In the general case, to execute some code (e.g. count) every time a pattern is found, you could use a while loop with m//g: 

$_ ='abacdbccdeeabacdbccdee';

my $cnt;
while (/[bc]/g) {
    last if ++$cnt == 3;
}
say pos;

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In reply to Re: a regular expression problem by Eliya
in thread a regular expression problem by siskos1

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