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Confessed my fetish and my addiction to my gf

Discussion in 'Dating during a Reboot' started by RebootingProtestant, Feb 21, 2021.

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  1. Freedom_from_PMO

    Freedom_from_PMO Fapstronaut

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    "a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made."

    "To continue". Do you understand what sunk cost fallacy is? I even agreed with you that it was a favour. Sometimes you did the best thing you can and situation still takes a toll on you. Have you ever read a greek tragedy?

    I think that you missed the fact that I am not endorsing this advice. If advice is designed for short/middle term relationship it won't work for longterm, effectively it will make relationships shorter, it is extremely obvious.

    What I wanted to say is that this advice is common, even if we don't agree with that.

    Btw. do you have a Reddit account? I don't want you to link it or anything, just asking.
     
  2. Don't let her to push you emotionally in order to stop PMO. That's a wrong way of treating things and it will affect you more than you think.
     
  3. RecoveringInIsolation

    RecoveringInIsolation Fapstronaut

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    Sounds like we agree and are just approaching from different angle.

    Yes I understand what sunk cost fallacy is. I said a girl dumping you for expressing your vulnerabilities is doing you a favour. You said yes, BUT IT IS STILL WASTED TIME. My point was that some people stay because they don't want the time to be "wasted". But you can't get the time back either way, so it's better to not see it as time wasted, but that you aren't wasting any time in the future on a poor relationship.

    I don't have a reddit account, it's actually a site I try to actively avoid. Why?
     
  4. arpegius

    arpegius Fapstronaut

    My first hand experience is that, even if she is a perfect girlfriend in your eyes and she loves you very much, there's just something about women that makes them despise men showing vulnerability/powerlessness. She will overlook the part about the courage you had to muster to open to her and she will only see the "you watch other women so you don't love me, you basically cheat" part.
    I will never make this mistake again. Her knowing this won't help either of you.
     
    ZiguShar likes this.
  5. ElSabio

    ElSabio Fapstronaut

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    Scream-crying is a gigantic over reaction. Feeling hurt or a little betrayed is a reasonable reaction to a lover hiding something from you but a massive screaming freakout when someone has revealed a vulnerability is a major red flag and pretty damned selfish and mean.
     
  6. p1n1983

    p1n1983 Fapstronaut

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    Nope, a lot of weak people confess their weakness looking for compasion.. and contention. A masculine man work to figure shit out and make that weakness into a streanth. A masculine man don't go out there and cry how miserable he is, he works to get better and be proud of himself.

    Admiting it is not bad at all, is the beginning to work to change it, improve it. etc.
    that's the problem... that's what she said. but you always have to see a woman from what they do. And for a fact, behaviour like this from a man turn a woman off.. they want a rock for a man, they don't want a weak guy.


    No they don't.. they are naturally attracted to the alpha... vulnerability is not one of the properties a woman is attracted to. They can say it is one, but once a man show this property the woman without knowing it she rejects it.. make the guy less romantically desired.
     
    becomingreat likes this.
  7. RiverBlue

    RiverBlue Fapstronaut

    Maybe you didn't mean it like this, but this is very selfish advice. Basically it sounds like you are saying, telling his gf about his pmo, will make it easier for him to quit. It will make it easier for him to achieve his goal. And if it inflicts trauma on his gf, well that's too bad.

    I think the partner's feelings are an element that gets left out of the usual advice about being honest. I understand the counterargument that your pmo is hurting your partner in some way she doesn't know about, and so it's better to just let her know what's going on. But that's a balancing argument. I don't know if it's always true that the unknown harm to a partner of pmo is actually worse than the direct harm of revelation. Which hurts her the most? I think that question needs to be asked, unless we approach it from the viewpoint it's better for us as addicts to open up, damn the consequences.

    Just to pre-empt some of the inevitable responses.

    Yes, not telling a partner about pmo is probably easier than telling, but that doesn't automatically invalidate the argument that it still not in her best interest to get this info. It could be that your interest in not revealing potentially traumatic info is in alignment with her interest in not receiving.

    Some say it's impossible for someone in a relationship to recover without telling their partner. Honestly, I can't find any real evidence either way on this, and it doesn't seem logical to me.

    Also, some say a partner can become a source of support, even an accountability partner. But your partner didn't sign up for that when she started dating you. First, is it likely she can be this supportive anyway? Second, even if she is supportive, is it fair to ask her to assume that role in your life? Is it fair to expect/hope that she will take on the task of helping to fix you?

    Finally, some maintain that the harm caused by the "secrecy" of not telling is always more harmful to the partner and the relationship than revealing the truth. But honestly, those on here who make this argument most forcefully seem to be women to whom the partner confessed and who are actually having a hard time now in supporting their partners. They say they are helping their partners to be more accountable, but their vigilance over their partners just smacks of distrust. No matter how they couch it, they seem to still be very angry at their partners for the pmo (which in fairness they did not agree to at the beginning) and the difficulty their partners experience in overcoming it. It just seems to be a toxic loop of recrimination, over vigilance by the partner, failure by the partner, rinse, and repeat. Even when the addict gets in triple digits of sobriety, the partners confess to never trusting them again.

    I am not saying these women are being unfair to their partners in all of that. After all their partners did conceal something that is obviously very objectionable to them, then compounded that by inflicting the truth on them after a period of concealment, and then apparently are expecting them to some how step up and be supportive of their recovery. I'd be angry too! But I only wonder how much of that heartache for the partners could have been avoided by the addict simply taking care of his own problems without inflicting them on his partner.
     
  8. RecoveringInIsolation

    RecoveringInIsolation Fapstronaut

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    Honestly mate, as someone who used to think what you did until I grew up a bit, you do you and I hope you find success in it. At the end of the day all it is is a projection of how insecure WE are about our vulnerabilities and flaws that makes us think women will reject us for admitting them. I have had more than one occasion in my life where I've opened up to a girl (who were just my friends at the time) about certain vulnerabilities or things that I've been through who have then made it VERY clear they'd like to date me. Because most women are used to being met with a wall when they try to discuss feeling and vulnerabilities with their partner.

    Is being a whiny defeatist child about your vulnerabilities and wallowing going to be attractive? Of course not. Is saying "these are the issues I'm dealing with, these are the things in my past that have caused me to be like this, and I'm actively working on myself everyday so I can be a better person and better partner" attractive? Of course it is.

    Unfortunately this is why I've started to go on NoFap less and less. You begin to realise a lot of it is just confused kids doing this to try to get some success with women, and eating up advise written by older bitter guys. The issue is they change the dynamic to suit the mind of a porn addict. Tell them to never show their feelings and act like a macho man. Tell them that this will get them laid. And sure to some extent it does. Being a faux confident macho man is a better tactic than being a shy guy if you're trying to get the odd shag from an equally damaged girl on a night out. But it doesn't actually bring any happiness. Because it's built on lust and mistrust. Unfortunately a lot of guys have to go through this state of mind and experience how little lasting gratification it brings before they realise putting on some act that is counterproductive to a long term, loving relationship is going to leave them miserable.
     
  9. Freedom_from_PMO

    Freedom_from_PMO Fapstronaut

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    Exactly. Are those 4 towers or snake with two sheets attached? It is an elephant.

    Nevermind, good for you.


    @RecoveringInIsolation

    This is the kind of experience I was talking about nad that's why this advice is still around. I don't think this is true to all women, but it happens and because of that many men do not want to share their vulnerability. It is not always obvious which woman will be ok with sharing and which not.


    I agree that you should work to get better, however it is harder to do this in solitude. And it is even harder when your loved ones are backstabbing you during the hard times. Imagine being able to look for support from therapist or your friends, but not from your wife. What kind of "love" it is then? Nobody can be sure that they will never go through some kind of crisis in life.
     
    ElSabio likes this.
  10. Freedom_from_PMO

    Freedom_from_PMO Fapstronaut

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    Well, this kind of people usually need this forum the most.
     
    Chris_Cactusblossom likes this.
  11. Yes, this is a huge red flag. Surprised no one else on this thread has expressed this.
     
    Faceless Void and ElSabio like this.
  12. Logic check, smartass. It would only be the sunk cost fallacy if he were to say the guy/he himself should cling on to the relationship because of all the time and effort he put in. That wasn't an option because he was dumped. All he said was it was a waste of time, which reflects how he feels about the relationship in retrospect. It's not the same thing.
     
    Freedom_from_PMO likes this.
  13. RecoveringInIsolation

    RecoveringInIsolation Fapstronaut

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    Absolutely they do. I definitely did. And there are lots of differing opinions. The hope is that as they begin on a path on NoFap and the effect of P on their mind gets less and less they can see some of the "advise" for the flaws and generalisations they have.
     
    Chris_Cactusblossom likes this.
  14. RecoveringInIsolation

    RecoveringInIsolation Fapstronaut

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    You are correct, very good point, well done smartass :)
     
  15. *Aaaaaaaah*. Feels good to be top pedant on a thread. :D
     
    Freedom_from_PMO likes this.
  16. p1n1983

    p1n1983 Fapstronaut

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    You have no idea what an alpha is. An alpha is after his goals and ambitions. He don't need to think about impressing a woman. He is what he wants to be, if the woman like him, that's ok. If not she can walk away, he know he is a catch and can find another woman that value him.
    I always talk about woman nature. Is a fact that a woman will be turned off by weakness... show weakness to a woman and her attraction for you sexually and romantically will be lowered. That's the harsh reality.. do what ever you want with it..
     
    becomingreat likes this.
  17. ElSabio

    ElSabio Fapstronaut

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    give up the alpha/beta nonsense. It's a useless distraction. It isn't helpful. We are not dogs or apes in the jungle.
     
  18. RecoveringInIsolation

    RecoveringInIsolation Fapstronaut

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    They also don't go on internet forums talking about "alphas" and "betas"...
    See the thing is, you talk about "woman nature", yet it completely contradicts many of the experiences that I have had in my life with women. It's almost as if your opinions are based on "facts" made by people on internet forums who have never ACTUALLY had a female friend or much interaction with women in their life. There are exceptions of course, but in general I've found women to be far more accepting of talking about mental health and vulnerabilities, in a platonic and romantic relationship.
     
  19. dandausa

    dandausa Fapstronaut

    This is fair, I'm a selfish person. I'm a porn addict so some of my opinions are definitely colored by my selfishness. I did want to encourage him in his honesty though. So many of us have lived lives of addiction and hiding and our culture encourages this, I just wanted to encourage a friend who was giving honesty a shot, honesty is so rare. I share about my porn addiction to most people that I consider friends and while I've never had that tough a reaction from people like he did, pointed at me specifically, I have felt very uncomfortable. For instance, recently I shared with some girls that I struggle with anxiety and then often I try to use lust to cover over that feeling rather than just diving into the anxiety and working through it. That was really uncomfortable and it makes lust way less appealing to me. But I think most women understand lust/desire to some extent or another and it was overall helpful to me.

    In another instance, I did have one friend say she didn't think guys and girls talked about their struggles with porn and so I didn't bring it up again because I do care about her. I just don't want any of my friendships to be based on lies. I want people to say, oh "@dandausa struggles with porn I should avoid him." Rather than thinking "I don't like people who struggle with porn, I hope none of my friends struggle with it." I don't want to be friends or have a relationship with someone who doesn't know me and accept me. This is probably based on my Enneagram 4 type though. I don't know if this is the unhealthy side coming out or what but that's just where I'm at right now. I'll probably be in a different place next year.

    This is a good question. I think the issue was that the whole relationship was based on lies of omission from the very beginning. That's what's so difficult about this question. The partner, whether a man or woman believes that they are spending their life with someone who doesn't watch porn or sleep with other people so they believe one thing but the opposite is true. I've noticed this can be the case in the Partner Support section, there can be many angry and unkind words that are said in there and a guy reading through those responses may commit to never telling their wife/gf because they don't want to be treated that way. So I think I understand what you're saying?

    I'm going through the conquer series with my church and they recommend that men have at least 90 days of sobriety before they tell their wives that they struggle/do a therapeutic disclosure, and I think the reason is that as we get to 3-4 months, 1 year, 5 years there's going to be less falling and more of an ability to handle life on life's terms rather than needing a drug to keep us going. In essence not traumatizing the women in our lives every 3 days or couple weeks. So maybe my perspective is changing some.

    I do think opening up has helped me as an addict. The only time I've gotten to 90 days is when I have a place every week to confess to my porn use or to celebrate a week porn free whether a Bible study or a porn recovery group. I was processing this recently. I think God miraculously saved me from my every day/multiple times a day relapses back when I was 19 and super depressed/suicidal. I prayed desperately that I would be delivered from this never ending relapse spiral that was moving into more and more intense porn/masturbation techniques. But I've never had real sobriety of months unless I'm living in relationship with others telling them how I'm doing asking them to pray for me, etc. I really need to be known and loved.

    But I really can't say. I think some guys when they open up the only thing that may happen is divorce, their wives just don't have enough grace or identity in Christ to get through something that shocking. I get it. I think that's actually a valid point. So maybe they will just have to recover in the dark, going to men's "book studies", or going for "drives" (recovery meetings) for the rest of their lives. But I think for those of us who aren't married yet who aren't committed through vows, we should be honest. Get the trash out now, and maybe she'll stick around or maybe she won't, no harm, no foul. Ultimately in a marriage relationship, I think I want a best friend who loves me even though I'm a messed up broken sinner. I really need someone who can handle my trash.
     
    RiverBlue likes this.
  20. RiverBlue

    RiverBlue Fapstronaut

    I think this is excellent advice. I am sure that is easier for a wife to hear "Honey, I have this problem, but I am doing a good job controlling it." rather than "Honey, I was watching all sorts of pervy porn yesterday, I do it everyday, I want to stop, and so I'm telling you so you can understand me and help me. I need you to accept and fix me." (I'm not saying that's exactly what one would say, but I think that's about how she'd hear it!)

    I agree with this too. Unfortunately, for a lot of us married guys, the first time we recognized we had a problem quitting porn is after we were already married. Sure, we always used a lot of porn, but it never seemed a problem. And we'll be able to stop after marriage. we thought. After all we can quit having sex with other people, which is generally true. So we can surely quitting looking at porn. It's only after we are married, try to quit, and find it difficult, that we realize we have a problem.
     

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