Sex / Pornography Addiction Support Group
Sexual addiction, also sometimes called sexual compulsion, is a form of psychological addiction to sexual intercourse and other sexual behavior.
Hi,
My husband is a porn addict, and has been secretly for 20+ years, he has a severe problem. I'm not going into details, as it's not relevant to this question, but the short version is that we have lived apart for the last year.
I'm fully supportive of him and have never judged him for his choices. Last year, he asked me to install a monitoring programme on his computer equipment, to help him stop. It's alerted me a couple of times, but there's always been a plausible explanation.
A few days ago, a penny dropped for me...he was doing this for 20+ years, how could he just stop cold turkey?? I knew he'd slipped early on, but have asked him often and been told no. Well, he admitted the other day that he's actually continued looking at porn, early on it was frequent, more recently he's done better, the last time was three weeks ago...I thanked him for his honesty and urged him to try and talk to me when he's messed up, and not conceal it.
Another penny dropped last night - the computer monitoring system! He obviously completely bypassed it, plus allowed me to think it was still operational. "Oh, I forgot about that".
I feel really let down here. We've talked for hours about his problems, and he always seems fully genuine in his wish to change and recover. But he's *still* lying to my face.
Is there any hope here? Will we ever get to the point where I can trust him?
Thanks in advance
My husband is a porn addict, and has been secretly for 20+ years, he has a severe problem. I'm not going into details, as it's not relevant to this question, but the short version is that we have lived apart for the last year.
I'm fully supportive of him and have never judged him for his choices. Last year, he asked me to install a monitoring programme on his computer equipment, to help him stop. It's alerted me a couple of times, but there's always been a plausible explanation.
A few days ago, a penny dropped for me...he was doing this for 20+ years, how could he just stop cold turkey?? I knew he'd slipped early on, but have asked him often and been told no. Well, he admitted the other day that he's actually continued looking at porn, early on it was frequent, more recently he's done better, the last time was three weeks ago...I thanked him for his honesty and urged him to try and talk to me when he's messed up, and not conceal it.
Another penny dropped last night - the computer monitoring system! He obviously completely bypassed it, plus allowed me to think it was still operational. "Oh, I forgot about that".
I feel really let down here. We've talked for hours about his problems, and he always seems fully genuine in his wish to change and recover. But he's *still* lying to my face.
Is there any hope here? Will we ever get to the point where I can trust him?
Thanks in advance
3 1/2 years sober
I bypassed accountability programs and filters. I never told my wife that I found a way around them because I swore to myself that I would never bypass them again.
After a slip, I swore to myself over and over again "I will NEVER do that again".
I lied and kept secrets because it would only hurt us and prevent us from being together again.
I NEVER wanted to be with my wife and still be acting out. I wanted to stop acting out, to be a good husband.
There was so much shame. And at the same time so much determination to stop and to get back together. I wanted it more than anything.
The problem was that a sincere desire to stop wasn't enough. I thought it would be. But I could not stop. If I looked at my history, of how many times I tried to stop and failed, I would realize that things looked bad. But it didn't matter now, because this time I really meant it. I will NEVER do it again.
The cycle just went on and on. I never wanted her to know my history because I just wanted it to all end.
I have stopped at this point. But the lies all came for one reason. Above everything else, I wanted to stay together and I would do anything in my power to do so.
I tried everything to stop, professional help included, but nothing worked Maybe he needs professional help. Maybe other means would help.
I am now recovered and 12 step was the only thing that ever worked for me. The fellowship of sex addicts anonymous and going to meetings didn't help. 12 steps. Doing the 12 steps. Check out SAAPP.org
I'd be happy to talk to him, to share my experience with him and to offer help.
And for you, I'd recommend this:
http://www.cosa-recovery.org/
In addition to what 2early offered, I can tell you, as a former addict now sober for almost 6 years, that porn lives off the following shadowy behaviors: denial, secrecy, lies and my favorite: avoidance of personal responsibility.
While it is true that I am not married and never had to account to anyone for my behavior, I did my share of denial, lies and excuses to anyone who asked me about it. It is also true that I avoided healthy people and chose to hang out with like minded folks, to avoid anyone asking me about it.
I will say this for myself, it is not that I thought I was doing anything wrong according to society (by this I do not mean that porn is okay, I am just telling you where my mind was at the time) but there was a serious disconnect between my emotional self and my mental self during my addiction and that was the main aspect of my denial where I used porn to cope with my unwanted emotions thinking that would be a good outlet, well it did not work, it ended up getting worse because my acting behavior escalated whereas just plain out soft porn photos were enough, it graduated to going to X-rated movies, peep shows, you get the gist and it truly exploded after the advent of free porn on the internet and then mild scenes begat more hardcore scenes until one day, I had to either get off the hamster wheel or just go into an abyss of addictive behavior that would get all that much harder to control. Needless to say, I gave away 30 years of my life to the addiction.
Why am I sharing this? So you can see what often happens with addicts, as far as your husband, my take on it is that unless he sees this is a serious issue for him (not that you do not matter because you do, by all means) and how it affects all aspects of his life, including the one with yours, there is not much you can do.
You can however, take care of yourself, go to a therapist to heal the deep wounds this addiction has caused you and your marriage. Yes, he seems genuine perhaps because he thinks he can actually control it or it could also be that he does not think it is a serious issue and there could also be that he thinks you may be making it a worse thing that it actually is because well, all guys do it, right/ Well, no neither of those things are even close to the truth of the matter.
Whichever case it may be and it could even be one I did not even mention, unless he gets real with himself, not much you can do about it. What I am saying is this: This is HIS problem (and yes, it has become yours, by default) and since it is HIS problem it is HIS job to get himself out of it. Yo can offer support provided that you see efforts, genuine efforts to get better such as: full disclosure, honest communication, ethical behavior and a willingness to enter a recovery program. If he does not show any of these traits, you may need to see where do you want to go from here.
I know these are not easy life decisions but your mental health is more important in this scenario. Hence why I strongly suggest for you to take care of yourself, all of you. Not just some aspects of it, your sanity depends on it.
Hope this helps,
Wolf (5 years and 9 months sober)
He tried SAA last year for about 4 months, but didn't find it suited him. He described it as making him worse...is it likely it was just too early for him to cope with it?
I've sent him a link to this thread btw, so he can see your comments.