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So what do I do now? Ideas for help with staring problem

Discussion in 'Rebooting - Porn Addiction Recovery' started by slb, May 8, 2017.

  1. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    Look. The important thing is that you not treat looking at people as a FAILURE. Just take note, readjust, and move on. The more you worry about this, the harder it will be to establish new patterns. Since you know what you want to change, give yourself room to change it. You're not hurting anyone just by looking at people. Looking at people doesn't hurt them, and it shouldn't hurt you. It's an important behavior to change, yes, but no one ends up bleeding in the street. It would be different if you were a pedophile, and any slip risked endangering a child. So relax.

    The most important thing is to rob this temptation of its power, so that it has no control over you. And that comes from (both of) your not treating it like some egregious crime. Keep it in perspective. It's simply looking. Call attention to it when it's happening and refocus.
     
    Last edited: Jun 23, 2017
    Chris14, Bel and Deleted Account like this.
  2. MindfulAchilles

    MindfulAchilles Fapstronaut

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    Holy s**t. This is messy.

    I get all of the pain, but I have to say that Bearish has been doing a great job trying to keep it civil. Staring, or scanning, is a serious issue, but you ladies seem to not want it to stop being an issue. You keep tightening the rope tighter and tighter around your SOs necks, to the point where I think the healthy thing for you to do is move away and let them breathe for a second. They don't want that, they want a different outcome, but unless you are fine with having a socially awkward pet walking around with you, I'd say you need to share in the battle and stop proposing another frontline against their best efforts.

    12-step groups force people to keep looking at their behavior as bad, irreparable, evil and diseased. What you ladies are doing is not very far away from that and you definitely need help in healing through your trauma as well. I have done the same damage to my SO, and for a long time, I considered just looking down, and not interacting with females. But that will not fix the issue and will not help me become a better human being.

    During my reboot, I started sensing that I can get information about what really triggers (usually a feeling that I need to 'second-survey' of a female in the room/street/area), and what is or could be regular interaction. I still feel like a moron smiling awkwardly at other females I pass by, but the more I do it, the best I start communicating with them, as human beings deserving of communication, and not just glancing or surveying them for their sexual value (the previous modus operandi). If there's the itch to turn around, check a specific body part, or "give her a thought" I just fix my eyes on their face, or keep moving and focus on the next important thing I'm doing. It takes time, and practice but it is possible. And yes, you just give it a short moment of thought and keep moving. The worst is to get stuck thinking: "Did I, or did I not...?" You keep affirming that you in fact 'did'.

    I know that this will continue to come up in the future with my SO because trust takes time. But I don't want the cheap fix of going blind, nor the worst case scenario of looking down all the time and wishing myself to remain "diseased". Here's another suggestion, since your men seem to be fighting their behaviors and affecting a change in their lives for their own sake:

    STOP REFERRING TO THEM AS PAs! For f***s sake. The more you stress it, the more they will continue to be PORN ADDICTS. You put the name you want, and you'll get the man you want. Yes, acknowledge the problem. But, once they ditch the behavior, they are no longer addicts. Give yourself a chance and cut that label.
     
    Chris14 likes this.
  3. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    I'll add just one more thing. The first rule of marriage (in my house) is "Never criticize, correct, belittle, conflict with, or in any way present disunity with your spouse in front of other people." Take it all up in private, but your spouse needs to feel absolutely safe in a public forum...like this one. The amount of criticizing I read on these forums from one spouse about another, especially when they're BOTH participating in the same thread, is really bad for the health of the relationship, and indicative of much deeper issues of security and rapport than those presenting in the thread itself. If one wants to help one's spouse change something as important and difficult as addiction and its attendant behaviors, then it is essential that one be absolutely, reliably, unwaveringly, and unconditionally supportive in public discourse.

    That's really what caused my initial rough words earlier, the way one spouse just jumps on the other, and then before you know it, everyone else piles on for good measure. Give it some thought, everyone: If you can't offer your own heart and soul that kind of safety, how can he/she ever feel safe with anyone else?

    I hope that's helpful. Kindness is the most effective support for change.
     
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  4. @MindfulAchilles , I agree with you and @Bearish. It would be ideal to communicate calmly and lovingly, supports each other, and preferably in total privacy. I find it very difficult to communicate with my BF face to face, because our emotions are still flying high unchecked. Talking things out in these forum threads seems the best for us at this point. Yes, it's sick, but we're still sick, so we use what we can.
    About some reasons for ultra vigilance. If my BF were doing everything possible to heal, I would probably stay off his back and support him. He still needs a push and a bit of a wake up call about his issues. It may sound tough what SOs are saying here, me included, but when someone is in denial, they need to hear what's what, otherwise they stay in denial.
    I truly hope my BF will continue healing and improving how he communicated, so we can have honest, open, civilized conversations in private.
     
  5. MindfulAchilles

    MindfulAchilles Fapstronaut

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    I agree. But from my own impression of what he has posted here, he is definitely not in denial and definitely on his way to a different mindset and set of actions for himself first, and also for you.

    You love him. You want the best for him. That's beautiful, and truly admirable, but there's a bit of a toxic air in bringing things like that (the public shaming does more to harm than to help). You guys could start writing together in a journal or a private platform. It seems that this way many feelings come out and it's better than if you guys were talking face to face (from what you say). I have experienced the same thing in my relationship, and writing things down for each other helps tons when wanting to say words that are hard to speak in conversation.

    About your vigilance. You're hurt, and at this point nothing he does will satisfy or undo the pain. There are no shortcuts in putting things back together, so you may need to wait a bit longer. Maybe make a bit of distance. I understand if you feel like you're the one in control of the relationship now (because you didn't do the cheating), but him losing all control of it will not help you both moving forward. It's addictive for you, it will become a pattern that seals the dynamics of how you both communicate, who has more 'credibility' and who is a 'little child', and I believe it will strangle the love you have for each other in a short time. You're his close friend, the target of his affection, his love. A regular close friend (usually from the same sex) has the ability to say things as they are, and rough as they are we take them - sometimes allowing them to micromanage our life for the sake of improving it. They can become instrumental in making us choose better. The friend is also a very emotionally uninvolved person compared to you, and we guys grasp better the inbalance of the relationship when a friend is doing his best to help us. I don't think that's your job description.

    I had to cut my girlfriend lose of my own recovery process because while I experienced success in dismantling years of secrecy and bad behavior, she could not stand listening to me processing it because it was a personal source of pain for her. She cares, but she can't bear the pain of it. I believe you're prolonging the pain by trying to love him, care for him, be exposed emotionally to him, and micromanaging his recovery. You're also slowly becoming a beast you don't want to be in that relationship. It hurts your relationship to always be the one "making sure that he keeps clean". Your aproval of his journey is simply not helping.

    It's hard. But I rather work this through with a therapist, books, podcasts, exercises and friends, and return to my girlfriend a new person to work through the pain I caused and how to help resolve it. I think she deserves that. She definitely does not deserve to be the one helping recovery, the one keeping score, and the one healing at the same time. It's nuts.

    If I can say one last thing. People, weak people, give in to their pain. Weak people also give in to their bad behavior. Both of them kill love. That's how so many people have gotten divorced, and so many have succumbed numbly to their addictions, because of porn. I don't think you two are weak people, and I believe you two will make it. You're both here, fighting for each other. That's strong.
     
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  6. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    I've read the threads, and frankly, I can't figure out what @slb is meant to have done to cause such trauma. Maybe I missed it. Is he seeing escorts on the side, getting erotic massages, or having cybersex with real people? What is the real extent of the addiction?

    I have a friend for whom pornography was just one manifestation of his full sexual addiction. He used to be married, and they have one daughter. He got fired from two jobs for having phone sex at work. He spent all their savings on prostitutes and became a consumate liar to hide his sneaking out to be with other women. In the end, he lost his career, all his money, his marriage, and and he almost lost even contact with his own daughter. Now THAT is an addiction that destroys lives.

    So @slb, say some more about the extent of your PMO troubles. What forms have they taken besides the staring thing?
     
  7. It is very disheartening to me to read your post/question. Maybe you don't know all the details of our situation. Maybe you don't understand how betrayal trauma is caused. Maybe you don't realize that all old traumas are amplified and revisited with every new traumatic episode. Maybe you question my feelings. Maybe you feel that only extremely perverted behavior is capable of creating traumatic reactions in SOs. Maybe you think all relationships are supposed to be the same, therefore our situation is not "crazy enough" for us to even be on this forum.
    I don't really know why you ask such questions, but they feel very invalidating of my feelings and experience and frankly they lead to re-traumatizing.
    I almost got an anxiety attack just reading your question. I think questioning the validity of my trauma is definitely not going to be helpful to anyone involved.
     
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  8. slb

    slb Fapstronaut

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    @Bearish: No, I wasn't doing anything interactive - on or off-line. I was PMing and was (and still am much too often) staring. So what? She feels it as betrayal. She feels the P use was large scale cheating (I didn't see it that way at the time). She feels the staring as me rejecting and humiliating her.

    So it's up to me to stop it.

    Trying to question or minimise the trauma she feels isn't helpful.
     
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  9. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    "Betrayal" is a very strong word to use in that circumstance, then. "Embarrassed" by the staring in public, certainly. "Neglected" by your attention focused elsewhere, sure, but "betrayed?" You were looking at pictures. You're a month and a half into reboot. What more can she ask of you?

    I return to my earlier statements: there is work to be done on BOTH sides of this divide, and you mustn't take all the responsibility. The feelings are hers, and she certainly chooses how to treat you in response to them. You started out by saying you feel "paranoid" about it, and that you have a hard time working on your own stuff because of the fear of how she's going to feel. Well, there is how she can help you. She can get a handle on her own insecurity and be kind, gentle, and supportive of you.

    Oh, by the way, I have direct experience with this sort of situation. I got involved long ago with a man who abused me emotionally. He said that he was the victim because I hadn't given him all the information about myself that he felt he needed before he fell in love with me. (?!) He was suspicious of me. He would not tell me what he needed from me because he was "giving me the chance" to do it right. Yet I never did it right, and he never forgave me.

    Meanwhile, I gradually taught myself to adopt HIS view of myself because it was less painful than his anger toward me, and eventually, I lost myself completely. He never took responsibility for his own feelings, and he kept me in that constant state of fear, guilt, and placation because that is how he propped up his own, narcissistic ego.

    When I had finally extricated myself from that codependent relationship, it took me several years to rebuild my identity and trust my own perceptions and judgments again. Now, about twenty-five years later, I still have flashes of the abuse. THAT is PTSD. THAT is TRAUMA.

    Don't let her tell you that this is all your fault. She needs to take responsibility for her own stuff, so that you can work on yours. And she needs to back off and get a handle on her own insecurity.
     
  10. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    It is because of how you CHOOSE to treat your partner as a result of how you feel. You can feel however you want, but you still have complete control over what you do. I maintain that unless you stop beating him up, he's never going to be able to reshape his orientation toward the erotic, and be able to stand on his own without fear that any moment, he's going to slip up and make you angry with him again.

    If this is the greatest trauma you ever suffer in life, then be grateful. He loves you. He's trying to remake himself to live up to what you want him to be. That's a mighty big commitment he's making.
     
  11. Bearish

    Bearish Fapstronaut

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    ...and if you've suffered greater trauma in life, then try to see this in perspective with the other. I don't think my friend's wife, whose life was destroyed, would consider your situation in the same league as hers. Take a deep breath, and take responsibility for your own responses to life.
     
  12. MindfulAchilles

    MindfulAchilles Fapstronaut

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    @novibe Your feelings are validated, but you seem to have self-diagnosed yourself. It is normal to feel betrayal for the time your SO spent looking for, and being emotionally involved with people on a screen. That is completely validated and I'd say it is not very different that being emotionally involved with a real someone outside of the relationship. What I feel is not helping you is that you're slowly conditioning yourself to experience betrayal over and over again from everything you think is not correct for him to do. That is something you're allowing, which will not help you moving forward.

    In the beginning of my relationship disclosure I though that my girlfriend sharing with others about my issue, her reactions to me not speaking about it, and her nagging were all wrong. I took it as betrayal that she was so confusingly 'abusive' to me unforgiving. But those things were just part of me wanting to feel better by constantly having her apologize for her behavior. I felt like I had to keep a share of the relationship under my control as well because I had lost credibility. She walked around me with a lot of care, thinking that she was doing something wrong. I was in the wrong though. When the tables turned, she experienced a lot of pain from 'tests' she placed along the way hoping that I would 'make the right choices'. I failed them without really knowing until it was too late. [A friend of hers influenced part of that, I believe. And sadly that friend sank the ship of her own marriage by being arrogant and not willing to let herself and her perceptions change as well. She believed herself righteous all the way, and is now reaping the consequences of his actions, and her mindset as well.]

    You must free yourself from this, because it will come back and haunt you over and over and over until there's nothing to save. Right now, he can't and will not walk a perfect straight line. You will experience pain as he slowly affects change to his behavior, and even when his best efforts bear fruit, you will still feel like it's not enough and you're again betrayed, again abused, again you're neglected. In all seriousness, this is probably going to cost you a lot, and the higher you place the price, the more it will hurt. Being a victim is tough. I think you are. You're a victim of his choices and the trust you put in him. BUT, remaining a victim is your choice, and this is where your strength can truly shine as you both heal and help the relationship moving forward.

    Don't sink the ship. I don't think you want to.
     
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  13. Thank you for your insights and support. We learn from our mistakes and from people who have already walked the path, like you.
     
  14. Bel

    Bel Fapstronaut
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    Idk about you @novibe but I feel like I live in a constant state of depression,anger, and uncertainty. I'm a little perplexed how ppl cannot understand how constant lies and demeaning actions by the supposed person who claims that they love you oh so much aren't straight up betrayals. It equivalent to me like hitting yourself on the thumb with a hammer. It hurts, one time it hurts but you go on hammering bc you have a project to do and you push the pain aside....but then you hit yourself again same finger, wtf you were trying to be careful, damn it hurts but onward you go as you are trying to accomplish something. Then wtf you hit yourself with the hammer 4 times in a row same finger goddammit it hurts how the fuck did you do that ?? I mean what an idiot you feel like! Why does this keep happening. You are vigilant, you are careful ,but it keeps happening. Now you are scared shit less to swing that hammer, but you have to finish your project, stress is swelling you can't seem to do anything right and your finger is bloody and mangled.....how the fuck??!! You look up and realize there's a second hammer , it's held by your lover. You look at the hammer in your own hand it's tiny, it feels so light. You look at the one in his hand, the head of it with blood on it. He's saying I'm sorry I didn't mean to...then before you can answer he swings again..... That's how supposedly small nothing actions start to add up. Nothing is benign in a porn addiction.
     
  15. Yes, exactly. It's not that I WANT to be vigilant, paranoid, ranting, and angry at my BF all the time. I don't! I'd love to be JUST loving and supportive. It's more like, what I call, an abused dog reaction to a hand. If you have been trying to be loving in the past, but got hurt instead every time, then you will start to react to every situation that, in your mind, may end up hurting you again.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 5, 2017
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