Hello my first post ……
I have read through previous but old 'husband and secret online porn use' posts on Mumsnet and I wish to say this for all your lovely but heart broken readers who are currently devastated due to finding their partner’s secret online pornography life/use - As a woman who has now left her porn obsessed husband (a man who seems absolutely perfect), if you believe you know the extent of your husband’s porn use please think again. THIS IS THE MESSAGE I WISH WOMEN TO KNOW:
I was lied to over the whole duration of our long relationship and marriage – I have my numerous and now tragic counselling transcripts that demonstrate how deeply confused, lonely and distressed I was for those years of being in the (pornography) dark – nothing made sense. For quite a while I seriously believed he was gay – he took so little interest in my body and the sex was a huge effort for him – but I determinedly continued to ‘force’ him….. so desperate was I to maintain ‘a sexual connection’ between us which I now know simply didn’t exist in the first place. Making love was a robotic and unemotional process that left me heart broken, feeling humiliated and ultimately devastated. My beautiful sexy underwear went unappreciated – rejected. I tried everything the counsellors advised to ‘get him going’. Nothing. When I first found out the shocking truth by finding porn evidence of temp files on the family laptop he smashed the computer preventing me from viewing them properly. Over the years, time and again he promised he would not view pornography but ultimately he was using every technical strategy to view it without my knowledge. This is a lesson for you: Ironically by confronting him he was able to identify the method that I detected the porn again, which had no longer worked for him and changed how he accessed porn the next time. The only way I finally found out again that he was using was by covertly recording him by his PC and unfortunately for him even though he kept the sound down low I could still hear the moaning, groaning and wailing of the porn action.... He couldn’t even be bothered to wash his hands – yet that computer and keyboard was used by all of the family. He simply did not accept responsibility for his obsession and ultimately blamed me. I now know through my own counselling that my husband is a COVERT narcissist and that pornography obsession, the love of oneself through masturbation is the ultimate narcissist trait and the dysfunctional response to loving sex, preferring controlling, nasty dirty online sex or with strangers… (Read Sam Vaknin – Malignant Self Love). What I will never forgive, cannot forgive, are the chronic lies and ‘gaslighting’ that went along with his secret pornography obsession that lasted well over a decade – I was made to feel neurotic, jealous and over-reacting and as the relationship deteriorated the mental torture upped a gear, unattractive and fat (at 8stone). He literally forced me to breaking point with his chronic lies and devaluation. What I am trying to relay (and badly), if you don’t feel that your partner is acknowledging his pornography use/obsession then you need to start digging further by all means possible. FOLLOW YOUR INSTINCTS – WOMEN HAVE AMAZING INNATE INSTINCTS THAT DETECT THAT SOMETHING IS STILL NOT RIGHT/IS UNTRUE – if you feel this way do not ignore your body. He may like my beautiful husband, have a dysfunctional personality and porn use is a trait of this – from my experience he won’t recover in order for porn to be removed from his life. Now for my final submission. If you find pornography on your computer DO NOT confront your partner until you have recorded and investigated ALL the evidence of the porn…. You must not (as I stupidly did) give him his right of reply until you are FULLY aware of exactly what he has been doing through YOUR OWN research (and with WHOM if this is the case). DO NOT confront him until you have a full grasp of true events – most men will NOT tell the truth and there may be a secret life going on that you would divorce him for if you knew the full horrible details. My husband smashed the laptop when first being confronted all of those years ago – he said he was angry and ‘humiliated’ – but now I realise it was to cover up the type of porn and evidence he didn’t want me to see. For reasons of my ‘high conflict divorce’ I had a technician attempt to recapture the images, temp files and cookies having kept the laptop in a secret place I was eventually able to view some of his hidden life (he is unaware of this still but that is my silver bullet). It appears whilst we had only been married for a few years, he was accessing sex hook up sites (I thought I was proving my trust by not continually ringing him and asking what he was up to – how wrong I was), had a LIVE porn membership Jasmine, online interactive porn and some pretty aggressive porn sites. It was clear he was not only leading a secret online porn life but over time this porn use had ‘spilled over’ into his real life. THAT is why I wanted to reply…. Chronic porn use sadly often leads to live porn sites, then sex meet ups and many of the woman who advertise for sex end up being prostitutes in another guise. That is the true reality for those men who get sucked into the world of chronic pornography use. Save yourself heartache and distress – keep calm and remain focused. Take back control and think calculatedly and carefully – information and evidence is power. Read up on as many porn obsession books as you can. Only then can you make the decision on how you proceed in your marriage/relationship and whether it is truly hopeless or worth saving. Personally I think that any prolonged need for pornography and the unashamed lying that goes with it, is a red light that signals the death knell for a marriage – why put yourself through the constant agony of being his mother continually monitoring him… life is too short. We are all beautiful in our own way and deserve to be loved in all ways and every way. If your investigations throw up huge issues give him an ultimatum, a time frame of changing his ways and if this fails leave the relationship. I am poorer now and the future is scary and unknown, but when I dance around my home to my favourite songs wearing my favourite makeup and high heels, I feel filled with hope for the future and a sense of true joy even though I am dancing alone – all feelings that I lost over the years of my marriage. Good luck and I hope you find at last true joy again even if it means you make the journey alone and without the person you once adored and worshipped. ;)