Glossary

One person who knows, whom you tell the truth to on a schedule. The single most protective arrangement on the path.

Also called ally

The reported surge in urges in the day or two after a slip. A community term, not a clinical one.

Also called the chaser

Whatever starts the loop: a feeling, a time, a place, a screen. Usually a state you want to leave, and the cheapest place to break the loop.

Also called trigger

A filter that works at the address-lookup layer, so it covers every app and browser on a device or network at once.

Also called DNS blocker, family DNS

Deliberately prolonging arousal without finishing. In the context of stopping, it keeps the loop running and usually ends the same way.

A stretch of low mood and low desire that some people report weeks into stopping. Community term; not a diagnosis.

The drift toward newer, more extreme or more numerous material as familiar material stops producing the same effect.

Also called escalation, tolerance

The sequence of small moves between the urge and the act: the door, the tab, the search. The last good place to step off the loop.

A slip is one event. A relapse is the decision, usually made in shame afterwards, to stop trying. Keeping them apart is a skill.

Also called lapse

Staying with an urge, attending to it in the body and breathing, until it peaks and passes on its own.