Sex / Pornography Addiction Support Group

I'm so sorry for what you have gone through. I don't fully understand your situation, because I'm not there. He has no right to take pictures of you without your consent. What he has done with his own body is wrong, but he does not show any concern for you by violating your privacy. It could be very damaging to your reputation and/or career if it was known that the pictures belong to you. The violation of privacy and the disregard for the safety of your reputation, in my opinion, is reason to leave. You need safety of knowing that you have privacy. And I know that this is just an assumption, but if he takes photos of you without your knowledge, what's to stop him from taking photos of your daughter when she gets older. I feel that you need to give yourself space from this man. Let him get help and then prove to you that he has, in fact, changed. And get some good friends around you to support you while you're going through this.

In my humble opinion,,, if you have to ask the question then it is time to go. You just need a little push... make preparations and leave. You will be better off.

Since you are not married to him, I suggest you leave. It will be much easier to deal with the reasons you are willing let your boundaries be so clearly violated like this on you own. And in this case you will probably be safer. As Paul said you are very unsafe in many ways in this situation. So at least contain the damage by not allowing him near you while you are asleep.

Now, considering your child. It is his child also, so this sort of changes my answer a bit about leaving. You can not do that cleanly. His behavior is very unsafe. And as long as there are no clear boundaries around that, it will continue, and may eventually jeopardize your daughter. But your mutual parenthood is a pretty compelling reason to consider following through with a committment to him.

If you can go to therapy and work on this, but for now, I would suggest thinking about and getting some help regarding boundaries to protect yourself and your daughter in this situation. I have only the one suggestion above, but I am sure there are several things that would be clearify the situation to him and keep you safe.

Also, you thinking that having his child would cure him is typically co-dependent thinking. He can only change from the inside out, by his own will, consider that carefully as you make decisions going forward.

Thank you all for your concern regarding my safety. That is also a concern of my own as he has a violent history also. As for him hurting my daughter, I know he would never do that. I was a victim as sexual abuse as a child and a he has seen the suffering that I still continue to have, I know he would never put that on our own daughter. However in saying that, I also ask myself why he would put me through 'this situation' after everything that he knows I still suffer from.
I am scared that by leaving him, he will continue a downward spiral and end up harming himself or others. I don't know if its love that I still have for him because at the moment all I feel is hurt, but I still don't want anything bad to happen to him.
He also has a ten year old daughter from a previus relationship, and the mother of that child also had her sexual privacy invaded - One of the many reasons she left...SHe is also fully certain though, that he would not harm either of our daughters as he is a great dad and loves his girls so very much... However she left him because he never admitted he had a problem, and because he wasn't engaging in sexual acts with others - it wasn't cheating so it was ok...
However now that he has admitted his problem, I don't know if he has only admitted his issues after being faced with the possibility of losing his second family, or whether he is sincere in his pleas for help. This is my dilemma... I know he wont seek help on his own - he has completed anger management courses twice - a compulsary court action... He would never freely ask for help, however this time he has. I am worried that walking away will only make him think that noone cares, and that he has no reason to get the help that he so badly needs...
We live on a big property and have a liveable shed ot the back of our land... He has offered to sleep out there until we can sort through his issues and get him some help... But I just don't know if I can face him on a day to day basis, and pretend that we are 'happy family' to the children, after all the humiliation he has caused... Is it more damaging for our kids to grow up in single parent families - again, or is it more damaging for me to pretend that I'm somewhere that I am 100% happy to be... My kids are the most important things in my life, and I believe putting them before myself is the only option I have...

First, sex addiction is not child abuse! plane and simple. So to automatically make this conenction is naive and dangerous. And I am NOT saying this is the case with your boyfriend.

However....Never is a long time, and almost always comes from an emotional not a ture place. So he will never hurt your daughter, and I hope this is true, but he has a long life to live and without healing the core issues in his life, you can not honestly say this is totally true. Addictions are progressive. Since they are never satisfyable they always take more of us. There are lots of child abusers in and out of jail, wondering how they ever got where they are, having no idea what dragged them way past their own moral boundaries to do something that disturbes them to their core, that THEY DID.

So, just the fact that you have a fear of this situation indicates it is more possible than you want to consider. And telling yourself in the very next sentance that it is not possible is a very effective mechanism for keeping you sane. As soon as your aware of this dynamic in yourself, you are probably ready to deal directly with the situation because you got strong enough to overcome the overwhelming idea.

Second, who cares how he got to the place he admits his problem is real. The great gift is this truth, the denial is over, and he can finally chnage. You say you love him so you are willing to give your safety to keep he from continuing the downward spiral and end up harming himself or others.

What if that downward spiral is his pathway to freedom? what if he needs to find himself beat to a pulp in a ditch by someones husband who he sent a pic of his penis to in order to find God. What if you spend the next 10 years "protecting" him from his salvation.

That is what co-dependency is about. Loving him is wanting him free of this violent tendancy to invade your privacy, even if it hurts or almost kills him to get free.

You sound committed, and he sounds at least open to help. So there is hope for him and hope for your relationship. Not that you take this, but I think youshould consider why you are not married in this context. How committed to him are you really?

That hope actually improves when boundaries get in place. It is counter intuitive when boundaries are weak, that they actually make us safer. Because they seem to create distance from the people we want to be close to. But in actuality the opposite is true. When boundaries are solid, and consequeses are real, it actually helps us act safely toward each other.

So, an example. You said him moving to the shed and still seeing him every day is you pretending everything is OK. I do not think it is pretending at all. If I were living in the shead like that weather we talked about it or not, my situation would be in my face.

That is not all the boundaries you need. If you do not need to see him every day, then is there a way you can express your committment to him AND ask him not to come around except at certain agreed apon times.

Seperation is not necessarily giving up, especially if you are working hard at dealing with stuff with the energy you get from removing the day to day termoil. If your committed, a sepration still means pressing into your relationship together, just in a different way for a season.

So, can you seperate AND work hard at your recovery? Can He?

Boundaries will help you get and stay safe. Studie them. Co-dependency, and even addictions are mostly about bad boundaries.