Need help with my feelings...
My husband just told me that he thinks he is addicted to porn. He says a friend of his told him about his addiction recently and made him realize that he has a problem with it too. I feel very hurt and betrayed by this, and when I've tried to explain my feelings to him and talk things out, he gets angry and says he doesn't want to keep going over it because he is trying to heal. He is making me feel like my feelings aren't as important as his, and I shouldn't be feeling as badly as I do about this. But I have no one to talk to about this, and he has his friend. I am now realizing that this has taken time away from our family, and we have had sex only a few times in the past couple of years. Now I find myself not wanting to look at him, and I almost cringe when he touches or kisses me. It's almost as if he has become a stranger. I want to get past this because I want us to get to a healthy place in our relationship, and I know he wants that too. Has anyone else felt this way, and how can I begin to heal?
Porn Game Over is Jason's self-help plan for quitting the habit. Click here for a fresh approach to internet pornography addiction...
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Mutual Understanding
Hi Gray77,
Firstly, welcome to the forum and thank you for sharing your story. You will find many people with similar experiences to your own here and I hope that this will reassure you that you're not alone, that there is support available and that happy and rewarding relationships can be found at the end of the working through porn related problems.
Your husband has made a really good start in being honest with you about his problem before you have challenged him with evidence or suspicion. This is undoubtedly the first step in tackling the issue; both that he acknowledges a problem and he wants to make a change. Essentially, if he didn't do these things, you would be unable to change his behaviour on his behalf.
You are right when you say that you both need to talk about your feelings; you may not have suspected his problem before now, but now you know you will have questions and concerns and want to get a grasp of how you feel about things.
The ideal scenario is for you to work through your feelings a little by yourself before you and your husband sit down together in a relaxed and open environment to tell each other what you feel. This is also an opportunity to talk about what you both want; perhaps he wants to curb or cut out the porn, perhaps you want an increase in time spent together. You'll find that many of your goals are the same and can then move forwards together.
Now, the problem is that your husband seems reluctant to have this conversation and he gets angry. Perhaps this reaction is understandable. By admitting the problem he's exposed a weakness and maybe he just wants to leave it there. In some cases, men tell their partners about their porn addiction to offload the responsibility, to make it their partners' responsibility to fix. It doesn't sound like that's the case here, though without some more dialogue you're only going to worry that the problem persists and worry about your relationship.
When you ask your husband for an opportunity to discuss, do so calmly and without judgment - remember that he was honest by telling you of the problem. Explain to him that you would like to discuss his goals, ask him questions to understand the problem better, to explain to him how it makes you feel and to offer him practical and emotional support in his healing.
Final point - relapse is likely and you should encourage him to be open about any slip-ups and be prepared to see them as distractions along the way rather than signs of failure. If they do happen then encourage him to learn more about his habit and dependency.
Good luck.
Hi there My boyfriend has
Hi there
My boyfriend has recently admitted to having a porn addiction and it explains why we haven't been having sex for the last 7 months. At the times when we do go to bed together (instead of him staying up late on the computer), he does these exaggerated yawns and makes out how tired he is. He has quite a stressful job and I half believed him but now know it's because he's choosing to have sex with his computer instead. Or all the sex with his computer is making him tired. Neither makes me want to stay with him to be honest.
Gray77 what is your husband doing about healing? My boyfriend has been angry when we've tried to talk about it more and I think he's embarrassed and wishing he had never told me. Now when he comes on to me it feels fake or like he thinks it is his duty to put things right. I think it is too soon for both of us. I ask the same question as you - can we get to that good place again? I wish I knew.
Nathan thanks for your support and good suggestions. I really like it about this site where people are so practical. I think we will try to have small talks about this instead of trying to "thrash it out" which is only ending in fights at the moment.
Chloe
As a man addicted its the
As a man addicted its the hardest thing to overcome. Its not about that we don't love you its about escaping reality more often than not. Simply put the best thing you can do is do not make them feel like the devil...you must take time to understand that most want to quit and would give anything and everything to quit. It sounds a whole lot easier to quit if your not the one addicted. I was once told...its not your job as a spouse to change how your spouses feelings are but only your job to understand it. Sometimes...no..always it takes the support of a loved one to make the rehab process able and worth it. Please do what u can to help them..acknowledging they have a problem is half the battle on their own, fight with them and support them until the battle is won.
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