the doubly dark place of edging and porn i'm dr trish leigh cognitive neuroscientist and
sex addiction recovery coach in this video let's talk about three things number one what is edging
i get a lot of questions about this edging to porn especially and how does it number two
create a doubly dangerous dark place number three is how we can bring you back from that dark place
get you on purpose in your life and keep you there am i right or am i right okay number one
edging what is it and what are you talking about in terms of porn what does it show up
in your life as and what is it doing to your brain let's break it down okay so edging basically
is when you linger your brain in a dopamine deluge place for maximal pleasure and escapism and i will
break that down so essentially what it looks like in a pragmatic sense is you keep going back into
the screen to consume porn usually of higher and higher intensity without orgasming or without
you know finally completing on your sessions basically your sessions continue on and off
it can be a really long session where you continue to do that or you might
go to work for a little while and come back to the screen go have dinner with your family come back
to the screen but here's the important piece is that you're lingering your brain in the dopamine
deluge place and what that means is you consume some high intensity porn that floods your brain
with dopamine and so you feel good it's lingering in that numbed out you know escapism place so that
you can go back into the world to get a little bit of life done then once you've put a little
time into your real life you go back to the screen where your brain has been trained all the pleasure
and feel good neurochemicals and all the goodness is you go back into the screen and you might even
go for more intensity something a little bit more risque that gives your brain even more dopamine
and once you get enough of a hit of dopamine you might go back into life for a little while
and you know go to work for a little bit of time or go grocery shopping if the old
ball and chain needs you to am i right no i'm not right that's what porn teaches you it teaches you
all the good stuffs in the screen no good stuffs in the world and i call it a dopamine deluge in
the screen and a dopamine deficit in your world and we know this it's substantiated by science
that this is how your brain becomes wired especially with edging so edging is you don't
complete it but you keep lingering your brain in the space and then you keep giving your brain more
and more dopamine and then finally after it can be really extended amounts or periods of time it
can be days it can be hours days but this is what i want you to know and this we're gonna transition
to number two right now is that it's very damaging to your brain the people who i have the most
challenge helping to get to the other side of this thing is people who spent a lot of time edging and
this is why and that's not meant to freak you out so don't get freaked out get motivated because
what happens is when you linger your brain in that space it is dropping out functioning of your
frontal lobe it makes it really difficult to think it makes it really difficult to stop going back
into the screen your breaks have basically been cut and so you continue to go back into the screen
and you continue to do these extended sessions with higher levels of increasing intensity
so it leads you back for more of the thing that's damaging your brain because the
frontal lobe's not working at the same time it trashes your motivation to get into the world
to do your work to be in your relationships to do your hobbies which keeps you stuck in the loop now
simultaneously the reward center in your midbrain is being fried out it's being desensitized
the cells and the pathways are literally losing their sensitivity to arousal because you're hyper
arousing them you're you're cranking them with the stimulation for long periods of time with higher
levels of intensity and so it's like hitting the gas in your car like having pedal to the metal
with of the gas being down in your car and you want me to tell you what that does it drives
your drive it drops your drive shaft you want me to tell you how i know that because my beautiful
husband dropped the drive shaft out of my truck the other day and my car will be in the shop for
approximately two three weeks and instead i will be borrowing his maserati because he terrorized my
truck so what happened was it was icy and instead of not going out he went out and he hit the gas
over and over and over and over and over i'm not even kidding boom drive shaft in the middle of the
road because you can't keep cranking your gas with all this stimulation over long periods of time
it fries out your drive shaft and what that looks like in terms of edging in porn is that
you're literally desensitizing the cells and the pathways in the reward center so what that means
is when you go to be with your partner there's no way you can become aroused because you need
the funky or violent or off the wall stuff that you've been consuming in the screen
to get you aroused so when now you're trying to be with your honey there's no way and it leads to
erectile dysfunction because you need this massive amount of stimulation to be able to become aroused
so not only does it show up as all these problems in your world it definitely shows up as erectile
dysfunction for most people who get themselves stuck in an edging habit now what's the solution
the solution is come out of the screen and it's very difficult if you've been in an edging habit
so you likely have to go 100 percent commitment get as many tools and strategies in place to
offset the lack of dopamine that your brain will be struggling with when you stay out of the screen
you've got to get as much dopamine flowing in the world as possible stay out of fantasy because most
people who have an edging habit can internalize the mechanisms in terms of the neurochemistry
cascade that happens because they can go there in fantasy without even needing the screen which
makes it more challenging to come out of an edging habit because of the intensity and the consistency
and frequency so let's put a bow on this thing is that if you're edging it's worse for you than
any other lower key lighter less frequent less consistent and especially less intense
pornography habit it is damaging your frontal lobe it's desensitizing the reward center in your brain
making it more difficult for you know more ordinary porn to do it for you
definitely for a human being to do it for you and it's going to lead you in
the wrong direction it is a slippery slope it is a downward spiral so the way out is
cold turkey upward spiral okay you got this and remember control your brain or it'll control you