Hey Jen, welcome back. Nice to see you mention the important part of offering support as well as seeking it.

Hi Jen. I have to give you credit for your 8 year sobriety. I am living with an addict who has shattered my heart. Stay strong. You came so far.

I notice when I'm usually feeling alone or need support myself, it's important for me to get out of my own head and try and do something to help someone else. That in turn helps me, as I said before.

In our addictions, we usually always hurt people, ourselves the most. That is something my ex husband will never truly grasp. As much as I'm sure he wants me to feel the pain I put him through, he has no clue I did tenfold. To be vunerable enough with your true self and not the addiction, and to let yourself feel what you did to another human being, especially one you loved, is the most heart and gut wrenching of pains. My heart physically hurt and felt I was being stabbed when I came to see what I had put him through. No amount of faults of his or pain he put me through could ever EVER measure up to what I did to myself. Addicts run from pain. They have no clue how to deal with it. There is SO much shame and self worthlessness that goes along with it. Allowing yourself to feel that isn't an option until you have hit rock bottom and want the change. You can know you hurt or are hurting others intellectually. To allow yourself to feel it though would just add to the pain you are trying to not feel in the first place.

Confronting my addiction and the reasons it originated was one of the scariest and hard and most painful things I've ever done. I can't imagine now living any other way but to have done that. It is hands down the most rewarding and enlightening thing I've ever done for myself. And in turn, for those I love.

We, as addicts, can't control how the addiction formed. For most, it's something that happened either in childhood and/or something traumatic. That part is sad and I sympathize with the child in addicts in that aspect. As we become adults though, how we choose to deal with what happened to us is OUR responsibility. There is underatandig surrounding the addiction, (how it formed and maybe why someone continues to act out) not excuses. As you all know, each addict has to hit rock bottom before they decide to really change or not. The scary part is where rock bottom is for each person.

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Hi Jenny! Thanks for sharing and congratulations on 8 years! I appreciate your sharing your story. Is nice to have an addicts perspective. My husband is an addict, ib thought he hit his rick bottom about month ago when he he was considering suicide. But he still will not admit that he really has a serious problem. So I'm leaving him. I can't live with the pain anymore. I can't have my children around it. Maybe he will be honest with himself and seek help, maybe he won't, but at least he won't be able to hurt us anymore. I want, morethan anything, for him to overcome. I love him so much.

I always keep thinking about if something traumatic happened to me as a kid but I think there wasn't any physical abuse. My dad was really depressed when I grew up and my mum was really overprotective of me and I think that's why I'm a love avoidant. And since I avoid love, I search for sex. (used to)

Annaroll,

I hate to hear the situation you are in. It's extremely hard to love an addict, more so when the addict won't admit to being one. This is NOT an excuse at all; I can't begin to tell you the pain and fear that we as addicts run from. We can't admit while acting out and before recovery that we are addicts for awhile. We don't even know most of the time what we are running
From it that we're even running. It's just all we know. If "x" happens or I feel "y", we do "z". It's engrained in us and we think it is just how we are because we've convinced ourselves of such. The addict has convinced our true authentic self of such. I hate to say- and I'm definitely not an expert in anyone's life- that he may have not hit his rock bottom. I can't tell you what to do. But I'm so sorry it's even a decision you have to make. Especially when you love him.

Xben347, there doesn't always have to be sexual abuse growing up to develop a sex addiction. I know statistics show us over 90% are in some form. There is never a 100% rate on how anyone' is though or why. I had a feeling something had happened to me too as a young child, but never dived into until 7 yrs ago.

I knew my mom had a personality disorder. My dad was verbally/mentally abusing to me growing up. I had 3 suicide attempts as a teen and multiple hospitalizations. I was sexually molested by my godfather as a young teen for over a year. Was sheltered in a strict Christian school up until junior high, long story, and became pregnant at 15. I could go on and on. There was a lot I knew had been painful in my life. I was in therapy for over 15 years some off, but mostly on, just peeling "the onion layers", dealing with and healing from what I knew right then was painful in my life.

I had been told by a couple therapists it sounded like something could have happened when I was younger, but just a slight feeling was all I had to go on and I didn't care to remember for a long time.

I said I didn't care to remember. I mean- who really wants to?! However, I came to see for me to truly understand who I was and why I was, I needed to find out. This was a decision I made for me. I won't say it for anyone else.

I had been diagnosed an addict and already started SAA meetings when I chose to find a therapist who could help in possibly unraveling whatever the hell was at the bottom of this feeling I had. It was hands down one of the hardest most painful things I've ever done. To have repressed memories, it means your brain knew what you could and could not handle. And I had so much other stuff (the outer layers of the onion), I couldn't possibly be ready until now to deal with what was at the core. I had repressed memories of being sexually abused from 2-4ish. And like my godfather, it was by someone I thought loved me. My idea of sex and love, which had then become my reality, was so twisted and just plain fucked up. This helped explain why I ran to sexual behaviors and people to deal with pain. I had to relive all of it again. I felt it physically again. There were times I was curled up like a toddler, scared and in pain.

If anyone is in a relationship with a sex addict, I hope you can maybe just slightly understand there is always something so painful we run from. I'm not saying everyone that's an addict has been through sex abuse and I'm not saying everyone has a similar story. But
The amount of pain we run from is always something so insurmountable, we have no idea in the midst of our addictions what we are even running from.

All I knew at the time was my husband never seemed to care where I was or who I was with. He never wanted to be intimate. This was the complete opposite from the 3 years we dated. In return, I never got validation anymore from him, because validation and love for me was in physical form, and I never felt truly loved or wanted then. I never decided one day when I woke up to go cheat. Ever. I was SO against it and never thought I'd do that. It went against my true self and what a marriage was. But as the addiction grew ( really came back 100 fold, it was there before that on a smaller scale), id find myself needing to get that validation and feel wanted. Nothing was more important than that. I would have told you then my kids were. I only went out when they were asleep. But I was too sick to see it and the impact every decision I would make had on them later. I was told I was a "nympho" and the "perfect lay". I didn't care if someone called or text back. I had got my fix and if I didnt with you again, I'd find it elsewhere. I prided myself on being different than all those clingy girls that wanted to cuddle and want a relationship. Again, I was sick. Addicts don't have the capacity and tools in the midst of their addiction and before recovery to think intelligently when it comes to their actions around the addiction. It's survival. And that's what we do to survive. It's a sick twisted mindset.

All I can say is pay attention to your gut. If you think you need to dig more in your past or find more answers, you're the only one that can do it. And while it was one of the hardest things I've ever done, it was one of the most rewarding too. Make sure you have a solid support system around you. People to take you to therapy or to call after. I lost my marriage due to my addiction. No he wasn't always a great husband either. But I know my addiction created someone in him that had to "not care" where I was because he had no idea how to process or deal with emotions. He still doesn't and hates me to this day, and we've been divorced a decade now. But I know I've grown. I'm not the same person. And while I don't ever think I have control of this, it would be a contradiction of step 1- we're powerless over our addictions- , I know if I keep making good decisions every day and keep growing as a person, I have a hell of a chance to continue living a life in recovery and continue learning what real love is.

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Flutterbyfly,

Thank you for being here. I mean it. Your story literally brought a tear in my eyes. I myself am a porn addict who came for some help. I had already done my research already how to quit this shit. Countless Google searches. Do these steps and those. Confide in someone. Who is close to you, understands you. But then after a while, I started feeling embarrassed repeatedly troubling him. He gave me so many advices, always listened to me, also followed up here and then, but then, I'm feeling like a burden. That I'm just hopeless. That I can't just escape from this pit. It's depressing really. That feeling of knowing everything still being not able to stop.i fully understand porn is bad. That it's degrading me and is not the real me. But after all the promises I make to myself, I eventually again end up repeating it. Its just a matter of time with me. If not now, then maybe day after tomorrow, or next week, or next month. But the relapse is coming. It surely is coming and there is no escaping it. I need help. Don't have many people in whom I can confide. They just won't understand. Will call me a freak and then look at me with those eyes. I fucking hate those eyes. Judgemental bitches. They don't even know what the person might be going through. Still will act all high and mighty and look down upon him. Still I'm a mess. This addiction is really affecting my life, both personal and professional. I'm missing deadlines. Feeling depressed all day. I don't know what to say anymore. This is a support group and after reading your post I thought of telling my story. I don't what to expect but then I accept that I'm an addict. And I need help. Anyways thanks to all those who read my post. Have a good day.