Is Masturbation Bad for Your Health? What’s Actually Happening in Your Brain

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]Everyone is asking this question right now.  Actually, they've been asking it for quite some time. Is masturbation bad for me? Is masturbation  bad for my health? And if you look it up, the answer that you will find almost everywhere  is a resounding no. But what if that is the wrong question? Maybe that's not even the question that  you're actually asking in your head. This video is brought to you by my Harper Collins published  book, Mind Over Explicit Matter. If you're ready to quit porn and reclaim your life mentally and  physically, go over to drtchishlee.com/book.

[00:00:46]The real question that almost every person that  I work with is really asking in their head is this. Is it silently hurting me? even though  I don't want it to. They're actually asking for permission, not really for information or for  knowledge. They want the answer to be a clean and simple no. But unfortunately, it's more complex  than that. After seeing 50,000 brain maps, even more, I know that the reality is it's not about  that behavior being bad for you. What it's about is what it's training your brain to do underneath  the surface. You know how this goes. One person can have a behavior, let's say masturbation, and  they can keep control of it. It's not a thing that overtakes their life. There's no compulsion.  Another person can have the same behavior and in fact, it is hijacking their brain, moving into  the driver's seat, and slowly taking control.

[00:01:54]I'm Dr. Trish Lee, cognitive neuroscientist. My  agenda here is to help you understand how your brain performs so you can make good decisions for  yourself and take your masculine power back. So, let's dive in because once you see what's actually  happening, you won't be able to unsee it. Okay, here's where it starts to get real. Let's look  at this graph that I made. During masturbation, you can see that the reward system in your brain  is being overstimulated, high spikes, right?

[00:02:33]This is what you feel as pleasure. But at the same  time, the control system in the prefrontal cortex, well, it's going dim. It's not functioning in  the way that it would in a healthy behavior. So, here's the idea is that you think you're making  a decision, but actually you're dealing with impulse control issues, less executive function.  That's planning and organization and long-term thinking. Your brain is being conditioned for  instant gratification over delayed gratification.

[00:03:10]So in the moment you feel like you're choosing  but your decisionmaking is offline. Neurologically you're operating with less control. And then  afterward the reward system drops but the control system doesn't spring back into action. In  that lag you feel it. You feel low low motivation.

[00:03:34]You feel low energy. You're dragging. That's the  part that if you engage in a compulsive behavior over time it makes you think that it's laziness,  but instead it's your brain in a temporary state.

[00:03:49]But if you go back to that temporary state too  frequently, it becomes your semi-permanent state.

[00:03:56]It starts becoming your baseline. You probably  feel it, right? You pull out your phone, you decide you're just going to scroll for a minute  or two, but something pops up on your screen and it catches your attention. That's on purpose. The  algorithm is not neutral, so it pulls you in for highintensity stimulation and before you know  it, you've lost time. I have a client, this is a true story, that he told me that he became aware  that he actually was preferring masturbation over spending intimate time with his wife. When she  was going to go out for an appointment and he knew she'd be gone for a little while, he could  feel this quiet excitement on the inside. That is not him. That is the hijack. That is the brain  starting to drip dopamine and looking forward to that high fast dopamine spike. But again,  the crash will come real soon and will drive you back for more. Stay with me because in just  a bit I'm going to tell you what happened to that man's brain and life once he stabilized because  he began to realize he was not in control of his brain or in control of the behavior. Okay. So to  be really clear, this isn't about if the behavior is good or bad. It's about the role it's starting  to play in your life. If it becomes a compulsion, it is driving you. And of course, when it's  paired with novelty, high levels of stimulation, even if this is from fantasy, it will keep  pulling you back in. Then we have life that's pushing you in. Before you know it, masturbation  does not equal pleasure to you anymore. Instead, it equals relief. It no longer becomes something  you just do. It becomes something your brain looks forward to to help you feel okay or not bad.  Your brain expects it. It asks for it without you even realizing. And what I'm telling you  here isn't my opinion. It's validated through research. The same thing is seen in brain scans.  During a sexual release, your pleasure centers, the reward centers light up intensely. At  the same time, the control centers dim. So, you're experiencing pleasure with reduced control.  And after enough repetition, your baseline starts to change. This is when people really feel it. On  brain maps, this shows up very clearly. It shows up in two patterns. One is called strain brain.  I call it that. And if you stay in strain brain, that cycle of your brain is on and it won't turn  off and you're starting to feel edgy, you need release, then you get it and you're feeling flat  and numb and low motivation. That's the cycle or the pendulum effect of strain brain. Now, if you  do that long enough, you tip over into what I call drained brain. This is where you'll experience  sexual arousal dysfunction, what I call SAD, erectile dysfunction, DE or PE. Your brain clearly  isn't working in the optimal stable pattern that would help you feel good or better than you  do all the time. It's no longer spiking up and down. Instead, the baseline is higher and you  can feel focused on purpose and have less anxiety each and every day because in the brain maps I  see it. This isn't random. Your brain becomes trained to need the behavior and you can't feel  you can't feel your best for sure without it.

[00:08:00]So this is not about whether masturbation is  good or bad for anyone. This is about are you in control of the behavior. Your brain learns to go  back for more whether you want to or not. It also learns to push the intensity of stimulation mental  and physical. And the repetition is training your brain whether you know it or not. That my friend  is the miswireer. So after going back to the behavior over and over, your brain becomes  miswired to need it. And now you can see on this graph we have spikes up, down, up, down, up,  down. That's the pendulum effect. That's the loop.

[00:08:46]You will stay stuck in it. Just like my client who  couldn't wait for his wife to leave the house. You can see in this graph the regulation zone. That  zone has a within normal limits band. When your brain stays within it, you can get up every single  day with the focus and the drive that you need to create the life that you want and you deserve.  You can show up in healthy intimacy and sexuality with your partner and enjoy it. Your brain's not  looking for the thing you trained it to go back to. Because if you keep going in this direction,  even though we've already said masturbation's not necessarily bad for everybody, but it might not  be serving you anymore because at a certain point, you know you've lost control. You can know  this by when you feel it on the inside, it's no longer a choice. Just like a roller coaster  that you're going up and down. Once you step on that roller coaster, you can't get off until the  ride is over unless you make a different choice, which leads us to the rewire. This is called  neurological dysregulation. It's classified as brain dysfunction. So, you can see that these  spikes up and down create dysregulation that leads to lack of self-regulation. But when you train  your brain, those spikes can come down and your brain can organize and stabilize its pattern. Your  brain in fact can rewire. You've trained it in one direction. Now you can train it in the other. And  when you do that, it leads to regulation in the brain that can be visualized. And it also leads to  improved self-regulation. Now you're not rattled.

[00:10:40]Now you're not edgy. You don't need anything  to take the edge off. You're not irritable.

[00:10:45]Your anxiety goes down, your focus goes up,  and control. You're back in control because your decision-making centers, they are online  again. How I help is I use top tier clinical grade technology that you can use at home. This  is an image of the hubs doing his QEG brain map at home. Yes, we use this technology ourselves.  What it helps to do is to reduce the need for over stimulation. It restores calm focus again and it  puts you back into the driver's seat of your life, booting that hijacker out for good. Now, I  think the best part of it is that everything is measurable. This is a graph of one of my clients.  You can see that the alpha slow alpha in his brain that blue line was very high when he started and  just a few days later it already starts to come down. So what this means is now he's not going  back to masturbation because he doesn't need to. His brain is regulating and he is on his  way to achieving the goals that he set. which then allows me to meet with him and his wife once  he's gotten over that, you know, over that bridge into feeling and performing better. He's no longer  distraught. His brain is working close to optimal.

[00:12:14]No more dysregulation and dysfunction, and he's  back to business in his relationship. He said that his intimacy has never been better and he no  longer feels the shame of his secret behavior that he was keeping from his wife and that he would  literally have to tell her fibs because she'd ask, "Hey babe, what'd you do when I was gone?" You  know the answer. So, he had to come up with an alternate one. No more. He's back to business.  So, your brain hack strategy for the day.

[00:12:48]This is how you're going to go from the hijack  and the miswire to the rewire. You can use top tier technology if you work with me, but let's  start with your brain being rewired through your mind and your body at home. It doesn't always work  for everybody, but it's a first step in moving in the right direction. So, number one, reduce the  overstimulation. that squirrel that you're doing, it is leading you in the wrong direction. Instead,  build a new habit that leads you in the right direction. Okay? For the next 7 days until you  come back for the next briefing, I want you to see where your attention is being pulled where you  can feel that hijacker moving you in a direction.

[00:13:34]Maybe not through conscious choice, but this  slight pull or need from the inside. That's your brain screaming at you. Then hit the pause button.  This may be difficult because neuroscience shows that once that dopamine starts to drip, you have  3 seconds to pivot. So use those 3 seconds and get moving in the opposite direction. That direction  of course is a replacement. We are building a new identity here that doesn't include compulsive  masturbation. That can be challenging, right?

[00:14:06]But when you replace masturbation when your  partner leaves with mowing the lawn if you're a lawn farmer or by getting out and playing pickle  ball, that's going to feed your need for dopamine from the inside out, not going to something  external. This way, you can bring your brain back into that regulation zone to rock out your best  life. Then the hijacker is behind you. You jump back into the driver's seat and you are now fully  in control. You know how good that feels. I do because I've helped thousands of people accomplish  it. And if you need help in this journey, please don't stay stuck. A brain that has been trained in  one direction is capitalizing on neuroplasticity, which I always say can be your best friend or your  worst enemy. So, if you meet with me, I can help show you how we can take that neuroplasticity  and reset those pleasure pathways in your brain and in your life, getting you to set the GPS with  no more hijacker in your car toward the life of your dreams. You can have it, but it may require  some help. So, schedule a meeting with me so we can talk. It's private. Go to drtrisheigh.com.  Okay. Now, I want to reiterate this. You know, in the essence of it, is masturbation inherently  bad? Not necessarily. But it's the role that it plays in your life. If it's something you're  going back to with consistency, frequency, with fantasy, and any level of intensity, it  is controlling you. So, I want you to remember, it's imperative that you control your brain or  it will control you. Until I see you next time.