DH been watching porn on TV in secret - i feel so betrayed. Advice please..

[nickneat]

I'm 45 so no youngster but have found out my husband (47 has been watching adult channels and relieving himself when i have gone to bed. We have been married 17 years and have two children aged 8 and 5. We tried for years to have them and finally had IVF which was successful in 2001 and thought we were the luckiest people alive.
However, i found out by accident in 2005 when i was still breastfeeding my second son age 3 months that my husband had been looking at porn on the PC and the TV. I was devasted and it nearly broke us up but we talked and i believed he wouldn't do it again.
I've now found him out again and i feel sick and just don't think i can forgive him again, not after we nearly split last time. He's really sorry and says he can't help it but i feel so betrayed. I really don't want to upset the children but i don't want to be in the same room as him at the moment.
What do i do?
Nicola

I'm watching porn right now, OH has taken kids to his mums for a sleepover, i feel randy so hey its all good

I've been with my OH for years and only found out in august that he has been wanking himself silly nearly every morning watching porn. Didnt bat an eyelid

nickneat- can you say more about what exactly he is watching? Is he paying for extra channels, or watching explicit television after you've gone to bed?

I honestly thought it was something all men did. I think that you are perfectly within your rights to be upset but not to stop him from doing it- I agree with other posters who've said you need to talk openly and honestly about it.

I think that porn only becomes a problem if it's affecting a couple's sex life or if it becomes an addiction. Small doses are ok IMO.

I hope you sort things out between you.

If your DH lied, you are absolutely right to be upset at the betrauyal of trust.

However your husband is an adult and you absolutely cannot control him by insisting that he doesn't watch porn and masturbate.

Is it the porn specifically that is the problem or would masturbation without porn still be a problem?

please can someone help me my nose is bleeding it wont stop,my husband beat me up

its realy late i'm too scared to ring anyone

please

you there elf?

elf phone the police

So your husband watches porn and you are shocked. Hmmmm.

Porn is about penises and vaginas. We all have them.

The point is you feel betrayed.

Ideas

1. Don't be angry
2. Try to understand
3. Remember your marriage vows
4. Mumsnet is not anti men or a place to run them down.
5. It is not a place where women are superior or judges of men
6. Think, get ideas, delay judgement, talk to friends and family, let your husband be.
7. There may be other problems in the marriage and you may be using the porn as an excuse to get to your husband negatively
8. Consciously look at his good points. Remember, you married him for him, besides a way of having children and security.

Haven't got a problem with porn and I know DH watches it when he gets in from work (middle of the night) and we also watch it together.

But this is not affecting our sex life (only ever to improve it really) and I know about it.

I do think the OP has a point if her DH knows how upset it makes her and won't discuss it/it is instead of sex together.

Elf... how are things this morning?

I'm sure this has all been said before but.....

the desire to watch naked people/people having sex is a primal one. Both men and women are sexually aroused by watching sex or looking at pictures of sex. This is perfectly normal and does not impact on a person's desire for their partner (usually). How those images are made and produced is a separate issue - Dittany has a point about the exploitative side of some porn however it is not all such.

Banning someone from looking at porn isn't really fair. Unless it is impacting on your lives together, it isn't really your place to say when/how he masturbates. Our sexuality does not become the property of our partners on marriage.

My DH was (probably, denied it but can't see how it wasn't him) downloading pornos on demand which we had to pay for. We wasted about £20 on that junk. That pissed me off. However if he had borrowed/downloaded free porn that would have been his business. It doesn't mean that he doesn't fancy or want me.

If he stays up til 3 watching it and is useless the next day, or he never wants to have sex with you, or is spending tons of cash on it, then you have the right to say something. But if not - you just have to deal with it, I think. It is certainly not worth splitting up over.

Has anyone trotted out the old chestnut "I'd rather my DH / DP watch porn than visit prostitutes/other women" yet?

Back to the OP - I know exactly where you are coming from, some women accept it and don't care (and compete to show how utterly accepting they are), for some it makes them feel uncomfortable. It makes you feel uncomfortable so you are ENTITLED to ask him to not do it. This is not control its about asking for someone to respect your views about something so very personal that has the potential to ruin your self esteem (I've been there so speak from experience)

So yes some people like it - whoopie-doo for them. But we are all individuals, whats acceptable to one isn't to another. But gems like "how is your sex life?" or "there must be other issues here" are great aren't they, as if there MUST be something else making you feel this way poor little lady (back to the 'competitive accepting' there me-thinks). Erm, no there doesn't have to be more to it. It is what it is - porn makes some women feel inadequate and its not right that their DP's / H's continue watching when they know this.

I'd guess that last time this happened you went spare and he simply agreed never to do it again. At the time he didn't mean it but wanted the shouting to stop and I'd guess you didn't or couldn't explain why you thought and felt that this was totally unacceptable to you.(especially given the exhaustion from having a tiny baby etc)

This time first of all think through why you feel betrayed and why this issue is such a no go area for you.

Write it down coherently, all of it

Then calmly speak to him and explain your feelings on the matter and where they originate from

With that out of the way ask him why he was watching porn.

LISTEN to what he says

Try to come to an agreement, explain the consequences of going outside the agreement in the future
then you have a blueprint

If you do this then it is all about respect, trust and understanding and nothing to do with the problem... be it porn, gambling, drugs etc

Also OP - in terms of advice, I can only suggest that you tell him again how it makes you feel. If it makes you not want him to touch you, or how you now wonder if that 'new thing' he tried out was something he got from porn then tell him. He needs to know how it makes you feel, really, and he can then decide from there whether he really can't survive without watching two people shagging

blinks, that wikipedia link is interesting ...."showing young male pandas "panda pornography" is widely credited with a recent population boom among pandas in zoos".

No SouthMum, funnily enough no one has trotted out that line yet

And actually whether it impacts on the OP's sex life is relevant. Relationships are about compromise and negotiation. It is no more acceptable for the OP to ban her DH from watching porn if he is still a loving and attentive husband and father than if he forced her to watch it with him.

I have been there too actually - with porn wrecking my self-esteem. But that was in a relationship where our sex life was verging on non-existant and where my DP told me that he struggled to find me attractive because I was too fat. In other relationships, it hasn't been an issue at all because it has been in the context of a great sex life and it hasn't been something my DP has done in secret and I haven't felt at all threatened by it.

Context is everything.

If porn wrecks a woman's self esteem , then porn most definitely ios not the problem.

That was a bit strong of me. But I think it can make women feel a bit inadequate if they have a rubbish sex life. I agree though that it isn't porn that is the problem. Took me a while to figure that out

It's rarely the porn that wrecks the self esteem - it's the partners' treatment that does it. And that treatment normally permeates beyond the bedroom.

"He's doing it in secret because it bothers you. If it didn't bother you, he wouldn't need to do it secretly...."
Sorry but I have to disagree, I told an ex I didn't mind in the slightest about his mags (pre-internet porn days then, and admittedly less worrying then) and he STILL pored over them in secret. That's the point, it's fantasy and therefore private..

Hope you're ok today nickneat and not too overwhelmed by all this.

Lotster - I'd have to say that sometimes if the other partner's not in the mood, it's a bit disconcerting for the one who's randy to pore over porn when him/her around.... so you would want to go somewhere else so you don't get distracted. Doesn't necessarily mean that you're doing it secretly, just in private....

Spicemonster - oh have you not heard that line before? I've seen it a few times on here and had it said to me as if that is the alternative . Anyway, theres still time....

And yes of course it is relevant if the porn is impacting on their sex life, absolutely. Whats not relevant is the suggestion that there must be another reason for the OP to be upset. Perhaps not, in some cases the partner watching porn is the only issue and can ruin a relationship.