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How to find the right balance when recovering with help of partner?

Discussion in 'Rebooting in a Relationship' started by heretochange90, Oct 27, 2021.

  1. heretochange90

    heretochange90 Fapstronaut

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    So it's a long story.
    But about 7 weeks ago my partner found my "stash" on my computer which basically opened the flood gates of my dirty laundry.
    Every kind of porn you can imagine + talking to girls online and paying for only fans.
    I've also struggled with Ed for a while (only 31) and she's sort of put it all together which is how ive ended up here.

    Although I'm Australian, my partner originally comes from a very traditional, catholic Filipino family (she was born over there). So this stuff really hit her hard.

    I actually thought we were done. We had a big fight and she left the home and didn't talk to me for almost 2 days except for 1 word answers.

    Then she came home. Surprisingly in a good mood all things considered which was probably more scary. But now she's a woman on a mission. We've gone through all my devices together and wiped everything. If I'm going to the bathroom or shower I have to make a point of leaving my phone on the kitchen table and I've noticed that even though we did it already, she showers with me almost every night now. She works in IT and she's weighing up the options of the best package to install on my devices to block everything.

    It's so strange because on the surface she's happy, supportive and her typical smiling self. She even said, you have 1 chance, just tell me everything now. But there's also this look in her eyes that says if I fight this intervention she's leaving.

    For people that have worked through this as a couple, how did you find the balance between helping but not destroying the relationship?
    I get at the moment she must be feeling a lot of emotions, but how do I start on the path of slowly rebuilding trust?
     
    Ishasy and Wugazi32 like this.
  2. Psalm27:1my light

    Psalm27:1my light Fapstronaut

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    You get clean, sober, into recovery, you don’t relapse or lie. That’s it. Sounds simple right? It really is. Do that and your relationship will get better than you ever could imagine. Learn everything you can about your addiction and everything you can about betrayal trauma.
     
  3. DefendMyHeart

    DefendMyHeart Fapstronaut

    By being in recovery. Plain and simple. That will be the only way she can learn to trust you again.
    My husband had the same chance as you. If he looked at P again, we were over. He relapsed 1 time after being clean for 2 years. He reached his 1 year mark last August from that time. I gave him one more chance to shape up or ship out because I was not going down that path with him again.
    He didn't want to quit initially. He was convinced he was the only man in the entire world that wasn't allowed to view porn. After his last relapse, we found this site and it has helped him.

    As far as she is concerned, it would be best for her to not dive head first into being your AP or therapist in any way. I speak from experience when I say that the damage from that is enormous. I was super involved in my husbands recovery and we had rules where he had to tell me, quite literally, everything. The purpose was to establish patterns in his behavior to get to the underlying cause behind his P use, but it tore me to shreds in the process. Find a therapist and an AP for yourself. As long as you are on the road to recovery, and as long as you don't lie, hide, and relapse, she will learn to trust you again. The lying hurts more than the action itself (although that hurts as well).

    Hopefully she is able to seek therapy herself so she can also heal. A lot of us SO's here have betrayal trauma, which is a form of PTSD. If she isn't comfortable with therapy, Bloom for Women is a good resource for her.

    The most important thing for you is to find and address the underlying cause that brought you to P use. If you only address using, then something else will continue to pop up, and you'll just be playing a game of Whack-A-Mole. Somatic therapy addresses top-down and bottom-up processing and is good for getting to the root cause and helping you work through things. Idk of they have it where you're at. There is also metacognitive therapy, and cognitive behavioral therapy.

    Best of luck to you both!
     
    masimas likes this.
  4. heretochange90

    heretochange90 Fapstronaut

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    Thank you. It's actually nice to hear from someone on the other side.
     
  5. True-Self

    True-Self Fapstronaut

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    I have seen this mentioned multiple times on this site. How does this help exactly? Let's say that a root cause of porn use is that someone first used it to sooth neglect and loneliness during childhood. How does knowing this make quitting porn easier?
     
  6. DefendMyHeart

    DefendMyHeart Fapstronaut

    Knowing is just the beginning. So you've identified the cause. Next would be to work with someone who specializes with trauma to find healthy ways of coping and identification of other maladaptive coping mechanisms. For example, as you said, you felt neglected as a child. Children who feel that way develop a form of insecure attachment to primary caregivers. This carries into adulthood and into future relationships where fear of being close to someone, or fear you're unworthy of someone's attention, or fear of commitment, etc., take over. Then there's periods of negative ruminating, and unhealthy coping that follows. When you address this particular pattern of events, you can learn to heal from what was experienced in childhood.

    When I talk about triggers, I don't mean those related to P. I mean things like, stress, loneliness, anxiety, depression, etc. Between the trigger and reaction there is space. It is within this space that you can learn to change how you react to the trigger, which can be difficult if the space is short. Someone who specializes in trauma, especially childhood trauma, can help increase this space. Then within this space can come logical thought, then a change of action. This is how you reform patterns and change reactions. This will carry over to P usage where eventually you'll no longer feel the need for it. Does that make sense?
     
    Sam-wise likes this.
  7. p1n1983

    p1n1983 Fapstronaut

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    That's cheating.. bad way to go.

    Why paing for something that is online for free???
    Good for her, you really deserve it and maybe is a good thing to make you wake up and get your shit together.

    Is not her job to fix you, is your own job to fix you. She can support you fighting against all of this, but she is not the one taking charge of your life and do what you need to do.
    Is a small line between asking you to never do this again because is not want she wants in her partner, and another to make you do everything she want and if you don't comply you are going to get dump.

    Trust is regained with work. The only way to regain that is to work to get your shit together, she lives with you, she can see your progrees and messures it every day. Actions speaks louder than worlds, the only thing that can make her trust in you again is to show her with action that you are changing.

    I definitevely thank her for all the things she tell you to do to help, and be thankfull to her for letting me have some time to get my shit together. (Most woman will definitevely dump you in the spot.) Buy I would definitevely tell her that is my job to fix my shit and I'm going to do it, that is not her job to fix me and of course is not her rigth to make me do anything or control me in any way. I'm the one that need to get my shit together, and all I want from her is a supporting person that belives that I can fix myself and let me be.
     
  8. True-Self

    True-Self Fapstronaut

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    Okay this makes more sense to me. Thank you for taking the time to respond!
     
  9. WilliamQuopy

    WilliamQuopy Fapstronaut

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    No you are not reading too much into this.
    Your BF does not love you enough Finish this now. Find a partner who loves and respects you. Dont you deserve that ? It will only get worse if you stay with him
     

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