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Mumsnet has not checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. If you need help urgently or expert advice, please see our domestic violence webguide and/or relationships webguide. Many Mumsnetters experiencing domestic abuse have found this thread helpful: Listen up, everybody

Original poster

How do you get your confidence back when dh has upset you?

48 replies

Mapleissweet · 13/10/2013 19:35

Dh and I had a baby last year and I have just returned to work. It has been a tough year emotionally and I feel a lot if pressure. Ds has been a difficult baby.

Things didn't help when I found out that dh had been looking at porn, nuts magazine etc and checking out people he knows on line. He is very remorseful and has done everything he can to make it up to me.

It has however really knocked my confidence and I am normally a confident person. I don't feel as if I an sexy enough for him and it hurts me to think of him drooling over these girls on line while I was nursing our baby.

I don't know how to move on from it. I so want it and we make progress, but then something will trigger me off and I will feel really low about it. I do feel good around other men and do get attention, but I feel upset my dh could treat me with such little respect. Leering at top less girls online when I had just given birth has effected how I think if him.

He has stopped. But how do I let it go and draw a line under it before I wreck my marriage.

OP posts:
Boosterseattheballcleaner · 13/10/2013 20:30

nuts magazine? What is he? 15!

Don't take his own inadequacies as personal slight, I'm not surprised it has affected your respect for him. I would find the whole thing a total turn off.

If you have made the decision to draw a line in the sand the perhaps you would feel better if you started doing a few things for you, getting out of the house for a few hours and feel a bit less "mummy" and a bit more you.

You can try to rise above it and put it down to juvenile behaviour, but be prepared to recognise that you might never get that respect for him back.

Original poster
Mapleissweet · 13/10/2013 21:47

God yes, how do I get my respect back for him?

And how do I stop myself feeling so crap Sad

OP posts:
Rules · 13/10/2013 21:54

Why was he looking at porn Maple out of curiosity. You said you were breastfeeding. Were you still having sex?

bigstrongmama · 13/10/2013 21:56

Do you want to let it go and draw a line under it? If it was me, I'd want to talk about it a lot before I could let it go (if I felt I could).

To get respect back for him, I think you'd need to understand and respect his motivations for looking at other women when you needed his support. Tricky, that. Counselling might help you work out your feelings and what you need.

Original poster
Mapleissweet · 13/10/2013 22:01

Yes we were having sex. He said he was there on every other way for me (he was), but admits he behaved badly in this area.
It's very difficult to let go given it was at a time most women including me feel vulnerable and self conscious.

I feel as though I go round in circles.

OP posts:
Original poster
Mapleissweet · 13/10/2013 22:03

I suspect he wanted some kind of escapism from the stress of a new baby.

OP posts:
Rules · 13/10/2013 22:37

Men do enjoy porn though and to them it has nothing to do with how they view you. Its separate. I understand how you feel and you have made him aware of how you feel but if its something he has always done (maybe in secret from you) then do you think you can let it go? If he likes it then he will still do it anyway. Can you come to an understanding that you are both happy with maybe? I don't think its a good idea to make him feel bad about it though.

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:05

Hello there

I have no respect for men who use porn for societal and political reasons. Particularly when they throw their use of it in your face for "not showing them enough attention"

I disagree with Rules profoundly

You don't have to put up with it, and you don't have to swallow your disgust and disrespect

He is an inadequate person. People who use porn, by definition, view certain women as "less than"

They think there are nice women who are fit to be wives and mothers and women who are not. If I thought my husband felt this way, he would be out of my life.

I wouldn't accept "he will do it anyway (so basically, STFU and make him a sandwich)"

If it is a deal breaker for you, then so be it

I suspect though that this mindset is not quite where you are yet. You are still thinking in terms of "I am not good enough" (aided of course by the porn apology we absorb all around us, ably demonstrated by comments such as those abov)

You are wrong. You are plenty good enough. It is your husband that is sorely lacking

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:08

"I need a little light relief from changing nappies. I know, I'll go and look at some borderline underage girls from Eastern Europe get their assholes stretched open"

Yep, makes sense. Not.

CuttedUpPear · 13/10/2013 23:09

I also disagree with Rules profoundly.
What AF said ^^

Rules · 13/10/2013 23:10

Lots of women like porn too though. For most of us its just a bit of fun as Adults.

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:12

Rules you need to educate yourself about what porn means to women as a whole.

Until then, I consider your advice to women in these situations to be less than helpful and possibly downright abusive.

Your best solution then might be "try it you might like it" ?

Puh- lease

Gingersnap88 · 13/10/2013 23:13

I love AF. Completely agree.

Rules · 13/10/2013 23:15

We are all different as women and Im well enough educated thanks.

Original poster
Mapleissweet · 13/10/2013 23:15

Thank you af and all. You have helped.

He is sorry, but I'm trying to come to terms with he us not who I thought he was. He has changed and us changing, but I can't seem to move on and my insecurities and upset keep reoccurring.

What you say I agree with, it's just difficult to apply to myself and that the person who I thought was my everything has made me feel do crap and undermined what I was/am to him.

How do I make myself feel better?

OP posts:
CuttedUpPear · 13/10/2013 23:16

Rules if you could speak to the women making porn then you might change your outlook.
Unfortunately you won't be able to as they are not the kind of people who have a voice. Or a way out.

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:18

I am in a certain amount of shock that this is the Relationships topic and not AIBI

AIBI is chockfull of porn apologists. Relationships, less so

Porn is corrosive to functional relationships if there is a mismatch of acceptance of it

Both partners are A-ok ? Carry on exploiting those women, you are both as bad as one another.

When one partner is uncomfortable with it, it's not ok. Really not ok

Using porn is not a given. It's a choice. For some women, their partner using porn is a deal breaker. And that is ok, certainly not something that anyone should be coming on to say "men will always do it, don't you think you should get with the programme". Hmm

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:18

AIBU

damn autocorrect Smile

Rules · 13/10/2013 23:19

A lot of women making porn are totally in control and make a lot of money and are quite happy with their choice. Yes it is a suspect industry and people (men and women) can and are abused within it however there are also strong women who have been in porn themselves and now run their own businesses and are not in any way abused.

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:22

OP, you should not be trying to "make yourself feel better"

Your distress is wholly justified. Why would you try and talk yourself out of it ?

Rules · 13/10/2013 23:22

Of course if its a deal breaker within your relationship and your partner continues to use it then you have the choice to walk away.
But for some couples porn is part of their relationship and that is ok too.

ThisIsBULLSHIT · 13/10/2013 23:23

maple it will take a little while. It must feel like he has betrayed you.

And your perspective has changed so dramatically having had a baby, yet it seems that his has not.

I suspect you might have to wait it out and wait for him to earn your respect back by being a decent DH and dad.

AnyFucker · 13/10/2013 23:23

Rules this is the wrong place for your pro-porn flawed propaganda. Seriously, you are not helping and your lack of education is making you look very silly.

Rules · 13/10/2013 23:24

I understand you are against it for your own reasons AF but that does not mean that it is wrong for everyone.

ThisIsBULLSHIT · 13/10/2013 23:25

And I mean that he will have to actively earn it back, not just that you will have to wait and find ways to respect him again.

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