Fernando Scherer on overcoming addiction to adult content: 'It was socially accepted'

Summary Fernando Scherer, former Olympic medalist swimmer, shared his overcoming of addiction to adult content, highlighting the negative impacts on mental health and relationships, and the transformation by focusing on self-knowledge and healthier habits.

Former swimmer Fernando Scherer , 50, recalled in recent days how he got rid of his addiction to adult content. According to him, he had contact with this type of material in his youth and, as it was considered something common, he did not see the issue as harmful.

However, after going through a period of depression, he rethought some aspects of his life, such as drinking alcohol and frequently watching adult films.

“Depression no longer exists in my life [... and pornography addiction] was one of the hardest to kick,” he said, in an interview with GQ Brazil magazine.

A bronze medalist at Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000 , Scherer says his addiction to adult films was already an issue when he sought treatment for depression in 2008.

“That was socially accepted [adult content], so I had no knowledge [that it was something bad]. There is a whole culture of selling this, of eroticizing women in every way, and it seems natural. It is not natural.”

The issue became a problem when it started to affect his love life .

“I’m talking about myself: today, with a lot of knowledge, I realized that my body was accustomed to dopamine,” he said, referring to the hormone of pleasure and reward .

“The dopamine that pornography generated was sometimes greater than sex itself. When you train your brain to have momentary pleasure, you lose the pleasure of before and after. You lose the whole context of the relationship: the connection, the love between two people, the exchange, the companionship, the look, the harmony.”

After controlling his addiction to adult content, Fernando Scherer began to replace the compulsion with something healthier: understanding his feelings.

“If I had the need to masturbate with pornography and I understood that it wasn’t slavery at that moment, there wouldn’t be a problem. The question I always ask is: what do you need it for? What are you feeling? Is there something missing here today? Well, there isn’t. So why now, alone? Is it to release energy, stress, anxiety? And when I start to question it, my mind is already somewhere else. I don’t need it anymore, it’s over.”

In 2018, the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized pornography addiction as a mental health issue. On its website, the organization details treatment as a process that involves the use of psychotherapeutic resources and, in some cases, medication, with the aim of helping the person control their impulses — always with the support of a therapist .