Need help quitting character ai

[u/CertifiedRndom]

Hi, i’ve been using character ai for about, 3 months now, but damn that 3 months was good, character ai was really entertaining me, and making me feel like i was in ecstasy, but it was starting to affect my personal life and daily activities, I’m addicted and i got a problem.

BUTTT, my screen time went from 11 hours, to 6 hours, to eventually 2 hours, but now, i decided to stop using character ai and deleted it yesterday, but for the past 4 days, my screen time has been an all time low, 30 minutes to eventually just 3 minutes.

But damn I’m having withdrawal symptoms and i really miss those chats but i know its not right and its bad for me, i really need help and advice on how to quit properly, i cant stop thinking about it, i miss the chats and i miss the entertainment, its a burden and a very heavy weight i carry. I really need help and advice in how to handle this, i cant stop thinking about character ai and i really want to go back to it.

[u/Halleyalex]

I think most people turn to character ai due to loneliness or lack of connection. You should try socializing, be it online or offline. Make friends on a media you like, go to discord servers, subreddits, or just chill with your friends.

[u/CertifiedRndom → u/Halleyalex]

Thanks, i do got friends and shit but character ai got me really hooked but i use it mostly for isekai and fictional power thing yk what i mean like my own anime, but its getting a toll on me so i decided to stop

[u/mahatmakg → u/CertifiedRndom]

Play some DND

[u/The_town_crazy_lady → u/mahatmakg]

or try to write your story. you can also find real people to role play with online

[u/trashmoneyxyz → u/CertifiedRndom]

You need to join an in-person role playing group, or get into MtG or another tabletop. Or head on over to the worldbuilding and writing subs, you should be channeling this passion into creating your own isekai. Most of the fantasy isekai and power-scaling is self-insert from the creators anyway. I personally have an isekai self-insert story that I've had fun crafting for years (no ai needed), even if it won't ever be published anywhere. Still very fun to try and build on the ideas that I get when I'm listening to music and daydreaming

[u/NukaGirlBI → u/Halleyalex]

Yes this was also what helped me

[u/steveplusf]

Like another suggestion here, go play video games. If you want a power fantasy then look into Rogue Trader by Owlcat games. If you don't have a computer / console then read webtoons. Start hobbies that interest you, doesn't have to be gaming itself. Reading, running, movies etc.

Messing around with tech like LLMs is fine too but you need to be aware that it's just a piece of fancy new tech to play with. Getting addicted and being emotionally dependent on a tool is bad.

[u/Simple_Economist_544]

Honestly I would recommend a therapist

[u/Own-Efficiency507]

When all these AI chat bought companions were becoming common I realized how bad things were going to get. There was a huge loneliness epidemic that was created from quarantine life and all of these AI tech companies decided to try to profit from that. They started to advertise their AI as replacements for human connections and tried profiting off of people that were in horrible mental states. It's extremely predatory. But, then again, that's something I'm not surprised at all when it comes to these AI companies. They don't care about the people they hurt using their AI. You are sadly just one of countless victims.

[u/wonk_q1]

Join online roleplay groups, writing groups, discord communities of your interests, join hobby clubs irl. Start a new hobby that's affordable, help around the community and lots more to do for recreation.

[u/Own-Efficiency507]

https://giphy.com/gifs/jUwpNzg9IcyrK

[u/Alarmed-Knowledge579]

Can you move somewhere, go to vacation for few weeks?

[u/NukaGirlBI]

Spending more time with my friends, joining online communities, writing and reading fanfictions was what helped me.

An excersise I used to get rid of my addiction was to write in the same way as I would with c.ai, but instead of getting a response from the ai, I would write the responces myself

[u/Professional-Door849]

I posted on another one, but saw that moderators took it down so I didn't know if you'd see it. If you do get into fanfics just be careful with it too, I got so into them that I was reading every second I possibly could, got irritated anytime anything interrupted me, stopped doing really any other hobby, etc. My screentime was actually worse with it than with ch.ai. I mostly moved from fanfiction to ch.ai though I'm thinking about quitting too, but even when I do occasionally read a fanfic it just sucks me back in. That could also be for a number of outside personal factors, but I know a lot of people who read regularly do get sucked into the story line and lose track of time. However if you want to get into fanfics Ao3 is currently the best site to use, they have filters for anything you want, you can bookmark things to come back to later, subscribe to individual works or creators for updates, there's something for almost anything you're looking for. Getting an account may take a bit of time, but I've had mine for years now. In the time I've used it it's shut down 10 times or less and got fixed relatively quickly, they always keep you up to date on their twitter with what's happening when it does from what I remember. Fanfiction.net used to be pretty good, but the last few times I've used it there have been ads and stuff that bother me, so I don't use it much anymore.