I Can’t Even...My Thread Has Become a Battleground!

Fuck privacy.

Freedom ends where it infringes on another person's freedom.

If someone cheats on you, they are taking away your freedom, taking away your human right to live the safe monogamous life you were promised. They are taking away your youth, your time, your right to intimacy, your precious years on this earth to be with someone who loves you. They are infringing on your freedom to choose.

The absolute majority of SOs want nothing more than to be able to ask their partner anything and get an honest response. This, however, is not possible with porn addicts and cheaters. They will deny anything and continue to do what they please. They will keep stealing your freedom to choose and there by they can no longer claim their own right to privacy.

Don't apologise for protecting yourself and your children from unreliable people, masquerading as monogamous partners. Real people have nothing to hide. Real people hand you their phone, saying, "what questions do you have for me? How can I help you feel safe?"

The gut feeling. Gaslighters call it paranoia. If a snoop on a phone can keep you from living a lie and scrape of HPV induced growths in your vagina for the rest of your life, it's well worth it.

Betrayal trauma is very real. There is almost no pain known to man quite as devastating as to be cheated on.

There are rabid bullies on NoFap that apparently needs their prescriptions renewed. They have never heard of porn addiction (how did they end up here?), they do not know how it affect spouses (what are their business in the SO forums?), they are as ignorant as they come with a PhD in vile and unhelpful keyboard warfare. I think I speak for most when I say:

You are not wanted here.

 

PA here.

Two perspectives. On one hand, BT is definitely a real thing, and it is at the core of all the snooping, worrying, "crazy" behavior, etc. that you are doing. You want control of your world, and you need to see if he's really working on recovery if he says he is. Maybe you're worried that he's just gotten better at hiding it, and so you snoop further or you dig more. And when you find nothing you start to think you're crazy, because you just KNOW he's still up to something. This is normal behavior, and it is a natural reaction to having your life "got-flip-turned-upside-down".

On the PA side, it can get frustrating if, when we are taking steps in active recovery, our SO continues to snoop, prod and challenge us. But we lost the privilege of privacy when we were discovered. We demonstrated that our private self is not the same as our outward self. So now, we are tasked with aligning those two identities. Is it frustrating for me if my wife calls me out or presses me on something when I've done nothing wrong? Is it difficult for me when she is rummaging through my phone because she wants to see what I've been doing, who I've been texting, emailing, etc? Sure. I often worry that she will read through my spam folder and draw a conclusion out of context. A natural reaction could be for me to lash out and defend myself, and the whole conversation could devolve. That's why it's important for PA's to understand that BT IS a REAL THING, and it is not unusual. Recognizing it when it comes up helps us give our SO's the space to deal with their feelings, and to not jump to conclusions. It really helps to navigate the conversation carefully and not get defensive or angry. Sure, I worry about things that can be taken out of context or twisted to paint me in a worse light. But I have to trust that my wife will look at things rationally, and I need to hold the space for her to get to that rational point. The SO has to be willing to give a little grace too, in order for that to work. In my case, I feel like it helps my wife to see all that I AM doing in active recovery so it's a bit easier for her to extend that grace. Being able to communicate freely and honestly is the biggest first step to healing.

 

Men's theoretical thought process:

1. If I tell my wife/girlfriend the truth, she'll leave me and end up with a man who also watches porn, but lies about it. She'll be with someone who watches porn no matter what, so it may as well be me.

2. If she doesn't leave me (and most don't, because hey, women would all be single if they put their foot down about this, at least without taking effective collective action to raise their own power and status as a group), she'll be a lot less pleasant to deal with. Nothing will change except her bitching and being unhappy afterwards, so why tell her?

3. This is the real world- men have the economic and social power to maintain the right and access to a slave class of sex workers, and women can't really do anything about it besides cry. Still, why tell them and rub their noses in it? Men need women fairly happy, or at least happy enough to continue performing their household duties, meet appearance standards, and perform emotional labor. It's not logical to throw a wrench into this well-oiled system.

 

Yeah, that is the basic thought process. But then you finally get around to dealing with these issues and realize that you actually can tell the truth, have some support, and build a better relationship from this whole porn issue.

I'm not at this point yet really, but I'm finally seeing an inkling of the "we are closer than I every thought possible!", or "I tell my SO everything, we have no secrets" sort of feedback that some married couples talk about.

 

Can you explain “emotional labor “