Struggling through a P induced marriage seperation

So - I let the Addict take control for too long, and my wife couldn't take it any longer. She asked for some time apart in January - too separate - so she could work out if there was still an opportunity for there to be an us. This hurts so much. I am out of the house and away from my family - I am now a part time Dad, and it sucks.

I see my kids regularly, and my Wife and I are still good together, but I have ruined the intimacy, the trust, through continual efforts to 'fix it' resulting in failures, dishonesty and more damage. I am now stuck in a place of my own design, where I cannot fix the damage, I have to wait for her to be ready - one way or the other.

I have been working diligently at improving myself. I have been reading widely and putting actions in place and I am in a great place personally (that counter keeps ticking). However, it seems every effort I make to show my Wife, or to start a dialogue about how we can work through things, result in the message - I need space.

So I thought I would start a journal here, to help me process my feelings and frustrations and where I learn something - share it with everyone else. These forums have been a huge asset to me with little seeds of knowledge or inspiration.

I created a goal statement at the start of this journey, and I am immersing myself in the process of getting there.

............... Fully committed to my family. Open and honest communicator. Loved and in love...............​

 

So - I thought I would start from with a few extracts from Nakken's the Addictive Personality: Understanding the addictive process and compulsive behaviour. Reading this has really helped me understand what has happened over the 25 years of P an M.

"Addiction is an active belief in and a commitment to a negative lifestyle. Addiction begins and grows when a person abandons the natural ways of getting emotional needs met—through connecting with other people, one’s community, one’s self, and spiritual powers greater than oneself. The repeated abandonment of oneself and one’s values in favor of the addictive high causes the addictive personality to develop and gradually gain power. The negative reinforcement of an addictive personality is similar to a person who gets up each morning and throughout the day says to herself, “Why bother? Life is hard.” The more she tells herself this, the more she will develop the lifestyle and personality of someone who has given up on life. Every time addicts choose to act out in an addictive way, they are saying to themselves one or more of the following: I don’t really need people. I don’t have to face anything I don’t want to. I’m afraid to face life and my problems. Objects and events are more important than people. I can do anything I want, whenever I want, no matter whom it hurts. This type of thinking continually supports and reinforces an addictive belief system in an addict. A personality change begins to take place. In most cases these changes are subtle and happen gradually, which explains in part the seductiveness of the addictive process."

This is the heart of the attraction to P, which is re-enforced by M. Essentially, Nakken describes addiction through the Jekyll and Hyde construct, where each person is separated into two parts - the Self and the Addict. The more people retreat into the Objects or Events (P an M), the greater the disconnect between the Self and the Addict. Important to people on this forum, is the next extract - beat the illness, not yourself up.

"Friends and family members often desperately ask themselves and others, “Why does he act like this? Doesn’t he care about us anymore?” The truth is that the Addict within does not care about them. What it cares about is acting out and achieving the trance. The Addict doesn’t care about the Self either. A statement such as, “At least if you won’t stop for me, stop for yourself!” falls on deaf ears. The person who suffers from an addiction often asks the same questions long before anyone else: “Why do I act this way? Don’t I care?” Many families have gathered together in tears, realizing it’s the Addict, the illness, the addiction they all hate and fear, not the person. It’s often a great relief for people suffering from an addiction to realize that they are not “bad people” as they believed, that their addictive personality is not all of them, but only a part of them that has grown as a result of the illness."

So stay the course people, work to develop a connection with the Self. I'll share some tips and tricks I have learnt to help this process, but it is challenging.

Best of luck

LP.

 

You are correct - the thing is - I didn't realise it was a problem - that was the problem... Whenever anything got too hard, or I was stressed, or I was alone, or tired, or whatever - a turned to the thing I could control - but the truth is it was controlling me. But no longer...

Not really - I think me not being around has taken a weight of her shoulders, and she is feeling much better. Not feeling like something was wrong with her, that she was broken in some way. I am trying my best to build her back up, but at the moment it comes across as pushy or needy. I feel like I am walking a fine line, and if I create too much space I will lose her, but if I don't give her enough space, I will lose her. On top of that, I am reconnecting with my emotions - my Self as Nakken puts it - which is making it even more emotional and challenging to not switch back to the old habits. But I am doing well - for now - I am trying to deal with all the stuff that caused this spiral so that I 'know' myself better and can recognise my requirements to support my Self and deny the Addict.

I wait for the opportunity, I know the person she fell out of love with is gone and I have promised myself he will not return, but I am not sure she wants to try again. Each time she has in the past, it has ended in more hurt for her. I just have to focus on being the best version of myself I can be, and hope that I am ready when she is.

I really appreciate this forum and the people who are establishing a connection through it. The other person who has helped me reconnect with my vulnerabilities, acknowledging my weaknesses and embracing them regardless, is Brene Brown. Her audiobook of her presentation called 'The Power of Vulnerability' is fantastic.. I have listened to it three times and it has had a profound impact on me. It centres on dealing with Shame and we all on this forum need to acknowledge shame in the spiral of porn addiction.

Stay safe people.

LP

 

This is the issue - I should of stopped at some point in the last 10 years. Not now - when it might be too late. The thing is, it took an incidence of so much hurt to realise how far I'd gone and how much of a role I played in not stopping. I had given in to the Addict, using the argument that nobody cared about me so screw everyone else. This is obviously not true - but that was my perspective at the time. I have seized this opportunity to fight back and start to make the right choices, and I hope it is not too late.

I know that she knew I was addicted to Porn well before I did, but I do not think she understands what that means. She sees it as I chose myself over her, which is true, but the greater truth is the Addict was in control. I refer back to my previous quote from Nakken - "... the statement "At least if you won’t stop for me, stop for yourself!” falls on deaf ears. The person who suffers from an addiction often asks the same questions long before anyone else: “Why do I act this way? Don’t I care?” Many families have gathered together in tears, realizing it’s the Addict, the illness, the addiction they all hate and fear, not the person. It’s often a great relief for people suffering from an addiction to realize that they are not “bad people” as they believed, that their addictive personality is not all of them, but only a part of them that has grown as a result of the illness."

I hope that one day soon we can have a discussion on this, but my fear is that she will see it as another excuse, and I need to ensure that she understands that it is never an excuse, but it has helped me understand the root of the problem...

I've needed to start having difficult conversations with people that love me, and I have some small amount of trust with. This is the start of me reconnecting with people and stopping the connection to the Addict.

LP

 

@fuzzywaz you are correct mate. I tried regularly, even seeking out assistance from counsellors on several occasions. But I never fully committed to the idea it was a problem, or that it was my problem, I guess I thought that eventually she'd come around. She did come around, but to her sense of self-worth not that my actions were fine. Every other time I went to the counsellor because it was something that I knew she wanted, and it would fix the immediate pain. I did not take the time to deal with all the issues that kept pushing me back towards the actions, and just tried to get better at hiding it. That was a choice, one that I made repeatedly with at least a sub-conscious understanding of the potential consequences.

To be truthful, I never understood I was addicted, and that I needed to take a different mindset to beating that addiction. I thought that I could just take up a hobby, or distract myself, but the lure was always too great. It became to easy to listen to the perceived comfort of the Addict, to ignore the potential impacts and just engage. Every time I talked to counsellors previously, I talked to them about the impact Porn was having on my marriage, and whether they were aware of the addictive nature of the problem or not, they talked to me about improving my marriage and the impact of trust breakdowns through Porn - not about the Porn addiction and how to fight it. This was in part I guess, because I did not acknowledge it as an addiction, so the sessions never went fully in that direction.

Simply by acknowledging the problem, and immersing myself in understanding it, I have been able to scratch away the layers. I am not done yet, they say you are always addicted, but if you are conscious of your triggers you can stop the habit loops before they get started. Unfortunately, it took my rock bottom moment, my breakdown to start the fight back out. I cannot take back the hurt I have caused, and that kills me, I care so much about her. So, as I said, I have to continue to improve and hope that I get another opportunity. That's the shit thing, we are a fantastic couple, but could never sustain an intimate relationship because of the continual edge of warranted distrust and hurt and a lack of genuine intimacy because of my inability to engage my emotions because of Numbing. I'll talk more about this another time, everyone does it, but it pushed me close to depression.

Stay safe, LP.