Masturbation

Dean.....I think it's just the remnant of what was pounded into us as children. It took me quite a while to work my way past that. You've just got to get to the place where you can subconsciously and consciously accept that you can have sex by yourself if you want to and there's nothing at all wrong with it. In one way I think it can be better than sex with another person because you have complete control of the experience.
.....David

 

For what it's worth, there's a certain hardwired aversion to sex that occurs immediately after ejaculation. Basically, what happens is, serotonin, oxytocin, and dopamine are flowing and levels are high while you're masturbating, but as soon as you ejaculate, the flow cuts off dead and drops pretty much to zero. This is an evolution leftover; sex feels good, but if there weren't something to make you go "yuk" after you've ejaculated... you'd probably keep on having sex. And in the cavemen era, people needed to forage for food, build fires, and so forth. So we evolved with this hardwired aversion.

Today, the remnants of that evolutionary function are still there, and if there's any aspect of shame or guilt or "this is dirty" associated with masturbating, then the hardwired part amplifies those feelings. Add in the religious stigma that is almost inescapable to hear somewhere in our formative years and... even if we reject it, it still creeps into our unconscious.

So you put all that together, and it's pretty easy to see where those feelings come from. The good news is, you rewire the pathways simply by engaging in the activity and reminding yourself there's not only nothing wrong with masturbating, but it is a healthy and normal endeavor.

 

Hello All.....The problem with masturbation is not in the act itself, as it is indeed a healthy thing for guys. It is in the danger of becoming addicted to it...especially to the combination of masturbation and porn. The question then becomes how much is too much? The answer is of course, different for everyone. My wife and I stopped being intimate about 20 years ago primarily due to health issues. Then, as I gradually accepted that I am and always have been gay, it became completely impossible for me to be intimate with a woman. However, I am hardly dead! So masturbation became my way of having sex. I call my self "autosexual". I know that there are many people who have sex primarily through masturbation...or perhaps completely that way. So, do I use porn? Yes, almost every time. Does this mean that I have an addiction. Well...I don't think so. I have sex two, sometimes three times a week. I don't think that's excessive. Now, if that number was a couple of times a day...then we are probably talking about an addiction problem. So I think the next question becomes; "So what if a person masturbates that often...it's their body?" That's a good point and as long as they are not injuring themselves or depending on masturbation to the point that they can no longer have normal interaction with other people, it may not be a problem. I'm 71 years old and I'm not going to be intimate with my wife. She knows that and is fine with it. I've also made the commitment to her that I will not be going on a dating/hookup app. etc. to find a guy for "fun and games". Therefore my use of masturbation is not separating me from "normal"/healthy relations with other people. If I was say, 22 and was masturbating 2-3 times a day then it probably would be something that would prevent me from having a normal sexual relationship with others. And that would equate to addiction. Masturbation is generally safe, it is healthy for men and in the right circumstances there is nothing at all wrong with it. Many of us have been somewhat "brainwashed" in our youth and that's too bad because it's hard to shake the feeling of shame that we were programed with when we were kids. Porn isn't necessarily bad...it's like ice cream and candy...so good until you've eaten too much and now you have diabetes! So I guess the old say "All things in moderation" might just apply in this case!
.....David

 

A couple of thoughts/updates:

There's some pretty good data on masturbation frequency that suggests that masturbating 2 or 3 times a day isn't uncommon for men in their 20 and sometimes beyond. In one's early-mid teens, masturbating 4 or 5 or more times a day isn't uncommon. At the opposite end of the spectrum, masturbating once a week or less also isn't uncommon.

So frequency of masturbation is wildly variable, though there does seem to be a fairly predictable curve where frequency is often fairly high in the early teens, peaking in mid-teens, and then leveling out and slowly declining in 20s and 30s. Sex drive on the whole is also quite variable between people, thus there are some folks that maintain a high sex drive and masturbate multiple times a day into their 40s or 50s or beyond.

The only concern with frequency of masturbation is when it is taking you away from something else. For some people masturbation is a stress relief and something that is quick and serving a purpose. For those folks, 3 or 5 minutes a few times a day isn't going to cause them a problem. On the other hand, if one is staying home to masturbate instead of going out with friends or family, or if one has extreme anxiety and is using masturbation as a way of medicating to momentarily calm the anxiety, those aren't generally healthy experiences because they are likely to lead to addictive patterns and deprive the individual of interaction with others. There's one other concern, which tends to be self-limiting, which is masturbating so much you chafe yourself. But that, too, is pretty rare and generally not a major concern.

Over the years here, I've seen a number of teens who are convinced they are addicted to masturbating simply because they're doing it a half dozen times a day. Provided it isn't taking them away from other things, and the concerns listed above aren't happening (self-medicating for anxiety, OCD patterns, etc), it generally isn't a problem to be concerned about.