Out of the Closet

One of the hardest things about your spouse being addicted to porn is when it gets to the point where you HAVE to start telling people. It reaches this point because ultimately the ups and downs of porn in your relationship will begin to affect your life and you can't just keep making excuses or living in the same denial land as your spouse. In my case, I also had to reach out because it was starting to make me crazy. Addicts make you feel crazy because they won't take responsibility for their actions so they have to blame them on someone else. What better person to blame than the long-suffering spouse? So I had to start talking about it so that people could reassure me that I was NOT the crazy one in this scenario. I still need to hear that, over and over and over again. After all these years he can still make me doubt myself, make me wonder if I am being too harsh, too judgmental, overreactive. Friends (and maybe other people's families, but not mine) will keep you grounded in reality.

My mom's response is typical of her 1950's female upbringing. I keep repeating this to myself so as not to be terminally disappointed by her seeming indifference and lack of compassion. My mom's initial reaction was that (a) porn is normal for men so what is the big deal; followed closely by (b) it must be something wrong with me (namely FAT) that turns my husband to porn.

I really need to elaborate on these points, because this is the crux of the matter, in terms of how most people perceive porn and porn dependence. I have read so many books and articles on this and it is tempting to go to one of the many websites that addresses these arguments and quote passages here, but I am going to try instead to paraphrase and take the "clinical" sound out of the explanation.

First of all, viewing porn on a regular basis is NOT normal. Yes, it is normal for men to lust after womens' bodies. Yes, men are turned on by visual stimulit, such as nakedness. Yes, it is probably harmless for the single guy to look now and then or maybe the longtime couple looking to add a little spice to their life. Prior to this marriage, I NEVER had anything against porn at all. I didn't care about titty bars, didn't care if my boyfriend/husband looked at these things. I, like many Americans, didn't think it was any big deal at all, assumed it was normal, never felt threatened by it. When I was still dating my current husband, we discussed porn and I specifically told him I didn't care if he looked at it. I simply asked that it not be a SECRETIVE thing between us. I didn't want to be getting on my computer one day and have it jump out at me unexpectedly, that kind of thing. I don't think that is too much to ask, nor do I think it is prudish.

My husband chose to look at porn behind my back anyway. Not only was he looking at it on the internet, but he was ordering it, paying for it on credit cards, and going into (just one example that I caught him doing) lesbian chatrooms and pretending to be someone else. When I first found the porn--unexpectedly and exactly in the manner I had asked NOT to have to discover it--my husband first DENIED it. After denial would not fly, he made excuses. Example: "I was looking in lesbian chatrooms to find out more about what women like in bed so I could please you." Ummm...ok...but you couldn't just ASK me what I like??? That didn't fly either. Then it was, "I'm so sorry, I'll never do it again." This was back in 1999, seven long years ago. And he has been denying and lying ever since.

Regarding my appearance...I am not going to lie and say I am Pamela Anderson or whatever. I am not. Curiously, my husband's biggest fetish is looking at gigantic breasts on the internet...and I wear about a 38F bra size. You read that correctly (at the moment I'm about a G cup, due to breastfeeding). I am not a thin woman, but I am not obese either. I have very high grooming standards, wear nice clothes, buy lingerie (or DID buy it), all those things. My husband never ever once expressed any unhappiness regarding my appearance or my performance in the bedroom. We never had any issues there whatsoever. Although, I will mention something I learned about around 3-4 years into this called "sexual anorexia"--more about that later.

So anyway, the bottom line is that men don't become addicted to porn because it's just there and it's no big deal and they don't become addicted b/c their wives or girlfriends don't satisfy them. Men (and women too, I might add) become addicted to porn for the same reason people develop addictions to anything else: drugs, alcohol, gambling, shopping, overeating, you name it. Porn fills a void, provides a rush. The porn addict can't stop looking at porn, even when everything in the world is making it not worth his while to continue doing it. He can be losing his family, his job (looking at porn at work), his home (spending too much money on porn), it doesn't matter. They can't stop.

Here is a checklist of warning signs of online porn addiction that I found on the internet:


Answer "yes" or "no" to the following statements:

1. Do you routinely spend time in sex chat rooms and instant messaging with the sole purpose of finding cybersex?
2. Do you feel preoccupied with using the Internet for cybersex?
3. Do you frequently use anonymous communication to engage in sexual fantasies not typically carried out in real-life?
4. Do you anticipate your next online session with the expectation that you will find sexual arousal or gratification?
5. Do you move from cybersex to phone sex or even real-life meetings?
6. Do you hide your online interactions from your significant other?
7. Do you feel guilt or shame from your online use?
8. Did you accidentally become aroused by cybersex at first, and now find that you actively seek it out when you log online?
9. Do you masturbate when having cybersex or looking at online pornography?
10. Do you feel less interest with your real-life sexual partner only to prefer cybersex as a primary form of sexual gratification?

If you answered "yes" to any of the above questions, you may be addicted to cybersex. With the availability of adult sites and sex chat rooms, more and more people like yourself have come to realize their initial curiosity has turned into an addiction.

(from: http://www.netaddiction.com/resources/cybersexual_addiction_test.htm)

Here is another good checklist I found:


1. Spending increasing amounts of online time focused on sexual or romantic intrigue or involvement.
2. Involvement in multiple romantic or sexual affairs in chat rooms, Internet or BBS.
3. Not considering online sexual or romantic "affairs" to be a possible violation of spousal/partnership commitments.
4. Failed attempts to cut back on frequency of online or Internet sexual and romantic involvement or interaction.
5. Online use interferes with work (tired or late due to previous night's use, online while at work, etc.).
6. Online use interferes with primary relationships (e.g., minimizing or lying to partners about online activities, spending less time with family or partners).
7. Intense engagement in collecting Internet pornography.
8. Engaging in fantasy online acts or experiences which would be illegal if carried out (e.g., rape, child molestation).
9. Decreased social or family interactive time due to online fantasy involvements.
10. Being secretive or lying about amount of time spent online or type of sexual/romantic fantasy activities carried out online.
11. Engaging with sexual or romantic partners met online, while also involved in marital or other primary relationship.
12. Increasing complaints and concern from family or friends about the amount of time spent online.
13. Frequently becoming angry or extremely irritable when asked to give up online involvement to engage with partners, family or friends.
14. Primary focus of sexual or romantic life becomes increasingly related to computer activity (including pornographic CD-ROM use).

(from: http://www.ncsac.org/general/addict_self_test_cyber.aspx)


Back to the original theme of this post...talking to other people about this problem...
The reason I started this blog is because I am tired of trying to explain this to people. I am tired of pointing them to websites or having to explain my story over and over. I get that people are not familiar with this. All the stars are in and out of drug/alcohol rehab and nobody bats an eye anymore but this is something new. (Maybe Charlie Sheen's ex is familiar with it, from what I have read; Denise, are you out there?) I am not mad at people being ignorant, I just want to stop the ignorance.

The final straw was when a very dear friend of mine who married about a year and a half ago recently confessed that her husband has this problem. She is heartbroken and wants to leave him. I felt so sad for her, and so responsible because I had never told her what I was going through with my own husband. I thought that maybe if I had told her sooner, she would have been aware, would have known what to look for and what she was getting into. This blog is for all women and men out there, so people know they are not alone dealing with this. More people than you think are dealing with this problem, but they aren't talking about it. It's embarrassing and uncomfortable to bare your sex life and your marital problems to the world. But when you've reached the point that I have, there is nothing left to lose.

The story that moved me to start my blog

http://www.poyi.org/63/11/02.php

I got an email today from a friend that she had forwarded from one of her friends. By chance I happened to notice her friend had a link to her myspace account embedded in the email and for some fateful reason I clicked on the link. Nothing on the page was very interesting, but as I was about to click off the page, the photo in the above link caught my eye. I read the story behind the photo, and it made me profoundly sad.

The photo was taken by Todd Heisler The Rocky Mountain News. The caption states:

[The night before the burial of her husband's body, Katherine Cathey refused to leave the casket, asking to sleep next to his body for the last time. The Marines made a bed for her, tucking in the sheets below the flag. Before she fell asleep, she opened her laptop computer and played songs that reminded her of 'Cat,' and one of the Marines asked if she wanted them to continue standing watch as she slept. "I think it would be kind of nice if you kept doing it," she said. "I think that's what he would have wanted."]

My husband is addicted to internet pornography. As such, pornography has tried to define my life for the past seven years. What I would give to have those feelings back for my sweet husband, the strong love of that woman in the photo for her dead husband. I am grieving and it is time to share my story. I know, unfortunately, I am not alone in this dilemma, so I am not holding my feelings inside any more, or taking them out on my children or other people around me.

I feel like the wife in that photo in one poignant way...I feel like my husband is already dead, because the person I thought I married was killed off by porn addiction. And here I am, camped out with his casket day after day after day.

It's not much different, really (no offense to widowed military women). One day you are marrying the person of your dreams, your soulmate, your best friend. All the usual cliches. And the next thing you know, you wake up next to this stranger, this shell of a person.

I have to go for now. I don't know how often I will be able to post, but I know that I need to do so. I need to get my feelings out and I need for other people going through this to know that they are not alone. We have a voice, even though porn addiction has taken so many other things from us. It's one thing we've still got left.