Accountability and redemption

General Discussion
#1

Over the past 1.5 years of dealing with this accursed syndrome I have thought a lot about my life and the future. I’ve contemplated suicide hundreds of times, sometimes coming very close to pulling the proverbial trigger and exiting the scene.

Lately, I have been working on adopting a radically different approach to the situation. For me I am now in “jahr null”… year zero. I have lost my relationship, all old friendships but one, the business I was making progress with and had received investment for prior to PFS has collapsed. It’s no exaggeration to say that my life is as barren and ruined as the smouldering rubble of Berlin and Tokyo in 1945.

I personally will never accept life with PFS. I’m uncompromising when it comes to this. I am not interested in managing symptoms and discussing protocols and HCG on whats app for the coming decades. I want to go scuba diving, enjoy sunsets, have sexual relations with attractive women, go on safari in Namibia, have a wife who gives birth to children I can feel love for etc. I am not interested in this mockery of life.

So where do we go from here? From here on I am committing to working on my new business no less than 50 hours per week between now and June. Come July I will up this to 60 hours per week, and then 70 hours per week come September. It will be challenging with my lack of motivation and energy. But this is truly a do or die situation in my view.

I will use the Toggl app to track my hours. They will be hours of pure focused work. No browsing the internet, fucking around on the phone. Sustaining 70 hours of focused work each week for 3 years straight, allowing for 2 weeks of holiday per year, should give me a serious chance of reaching an objectively successful station, with a bit of luck (for once).

Over the next 3 years I plan to stick to this commitment and see where it takes me. Worst case scenario I keep my mind off thoughts of suicide. Best case scenario I became wealthy and can make a big contribution to moving our issue forward.

If anyone is on the same page, I’d love to connect and help hold each other accountable. Time to go Edmond Dantès mode.

comc

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#2

I’m sorry to hear your relationship has ended as a consequence of this condition. I hope it happened with some understanding.

I’ve also been considering starting my own business, seeing as being a regular wage worker in my field is kind of a dead end in terms of wealth increase. Curious as to what kind of business you’re starting and how you approach things.

I do want to warn you that 70-hour workweeks are very punishing to your health if those hours are done under prolonged pressure and stress. I know running a business is essentially a non-stop occupation and I understand your all-or-nothing view but please don’t lose sight of yourself. It’s easy to fall into the trap of dismissing your health when it’s “shit anyway”.

I recently had a burnout after some killing deadlines for a very important client to my employer, it’s been almost a month and I’m still recovering. Not worth it at all.

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#3

Just seeing the way you guys are able to move people, the proactivity you show, and the ability to organize new projects, I am sure you will succeed in whatever business you propose.

Of course, before this condition I was lucky enough to work in a technology hub. Business failure is very common among those who have had the greatest success. There is almost no success story without a failure behind it.

I only ask you not to be discouraged :slight_smile:

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#4

30 years of fraternization and collaboration through silence, with the disease, the devilish system and the false prophets are enough. The fight that started in 2012 with Kevin Mullay and John Santman has gathered tremendous power over the past two years with new fighters and some brave veterans. And every day there are more new fighters

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#5

Good to hear from you as always. I appreciate your input. It’s a tough situation to navigate and you kind of read my mind with what you said about one’s health being “shit anyway”. Yeah, I was thinking that.

I feel I’m compelled to take some drastic measures in this situation. To make all this suffering and pain worth it. For it to mean something. So I can look back one day and say “at least I built X… at least I accomplished Y”. It won’t be easy, but I fear my soul is going to rot otherwise.

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#6

Oh I think having something to chew on that demands your full attention is always a good thing, especially when you’re trying to get your mind off setbacks. I certainly don’t intend to discourage you from your venture. Just reminding you that a steady pace wins the race and to “work smarter not harder” as they say.

Not that this applies to any of my own current business ideas lol so I’m being preachy wise guy here.

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#7

What I hope is to wake up excited about my project, instead of my currently waking up fantasizing about punishing my doctors. My method for long term projects is that I wake up in the morning and read one sentence, and then stay focused for as long as I can. I’m currently at the end of a decade writing a book. Today I got two hours on that project before my brain couldn’t anymore. Then I spent 9 hours on my new project. I’m way less social right now because I’m only at 5 months and I want more clarity on what my penis is going to be capable of before I go back out and talk to ladies again.

What works for me, with long term projects, is mainly being in the habit of getting started working on it each day, and really feeling the moments during the day when I’m excited by the vision of how great it’s going to be when it’s done. For me, personally, I can’t do specific timetables of hours. I work as long as I can, but I do it every day, and I have for years.

Before pfs I was motivated by the idea that I’d be super successful and I’d find a sexy wife or at least have sex with cute groupies, and that was the underlying motivation to keep working. So, when my penis detached I actually wasn’t sure if I’d keep going at all. Really, honestly, I do have some underlying fantasy about becoming successful enough that I have the tools to do something about this awful situation. But, also, I just want some sort of purpose to focus on and believe in while my body and psychology get more distance from this tragedy.

In the meantime, socially, I’m really okay with coming to this website over and over and sympathizing with guys who want to kill themselves. Me too. I won’t. I have a project to work on, and some vague hope that I’ll have happy moments again someday. But some of my current best moments happen while reading about how everyone else wants to die too.

So, I’m more habit-driven and less hour-driven than you, but I feel the same way. If I put in a few hours a day, that adds up to a lot over a decade, and I’m happy to put in a decade or two. And, I hope my body recovers some, and I hope I find a cute girl and can actually feel something for her too. But, for today, I’m glad I got my 2 hours of book this morning and my 9 really-hard hours of project time in. That’s enough for today. Now I’m going to sit on my porch and enjoy the breeze for some minutes and then watch some stupid Netflix show before bed.

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#8

Just to be clear, the reason I got nine hours in is that I was trying to do something that looked simple and it just wouldn’t work. So I kept trying and trying and even now, after all that time, I only got it to work once. I have it running in the background now, trying to get it to work a second time and every indication is that it didn’t. My whole day was spent trying to replicate exactly what this guy did in this video: https://youtu.be/fVeW9a6wItM He said he did the whole thing in 30 minutes, but I don’t know Python at all and I wanted it running on my own machine. Basically I did enough so that I have a better place to start tomorrow. I clarify partially to give an idea of my project, but also to clarify that I’m not trying to brag that I did a lot of time today, I don’t get that many hours every day, I just happened to today because it was so effing slow getting this stupid thing to finally work.

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#9

I wanna join your journey. I’m done with this shit. Every time I try to do something fun, or to enjoy myself, I end up feeling worse. Last year I was able to focus on work from august - november without interruptions, fully focused and I felt great. That came to an end the second I tried to go out and have fun. This happened again last weekend. I’m not allowed to enjoy myself anymore it seems, so I’ll work non stop instead. I’ll dm you.

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#10

Something twists my stomach a little about finding the bright side in my penis destruction, but, the truth is that when my physiology and psychology were obliterated I lost some of my unsettled feeling too. I really wanted to move to a different country before this, and now I just don’t feel that hunger anymore. Instead, I wake up and I’m working just fine on my projects. I didn’t for the first few months. I’d say my first two months in particular I got zero done, and the next two months I didn’t get much done, but I’m closing in on six months and right now I’m surprisingly productive. I can stay focused on work for a lot of the day. I’m the same in that all my relationships went to shit, I’m just alone in my house all day long, and my balls are still super tender all the time, and I pop out of fantasy daydreams about telling my doctors why they were idiots.

But it does kind of tickle me to think that this group of guys might end up creating and producing, and maybe even more than we would’ve if we’d’ve been able to keep our old motivators. I’d punch my doctors if either of them suggested it, and I would still choose to go back if I could. But, among victims I’ll say that I do wonder a little if I can focus more on my work because I don’t get distracted with sexual potential anymore. I’d show up with nothing now to sex. I’d have a hot dog and attraction, but no arousal. But, I can show up to my project with less distraction now too.

I hope everyone in this thread, even the lurkers, posts here ten years from now reminiscing about all we’ve accomplished since we started talking about it. I’ll also be delighted if all our contributions produce a treatment and restore us. I am not convinced that that’s the only success story for us though.

I even wonder some if some greater fate fucked me in this way to keep me project oriented. The goal of my life was a cute sexual partner before. Now the absolute best idea I can come up with is a creative project instead. And I like what I’m working on. I get excited sometimes when I think about it. My real goal is to wake up in the morning thinking about it (instead of the obvious). A decade is a long time. A few hours a day over that much time is how great things happen.

#11

I respectfully strongly disagree. What has happened to us is a monstrous crime and there must be restitution and restoration. All the money I earn is meaningless unless my health is restored. I will push for that every waking moment until I am normal again and will wage war against those who did this to us. Until the moment of restoration, I’m imprisoned.

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#12

100% @Erik for some every aspect of life has been effected and there is no distraction ever. Some of us can’ hardly walk, dress, the body is breaking down, we can’t carry out routine tasks, read, think straight and are progressively getting worse. It’s like being in a torture chamber around the clock with denial all around you while your life has been destroyed it has to be the worst crime ever committed, its not acknowledged anywhere. Closest thing i can describe it too,
Imagine being imprisoned, then attacked physically and physcologically constantly throughout the day every day with no let up. Then watching the perpetrators who imprisoned you get in their cars and drive off playing at their normal lives At different points u get to see people on the outside, even those you 1nce held close and you plead for them to run to get u some help. They simply turn their backs and also get in their cars and drive off. You’re left broken, not even a shell, while years pass by the level of abuse gets worse they even feed u rations of food that now makes u violently ill.and weaker. Everything has been taken from you, your faith in humanity, the world as a decent place, all gone, Everything!! Then one day you hear voices and realise that others have been imprisoned too even though you’re at deaths door it gives u hope that as a group u may be able to hatch a plan to escape. Getting justiice for fellow prisoners who died at the hands of these monsters and getting lives restored for the survivors becomes the sole driver and the survival guide. One day our faith in humanity will also be restored.

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#13

Couldn’t have said it better.

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#14

I largely concur with what you have to say. Keeping so busy that I don’t really have the space to marinate in how fucked this situation is (and all the trauma it has inflicted on me), is one of the few things I find solace in. My mood noticeably gets worse when I’m not doing this.

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#15

Good to hear from you man. Hope you’re doing as well as you can

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#16

I just read this article about the origins of Finasteride: https://finasterideinfo.org/finasteride-origin-invention/

Even though I have heard to story before it leaves me speechless every time I read it. It makes me so angry that these origins are swept under the drug. Every doctor should be required to present this information to their patients when prescribing Finasteride or Accutane.

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#17

It’s absolutely bewildering how this drug ever made it to market and even more so that it continues to be sold today considering its unethically warped origin.There would be a public outcry if women were prescribed a cosmetic pill where some developed a multitude of off label symptoms and it was discovered the drug was derived from a tribe with a genetic mutation who developed smaller genitals, masculine traits and infertility in adulthood. I doubt it would be on the market nearly 30 years on.

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#18

While it isn’t for a cosmetic issue, women are highly encouraged to take hormonal birth control (which, for a significant number of women, causes a multitude of sides that significantly reduce QoL) when safer alternatives exist.

I’m not surprised at all. Injustices like this happen constantly, this is just the world we live in. Going through this has made me realize that it’s actually sickening how we react to other people suffering - our default response tends to be to ignore it if it doesn’t affect us.

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#19

This condition has made me far more sympathetic. Not saying I looked down on homeless people before, but when I see them now I always ask myself what bad luck many of them must have had to end up in such a situation. And I feel a sense of connection that wasn’t there before.

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#20

Considering prescription drugs are the 3rd biggest killer I don’t disagree

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