SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

Hi everyone,
I am new here and I am very thankful to have found this amazing site! There is lots of great information and support here and I look forward to benefiting from it.

I need some advice. My situation is a little different as my husband appears to have an addiction to pornography and while that can lead to infidelity I don’t know that it has gotten to that point. I was looking for anonymous support groups that value privacy and came across this one.

I have found my husband’s porn on a few occasions and when I ask about it he gets defensive, angry, and says it’s no big deal. Our intimate relations became almost non-existent a few years ago because of his health issues, he said, and I believed him but then found porn and knew he was lying. If I try to talk about it he gets defensive and blame-shifts.

I did lots of research and found a highly-rated porn recovery program, and after several tries he agreed to watch some of the videos but he says they make no sense to him. He calls any emotional discussion "baby talk." He didn’t use to be this way. I thought the videos would help him see the negative effects of porn but it hasn’t worked. I got him to see a counselor with me once but that didn’t help either.

I need help setting effective boundaries that will affect our teen and pre teen children the least. I would appreciate any advice. Thank you in advance!

Welcome to SI and sorry you're here. I'm glad that you found the site. There are some boundary setting posts in the JFO (Just Found Out) forum, but they're more for you and not necessarily ones that would benefit your children. There's also a thread in the ICR (I Can Relate) forum for Emotionless Infidelity that may help you. The Healing Library is at the top of the site, and I hope you've found it already.

If he doesn't want to change, then he isn't going to change. You can't change him. You set the boundaries to protect yourself. Is there an addiction-related recovery program for families in your area? They may have some tips and tricks that could help you. Whether he's addicted or not, your scenario may be addiction-adjacent.

So sorry you're here.

Thank you so much for responding and I will definitely look into the threads you mentioned. My situation is very hard to navigate as it looks like this is an addiction, and if it were drugs or alcohol I could find more help and get family support. I am trying to find a CSAT (certified sex addiction therapist) to give me advice but the ones I contacted said they aren’t taking on clients. We live in a rural area so I need to find online. God bless you all for all the help and support you give everyone. I really appreciate you taking the time to answer my question!

You find all sorts here. Some will say porn is harmless, others think that bikini-pics border on porn. For some a porn obsession is spending hours per day online, for others simply browsing a lingerie catalog is enough.
What’s the extent of your husbands obsession? What type of porn is this? Gay? Hetro? Legal?

I think a key issue might be to change all discussion about this from "this is a you problem" to "this is OUR problem because it hurts me, and therefore our marriage". I think MC might be in order, along with mutual effort and work at reattaching emotionally. This does not mean jumping into bed and going at it, but more like spending time growing to enjoy each others company.

I can share that personally I don’t use porn. My stance is based on my experience in law enforcement, where I never met the unicorn of a willing and there-by-choice sex worker. The myth of the happy-hooker. Unlike unicorns I know they exist, only the hundreds of women I met were not in that group. I took my stance one day looking at my wonderful daughters, thanking that they made it to adulthood without having to sell access to their bodies to pay for their needs. If I didn’t want this for them, why should I encourage this industry when using the bodies of other daughters.

Thanks for taking the time to respond and for valuing your daughters so much! I also appreciate your service in law enforcement.

You are correct, it’s an us problem versus a him problem, and I don’t think I conveyed that very well in the beginning but do so now. I know there are a lot of different opinions on porn but in this case it’s led to dishonesty, more isolating, and him projecting his shame towards me. I feel like I am walking on eggshells. It appears to have started long ago and he hid it from me for a long time. I have researched about addiction and one tip I learned is to say I love you, this is a problem, and I will help us get through it.

Thanks again.