SOs feelings and thoughts through their partners Addiction/Recovery

I definitely agree with that.

I though historically have thought I was inherently bad. I posted that mostly to affirm that I'm not. I think it's hard for me to express this. That I have become so good at using that in a defensive way to hide what I think was bad about me.

I really think many of the married men here struggling over and over deal with this. We feel shamed by our partner and for good reason. We resort to the same drug to fix that same problem in an endless loop.

 

I definitely disagree. For me it's not the look of the person on the screen. It's the acceptance I felt. Or that I have fantasized about being the guy that the girl is so turned on by. It's not the fake acting they do. It's the feeling that I'm "such a stud". What I'm seeing is it's been my way of protecting my own self from my own insecurities. Especially when my wife isn't in the mood. I've put so much value on my wife's approval that even when she rightly so, didn't want sex, I took it as rejection that I am not worthy of her love. I subbed that feeling with a cheap substitute of PMO that I thought worked. I realize it doesn't.

I've posted before that I'm not one to really want to naturally do wild things in the bedroom. My wife isn't either. But there are things about experimenting that I do enjoy. There are things I know my wife has done sexually with others that she refused to do with me. It hurts me badly. P didn't hurt me in that way because I could on demand get whatever experiment I wanted.

I'm realizing now how much damage I've done disassociating sex and intimacy even though I do understand it and desire it with and only with my wife. IDK I'm having a hard time expressing this.

 

I also want to admit that I realize that I most definitely screwed this up because of what porn did to me. That it did in fact alter what I thought was sexual approval. I'm just trying to also express my deepest feeling and desire that I want my wife and always have.

She was the girl in the neighboring town. Every guy liked her. She was older than me and wouldn't have even turned her eye my way in high school. First time I saw her I was a freshman she was a junior. I wouldn't say it was love at first sight it was more. Wow, that girl is the most beautiful creature I've ever seen. It was like a movie when the girl walks in.

Fate I guess played it's role and 10 years later we ran into each other. We hit it off instantly. I guess in a way I still feel like that 14 year old boy.

 

I think, at at least, that is that I'm trying to suggest. That I have felt historically that statement as if it is selfish. Because I didn't do that to hurt her. And even though I didn't mean to. I feel as though i did, because I did in fact hurt her. In that moment of shame I feel a certain disassociation because it's not my perception. The reactions of the SO, that you laid out well reinforce the fact that it did in fact hurt my SO and generates it's own level of shame for her. I think this really complicates the feelings and emotions for the addict. The addict has a hard time understanding that it isn't the SO being wrongly selfish. It's a hard pill to swallow. Because I think most of us didn't know it would happen and are stuck.

I think to how my wife would say "how could you do this to me"? I hear and feel that as if I meant to. My inner most being says I don't want that at all, but it's like he's under lock and key in the deepest dungeon of my soul. I'm not trying to suggest it's selfish and wrong in any way for the SO to feel that way. It's that I think many other addicts like me don't realize that we were doing something wrong until it was too late. We cling to the one hopefully reedeemable part of us.

That we didn't mean to do it.

 

Perhaps this is exactly where I am in my life.

I think it's essentially what I was infering when I said I was a 12 year old boy who was hooked. And woke up a 34 year old man married with kids asking myself how did I get here.

Maybe there's some disconnect here. Maybe the SO thinks that the dummy should have realized this much sooner. I think that's definitely a reasonable thought.

For me though it hasn't been my reality. And now I'm battling the subconscious habits I've clung to my entire life.

In this I think we need way more grace than we deserve.

 

I love this!

 

I can't speak for you and your husband. For me though in the moment if rejection I can't just imagine my wife and get that acceptance. She just rejected me. Very Hard and often multiple times. Sometimes for months. I'm not saying it's right it's just how I felt.

I'm not denying this truth. I think it's an over simplified example though of what's truly going on.

I'm not going to deny that novelty is a real thing. Nor that physical attraction is needed. What I think many SOs misinterpret is that it isn't always the base impulse. It's not the look of the woman it's how it made me feel. Loved, wanted, and accepted.

 

I hate to be so direct. But this is exactly what shame dumping us. You are telling me something about myself that you can't possibly know. There are actually multiple men here expressing the same feelings. Maybe it's worth thinking about a little.

Maybe I'm not most men IDK but this is most definitely my truth.

 

I can't speak for your husband. But I can say for me this is ignoring very much of my experiences.

Feeling needed, wanted, accepted were the main forces at play. What I didn't realize is that it was me that was not meeting my needs. I used to blame my wife because of my toxic shame.

At the very least I see that clearly now.

 

I don't want to assume here either. But.. your husband has expressed similar sentiments as I. Maybe he's being honest? At least a little?