How I Got Here, Ruins of Porn Addiction

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This is my first time telling my story outside of a counselors office, to my now estranged wife, and a couple close friends who struggled with the same thing. I am a porn addict, I’ve been watching porn since I was 10 and it has destroyed the thing that means the most to me, my marriage to my best friend. I watched for decades until it became a routine that I struggled to break and felt literal withdrawals I didn’t even think we’re possible with videos when I tried to stop for too long. Today I am 26 days, 20 hours sober (or since last viewing if you will) and I live in a borrowed room in a very generous friend’s house. I’ve relapsed 3 times since September 15th, each time getting longer apart, this is the longest I’ve gone so far and funny enough, I have my wife to thank for that too. She’s my accountability partner, I gave her the keys to my computer and my phone, what isn’t blocked, she can see, and for the first time in a long time I feel a little comfort knowing that I cannot escape through another lie or cover up another relapse.

With porn, I broke my wife’s trust repeatedly constantly falling back on it to cope with the things I did not like about me, my shames, my insecurities, and my past traumas that triggered my need for it over and over and over. It caused so many more problems to follow, problems I ignored by escaping into porn even more. I lost sight of how beautiful my wife is, I compared her to women I saw on a screen and destroyed her self worth and self image. I neglected her emotionally and was too spent physically to care about her needs. I was angry and I snapped at her or found time away from her to sneak porn. I became persistently depressed that I tried to solve with more porn to get a moment of good feelings. Now she lives alone in our home trying to repair the 7 years of damage I did to her. I’m the one person who cannot comfort her or give her the affirmations she needs. Now that I’ve regained some semblance of clear mindedness, it tears me apart knowing that no matter how much I want it, I can’t comfort her.

Now, we are just friends, while we maybe, stressed maybe, try to repair us. Right now, I’m the friend she doesn’t trust, the friend that she criticizes herself for even thinking for a moment that she could trust. Hearing that, hearing the word ‘divorce’, hearing that she can’t even touch me, hold my hand, kiss me, it’s the worst feeling I have ever felt in all 32 years of my life I have ever experienced and I’ve experienced a lot of pain no one should. Even still, with the prospect of more pain to come, I’m in it for the haul, but it’s a living hell not having her be sure she can stay to fix it. The porn wasn’t worth this. The cover for my shame wasn’t worth this. The dishonesty was not worth this.

So let me say this, if you can’t choose between your addiction and your loved ones, your spouse, girlfriend, boyfriend, personfriend, whatever, because you feel shame and vulnerability choosing the latter…trust in my experience and rip your god damned chest open and give them everything or that addiction will do it anyway and steal everything anyway. None of this is worth losing love, none of it.

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Welcome to the forum here. Very strong words you have posted. The words will help many others, too. I am glad you are able to clearly see the damage it has done to your life so you can continue to go forward.

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Hey Michael, thanks for sharing. I can relate. My porn use caused a lot of damage to those that loved me the most. Anyways, congratulations on 27 days. And keep coming back. Having support helps a lot.

Don’t lose hope.

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Welcome Micheal and thank you for this powerful and touching post. I’m the /partner/ of a sex addict, I know the pain and destruction it causes.

I want to wish you a warm welcome here, commend you on your journey and your progress. You are honest with yourself that is THE most valuable thing in early recovery for anyone, but sex and porn addiction in a special way, because it’s so private, so taboo. So, fucking well done.

I’m not the right person really to help you, I’m on the other side of this whole thing. But I wanted to ask if you’re seeing a therapist, and if you’re in a program, like SLAA, SA or SAA? therapy and SLAA are helping my partner a lot. He has found a community, trustworthy people with similar issues (intimacy struggles) who don’t shame him and he can relate to.

Best wishes to you. And a hug to your wife. :heartbeat:

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So…your story, from age 10 to where you are, We have alot in common. i’m 40, struggled hard the last 20 years, so many confessions, always at war. Now i’m on day 22.

This time feels different. @KevinesKay and myself, have read the easy peezy method of quitting porn. On your journey I HIGHLY HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU PUT THIS BOOK DOWN! I’ve said this before on here and it’s worth repeating: *Regret, Guilt, Shame = If you let these qualities dominate you all day, your body neurologically will flood your system with DOPAMINE. Which in turn will send you to a relapse! Keep you in the cycle.

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You are FAR FROM ALONE. My almost 20 year marriage is on the brink too, BUT I REFUSE TO GIVE UP. IT’S A WAR WORTH FIGHTING. Guess what: You and I, WE ARE GETTING TO DAY 365. JUST WATCH.

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Welcome Michael. I echo a lot of what has been said above. I am also a recovering porn / PMO user.

Recovering from porn / PMO is about getting grounded in reality, and not escaping. In that way it is very similar to other addictions.

In other ways, it differs. In particular when you are intimate with another person - as you are (and me as well; I am married) - it is a fantasy that cuts the other person out of the core action of marriage: intimacy (mental, emotional, and physical).

There are many resources at your disposal. I would encourage you to check some out. I would also encourage you to share the partner support programs (for example, S-Anon) with your wife and encourage her to join one. For my wife, it made a big difference, and the sense of community and support from the other partners in the group has allowed her to build confidence and assurance.

For me, the biggest change started when I joined a sex addiction recovery clinic in my city. The partners group my wife is in is also part of that clinic.

Take care Michael and never give up. Use all the tips you find. (Just this morning I used one: an impulse came; I set a 5-minute timer; by the time the timer rang, it had passed and I was making breakfast.) Reach out and share and speak and connect. When you put in the effort, you will find what you need.

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I am in regular therapy and do a lot of self work and journaling. I primarily rely on my wife as an accountability partner, I chose her because of how I broke her trust and I’ve wanted to rebuild it by telling her what I tried to hide from her before. I have a couple friends that I’ve told and they’ve shared their stories with me about their same struggle with years of porn (strange that it’s so prevalent and not even close to a normal topic of addiction) so I go to them as an impromptu group.

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Thank you, I appreciate it, I’ll look through those and talk with my wife about them too. I think it might be helpful and maybe give her some understanding that I really didn’t realize how much it pulled me away.

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Constructive communication is helpful :innocent:

I will be direct: that is not a good idea. (Even if one or both of you believes it is necessary, I promise you it is unwise. There are other, healthier ways to be accountable in recovering from porn / PMO / sex addictions.)

Committed relationships are a partnership of equals. Having one person bear the majority of the weight of holding accountable throws that balance off. And on top of that, every disclosure to her will cut into her wounds.

Partners and family of addicts - as your wife is - are traumatized and wounded as deeply as the addict. The family is as deep into the emotional and psychological pain as the addict themselves. A person bearing that much pain cannot be an accountability partner for the person whose behaviour caused that pain.

Partners need support from their own recovery steps as much as the addicts do. Patrick Carnes speaks about this; here’s a brief part of one of his interviews:

Accountability needs to be with someone who has the objectivity to be able to give the kind of perspective that is needed. That is the benefit of the programs.

Your wife has her own path to walk. You have yours. They are different paths; they are both recovery paths but they are not the same path.

You aren’t doing this for her. You are doing this for you. You need to be doing this because it is the right thing to do, and it is what you need to do, no matter what. I promise you there are many unpredictable and painful things coming. If you aren’t doing this for you - if you’re doing it for someone else - it will not work. If you do it for you, and you stick with it, it will.

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100% agree. My wife was my primary Accountability partner and that wasn’t a good idea at all. I confessed to her so many times, it started to seriously affected her/my marriage. I choose friends who’ve overcome the addiction instead. I’ve slowly rebuilt my trust with my wife. Now it’s not to say i’ve been perfect, like i haven’t. Afterall i’m on day 22. But i choose to protect my family and not put all my trauma/issues squarely on them.

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You bring up fair points, I’ll address it with her and look for someone that I feel comfortable teaming up with.

I am doing it for me though, I see the monster that it turned me into, always angry and on edge and hurtful to my wife. It has to be for me before I can live for her, husband, partner, all the titles I thought I cherished before. I suppose that with the repeated broken trust, it seemed reasonable to include her and tell her when I am thinking about using it so she can intervene and we rebuild the trust that I can and will talk to her when I need to be vulnerable. One of the biggest things that has come out of our individual and couples counselling is that the trust can’t just be repaired, it needs to be rebuilt from the ground up and the willingness to be vulnerable with her has always been the foundation of trust for her. So that’s kind of where my thought was when I asked if she would be my accountability partner, especially with removing all access to it, it’s seemed like it has done really well to push me to talk to her first and find some distraction to get past the urges.

On a more positive note, I have only used it 3 times in as many months, so the urges have become far weaker, easier to talk about, and she seemed unhurt to help. The only thing that I keep doing that makes her feel bad is how I want to work more on us and reclaim some emotional and physical intimacy (hand holding, leaning, hugs, "I love you"s and other smaller affirmations) that she isn’t willing or comfortable to give but on occasion. I’d chock it up to the nerves and anxiety about our future and the giant unoccupied chunks of time I’m having to fill with other things that I kept asking for them.

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That sounds great!

Yup, gotta wonder. A lot more ppl should be a lot more concerned about this. But we gotta focus on ourselves right now. It’s not about society in early recovery, it’s about us and our relationship to the world and its people.

Just want to remark one thing here. While I get your intention, building trust, keep in mind that by involving her as the safekeeper of your acting out devices and so closely involved with your struggle for sobriety, you jeopardise this very trust: in case you struggle, relapse, lie again it will be broken, again. Your wife will then be the victimised, again. That’s why from what I hear ppl take outsiders with no stakes in the relationship as accountability partners. And trust has to be built independently of that. On a firm, firm foundation. Your spouse has suffered so much already and has to be the safeguard first and foremost of her own safety and sanity, that was damaged by the lying and betrayal. I personally find it absolutely necessary to draw clear boundaries between my partner’s efforts to live a sober, interger life and myself, my wishes and needs, and lastly a potentially ongoing relationship. Where we revolve around another, we forget to look out for ourselves, and we first and foremost have to make sure we are ok, aren’t being abused (any longer) and remain sober ourselves (in my case).

Wishing you the best of luck.

Edit: I just caught up with the end of this thread. Glad this was already addressed by others here. This community is a great place.

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I appreciate you sharing anyway, the same sentiment being echoed here repeatedly rings home with me, I should find someone that I can talk to locally as an accountability partner. I don’t know that I want to exclude her altogether, even if it’s just updates on how I am doing and progressing, sobriety milestones, and the like. One thing that I do want to be clear on, I’ve relapsed after promising multiple times to stop, this time the stakes are all or nothing. Where she and I are at right now, relapse is off the table, it cannot happen again. For all intents and purposes, I am physically removed from the ability to look at porn and in a poor man’s rehab. The friend I am staying with had a long history or porn addiction too so it’s been easier to talk about it and relate while also having access removed for me. I’d choose him as an accountability partner but our families were friends before all this and I don’t know that they’re removed enough to be objective. I’ll find someone somewhere though.

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12-step fellowships such as SAA, SA, or SLAA would be a great place to find such accountability and support.

This app is also a great place for support. A lot of us here know each other very well.

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Very very cool you’re so open to input and learning from where others before you have failed or succeeded. Again, kudos.

May I ask why the families of the potential accountability partners are an issue? You should feel safe and private with this person. Neither your nor his struggles should be shared by the other with outside parties. Could be so good to have someone who already knows you since forever. Could also cool to have someone entirely new, with new input. Check out SLAA, SA, SAA online for more communities and connection. There’s online meetings and you can connect with ppl privately.

Lastly I recommend the podcasts “love sex and addiction with Dr Rob” and “Overcoming Betrayal and Addiction” by the same guy. He’s got plenty of experts and Q&A, especially the topic of “relapse is off the table” comes up a lot. Check it out.
Do not exclude your wife. But make sure she does not bear any more burden from your acting out. I listened to and shared episodes of podcasts with my partner, for example. And we talk a lot. But he’s got to keep himself sober, just like me.

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Well, I spent long enough doing it my way and failing every time, so the primary school level lesson on the scientific method tells me my theory is wrong and I should start listening to other people.

It was just something another person here had said, the accountability partner shouldn’t have any stake in the relationship, and it sounded like this person not only needed to not be my wife but also not a friend and could tell me when I was screwing up without fear of damaging our relationship outside of the accountability. I will definitely check out those groups, I just don’t know that I should do it from my work computer lol (I was surprised this site was permitted) so I’ll check them out after I get off work from home.

I could definitely use some new material to read/listen to, I ran through what I could on some self help books for marriage and interpersonal relationships. I’ll give those a listen tonight too, I’ve got lots of time for introspection and learning now.

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Don’t forget to check out EasyPeasy

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I’m filling a full sheet of notes today

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Hello and welcome to the forum. Thank you for your openness and honesty. Porn is so destructive on so many levels. So much shame and secrecy. Recovery is possible! I struggle with porn too. I’m now a bit over a year clean.

I’m sorry about your marriage falling apart. Don’t give up, you need this for YOU, first and foremost.

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I Feel like i’ve tried everything and the 2 things that have helped me the most: Easy Peezy method and Porn Free radio podcast. Eazy Peezy for me was the game changer.

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