life. That it basically was dead. I was afraid as hell. But after two-three weeks, the morning erections started returning. They were not strong at all (Only like 20% strong) but they have improved and I would say they regularly are around 70% [at one month] .

• [Age 37, Day 40 no PMO] For me the flatline thing first went for about 20 days. Then there was a super-intense urge to O. I would feel drunk on horniness, but wouldn't have an erection. Some days, if I wore silk boxers and drove on a bumpy road, I would feel like I might have an O while driving, even though I didn't have an erection at all. Just these waves of warm, erectionless horniness.Just observing, it seems to me that these washes of total horniness without an erection are some kind of leftover process from watching porn. When I first watched porn, I felt like I was going to have an O without an erection. That's how powerful an effect the porn had on me. I think my brain probably just dumped an overdose of dopamine, and yeah it certainly feels great.I'm guessing the tolerance is way up there for people who have watched porn for years, and we don't feel this wash anymore. They need the porn-level stimulation just to function, like a junkie who needs drugs just to feel like they are at their own baseline.So anyway, after will-powering through a few days of intense desire for an O, I went into a sort of a flatline again, for a few weeks. There is something ok about this. Actually, now I have to say I think it's a good idea to be ok with the flatline. Here is why. We have been obsessed with sexual imagery. Not just imagery, but forms of stimulation which don't exist in real life. In porn the camera moves around, one scene cuts to the next, magical orgies, etc.Our flatline comes because we are not yet re-acclimated to real life. In real life we get aroused because we are sitting next to our lady at the movie theater and she is saying intelligent things and playing with her hair, or because she keeps taking sips of cranberry juice and fluttering her eyelashes, or we are just thinking about making out with our girl on the couch.So, we need the flatline period to get from artificial dopamine overdose levels back to being able to get aroused by the real world. And over the past few days I have been. I've noticed all through this process there have been fairly regular erections in the morning, though generally they are on the weak side and only last a few seconds after I wake up. But these past five days or so, I've been waking up with fairly normal fantasies in my head and the erections have lasted for quite some time. They've also started happening at random times, while driving and not thinking about anything.

• One thing I REALLY hate about beginning a reboot is that the balls tend to get really, really small before they start to get big again. A lot of the time it feels like they're trying to crawl back into my body. Surely as I've stopped emptying them, they should maybe at least stay the same size, not shrivel?
• (Day 12) I'm still flat lining, my penis is unresponsive and small but I knew that was to be expected going into this so I'm not too worried and honestly I'm enjoying not being ruled my my PMO cravings.

• Shrinkage is a common experience and pretty scary while your member looks like it's getting reabsorbed into your pelvis. After a while things return to normal and maybe even improve. Hard to tell unless maybe you're measuring with calipers etc. In sum, don't worry about it. It is definitely part of the process.

• [Report on symptoms after a month of rebooting]-ED (Working on it with some progress)- No morning erections (Some progress)- Cold penis (Gone)

• I’m desperate. My penis is dead and my libido is dead after 3 weeks, is this normal? I'm getting so depressed. I think I’m worse than before, doing no PMO. I’ve used lots of porn stimulation, but with time it caused me ED. I’m desperate and fear to lose my 8-year relationship.

• My libido kind of plummeted this week (week 10). The problem I had a few weeks ago, where my penis retracted itself appearing like I just had a cold shower, came back. I'm not stressing about it though, I figure it's just another phase in my recovery. (Read his full rebooting account.)

• [Day 35] I never realized how serious my ED problem was until I came to this site. My penis feels so tiny and lifeless in general right now, which worries me a little bit.

• I've noticed the 'dead penis' syndrome. After about 4-5 days my libido is absolutely shot and my penis shrivels up to nothing. It's terrifying actually.

• I wake up every morning hoping there is something...anything....but nope. Day after day there is just nothingness. I felt better fighting The Urge because at least I knew there was something going on, but there is no Urge now. Also, does anyone feel that their penis feels cold? Or maybe it's just my mind playing tricks on me.

• My penis is limp. I get random erections, but it's extremely dead..lol, if that makes any sense. Like it's just there. It's shrinks a lot. And I don't know why. I can have sex if the time comes around, but when I'm not aroused, it just goes completely dead!!!

• Apart from mild headaches and restless sleep, I haven't had the withdrawal symptoms many people mention. Instead, I feel nothing. It's like I just don't have a libido. No morning wood. No wet dreams. No spontaneous erections. No cravings. Haven't been horny. I've had opportunities to have sex but my body is not responding. I'm taking tango classes, so I'm reasonably social but still no sign of my libido. I can dance with a beautiful girl and have no physical reaction whatsoever. I'm aware cerebrally that a girl is attractive, but I don't feel it physically.

• The softness and shriveling are absolutely part of it. I would go a week or so no PMO and then give in because I was so horny, or else I would do PM just in hopes it would charge up my libido. This only made things worse. You will have to go through some weeks—some people go months—where you are worried that your libido is going away forever and even more worried your penis is getting so small you think it's retracting into your stomach like the head of turtle. It's terrifying. It really is.

• I wanted to be with girls, as my solo sexual experiences were just depressing. So I decided to quit masturbation and said to myself, "Orgasms could only come from girls." This forced me to go out approach, and flirt with, girls. One side-effect of the 'I am not allowed to masturbate' is that I stopped watching porn. I didn't know about this website or porn addictions at this point, so I was sort of giving up PMO by accident.I was surprised. I quickly started to feel attraction for girls. I was horny and knowing I could only get sexual gratification from a girl (my self-imposed rule) started to actively approach and pursue girls. I met this amazing girl one night when clubbing. We had a surreal connection, with stupidly high levels of attraction, kissing, grinding, and feeling each other's bodies all over on the dance floor. I asked her to come back with me that night, but we said she didn't know me enough. I went home and despite wanting some release, didn't allow myself to masturbate.We met again and ended up in her room. I was nervous, as it had been so long since I had been in bed with a girl. We kissed passionately and undressed each other, but I wasn't getting an erection. Nothing. In fact, my dick was tiny and completely limp. Nothing she did had any effect. She was really understanding, and said "It's your body there is nothing to be ashamed of". She was totally comfortable with her own body, and loved being naked. We spent the whole night lying naked together talking, relaxed and comfortable. It felt great.The next day I got home and went to my room to masturbate to see if everything was still working. The experience was disconcerting. First, I struggled to get hard, and then when I did I would lose it. It took about 1.5 hours before I had an orgasm, using the most intense fantasy and hand action I knew.At this point, I assumed that abstaining from masturbation was not a good thing! No PMO forced me to meet girls—but it also seemed to kill my erections. A Catch 22. (I didn't know about rebooting, flatlining etc.)

• [Two weeks since porn use and orgasm] I feel more relaxed, but my penis is extremely shrunken and so are my testicles. I don't know why, but they are.

• It's amazing how the great libido pendulum swings around. The last week or so, as I have been purging sexual fantasy out of my mind and dealing with the grubby withdrawals from that, I have felt lost, lonely, confused, almost asexual, worried, anxious and depressed. The only thing that was keeping me going was faith in my creator, nature and in the reboot process. Getting fantasy out of your system starts out as a hard task. It starts to get easier after a while. Then you notice that your libido starts to completely depart from you, even in your mind. You start to lose all desire for sex. At that point, I started to panic, I tried to force fantasy with little to no results on the penis. Many times I would try to fantasize and I had a hard time constructing a fantasy at all. It was like a skill that I was losing the ability for. At some point I just completely let go. I figured if fantasy was going to be that hard to conjure, I might as well just relax and let it truly pass away. This results in a flatline of the libido, both in the pants and in the brain (was scaring the SH*T out of me). But, as I said in my last post, the night is darkest before the dawn...Today was incredible! For the first time since I can remember, probably when I was 23 or so, I had spontaneous erections in public induced by nothing more than the presence of beautiful women. I felt like an animal! But in a good way! I knew something was different on my drive into town. I saw a woman jogging and suddenly I felt a rush of blood down there. I wasn't fantasizing at all; it just happened. I saw another woman and it happened again, only stronger. And another and again and stronger still. What was going on? I was in orientation for my new job and there were quite a few very well dressed hotties in the room - one was sitting next to me. About five minutes into one of the presentations (I was actually paying attention believe it or not), the girl next to me started playing with her hair. I was instantly aroused - I couldn't help it! There were probably a total of 5 very attractive women in my field of view, and I started really noticing them. Some were making eye contact and some weren't. I started feeling like a damn baboon! Before I knew it, SSHHWWWIINNG! We have liftoff! The funny thing is, I was capable of paying adequate attention to the presentations while covering up my boner with my books. I had probably a 50% 60% erection for about a total of half an hour or more during the pres. NO fantasy, truly spontaneous - just from looking and eye contact. There were probably times where it spiked up to about 80% which was enough to cause the books to start jumping up and down (I am a compulsive PC muscle flexer lol!). I scooted back in my chair and sat forward to cage the madness. All day I have felt as horny as ever. It probably has something to do with being at Vanderbilt all day surrounded by angels. Seriously guys, I am 30 and, until I discovered my PMO addiction and this site, I was convinced that this level of virility was simply gone with age. I was buying in to all that western medicine corporate propaganda with viagra commercials starring guys in their 30's. Have you all noticed that? It seems that lately viagra and cialis have been targeting younger and younger guys. Anyway, it is all BULLSHIT! Though the great libido pendulum in my brain is not likely done with all of its bouncing around, I am seeing dramatic improvement. Today was simply incredible. 48 days and pressing on. I plan to go 90 days or until I feel like the improvements have reached a general plateau.

• I stopped PMO over 2 weeks ago, and to my surprise, I have had literally no cravings for porn at all. It seems like I've jumped straight into flatlining?? I've had some tiny flashes of horniness here and there, but they are very few and far in between. I have only had 2 strong erections in the last 16 days, and one I believe was caused by a semi-awake dream of porn-related images, which I couldn't really control. Otherwise I have been as limp as a noodle.

• This cold turkey thing is just so brutal. Seriously, it's almost like my dick freezes off, like some necro-organ or something.
• [Sometimes the flatline shows up as flat emotions.] At 87 days I have had a long flatline with spurts of life in between. I've almost gotten used to the feeling. I know this can't be normal. It will pass. The signs of life have shown me the light. I have some of my personality back, but I know it's not the whole story. I felt very very bland at one point though.
• (2 weeks into reboot) A few other withdrawal symptoms have sprung up. I feel tired all the time, and my head feels like it's stuffed with cotton. I don't really feel "present" in life right now. My penis still looks and feels dead; haven't been able to get much of a reaction out of it.

• I'm dealing with severe shrinkage of my genitals. WTF? My balls are bigger then my dick. Really weird. On the other hand the fact that my morning wood is returning is definitely a positive sign.
• (Day 28) My penis is comically small - just about non-existent (sometimes I even have issues holding it while urinating).
• About my flatline. When people say they feel like their dick is dead, they arent exaggerating. Iit literally feels lifeless. It feels like a burden to have to carry it around.

Not everyone finds the flatline unpleasant:

I'm having very little fantasies and also very little erectile activity and no morning wood. I guess I'm giving my brain finally that needed rest.. there have been some days with more libido, but still no real erections. It seems like I've hit this state where I seem able to continue forever this way. It took many months to develop the mindset that is required for this, and every relapse was part of that process. So don't give up.

Also, letting desire go feels good. It's not that I want to be desire-less forever, but right now I'm having all the success I want with women. I don't have to get them in bed. Just having fun with them and fooling around is already success. And the women seem to appreciate that. And I in turn appreciate female contact more than ever. It helps so much in this process.

Now, go back and read the ED recovery pages.

Stay on the path until you see the results you want. Avoid fantasy or forced sexual activity. The point of all rebooting is to have normal sexual relations without the need for superstimuli.