I Want to Move Forward but My Mind is Living in the Past

Let me start off by saying first and foremost, this is not your fault. Not one bit. Everything you're feeling right now is what is known as betrayal trauma. It is common with SO's. If you've not yet, I would recommend seeking a counselor that works with trauma so you are able to focus on your healing. This is super important. When my husband first disclosed all of this to me, my brain went in circles with the wondering and the wanting to be close to him. I thought if I gave myself more to him, it would fix him. However much or little you give him isn't the issue. This is where coming to terms with the fact that it is not your fault is so important. You could be the best of the best, completely flawless in every aspect, and if someone is addicted to P, they will continue to watch it.

Is he seeing a counselor? As far as what he watched, I understand the curiosity behind that. Knowing what he watched is only going to tear you up inside. It won't help him and it won't help you. However, he does need to disclose this to a professional because what he watched could be an indicator in what he felt he lacked in himself, and could be used for his healing.

How you feel about his recovery and how he feels about his recovery are separate issues. Just because he is doing well, it doesn't mean you're not entitled to your own feelings. You are allowed to feel hurt, skeptical, worried. You are allowed to keep your distance from him if you see fit to do so. P addicts lack empathy. This is something he has to learn to do for himself. This is why he is able to continue with his life while you're drowning in yours. He doesn't see what you're going through, doesn't understand it, and hasn't found it within himself to care yet. This is why it is important to care about yourself, to trust yourself, and to learn to love yourself. It is difficult to do this, of course, because we look to our husbands for support. It isnt there yet. This will take time. You have other women on here to help fill that gap for you until you're ready and he is ready.
It is the dopamine that they are addicted to. When they watch it, they get a huge dump. Regular sex does not provide the same dump, which is why P is addictive. The best way to go about this would be to refrain from sex for at least 90 days if possible to allow his brains DeltaFosB levels to drop. Having sex during his recovery can lead to what is called the chaser effect. This sensitized them to all triggers and can cause a relapse because their brain is hooked on dopamine.

He appears to be making steps in the right direction, so this would be a great time for you to make steps in working on your own recovery. I dealt with all aspects of my husbands addiction for 2 years. I was his counselor, accountability partner, cheerleader, and the one he disclosed everything to. Because of this, my physical health suffered as each disclosure ripped me apart more and more everyday. I would not recommend this to any one else. Let him get outside help. You can be in his corner while still focusing on your needs.

What you're going through is common with SO's unfortunately. The safety of the marriage has been pulled out from under you. This is not your fault.

Is he on this site? Does he have an accountability partner? Does he go to meetings? I would suggest he do all the above if he isn't already. Doing this alone is called "white knuckling" and can cause so many more problems in the marriage. Having guidance from others will help alleviate some of that stress from himself and your marriage.

During adolescence, or brains enter a second pruning process. What happens is our brains strengthen wiring that is important for survival, and weeds out the rest. When someone begins watching P in their adolescent years, it wires their brain to what they are watching. A normal development would consist of imaginination with a real life person, and more than likely wouldn't cross past regular old sex unless they saw it done somewhere else. This wiring attaches to real life people. When their brains wire to the screen, then their brains begin to think that what is on the screen is what is important for survival. Just like any addiction, there is a tolerance level and withdrawals once they stop. This unhealthy wiring is why it is hard for them to rewire. It was done during a critical stage in brain development. It won't ever be undone completely, but it can be worked on. This will be something he will have for the rest of his life. It is the severity of it that matters. Because it is a cue reactive addiction, and due to the stable protein DeltaFosB, avoiding or reassociating triggers, changing his routine, and learning a new way to navigate through what would cause him to look at P (stress, anxiety, boredom, etc) is crucial for lessening the severity of the addiction.

 

I’m so sorry for your pain and hurt. I’m right there with you. My husband is trying to do all the right things now, but I can’t stop living in the past and what he did and how betraying it feels. How could I have married someone who looked at such disgusting things? I can’t stop pain shopping even though it hurts me the most in the end. I can’t stop being fearful. I can’t get rid of this cloud over my life. I flip flop so much from needing to be near him at all times, to feel him close to me - to WTH are you doing?? He betrayed you! Where is your dignity?!

I understand your bourdior story. That is so heart aching. Just yesterday I found an outfit of mine that my husband always had a thing for, based on a movie he loved. We had bought this outfit a few years prior to his relapse. I was triggered so badly finding it because even after seeing me in it and saying he loved me in it most, he STILL HAD to look it up while in his relapse. The real version. And the P version. He deliberately searched for it and PMO’d to it, while all along he previously told me I had totally replaced it. I felt gutted and used, and threw it in the trash. Even though he has been doing so many things in the right direction *now*, it took me back like I was still living it and I got so upset. It still seemed fresh and new. It was an ordeal, but thankfully he heard me out even though I could see he was starting to get bugged.

He assured me that P was separate, his mind was sick, and he still truly loved me in it more.. I was real, I was his love, and P is not special. P is P. The outfit still went in the trash and will never be seen on me again, as well as ANY outfit based on a movie. I feel that is one scar that will never go away.

I think the reason your SO feels like ‘nothing is wrong’ now is because he took all his burdens and bricks (of P, secrecy, etc) and by disclosing them, put all those bricks and rocks on top of you. Now he is left light, to fly about life, while you are trying to drag yourself with these bricks to the next day.

I had to describe this to my husband as if we are waiting for a train to some great place. All of a sudden, he rips up his ticket, and grabs mine out of my hand. I’m left there dumbfounded as he runs and boards the train without me, waving to me out the window saying: See you there! He is on his way to our new life on a fast train, while I’m now left to walk. There are no more tickets. And he’s asking why can’t I just hurry up?? Because you took my ticket and now I have to walk you dumb $@^!!

It’s a really hard journey. @used19 recommended a book called Worthy Of Her Trust. I asked if my husband if could read it as a loving favor to me, and thankfully he is. I can’t believe some of the changes. It is honestly helping to change his perspective - and he even admits this. For some reason someone else (a man...??) can speak to them more clearly than us. But anyway, for now it’s helping him realize how real betrayal trauma is, and what HE needs to do/how to act gently if he wants this new life with me. He is in a SA/PA group, and he thinks every man who has hurt their SO should read this. The group talks a lot about the addiction, their past, etc - but not so much about how to understand your wife (as of yet). He thinks this book should be required reading, and that makes me put another notch on my path to healing.

I still have nightmares though and I still relive everything. I still hate and remember the past and morph it into the present. That’s a massive journey for me, God, my therapist, and the betrayal class I’m talking. Hopefully I’ll catch up to our destination.

I really hope you find healing too. This stuff is rough.

 

"Because you took my ticket and now I have to walk"
Yes! So much this! They don't understand what they put us through.

My husband is the same way with listening to men over women. It is a childhood thing (of course, right?) I can't wait until we are able to get that book @used19 recommend (she recommended it to my husband on his post as well).

 

I'm sorry you're going through. I want to say the two posts above mine are great and I want to emphasize a couple of big points they made.

1. It's not your fault. Him looking at porn has nothing to do with how often you had sex or the outfits you wore or didn't wear or anything else. It's his problem (as it is mine) and not yours.
2. The thoughts and feelings you're having are perfectly normal. There is a lot of good information out there about betrayal trauma and my wife has seen "some" success with an expert. It's slow, but the goal is not forgiveness but healing.
3. He needs to own his recovery - not you. SAA, therapy, online group, honesty with friends. There are lots of paths forward, but the singular point forward is that he needs to run it, not you
4. I have also read worthy of her trust - agree it's a good thing to read


A couple of points from myself - the PA side of things

1. He's going to want things back to normal quickly - it's natural - however everyone should remember it's a long game
2. porn relapses happen much more often than drugs or alcohol - it's free and everywhere and can be accessed on any device. Heck, walk around a mall and it's on the walls. Relapses will probably happen, how he responds is the question. Honesty, openness, or shame and secrecy?
3. It's natural to want details - when, why, how much, what, etc. Some of the answers may help you feel relief, others may not. He may simply not remember or have answers.
4. I wake up with a fear every day that I'm getting complacent. I can feel my chest being tight with anxiety just typing that sentence. Addicts are always addicts. There is no 90 day cure or reboot cure. His life will change if he does this right, and so will your relationship - hopefully for the better. But how it was before may never come back - this is the chance to come back stronger and more honest and more open and closer by beingvulnerable something he's probably never done before.

I wish you so much luck.

 

One other thing that comes to mind, and it is difficult for us SO's to see this through the hurt. Our husbands married us because we had something that P didn't have. We fulfilled something that those stupid pixels could not. We are better than P in that way.

 

Just wish we could figure it out. Cause good God it is buried under so much smut. Most days I just want to clobber him with the shovel.

 

I hear you on this. Our dday happened and then I got pregnant with #4. We're 6 months out from his birth, 1.5 from dday, and the struggle is real. I'm struggling so hard to not develop an eating disorder this time. I have always been a tiny person so having to gain weight in pregnancies and then lose it has been very hard on me. But this time it is so difficult because I constantly feel like I have to be better than perfect. Instead of being confident that he'll love me while I get back to normal, now I look in the mirror and feel horrible even though I'm only 10 lbs off my weight still. I don't have any advice on this, only to be gentle with yourself. I did the change to motherhood completely unaware of what was happening to our marriage, and it was a big change. What you are dealing with is so hard. Give yourself some grace to to enjoy your baby and not lose this precious time to the trauma. I am allowing my baby to be a joy that is keeping me holding on just enough for now. He protected me from the trauma while I was pregnant by turning it to waves instead of a tsunami, and now he is keeping me holding on until whatever path becomes clear as the one I will hopefully see levelheaded. You don't have to decide this all right now. We don't know where this will take us.

 

I know this is meant to be helpful every time it is told to us SOs. I know it is meant to relieve us, to affirm that nothing we did or didn't do caused it. But man, as much as it is meant to help, it stings. To feel so irrelevant to our husbands that nothing we could do would stop it. That nothing about us was so alluring or good or whatever to prevent our husbands from falling into such depravity. To give away what should have been only ours, to rob us of our agencies as wives and lovers and best friends.

All these little tidbits keep surfacing for us that remind us that our husbands had separate lives and while they were in that life we were nothing. An example, that seems like nothing to most, is that for at least the past 6 years my husband has gotten a box of cookies from a bakery on his birthday from his work. I never knew. Not once. No idea. He either ate them in secret at work (including the year we met him at lunch, how he had room for lunch is beyond me) or shared them with other people at work. Not his wife. Not his kids. He seems to think it's enough to tuck his tail between his legs and say he's sorry. But I feel like nothing. I had no idea what my husband, *my husband* was doing on his birthday. So over and over again we get to feel like nothing. Yes, it was our husband's problem. But the problem for us is learning how we just didn't exist. We may as well never had been married because in all those moments of transgressions we basically weren't, we were as good as strangers to our husbands. How on earth do you rebuild confidence knowing that you were nothing to the person who was supposed to value you above all others in all things?

 

I apologize - I had no intent to minimize your connection to your husband. I can just say from my own experience that it didn't matter if we had sex 5 days in a week - my porn attraction was due to a lot of emotions (shame, inadequacy, resentment) I was afraid to share with my wife because I was afraid if I was vulnerable and explored them with her she'd leave me. Heck, I still fight those feelings after 5 months in therapy and SAA and sobriety - that if I'm honest about a hard day or a trigger or feeling anxious or mad, that she's going to be disgusted with the "real me" and leave. The catch-22 is my addiction to numb those feelings lead to doing things that may lead to her leave me anyway.

I would not say you were nothing to him - I mean I'm not him or you, but it's just my best guess. My wife's therapist told her not to discount the good times, and not to question everything. We still had fun together and got married and had fun together for real reasons. I try to remind my wife of those times too - the trips and laughs and dancing and such was still there. My therapist posed this as an opportunity, to rebuild trust in a way that I was incapable of before - with vulnerability and honesty - the kind of trust that is much stronger than before.

I can't really imagine the emotions and thoughts going through your head. I'm really sorry if I brought up negative thoughts, it was never my intention.

 

Can I ask if you'd had run ins with those emotions with her that led you to be afraid to talk to her? I'm really struggling to understand in general how men go from negative emotion to porn as the coping. All I want is my husband to comfort me when I feel so horrible, I struggle to understand going to one of the things that puts the relationship in real risk.

I think it is very hard for us wives to feel that anything matters to our husbands after they've had the high of porn. To be honest, it is so hard in this world to even know what really matters to men. Sex is everywhere, porn is everywhere, scantily clad is everywhere. And most of the time it feels like all of that is just the holy grail to men, and so thinking your husband wasn't doing that when he in fact was....it's just so hard to believe then that anything you do could be better. As I type this I realize that I'm reducing my husband (and all the men on here) to a single facet. But I just don't know what to think.

Please don't feel the need to apologize. Those of us with betrayal trauma are thinking them all the time anyway. I do feel that it is good for me to read things here and then challenge them so that I can explore the thoughts in a less charged setting. Your thoughts allow me to pull at a thread and see where it goes, to see if it is something I need to explore on my end. The exchange is good, I think, for all of us trying to wade through this mess we're in.

 

Going to do my best to respond before I have a call

Without going into too much detail I always had those emotions. I found something I wrote in 5th grade that said I liked a field trip most that year because I didn't have to worry about not being picked or being left out. In that sense I've always felt "less than" (smart, funny, attractive, interesting, in general). Those feelings guided most of my life: how i interacted (and sometimes didn't) with friends - how i interacted with my parents, how I parented, how I chose jobs, and in my relationships. There was always a fear because I always felt not good enough - so I pretended to be the person I wanted to be, and lied to uphold those standards.

I was insanely jealous of the sex lives i thought other people were having - it's not like I was a long term virgin or never dated or anything. I'm probably very in line with average - but it was a mental obsession. It started when I was 12-13 when an older boy who was already going through/done with puberty convinced me to be sexual with him. He talked about masturbation and girls and what felt good - and honestly from that moment forward I feel intense social and sexual inadequacy. Those sexual assaults - for lack of a better term - went on for a long time and I pretended that I was OK with it because it made him want to hang out with me and be my friend. In reality, I was being abused and used for his pleasure. I'm lucky the experience never included intercourse.

After that I saw my first porn (magazine) at summer camp and then found digital porn and roleplaying on AOL and limewire.

Porn let me escape from trying to be the person i thought my parents wanted to be, from trying to be the person my teachers and friends and bosses and girlfriends wanted me to be. Roleplaying gave me validation, porn never said no, i never disappointed it, and it felt a lot safer than going to bars or taking risks in real life where I could face real embarrassment. By the time I got married I was to a point where it was unmanageable and the therapist help I tried getting didn't help. Trying to make lines in the sand didn't help.

It's now close to 25 years since that first sexual contact and I've only now come to realize and be retrospective and see what a big issue it was - not just in my marriage but my life. The denial exercises I've done have been the most eye opening. It has stolen a good portion of my life - it held me back from knowing my true self and enjoying life. It's held me back from the deeper connection I want with my wife and what she deserves. I can only be happy that I'm getting to this now and not when I'm 65 so I can be the father my 2 girls deserve.

 

@RUNDMC Well, you should to get up and start cooking and cleaning. Use those hands for something better.

 

It also doesn't love, it also doesn't bond, it also doesn't fulfill the emotional comfort a man needs in life. It falls short of a lot of things that humans need. That was the point. I'm not sure if you were trying to be funny or not, but it obviously was not seen that way if so.
Taking a woman and reducing her to menial chores as though that is the only contribution she can make, as though her absolute worth is based on that, is short-sighted and cruel. Especially when you are talking to women who have experienced trauma.

 

She was being facetious. I’m pretty sure

 

I hope so. I have a bad habit of taking things literally

 

I sent you a PM about it