I'd really like some wise advice from the sisterhood of mumsnet please.
The title makes it pretty clear, I'm going to be as short and sweet as I can, ok.
We met very young, he was 22 I was 18. He was superfit a professional athlete , I was a tad overweight and very shy, I am mixed race , my genetics are cuddly ;)
He made new feel bad about myself, he was kind and loving but his own insecurities made him boast about other women, his attractiveness etc etc. He is better looking than me, yes, I have low self esteem but he actually is. It's a fact. I lost a lot of weight, I dyed my hair, I got ill, I became eating disordered but very slim and socially praised unfortunately.
We travelled the world and had our adventures then we had lots of children, way more than is sensible really, we bought a big house and it all seemed perfect, I did all the work, he earned very good money, barely had to work due to successful inherited business I must add, so no effort involved, but I really did everything over the years , home, kids money etc all down to me, don't get me wrong though , he did do things but I had to plan, think, tell him to, if that makes sense.
Night feeds, babies, kids and then Tweens all mine.
Decisions, all mine. He always let me down, always. If someone was ill, he fell asleep while I stayed up, if I needed anything, support, advice help of any kind mentally or physically, he would ignore me, smile tell me he loved me, quick hug and then back to the gym, computer game, TV whatever he was doing. Money was always there, he was always around but I couldn't rely on him, ever.
I isolated myself immersed in the kids, cut of from my friends lost in my eating disordered lonely hell, he went out, had friends, hobbies a life. I trusted him fully, nothing suspicious we even shared a phone.
I lost a baby, late on, it was traumatic, he was annoyed because I wasn't myself, it pissed him off that he couldn't train, the house wasn't perfect.
But he was always, nice, very selfish, but so nice. We got on so well, we talked about how other couples split because they lied to each other, we said we were best friends, no secrets, my resentment was there but I ignored it, buried it in my anorexia I guess.
Sex was boring, sometimes infrequent and very distant, no kissing, I was jealous of people who had passion, fire etc. my drive was seemingly higher than his, I put up with it. I loved him after all.
He constantly made reference to his looks, his muscles, women that wanted him etc etc I felt ugly and insignificant we both knew he was more attractive then me, when we went out women stared, flirted literally in my face I felt like shit.
At times he was violent when we rowed, once he broke my shoulder I'm 7 stone lighter than him, he lashed out , he swore get never meant to hurt me. I blamed me, I got in his face. This happened a few times.
Years went by, nothing changed I dealt with life, the shit the ups and downs he put himself first and reaped what I sowed.
Gradually he became lewd in his sexual approach to me, making derogatory comments, he began for the first time in years to leer at other women, younger women, we barely slept together, to be honest he began to disgust me
Then one day he started to not be able to have sex with me anymore, he wasn't about to maintain or finish. He was there physically but elsewhere mentally. Somehow I got pregnant with our last baby round that time. Soon after that it stopped altogether.
I thought, this is it. He is having a affair.
This is getting to long, so sorry, he had got himself a phone about a year before, one day I borrowed it it was full of porn downloads , I'd never really been bothered by porn in the past , we had watched together and I had alone but when I found this it cut.
He was rejecting me for internet porn, I scanned his email etc, I found numerous sex sites , contact pages , web cam etc etc. it hit the fan.
Basically, initially he blamed me , he told me I was a turn off, he used porn as I was boring then gradually over an entire pregnancy I slowly learned he had intended for me to find it, he was a porn addict and he wanted to stop,to be with me again he lied so much through the period of discovery, so many lies , first it was just a year, then two and eventually I found out it was the whole relationship. He had a f**ing 60 inch cinema TV in a special room.
I felt so much pain, anger, occasional porn use is one thing but to be lied to for years and be actually rejected for Internet whores etc is very traumatic, you feel like it's an infidelity when it's like that. He swears to thus day he has been physically faithful, he was shown porn at a young age, it was normal to him. I'll never know wether this is true or not. I felt so naive, dumb, plain stupid
We are conditioned as women to believe that if we have a problem with porn then we are prudes, insecure etc etc but when it literally takes your man it a whole different ball game. I felt ugly, old , rejected and mostly like a fool for not seeing what was happening under my nose. I got to see what he wanted to get off over when I trawled our computers etc. that hurt. A lot.
I wanted out, the kids the house, the money , my crap self worth and isolation made me stay. He lied for twenty years, I had no trust anymore, he was a fake.
One night during all of thus I awoke to find him sobbing, I'd never seen him cry, he was a gibbering mess, photos of us everywhere, he had had a sort of realisation, he saw the way get had treated me over the years, he saw it all how much he had hurt me. He begged me to stay with him.
So now, he doesn't watch it and he is a changed man, he is attentive, try's so hard to be there for me, puts loads of effort into the kids, he is literally the polar opposite of what he was before. His appearance isn't his main focus now, he walks, notices the world around him, it's crazy. He gets up at night, everything, he is everything a woman could want.
I am not happy though, I can't forget his lies, I can't trust him, can't undress in front of him, I mourn the past , the years I wasted believing his lies.
Would you forgive and forget ? How would you do it ? How do you rebuild trust after years of lies, Would you believe he had never actually touched another woman ? These images haunt me, the times I wasn't able to have sex, childbirth etc I believed he wasn't either but the whole time he was wa*** to some woman on a porn site or on a camera or some crap. That hurts believe me.
I'd appreciate any advice. I can't tell or share any of this in real life , please do consider the intensity of lies and deceit surrounding this type of porn use before giving me the, it's not porn it's your problem speech as so many women get slayed here for that unfortunately :'( thanks for reading xx