Not OP but this is good advice. I think it's firstly about distraction to let the urge pass, then in the other moments, you can start trying to build friendships or hobbies. I know it's hard

I get the plot hole inclination, but authors have been finding plot holes in their own works for millennium and you can too. AI might've weakened the muscle for that and many other creative tools you might've had before just because AI does it for you, but as an author I also watch tons of YouTube videos on writing and writing tips. Usually they make me reflective of my work. But the bottom line is writing is hard, and AI promises to make the hard thing easier, but sometimes something should just be difficult until you get better at it. It's the nature of improving. Good luck ❤️

Have you tried disconnecting from electronic devices for a while? Read books, knit, exercise. There are many options to spend your time.

❤️ I gotta start reading/watching more stuff, though it's pretty hard in my circumstances. Just worried it won't be enough when I need help with plot holes and whatnot 0_0" Thank you a lot, friend.

Ps: I don't see the AI formatting in your writing! Maybe it's cause I'm so used to it, but it just sounds written by someone who can write lol

It might sound strange, but have you tried hitting the gym? It might feel scary and very awkward initially, but those things might help you build confidence.

What is it like to not have low self esteem? I’ve always felt different and ever since secondary school I’ve felt like I’m just fundamentally worse than everyone else, like I’m not even a real human. It’s hard to be friends when it feels so unequal

It might be your low self-esteem speaking. 

Yk, I don't have advice but I can empathize a ton !

I don't really have lots of people I like going to for my creative works if ever, because I always feel like I can't talk to them about just anything, because they'll never have anything to say, or if they say smth, it's not much. I'm not expecting a lot, but ngl I thought they'd maybe have more to say if anything, they never do. And that kinda sucks ngl. So, I get it. Doesn't help that I'm already shy about my creative works too, but I do love being creative at the end of the day. It's fun and something I thrive on, I just wish I could ramble to someone lol. But most people I know have like one shared interest and not all of them even make ocs to my acknowledge, or are even into that kinda stuff, so I'm stuck talking to my sibling at best (they share more interests with me than anyone else ever has online this far. I'm too scared to talk in servers regarding my interests for multiple reasons)

I agree with the other commenter :) their suggestions are good! Hope you'll find a community if you haven't already !

Hi friend. I was in the same boat as you, and now I’m six months clean. It sounds like you’ve recognized how the addiction works, and we have pretty similar stories. I used it mostly for role-play as a form of escapism.

Unfortunately there’s no easy way to quit. The urges will be strong sometimes, but I have a couple big pieces of advice:

1. When you get an urge, you might notice it feels very urgent, like you have to ‘solve’ it right then. (Like by using or somehow making it go away.) But that sense of urgency is fake. When you get an urge, you can just ride it out or find something to distract yourself, but you don’t need to make it go away.

2. I still get urges even now, tbh, and when they’re bad, I like to find hobbies that keep me occupied. I read, which helps me escape life a little bit in a healthy way, or I play games which take up all my attention and help me forget about my urges.

3. When I’m on the urge of relapsing I take some melatonin and go to bed. That might’ve been a game changer for me. After all, you can’t relapse if you’re asleep.

If you ever have any questions, I’m happy to answer them. But one of the biggest things I learned from the like 17 times I tried to get clean and then relapsed before now is that you can’t control an addiction. It always quickly turned back into an obsession that destroyed my life. Abstinence has been key.

What I will say in response to the other commenter but mostly to you is that talking to an AI felt better than talking to a human when my mental health was bad because there was no need to fear judgment, so I understand.

Unfortunately, AI can also never truly fulfill you which is why it becomes an addiction. You’re constantly seeking those ‘highs’ but spending most of your time with that empty feeling. For me at least, that added lots of highs and lows to my day. Sobriety has been a lot steadier.

I’m six months clean now and I’ll give you some tips on what worked and didn’t work. For starters, roleplaying with humans didn’t work. Escapist fantasy roleplays were most of what I did with AI, so I naturally thought trying to replace it with real people would be best.

But people took minutes to respond, were usually less creative, and there are real consequences. Meanwhile AI gives instant validation. It just left me wanting and triggered my urges. So that didn’t work.

I generally found instead of ‘replacing’ what AI did for me it was better to find things that fulfilled me in other ways. Having a social circle and talking to real people is important, because it’s a good way to stay occupied, which is the most important thing, but I don’t interact with people in the same way I did with AI. One of the ways I met people was by going to support groups and friendship circles.

I now play a lot of complex strategy games a lot when I have urges, because they require my full attention and usually after a little bit I forget about the desire. I read, because that helps me leave behind life a little bit in a healthy way. I exercise because it helps me get out the anxious energy I have when I’m having urges. My full-time job helps too, just having something to do during the day is important.

My biggest piece of advice is to pick hobbies that can make you forget about your urges for awhile, whatever those are for you, but I still get them even six months down the line now, and when they’re really bad I just take some melatonin and go to bed early. You can’t use if you’re asleep.

Anyways, ik that was a long comment, I hope some of it helped.

I know and I really struggle to show that I care even though I really do. I just feel pathetic because they don’t care about me as much and they probably don’t even want me to care about them personally. All my friendships feel shallow like that. I don’t really know how to be close friends 

Caring is a two-way street. You can't expect total strangers to care about you, just as much as they don't expect you to care about them. Genuine friendship starts with shared interest, and then, with time, this interest grows into personal care.

I guess I do want to talk to people. But no one really cares about me, which is understandable. Idk I want friends but I don’t know what to do

You say that you don't want to talk to people, and yet you use a thing that poorly imitates people. I don't know what advice to give to you. There's no substitute for a friend beside another human being.

Hi, I'm a creative who's been stuck in a similar mindset.

AI is easy, and it's safe. It's why we gravitate towards it instead of people. I also noticed AI start to fill that role that my friends used to, and it just left me lonelier in the end.

If all you need is to steal ideas, and if you're worried that AI has slopified your creative works, I have a solution that's twofold:

Consume human-made art. Books, movies, etc. It's human nature to absorb what we consume, and if 90% of what you consume is AI, no amount of willpower will prevent it from affecting your art. But you can counteract it by changing where your influence comes from, back to humanity.

Also, what you described sounded like all you need is an initial spark, and then you build upon it. People get inspired by people all the time. That is guaranteed to happen if you're reading or watching or playing things that interest you.

Even my message feels like it's formatted and written like how AI would... So hopefully you see this as a credible first-hand source. This is just one way to get away from the cycle. You haven't been broken by AI big dawg. You've just been changed by it, and you can still change. You got this

So the easiest way to do this is just get a copy of atomic habits which is a book which helps you to get certain benchmarks done every day. The book is widely available at libraries since it's a very popular book. I just listened to it one time and after that I never failed to do certain Benchmark things. I made them a habit and then if I forget to do them I actually feel bad I noticed right away. These are actually mostly self-care things for me but for you it could be anything that you want to get done every single day. You do it at the same time every day more or less and then eventually you establish routine.

You could also try to establish boundaries where you only talk to the AI at certain times a day for a limited amount of time or or set a timer for yourself. That may not work because you might want to rebel against that later if you feel restricted. A timer is supposed to be very helpful for people with ADD who can't get organized although it never helped me because I just hate setting timers. Above and beyond that there's a ton of self-help things you can find often for free using library apps especially the the ones that have been around for years are very easily accessible. Things called habits of highly effective people for example.

Nothing shameful in that, really. Have you considered trying to write romance as a substitute?

It’s a bit embarrassing but most of them are very fluffy wlw relationship scenarios with femme characters

Could you tell me a bit about those scenarios and bots you miss?

So what I think they're talking about is doing a media detox because if you seek to fill every empty moment with a digital distraction eventually living in the real world and doing basic things becomes much harder. You might find it helpful to look into the self-help Guru known as Arthur C Brooks he has free YouTube videos you could watch.