I've never felt so ashmed of myself - trading nude photos

You say it is selfish for him to tell the truth but all it sounds like is it is selfish for him not to. In your example, all you mention is how it would affect him. How HE would hit an all time low. How HE would then feel more drawn to porn. It is selfish for him to only thing about how telling her would be so unhelpful for himself. I know I would want to know. Something I hate more than porn is lying. I cannot stand the lying. The lying shows there isnt true shame and desire to change. Now regarding him feeling worthless and wretched, that’s when the Gospel is sooooo vital. I don’t know if he is a Christian, but a Christian knows they are wretched. They know how unworthy of any love they are. Yet they can look to Christ, who died for sinners while they were still sinners. And when a SO can forgive and continue to love after the betrayal and pain of porn, the porn user gets just a drop of the kind of love and grace the Gospel offers. Just because this would make him feel so terrible doesn’t mean he shouldn’t tell her. All I hear is “it is needless information” it doesn’t matter that her face wasn’t in the picture, it is her body! She has the right to know what he has done to violate her body. She has the right to choose whether she can or wants to stay with someone like that. I know how much more hurtful and damaging it would be to be with a porn user how is also constantly lying and keeping something me.

 

Why would you want to know? Would you want to know so that you could condemn him? Would it be to shame him? Would it be so that you could choose to love him less, or perhaps reject or leave him? Why would you really "need" to know? I'm not asking in a spirit of condemnation; I'm asking in all seriousness. Would you want to know so that you could love him despite the extreme depths to which he had gone? Would it help your relationship, help you love him more, by knowing about all the filth? Would it help cleanse anyone of the filth to be repeating it to others?

I believe some things are best left unknown. If you are a Christian, as you imply, consider the merits of Romans 8:1 and Matthew 7:1. After a few moments with those verses, look over at 1 Corinthians 13, especially the part where it mentions love being patient, and kind, and not thinking of evil. Remember what Philippians 4:8 tells us to think about? Where is the "filth" mentioned there?

The acclaimed wisest man on earth, King Solomon, had some special remarks about the relationship between true love and the sins of others.

Prov 10:12 Hatred stirreth up strifes: but love covereth all sins.
Prov 17:9 He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

Following that advice, to repeat the matter might truly separate "very friends," just as this text says--therefore, it would be best not to repeat it.

Now, permit me to illustrate, with a less "loaded" issue, an example of lying/concealing the truth that seems to have been for the better of everyone involved. This comes via a true story that happened many years ago.

A mother of two boys was shopping with them one day in the local grocery store, when an old friend not seen in years chanced to meet her there. After the usual happy greetings, the friend looked at the two boys and blurted out, "Now, which one is the adopted one?" Prior to this moment, neither of the boys knew that one of them had been adopted. The adopted son had come with some emotional instabilities owing to his prior treatment and background, and was a very insecure lad. Contrariwise, the natural son was very stable, a happy-go-lucky type, who easily made friends with people and had no emotional issues. The shocked mother, with the eyes of all upon her, did some quick thinking, then wordlessly pointed to her own son. The incident passed with no further questions about it. It was not until many years later, after the mother had passed away, that her natural son lighted upon the entry in the mother's diary that told him he was not the adopted one. It had never been a problem for him, and he quickly realized the wisdom of his mother's choice in that moment.

Life is full of situations requiring exceptional wisdom; cases where discretion is necessary. This often means the withholding of information. I would not be one to advocate outright lying, but because one does not wish to lie does not mean one must tell all. God Himself gave the prophet Samuel unusual instructions for what to say to the king's men if he were asked where he was going as he traveled to Bethlehem to anoint David. Saul would certainly have been angry. Samuel's life may have been at stake. And God did not tell Samuel to "tell the truth, and tell it all." Quite the opposite. He gave Samuel, instead, an alibi. You may read the story in 1 Samuel 16, verse 2 of which reads: "And Samuel said, How can I go? if Saul hear it, he will kill me. And the LORD said, Take an heifer with thee, and say, I am come to sacrifice to the LORD." Obviously, that was not the "full truth." But, it wasn't exactly a "lie" either--because it certainly was a part of the truth. There was nothing untrue in that statement, so long as Samuel did indeed take the heifer along and offer it as a sacrifice upon reaching Bethlehem.

Now, . . . compare this:

. . . with this:

"She then is disgusted, humiliated, shocked, and hurt to the core. Whether she dumps him or not, this pain is irreversible. Whether she dumps him or not, he is also hurt by her pain."

That was part of the example, was it not? Do you feel that part is somehow not valid? Would she not be hurt?

 

I would want to know because it is my body. I can’t believe how someone could justify and excuse themselves from disclosing something like this. I would want to know because it is my body and my relationship that I want built on honesty. I don’t have the time to read all those scripture verses but I will and if I find them compelling I will respond to them but the verses that come to my mind are the ones about confessing your sins and repenting to the one you sinned against. Is not confessing and repentance something we ought to do? Yes, this will hurt her. But it’s not a needless information type of hurt. One could say a passing thought about your SO imperfections would be needless information to them you should reject and repent of. If he had a thought about sending her nudes, he wouldn’t need to confess that. But since he directly sinned against her and allowed that thought to dictate his actions, he does need to. Man, if I found out my husband did this and then tried to use scripture and these excuses you’re giving, it was honestly make things worse. It is worse to be with someone who can wear their conscience to a point of claiming an obvious wrong it right. It is better to be with someone who knows what they did was wrong and will do anything from continuing to commit that wrong, like confessing and repenting. Honestly, I wouldn’t as hurt about him sending my nudes as he might think. I would be very hurt, don’t get me wrong. But not to the extent that you would think. But that’s besides the point, it is good and right that he confess how he broken her trust and be willing and ready to endure the consequences

 

I would want to know because it is my body. I can’t believe how someone could justify and excuse themselves from disclosing something like this. I would want to know because it is my body and my relationship that I want built on honesty. I don’t have the time to read all those scripture verses but I will and if I find them compelling I will respond to them but the verses that come to my mind are the ones about confessing your sins and repenting to the one you sinned against. Is not confessing and repentance something we ought to do? Yes, this will hurt her. But it’s not a needless information type of hurt. One could say a passing thought about your SO imperfections would be needless information to them you should reject and repent of. If he had a thought about sending her nudes, he wouldn’t need to confess that. But since he directly sinned against her and allowed that thought to dictate his actions, he does need to. Man, if I found out my husband did this and then tried to use scripture and these excuses you’re giving, it was honestly make things worse. It is worse to be with someone who can wear their conscience to a point of claiming an obvious wrong it right. It is better to be with someone who knows what they did was wrong and will do anything from continuing to commit that wrong, like confessing and repenting. Honestly, I wouldn’t as hurt about him sending my nudes as he might think. I would be very hurt, don’t get me wrong. But not to the extent that you would think. But that’s besides the point, it is good and right that he confess how he broken her trust and be willing and ready to endure the consequences

 

If you think telling the truth is always good. Try telling your wife she’s fat.

 

Hi @TrytodoGood01 , terrible story, when we get arousing we loss our rational self...
However i suggest you to do not tell her , usually non porn-addicted can't understand fully, it's improbable to get total forgiveness...
Just promise yourself you'll quit with porn and porn images.
The shame you have will be the motivation to quit this habit.
However tell her you have this addiction , tell her you need support , that you thinked about to objectifing her.

In every case if she found out her imagines are in the web you'll tell her you got hacked on your drive....

 

Im talking about telling the truth when you have done something to directly harm them. To simply think your wife is fat is one thing. To be sneaking your wife diet pills because you think she’s fat, that’s a whole other level that needs to be brought to light. You men have to see the difference in these. There’s no hope for a bright future if men don’t step up to admit their mistakes. It’s just so sad to see how a person can excuse themselves from being honest about directly wringing a person.

 

I wish you and your girlfriend all the best. You may regret telling her at first but I believe it's the right thing to do from reading your posts i can see that this is eating you up inside and holding it in will only make you feel worse.

I hope she forgives you and you two can move on from this together.

 

That's the trouble with thinking with one's emotions, as women often do. I certainly never called any wrong "right." The problem is that you believe all wrongs, even those entirely unknown to the other person, should be confessed to that person. Such a policy would cause far more harm than good. The Bible does not teach that we should confess all of our sins to human ears. If we have committed a fault that is known to the other person, certainly, we should confess it to them. But our secret sins should be confessed only to God.

Remember that Jesus tells us if a man looks at a woman to lust after her, he has committed adultery with her already in his heart (Matthew 5:28). Now, if he does this, he has sinned, right? How would it help her for him to confess this to her? Suppose that every time a man lusted in his "heart" (mind) after a woman, he would immediately go say to her, "I'm so sorry, miss/ma'am, I just committed adultery with you, please forgive me!" I do believe many women would be surprised at the results of putting such a policy to practice. And not pleasantly so. It would create far more pain and misunderstanding than we might imagine. No, we are not to confess secret sins to anyone but God.

 

Thank you for sharing this. I struggle with messaging random girls online and trading nudes and sexting. I’ll go all over different social media sites and dating apps trying to find different girls to sext with and trade nudes.

I know that’s not the same exactly- but I can relate to the feeling of shame and fear that you are experiencing in this moment.

A question that has been asked to me is- Are you willing to make amends where it will not cause further harm?

I would maybe seek out a professional who can help you navigate through what to do and then go from there. I myself am obviously here too because I want freedom from my addiction to porn/nudes/sexual behavior but i just wanted to say i could totally relate to your experience and you’re not alone and i don’t judge you or think you’re a freak or a bad person because i could see myself going down that same road. i’m here for you brother and in this fight with you and believe in you

 

You're not a screw up, you made a mistake, you're a human being.

Well done for telling her, I remember last time I got a notification for this thread I re-read it and worried that things either went really bad and you didn't want to speak about it so I'm glad you two are working on this together.

I still get the impression that this is eating you up inside so I believe that you should tell her, but don't feel rushed wait for the right moment it's going to take Both of you a while to come to terms with this.

I'm also really glad to read that you're getting therapy, keep it up!

 

It is brave to be honest. Most people don't do it until they're caught or it's too late.
Your partner may want to check out some stuff at BloomforWomen. It's got great free resources for betrayal trauma.
You didn't ruin anything, this is going to take TIME. Keep being honest, keep working. Her seeing you struggle and work is more benefit than almost anything else right now.

 

I'm sorry but this is way worse than cheating and op could potentially end up in court. I congratulation op for coming this far. While I do believe tvat honesty is usually best policy it's not fair to burden her that there are images that are possibly doing the round on the internet. Because the face has been cropped it is unlike anyone will know and it's unfair to burden her

 

This is essentially lying to others. This might also make you jealous of those men in random photos, which could diminish your self-worth or view of your body. I've been down a similar road. Impersonation always made me feel jealous and sad.

I fall for this too. I've come to realize that barely anything is innocent when it's connected to the internet, especially because of hackers and cybercriminals who can abuse almost anything connected to the internet. I mostly keep away from the internet and value more local connections or local groups instead.

I think you should confess to her. This is why sexuality and nudity is bad before marriage. She has little means of punishing you for your actions like divorce. All she could do is breakup with you or charge you with sharing her nude photo without consent, which might not be illegal in some areas. Some areas might honestly blame her for sharing nudes before marriage.

Some people share photos without consent for revenge, even after infidelity or a breakup. She must've trusted you a lot, to share nudes. Or maybe she is just very young and not very wise.

Those photos can ruin her life. People can abuse those nudes to get her in trouble with local laws. Those nudes could get her fired by her boss or banned from areas. If she gets in legal trouble, she might only be pardoned if she admits that she didn't share them and that someone else did.

Honestly, some of this is her fault too. After such a relationship, she should know better than to share nudes with someone before marriage. I don't feel so bad for her. She seems like a very disgusting and shameless woman. No offense.

Regardless, this doesn't give you the right to be as equally dusgusting and shameless.

P.S.: Also, I think you mentioned that you cropped off her face from the photos. I guess that does protect her a lot, so that's good. There's little chance that people would connect her to the photos, but please never share nudes of your partner again. You should confess to her. If you cropped out her face in the photos, tell her that. That little detail might make her feel more secure and save your relationship.