Over the past few years I’ve heard many heartbreaking stories from wives who have learned about their husband’s secret sexual lives. This discovery, or its disclosure, is what I refer to as blackout. It’s like sitting in a friendly, familiar room and suddenly having all the lights go out. The familiar surroundings take an unfamiliar form. Well-known objects become obstacles that trip us up. Fear shrouds us as we grope in the dark, searching for something to orient ourselves by.
Some would say the above descriptions are overstated. You may have family or friends who say that you’re overreacting. After all, looking at pornography is “harmless” adult entertainment. Fantasy doesn’t harm anyone. Such opinions, though, are made out of ignorance and denial. Sexual addiction typically begins with the habitual use of porn combined with masturbation. This self-gratification conditions men to experience sex in isolation, moving them into what I call “the world of me.”
I’ve experienced firsthand the devastation a wife feels when she realizes the most intimate area of her heart has been betrayed. I’ve seen over and over the same pain in others, and only those who have been there truly understand it. But well-meaning onlookers, because they lack this understanding often make comments that create additional wounds.
Blackout occurs in different ways and at different levels. Sometimes disclosure is quick, and it seems like someone flipped the off switch. More often, a bit of information starts a dimming process that, over time, ends in complete darkness. One reason for the slower progression is the way many men are discovered. Often, they’re caught —a bill, note, or Web site gives them away —which leads to a partial confession. Even husband who desire to come clean leave out information in the face of fear. Add to that an angry and hurting wife, and to many men, complete disclosure seems impossible.
The result for the wife is like candle flames being snuffed out one at a time, as he discloses or she discovers more and more information. But, in a diabolic twist of irony, a partial confession turns out to be worse than none at all. Husbands must confess everything in order for real healing to begin. Lies of omission are still dishonest even if well intentioned. Anything left in the darkness leaves a noose the Enemy can tighten at the opportune moment. Inevitably the rest of the story comes out later, increasing the wife’s pain and making blackout complete.
…I suggest you use great caution in demanding too much detail from your husband. Morbid curiosity has left many a woman with too many images that are difficult to erase. The best thing is to get only the general facts needed, not the gory details.
When my husband got tired of running from the truth —and from God —he finally confessed everything. I took advantage of his desire to be completely honest. Looking back, I realize I asked some questions that crossed over the line of what I needed to know. Plagued by images I didn’t need, the war raged in my head every time those images came up. Thanks to the teaching in my husband’s men’s group, there were times I’d ask questions and he would say, “I’ll answer that question, but are you sure you want me to?” This was a good check. Realizing I had all the information I needed, I stopped asking for unnecessary details.
You may cringe at this next statement: If your husband has come to you and confessed all, you will eventually come to see that as fortunate. I was one of the fortunate few —my husband did come to me, though at the time I couldn’t see how anything good could come out of it. Eventually, though, I recognized my husband’s coming completely clean was the first truly positive step even though the further disclosure caused more pain for me. It was God’s way of giving me a fresh perspective, and it was the real beginning of healing.
Dave’s disclosure caused more pain for me. It was God’s way of giving me a fresh perspective, and it was the real beginning of healing. Dave’s complete disclosure helped me to realize I wasn’t the only one hurting. It began to sink in that God was showing me Dave’s years of pain. He was a broken man and God had let him hit bottom.
My anger cooled. Dave wasn’t having fun. On the contrary, he’d been living a double life and battling demons since he was eleven years old. In addition, with his full confession he had to be willing to accept all of the potential consequences, including losing his marriage. He realized nothing could be worse than remaining where he was —in spiritual bondage.
I’ve encountered many wives who’ve had to deal with this same heartache of sexual betrayal, and I’ve repeatedly witnessed that once the whole truth has been revealed, even by accident, healing can start —for the husband, or wife, or both. Most men want help out of their bondage but are too ashamed to ask. Many have cried out to God in agony asking Him to release them from it. Every man believes, however, that if others knew fully what he has done, they wouldn’t forgive him. This lie keeps him in hiding and away from healing.
His being discovered, then, can be a husband’s first step on the road to freedom. But just as important, his being discovered can be a catalyst for the wife to get help —if shame doesn’t keep her in hiding. Yes, I hated what I’d learned from Dave, but finding and dealing with the truth, though painful, was still healthier than living a lie.
The above article comes from the book Hope After Betrayal, written by Meg Wilson, published by Kregel Publications. This is a TERRIFIC book for women who need to experience healing after finding out that adulterous sexual addiction has invaded their marriage. Not only does Meg, herself, greatly minister through her own personal experience, she also gives insight into the lives of several women and the journey they took to healing after finding out about their husband’s addiction and adulterous situations.
The book also has sections after each chapter that can also be quite helpful. One of them is called “Path Lights” which contains related scriptures and quotes. And the other is called “Journaling” which poses questions and thoughts to help women to process through this difficult journey through journaling — which is essentially what marriage counselors help you to do verbally. So it’s like therapy of another kind. We can’t recommend this book highly enough. We can see where it would be extremely beneficial to any woman who has been betrayed by her husband’s unfaithfulness — whether emotionally or physically! Review or Buy This Book Now
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(UNITED KINGDOM, LONDON) I’m writing this in the hope that there may be someone out there who understands what I’m going through.
In August, on my second wedding anniversary, my husband confessed to me that he had a sexual addiction (although he didn’t realise what it was at the time). He told me that on 3 separate occasions he had gone into men’s public toilets and had oral sex performed on him by strangers. The final time before he confessed, was on his oldest brother’s wedding day while I was at the reception with our two daughters, and he had gone to get some baby food for our youngest child. I then discovered the full story about his pornography addiction, porn movies etc.
We’ve been together for almost 5 years and have been married for just over two years. His confession has completely destroyed me. His actions, but most of all his lies, have ripped us apart and I’m really struggling to find a way through this and I just don’t know if our marriage will survive.
He’s recently become a Christian and is growing in his faith. He’s getting all the help available to him, attending a course at our church and seeing his counselor who runs the living waters course which he’s doing. I can see the change in him but I’m so ashamed and disgusted by what he did. He’s also destroyed the joy I had on our wedding day because I will never remember that wonderful day, just his confession.
I feel terrible within myself. In my head I know I’m not to blame for the things he did. But in my heart I feel that I was not enough for him and neither were our children. He claims to love me more than anything in this world but my heart is really struggling to believe this. He says he is not gay because he does not find men attractive and has no desires to be with a man. It only happened with men because it was so easy to get that sexual thrill through his orgasms, which came from the oral sex.
Just writing this is turning my stomach, I’ve always thought I was a strong person. Everyone important to me has always betrayed, even family. My husband knew this and I’d told him the importance of honesty to me and trust. I never thought he would do such a thing. The person who should be my back bone, to love and protect me is the one who has completely destroyed me and the life we have. It feels like everything has been a lie and I do not trust him.
I’ve always had trust issues and I worked so hard to get through them for the sake of our relationship, and he’s just proved that everything I ever thought was right, I want to leave and run a million miles away. But I can not do that to our children because they love him and he loves them.
I’m so fearful that everything he’s doing now is just an act to keep me here, when really behind my back, he’s getting up to even more things.
If anyone has an advice for me, please let me know. I know that God has plans for each of us and things happen for a reason and that God would not give us things we can not handle. But I’m beginning to think that perhaps God’s plan for me is a life of constant suffering so that I can be an example to others that you suffer but you just have to keep on going. I have to survive because my girls need me.
(USA) Caroline, I am so sorry to say that I understand more than I wish I did. It hurts. I know the pain you feel.
I was once divorced because of domestic violence. My children were 1 and 3. I met a man who was wonderful. He was everything I could ever hope for in a man and then some. I didn’t think men like him even existed. We moved in together and planned on getting married a few months later. My kids started calling him "Daddy" because their biological father had abandoned them after our divorce. We were married in May of this year.
On July 21st we came back from vacation and I was preparing to leave for my grandfather’s funeral. My husband was curious about how long I would be out of town for. He couldn’t go because he had to work. He was on the internet and I happened to walk up behind him just in time to see him close out a website for "erotic services." As it turned out he was shopping for a prostitute to have while I was away. I didn’t’ know it.
He came up with horrible excuses about why he was on that site. It took me cleaning the computer and running phone numbers from his cell phone to discover he had been with a prostitute the week we returned from our honeymoon. My world fell apart that day. It truly did. I was so confused and hurt. I could not even function. Like you, I had trust issues before this had happened. But for some reason when I met him, he just seemed so wonderful and perfect. I had no idea that he had a "sexual addiction."
Addiction or not, it still hurts worse than anything I have EVER felt before. I had thought he was a Christian, but he wasn’t. I called him to our house the next day and told him that I had to forgive him. I couldn’t risk my salvation and God was commanding me to forgive him. I asked him to make a full confession, no more lies.
He did. And it hurt. Our vows were sandwiched between 2 acts of infidelity with prostitutes and he was addicted to porn. I was crushed. I could not even get to my grandfathers funeral without someone taking me. I had to face all my family as a newlywed. They wanted to hear about the honeymoon in May and how happy we were supposed to be. I thought I would die. I wanted to die. I begged God to just take me away. I couldn’t face the humiliation of being so trusting to someone so selfish and undeserving. My kids are 2 and 4 now and they love their "Daddy" they have already lost their biological father because of abuse.
So my husband got saved and I worked very hard to forgive him. He got some counseling and everything. We talk about it and I have blocks on the computer. He had a bank account that was not accessible to me, and no longer has that. He asks me to check on him and asks me to put things in place to block his addiction. But it’s hard. Some days everything thing seems okay and other days I feel as bad as I did the day I discovered it. I try to put myself in his shoes, how I would feel, how I would hate myself… and want people to love me anyhow. I know that is why people hide that kind of addiction… the shame.
But I feel like everything we had is based on a lie. I thought he was looking out for me, protecting me… loving me. And now I feel so used. He swears that is not the case, but that is how I feel. I gave him my WHOLE self… just to find he was hiding so much inside makes me feel so alone.
He says he is coming clean, he is sorry, but it hurts. And just because it happened a few months ago doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hurt. I try to tell him, it’s like someone’s death. Yes, I forgive him as much as possible. I know he can’t go back and undo what he has already done, but it still hurts. It still makes me sad and I still wish it wasn’t so.
I have forgiven him as best as I am humanly able. God has helped me. He really has. But it seems I find a new reason to be mad at him all the time. Things that didn’t bother me before, bother me so much now. It hurts.
I can go on and on. I was planning on saying something encouraging. But the only thing I can say is that I understand how you feel. I often ask God why it happened, why am I suffering and then I know that it is because of my suffering that I am so close to God. And maybe I need to suffer in order to stay close to God. And yes it hurts. It hurts so bad. But whatever the reason for all of the suffering I have endured in my life, I must need it or God wouldn’t give it to me.
There are not many people who would have responded to my husband’s offenses like I did. And had I not obeyed God and worked to forgive, my husband would still not be saved. He never understood God’s love. He questioned my faith and argued with me when I sought to forgive him. I think he wanted me to push him away so that the could continue to curse God and hate himself… continue to be damned.
But God chose me to endure. And I chose God to carry me. And maybe it’s unfair that those closest to God suffer the most, but perhaps that is why we are so close to God.
And I believe that your husband probably isn’t gay. That is why mine chose prostitutes, he said it wasn’t the "sex" it was the high of the orgasm that was stronger with knowing he was doing something "really wrong." It doesn’t make sense to me. But I do believe it is not about the sex when it comes to sexual addictions, I did a lot of research on the brain chemicals… and it is sad.
The only advice I have is to be honest. Don’t keep your hurt inside. God says that we will reap what we sow and if your husband can’t support your genuine hurt then he is trying to shirk his punishment from God. It hurts. But the only one, aside from God who can understand the pain and make it better is our husbands. I tried to keep it inside. I did. I ended up in a HUGE depression and that was no good for my kids, my husband or me.
Now I just tell him. I say, "I feel like you are just looking for…" I tell him exactly how I feel, so if he cares about me he really has to work to comfort my fears. I am vulnerable, I was the victim and the only way I can ever trust him is to feel safe with him again. The only way I can ever believe that he loves me is if he endures just as I am enduring.
It is hard. VERY HARD. I have to forgive him every day it seems. It crosses my mind over and over again. I have to pray before we have sex… "God please let me enjoy this wonderful gift that you have given to us as a husband and wife. Please keep the hurtful thoughts away so that I may share this gift from you with my husband." And it works.
Don’t find other reasons to get angry… you don’t need to justify your hurt with petty things. I find myself doing that… the root issue of my anger is always the same and my husband has learned this and always listens to me and holds me and tells me he is sorry and has no excuse. It is hard. And he gets frustrated, just as I do. But ultimately, he and I want the same thing… a happy, honest marriage. And whatever it takes.
Perhaps my tears are God’s reminder to him, his thorn in his side for as long as he needs it. Perhaps my pain keeps me talking to God. I don’t know. But I will pray for you and I am so sorry. It hurts and you can forgive and still hurt. Some people say that if you are still "hurt" you haven’t forgiven. That is not true.
Just don’t let anger take over the pain. Feel the pain and not the anger. Share the pain, not the anger. Anger will divide you. Love will unite you again. It is okay to mourn. Death hurts, but just because we miss someone doesn’t mean we are angry at God for taking them. It just means we are sad because they are gone.
Forgiveness is choosing to accept the consequences of another person’s actions. Choose to accept the hurt and feel it, let it out, give it to God over and over again. Share it. Tell him how you feel. Make it his job to prove you wrong. Let him know though. He is a man and he won’t get what you are feeling unless you tell him.
I know a woman whose husband cheated 20 years ago. She still gets sad when she thinks about it. It will always hurt, but hopefully time will heal. Just suffer it through and share it with your husband so it won’t divide you. It’s hard but God hears us. And he hurts with us. He knows.
(USA) There is a great website and healing ministry called Pure Life Ministries. This sexual addition that you are referring to, is not easy to get over… It will not happen without the strength of God’s love and mercy.
Also, if you will fight the devil to break the power over God, it will break you free. I can tell you that this website has many resources to help you get the healing you need. I think that after reading your stories that your husbands are at least trying. My husband has been cheating on me for over 2 years. I think he did admit to having an affair back in march 08. However, he has continued to tell me lies and continued to promise to quit but he continues to keep doing it.
He has been in a support group and nothing I can do seems to help. He is in bondage and doesn’t care if he loses our family and children in the process. I wanted him to change but he just will not. We are getting a divorce. I cannot allow him to hurt me anymore. It hurts too much.
As women I encourage you, if your husband is willing to try, then pray together and he will break free. Get some scriptures and meditate on them day and night. Put them on note cards and pray them out loud and break the power of the enemy. God will be faithful!!!
I wish my husband wanted to change but he justifies it over and over and is always angry. Good luck!!
(USA) Dear Caroline, I read your note, and those that followed. My heart grieves with you. I went through the pain of this type of discovery. It brings on such a torrent of emotion that it is VERY difficult to think rationally.
When I went through the pain of discovery and truth, I reacted in anger. My husband and I were in counseling and the counselor told me that my husband was not truly interested in recovery, that he was doing the bare minimum and that I should confront this in one of our counseling sessions together. I did do what she suggested and the result was a reaction of anger on his part toward our counselor. We didn’t speak much for the following two weeks and then he moved out suddenly.
After he was gone, I received a package filled with magazines, all very x-rated. He had ordered them before he had moved out. I also received a phone bill for nearly three thousand dollars for phone calls he was making (illicit in nature). I am sure he didn’t yet know how expensive they were. He was on a downward spiral and I didn’t even know it. I reacted to all this, feeling betrayed. I didn’t want anything to do with him. We had no children and I felt justified in not pursuing him. I waited to see what he would do.
We had agreed to come together to discuss the situation in six months. When we did, I had one question for him. "Do you love me?" His answer? He stumbled over his words a little and then told me that he missed the companionship. "sigh" I was angry and he knew it. I had loved that man with all my heart and the whole thing had completely devastated me. Rather than facing up to all that had happened, he suggested we pursue a divorce. I didn’t argue. Like Jessica, I ran to the arms of someone else. But the truth of a fallen world is that there is no where totally safe to run except for the Lord.
We both remarried and he had three little girls. His addiction spiraled further out of control, and he grew depressed. He tried to get in-patient treatment for depression. They told him that because he hadn’t made an attempt on his life, he wasn’t eligible. He decided to make himself eligible. Only he succeeded in taking his life. His wife did get to talk with him for a bit before he was taken away by ambulance. He told her he wasn’t actually trying to take his life but to get treatment.
I am a long ways away from all that now. It has been nearly eighteen years. I don’t regret the life I am leading. If I had it to do over again, what I wish I had done, was to be willing to go through the pain I already had and work in praying together toward our mutual healing. I wish I had pursued our marriage rather than being concerned with just myself and my pain. I viewed him as a perpetrator, not as a victim in any way. But I know now that he was in bondage to sexual addiction and shame and I "could" have taken on an attitude of working together to be over-comers together.
I am grieved with you at the loss you feel, the trust violated. Only you can make the decision before you. To me it seems like a decision to either be willing to work through the issue itself with him and the possibility of future hurts via failures on his part OR a decision not to. This decision is hinged on a desire to know that he will be honest from this point on, but with a shameful addiction like a sexual one, there are no guarantees. It seems to me that it is necessary for you to anticipate that he may fail to be totally honest with you. May the God of heaven grant you wisdom to know what direction to go in and lead you from that point!
(USA) I can feel your pain. I have been married for 40 years and have always felt a loneliness and emptiness and now I know why. In Dec 08, I confronted my husband about his Internet use and he told me he was addicted to porn and that for 6 years he had been in chat rooms and had met women but had not had sex with them.
We started seeing a marriage counselor and I thought we were doing OK and that he had told me the truth. About 1 month later he shares more of his life and his addiction is much worse than he led me to believe. The lies are the hardest. He has had sex with many other women and masturbates to porn on a regular basis. I am heartsick and want to work on my marriage but like you the trust is gone. I have also been betrayed by family and feel I can trust no one. I pray but sometimes wonder if God is listening or if this is part of his plan for me. I pray for you and all the women suffering from the pain of sexual addiction.
(USA) Ladies, I join you on this painful journey and my heart goes out to you because I am experiencing the same pain. The disclosures come a trickle at a time and only because I push for them. There is still much denial and blame-shifting so I don’t know if he is really ready to stop and get true help. The only positive thing I can share is that I know God understands our pain and is there with arms outstretched ready to help us walk through this pit of darkness. He is the ONLY one who will not betray or forsake us. Somehow we will make it through this regardless of our husbands’ choices or decisions.
(ENGLAND) I am so grateful to have found you… my husband is a sex addict and is at this moment in treatment. I have suspected for years that he was sleeping with prostitutes and addicted to porn on the internet. Over these years my husband has lied… blamed… denied and almost destroyed me. He is also impotent and we have not had any sexual relationship for over 7 years. I feel completely broken and drained… I have no confidence in myself. I have had a very lonely loveless marriage.
He is now in a clinic because I could take no more pain and asked for a divorce. His psychologist who is treating him has asked me to show a little trust and support towards my husband and to think about him. What about me and what he has put me through? Is that nothing? I feel that I am nothing.
How can he talk of trust, when I have been left destroyed time after time after time. Who supported me???
Now I have to call my husband at the clinic and say how proud I am of him, when I am not… I feel I am still being manipulated and controlled. I wish I had the belief and trust in someone to get me through this. Thank you for listening.
(USA) Hi Millie, My heart cries for you over all you have been through. I can only imagine the pain you have experienced. The intensity of the betrayal you must have felt HAS to be enormous. I grieve for you.
You are SO right in questioning how you can endure more pain and the feeling of being manipulated when you have gone through more than most people could ever have taken. I would question the same, and most anyone else reading this would as well.
But I have a thought that I would like you to consider that may help in some way. I don’t know if you are a born-again Christian. You don’t say in your letter. But I am going to address this as if you are (because this is a Christian web site, so I feel a bit free to assume that you might be). If you aren’t, then what I am about to write would have little meaning and I ask for your forgiveness in my assumption. I would never want to contribute more pain to your life — only help.
You ask how this counselor could ask you to trust and support your husband after all your husband has done to you. All I can say is that he is acting like a doctor who is ministering to a dying patient. Even if his patient is ill because of self-inflicted behavior, the doctor would still do what he could to help him recover. He sees you as the stronger one right now, hoping you can help him help your husband. His assumption may or may not be right, but that is what he is assuming.
And even if the patient hurt others around him in the midst of his sickness, the doctor’s immediate attention HAS to go to helping the sick patient recover so he doesn’t die. He is assuming that when he is better, he will then stop inflicting further pain and maybe he can at that point try to work to make amends in some way, to those he hurt in the past. But first things first. If you were his patient instead of your husband, the doctor would turn his attention on your care first and foremost. At least that is the perspective I see, in my humble opinion. I hope you will consider it.
As for the emotional destruction you have experienced, there is no doubt that you HAVE to have felt abandoned and betrayed on so many levels. It’s only humanly natural. But I’m going to ask a very different request of you, that might minister to your heart. Have you ever seen the newer version of the movie “Les Miserable” with Liam Neeson?
I ask you this because if you haven’t, I recommend you watch it so you will know what I am about to say. If you have, I think you would see a picture of what Christ has done for us and what He asks of us to pass onto others. Christ sees beyond our faults and sees who we COULD be, rather than who we are presently portraying ourselves to be, and gives extravagant, forgiving grace despite all odds and beyond human reasoning. At the end of this movie, the main character experienced a glorious freedom — one we can experience as well when we stop allowing ourselves to stoop to human ways of doing things.
You say that you wish you “had the belief and trust in someone to get” you “through this.” My prayer for you is that the someone you would put your trust and belief in, would be Christ. HE will get you through this and will give you the power to endure more than you could ever imagine and will amazingly transform you (and others who will witness what is happening) in the process. Please read Romans 2 and what it says about being “transformed by the renewing of your mind” and more of the total picture of what extending grace can do. As it says at the end of that chapter, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
What I pray you will be able to do is pour out your heart to God. Cry out every hurtful thought you are dealing with. You can use the book of Psalms as a guide to read and pray through and cry out whatever comes to your mind. God can take it and He will minister to your hurts in the process.
It could be a cleansing and powerful transformation that you would experience as our Wonderful Counselor, the Holy Spirit, ministers to your aching and weakened heart. I pray that eventually you will be able to empty enough of your hurt out that you will have a clearer mind to see your husband through GOD’S eyes — someone He wants to redeem and help turn his life around for the better. But right now your vision and heart may be clouded by your hurt — which God well understands. After-all, He has experienced betrayal by those He has loved.
And I pray that if you are able, that God will use you as His colleague in helping your husband despite the pain he has afflicted on you. But that is something between you and God. Only you and God will know in this process if you will be able to grasp God’s amazing love and give some of it back to your husband through grace. And only you and God will know if your husband would be open to the process. I pray it can happen because in the process you BOTH will experience healing in a profound way — hopefully together.
But if not, I pray you will be able to see how busy and deceptive the enemy of our faith has been behind the scenes in your (and your husband’s) life and that you won’t allow yourself to go down in defeat. This would only entertain the enemy and would take apart the amazing story of redemption, forgiveness and grace that God wants you to embrace and live out for the rest of your life here on earth.
Please know that my heart and prayers are with you Millie.
(USA) Wow. It never ceases to amaze me, as I search on the internet for something that will make “this” all better… that over and over and over again I see my OWN story reflected in every woman that writes her own story. It is heartbreaking and brutal and UNFAIR that we have all had to suffer this. And it seems like everyone, like myself, did NOT give consent–did not say “gee you are a total sex addict, cheating when you can, internet affairs, porn sites with chat, BDSM, prostitutes and on and on and on, lying all the time,when I go out of town you cheat, GREAT, yes please do this!” NO! We were never given the choice. Like my situation, these guys are masters at deception, and then we become “those women” that we see on talk shows. I cannot believe I am now one of “those women.”
My story … I met him 20 years ago. Instant attraction, I was in love. We went out, then he would either cheat or dump me and go out with someone else so fast my head would spin. There was my first RED flag. But I was so young, 25, I had NO idea about sex addiction–20 years ago I am not sure anyone really did. Then I went through the cycle with him many times. It is NUTS that I kept going back to him. I was so in love, I could not see the forest for the trees. I was seduced over and over, by a master liar, who could so easily make me feel like number one, and the others meant nothing, that I kept believing it.
So I got engaged, and got married–we had been together 5 years at that point. He seemed past it all (dumb me). I should have known when he flirted with the girl on our honeymoon (who booked boat cruises) that I was in trouble. But I was always told, “you are insecure” and so over the years I believed that, and made it about me.
Two years passed, overall it was pretty good. But there is a money thing with my husband–called he is terrible with it, totally irresponsible. So I was feeling stressed about that, but had NO idea that he would just decide to leave. (I am sure it was in the works anyhow.) He was immediately screwing the cocktail waitress at a bar he went to. I was devastated. I mean, I thought I had married my dream, and 2 years later I was left so fast my head spun.
14 months passed. We were just about divorced, and out of the blue he calls and wants to get back together, and I AGREED. Where was my sense of reason? Nuts. He had no job and no money. Writing this, it is insane what I did… but I still was so in love, I just wanted it so much.
So we got back together and for awhile things were good. Now at this point in my life, I have to question whether in my mind things were good, or had he become so good at lying and manipulating me, that I had no idea… I am not sure… but we had our daughter a couple of years later, and then over time (I had no idea again…) he waned and fell out of the marriage, but never bothered to tell me. He just used our marriage– his cute little girl, his pretty wife, as his nice facade to the world.
Now he was really into porn the last couple of years. I did not support it, but felt like I had to just let it be. It sounds so dumb, but I thought it was all about looking at naked women, like playboy–I had NO idea of whole sites to meet people, internet affairs, BDSM parties, and on and one and on. No idea. When he moved the computer in the garage and spent hours there at night, he convinced me that for the most part he went to boating and car sites and smoked cigars, and I believed him. It seems impossible as I write this, but that is the story. I just did not believe he was cheating on me. And I felt so hostage to him and the marriage–so NOT wanting a second divorce in my life, and another daughter to grow up in a broken home (I was married young, and when I met him, my daughter was then 5–now she is a superstar, 25, so I did something right..)
This past summer I told him I could no longer enable his disaster of a financial life–I mean massive debt. Dumb me, I had no idea at the time of the sex addiction, so I was totally enrolled in helping him with his debt as a partner, but I told him I could no longer enable his financial disaster. I had no idea he was living a double life at that time.
He became more angry and less involved than ever before and over 6-8 months we went no where with financial planning and counseling. When he told the marriage counselor that his idea of marriage was a lot of sex, I guess I should have been listening… again, NO idea.
So this past February he said he was leaving. He was running a personal ad within days, totally looking for sex. I thought that was the worst of it. But as I did my research on the internet, I found out he was on dating sites for FIVE years! What married committed man does that? He had profiles on BDSM sites, claiming he had been into it for years, but only limited real time practice– probably meaning whenever I went to see my family with my daughter– like 6 times a year, he was a free agent.
My world came tumbling down. I felt steam rolled. I could barely go to sleep that first night. Even though I knew he was totally arrogant, bored, unfriendly, mostly uninterested as a dad, rude, terrible with money, an over eater, fat, no exercise, always telling me I did not spend enough time with him, and when I tried to be more sexual in January, he told me he was not interested in kissing a high school romance, but wanted hard sex…I should have known then, but did NOT…and on and on (I know you are saying what were his good qualities??).
There were some good qualities, but I believe now they are all an act to get what he wants. I thought he was my best friend, but it was just a facade. When I was out of sight I was certainly out of mind, and over the years even when I was in sight, I was out of mind for him. I had always thought we had fidelity. I thought for all those years I was his only girl, the number one girl, and though the marriage was strained, he was only with me–in mind and body. I had NO idea that I had fallen to NO meaning at all. Because for me, he was always my dream guy. I was crazy about him, which is nuts, and loved our sex life. I thought we were together for a lifetime. If I could wave a wand and make it so, and change him, I would.
So the last month I go from being okay one moment to total breakdown out of the middle of nowhere, as my heart breaks all over again for not being good enough, not being the “one” living in a total illusion and not being given the choice to accept his lifestyle or get out. I feel like I was in prison and did not deserve to be.
I do agree that the higher power at this point is our salvation, to raise us up and carry us through. This is so devastating that there has to be something to hold on to. I do a lot of prayer and meditation and plan on really removing him from my heart and life, because it is a must. Oh, and he is a total narcissist–also something I had not heard of–but they go well hand in hand. And a narcissist like a sex addict will leave the ones that love them in emotional devastation.
I feel awful that I had a baby with this disaster and must allow my beautiful child to spend time with a man I would never allow such a thing if not forced by the court. He is such a fraud. Who wants the father of their children to be a sex addict? He spends all his time looking for sex–he has TONS of ads running– I find them all over the internet. It is all his life is about.
He is now on a crash course. From what I read, it is now just speeding up, soon to be out of control. He thinks everything is great now since he no longer has to pretend in a marriage, but really I was the glue keeping him together (again I had no idea) now he will fail, I see that in his future. I no longer will be saving him. It has been too much time of my precious youth, loving someone to the highest degree, to only have it all trashed, meaningless, empty I would not believe this is possible, unless I had lived it.
Thank GOD that I was saved last summer by seeing I was enabling him with money and it woke me up. I had NO idea about his sex addiction, but the money thing was something I could get my arms around. I believe Divine intervention led me to the internet to finally see the truth about him
Bless us all as we walk this awful path. We don’t deserve this… we are the victims in this– none of us willingly agreed to such a marriage/lifestyle. Most sex addicts are NEVER cured, by the way.
I was very naive about this whole issue of sex addiction. I recently learned that my husband is addicted to sex (he claimed it is ONLY phone sex)- does it matter what type or kind? He is hooked on computer surfing porn sites. We were experiencing a lot of difficulties in the marriage that I was quite baffled about. I could not understand what was causing my husband to constantly leave home for long periods… even days… weeks. He would constantly leave home and stay out for days and I would have no idea of his where-about.
After a separation he admitted that his phone sex addiction was the cause of the problem. After this revelation he has done nothing. He has not sought help. Right now he says he only told me so at the time, but it is no longer a problem. After we reunited the same behaviour continued… nothing changed. We are now separated again as he has continued to behave the same… leaving for days. He now claims that he has no addiction. He says he loves me but we are now separated for 20 months and I am now contemplating divorce.
(USA) I am sickened by how many of us there are – basically the same story. My husband of 15 years admitted to a one time affair with a co-worker 5 years ago that lasted approximately two weeks while I was out of town. We eventually worked through the affair. A few years later I discovered a pornographic picture he had printed which he had “forgetten” to put away and left lying on his desk. I packed up his things, took them to his place of work, put them in his vehicle and told him not to come home.
Eventually he did come back and we went through more therapy. At that time I told him I was done – if the secrets, lies, pornography continued he was out for good. Two years later I walked into his office while he was on the computer and he quickly hid what was on the screen – but I knew. I told him that was it and he was to leave. The next morning he left for work but never arrived – 12 hours later he was found on the brink of death having taken an overdose. He was hospitalized, sent to a psychiatric facility and underwent counseling. As he had no place to go when he was released, he came home.
After many discussions he finally told me everything. I put blocks on the computer and had software put in place that would show me everything he did on the computer – all e-mails, etc – he did not know about this. One night I found an email from her regarding not talking to him for eight weeks and how she missed their intimacy and conversations. I was crushed – after all we had been through I thought he was finally honest and open. He then admitted his earlier affair had stopped for a few weeks but then resumed and had been ongoing for five years. She had accompanied him on numerous business trips – he always made sure to buy me something before he left or to call often to check in so that I would not think something was up (or was it to make sure where I was?).
Every time I was out of town she was in MY HOUSE! He would leave work early to go to her house before coming home at night for 30-60 minutes – always if I tried to call him his phone didn’t ring or his bluetooth was connected – he always had a reason. As bad as all of this was we eventually tried to work through it and I was trying to find something to hang onto. After about four months in therapy it was suggested he take a lie detector test to make me feel better and know that I could trust what he was telling me was the truth.
We did this – he tried to manipulate the test which was obvious to the examiner and he was called on it. There was one question which he never expected to be on the test and he totally blew it. Again, he had to confess to something which he had omitted previously because “he knew how much it would hurt me”. This disease is like a never ending story – once you think you are at the end, there is always another chapter down the road. In order to restore themselves to a healthy state they destroy others.
I cannot understand what is wrong with me – why do I stay and keep putting up with this? I feel empty and like I am in a deep hole and cannot get out but yet I love him and cannot leave. Family does not know because I think it would make me look really dumb in their eyes that I could not see this and as low as I feel I don’t think I could take someone else confirming that. I am afraid to leave – if he attempts suicide again and succeeds then it will be on my shoulders.
How long before this gets better? One day I love him and want it to work out, the next day I hate him and just want to get away. Believe it or not, he loves me and she didn’t mean anything. He destroyed everything for something that didn’t mean anything.
(USA) I almost got married to a sex addict but God revealed it before the commitment was made.I suffered a lot and still suffer because I really loved him. I thought we’re in a very exclusive relationshiop and I thought I had found the man of my dreams: kind, smart, loving, etc… etc… I found out he was addicted to porn, was on a horrible web site site looking for “incredible encounters” and “craziness” and also found out he runs ads offering “oral sex” to women.
I confronted him and the denial was complete. He tried to manipulate me, to pull me back to his lies.. It was very hard to realize that I was just a facade in his life… I know like any other addict he suffers with that, but he is too proud to seek help and also didn’t hit bottom yet. Still, the pleasure of the lifestyle is bigger than the pain of the addiction. I would have stayed with him and tried to work things out together if I had seen one little sign of sincerity, but all seemed a big, fat lie.
He tried to get back together until last February, but I didn’t want to give him a chance because I know he was not being honest with me. He moved on, met again a high school sweetheart and he is currently engaged now. My heart certainly hurts but I trust that God will heal my broken heart and will bring to my life a man that will love me and respect me…
(USA) In my case, there were constant lies regarding money. I still don’t know where much of it has gone. It started out, sadly, on our wedding day. We got into the car to leave the church and he said, “By the way, I spent your precious money.” I had received an inheritance from my grandmother just one month prior to the wedding. I felt as though I had gotten into the car with the wrong man–Dr. Jekyl, Mr. Hyde. Who are you?
After speaking with pastors, family, etc., we worked through it. Everyone accused me of being a greedy little cuss for not wanting to “share”. He’s a real piece of work when it comes to manipulating others. What disturbed me about the whole thing was that he didn’t seem to see anything wrong with what he had done. There was no guilt or remorse that I could see. That frightened me, but I had made a vow before God now.
A few years later, he was determined to buy a business that I was opposed to. Again, everyone accused me of being too sensitive, or holding him back from reaching his “full potential.” Well, he reached it, alright. He took out a credit card in my name and charged up over $10,000. I took a second job to pay it off and we went back to counseling. This pastor was the worse yet. He said I was just angry because we hadn’t been able to have children. He also said I was being too hard on my husband by saying that he had to earn back my trust.
Shortly thereafter, I had a daughter and son, very close together. My husband was spending many hours at the office, and hiring people I thought were of questionable principles. But, I was enjoying the children and loved being a mommy.
When I went back to work, it was hard on the children. We had a long discussion, and decided I should quit to return home to the children. 2 weeks later, he showed up at an outing for the children and said with a smile that he had something to tell me. He wanted to wait until we got home, but led me to believe it was something good.
When we got home, he said that he had been lying to me for 15 years, and that he had defrauded the IRS out of $500,000 through the business. That was only the beginning of the lies. I later found hard core pornography on his laptop. He threatened suicide, but I never thought he would do it. He didn’t.
The thing that has been so hard is that everyone believes he is such a saint, and that I’m just over-reacting. I take comfort in knowing that God sees the truth.
The pornography on his laptop was horrifying–torture and mutilation of women. It completely desensitized him. As the Bible says, his mind and conscience have become seared, as with a hot iron. His conscience just doesn’t work anymore.
Pray for my children and family that the lies would be revealed for what they are, and that this man’s manipulation would end. And, if you meet a man involved in any type of porn, run and don’t look back.
(USA) Hello ladies. Wow. I am simply amazed that I identified with something in each of your posts. The spread of pornography and the destruction that it causes is truly a work of the devil. He is out to destroy us, our mates, and our marriages HOWEVER he can. Please realize this.
He is working on me/us as well. I have been married for 38 years to a man who is sweet, loving, would do anything to help someone else and generally appears as a good godly man. Oh, but underneath all of that there is a very wounded person (little boy) from childhood tragedies. And I am getting the fruits of that. Through years and years of different addictions and lying about all kinds of things. The lying seems to be the main culprit.
I am 59 years old now and have been a Christian since I was 28. I also have a wounded background, but unlike my husband, I prayed for years and years for inner healing from my past abuse, insecurity, and trust issues. That finally came when I was in my early 40’s and I broke the wall down and confessed that I had a scarred past. It was a process but God healed me of a lot of things. So God can use my weakness and turn it into a strength, right? Yes, He has done that in so many ways.
But now, I feel like I am going through the exact same issues again as everyone else has posted. My husband was arrested for soliciting a prostitute back in 2002. At the time, he told me that he did not have ANY attention of following up with it, that he was only trying to “get back” at all the prostitutes who had solicited him during his job in which he had to travel in undesirable parts of our city. I believed him and told him that if I thought for a minute that he was actually doing it for the act that I would leave and that would be the end. Also, the night that he was arrested, he immediately quit drinking, which had been a BIG problem in our marriage. He gave his heart totally to God that night. And we worked (without any real counseling support) at putting things back together.
Now, in the spring of 2009 I happened to look at the history on the computer and noticed that “craig’s list extreme girls” or something like that was on there. Well, when I clicked on the sight I was absolutely shocked out of my wits and truly experienced the “black out” that the article on this says. I completely lost it. I couldn’t believe the filth that was on there. So I left that very day and stayed for a few nights at a friend’s house. Bless them… they tried so hard to minister to me. But those who don’t have a clue what you are experiencing are not able to do that.
I went home the next day and confronted him with what I had found and he vehemently denied everything, which only added fuel to my fire. I found that I was able to do the tough love thing and told later that weekend that until he confessed this he would have to sleep down the basement and there would be no contact with me (emotionally or physically). After a few days he cried and seemed to repent and said that he was truly sorry for what he had done but this was after I told him that if he didn’t confess that he had done it that I was going to tell our three grown children. That is what made him confess. He truly didn’t want to. But I admit I cornered him into it.
At this time we were talking about this to a very godly man at our church who walked us through the steps to take. So in late June we take a two week trip to Colorado, right? That was also a nightmare. As I had been telling him, talking to him, begging him to start being honest with me about everything, don’t hide anything from me, etc. and he said that as God was his witness he was not hiding anything from me, I found a pack of cigarettes hidden underneath the truck seat. We were camping and I was devastated AGAIN that he lied again and told him that we needed to just go home. I no longer wanted to be on vacation or anywhere else with him. Since then, he got the “patch” to quit smoking, told me he wasn’t smoking, but indeed WAS smoking with the patch on!!! Smoking in and of itself is not the issue here. It is the lying.
I do not believe or trust anything else he says which includes “I love you and I don’t want to lose you”. He puts all of his own hobbies and interests above me and our marriage. So here is where I’m at. God has shown me in the last several weeks that I have a serious control problem which I’m sure has gotten out of control due to my fear of being hurt again. But I know that I need to “let go and let God” work on him instead of me trying to fix him. Is that possible? I do believe that God can do anything and that He is the great healer and restorer. The Bible says that He will restore what the locust has eaten.
I have been SO angry, SO hurt, and SO confused. Neither one of us want the marriage to end after 38 years but I cannot go on or even go back to the way things were before! Either we heal or we go on with our lives separately. And even though God wants to heal us, we do not have the tools except for the Bible to show us how to communicate and put things back together. So I am pretty confident that God wants us to go to an intensive marriage seminar called “A New Beginning”. If you google “marriage restoration seminars” you can find all kinds of them in there.
So I encourage you to pray about that for your own marriages. We have to heal, ladies, and with God’s help and the help of experts on marriages in crisis, we can. Even if your husband doesn’t want to go, but will do it, it might save your marriage and turn it around. The Bible says that marriage is a covenant between God and the marriage partners. And that the vows are not to be broken. I know that adultry is grounds for divorce, but I believe that healing even for this is available. And if we will let Him, God will make us stronger through this horrible suffering that we have had to endure.
Why??? I believe that what WE go through and are able to come out of it with God’s help, no matter how bad it is, that God can use us to help other couples in crisis. And the only way we can do that is when we have been through it ourselves. No, it is NOT fair. But God knew before He ever formed us in our mother’s wombs that we would go through this. He has a plan and a purpose for it. If we had known or seen in the future what was ahead, I am pretty sure the majority of us would never have married that person. Thank God that we don’t know the future or none of us would make it!
Ladies, I don’t know you but I know your heart and what we are all going through which makes us “sisters in pain”. And I want you to know that I love you in the Lord, I will be praying for each and every one of you, and I pray that you will do the same for me. Barb
(USA) I too have just been cheated on. Internet Porn and strip clubs were involved while I thought he was working. I think my life is now a lie. I am 51 years old. He told me he is attracted to 20 years old. How can I erase years from my face? I guess I knew in the back of my mind there has been a problem, but 10 years of it? I did not know. Why the lies? I hope God has a plan for me because I am just not sure. I have no one to talk to about this. All I can do is cry and try to express my feelings in my head.
(USA) As I read all these posts, my heart is breaking for each of you. I myself found out a year ago that my husband was addicted to online dating sites. We had been married for about a year, and were about to have a huge reception party (we had semi-eloped and were throwing a celebration for our large family) when his sister called me. She had let him use her computer when he was over for a visit. He forgot to close down his email. She went to close it but saw a suspect email open. She sent it to me. It had all manner of disgusting things he was saying to some woman he had met on a dating site. He was telling her he was lonely and wanted out of his marriage.
I dug a little deeper online and discovered he was on several dating sites, each with a different story. In one he was not married, in another he was newly divorced. The sexually explicit things he said to these women were things that humiliated me. Some of the things he said I had heard him say to me in the past. He told other women they were beautiful. It made me sick. When I confronted him about it, he denied it for two weeks until I actually printed out proof and he couldn’t deny it any more. We ended up separating and we cancelled our party one week before it was supposed to happen. His whole family found out about the issue. It was the worst time of my entire life.
Through God’s grace, we were able to get to a counselor and save our marriage. It was so hard! I had to face my family and friends. Many of them lost respect for me because I was trying to work out my relationship. I still don’t get invited to many get togethers and some of my family won’t speak to me. Sexual addictions are so hard for people to understand. They think you are weak or have low self esteem if you stay with your husband. In reality it takes a very strong person to stick it out and support a spouse with this issue.
We had a little girl five months ago, and everything seems to be going fine. Then I get this feeling that I need to go online and check again, and for sure he is on a motorcycle dating site. He isn’t as explicit on this one, but to me it is still the same old stuff coming up again! He doesn’t know I have found this yet. He doesn’t do this stuff at home, he does it from work on his laptop. It is so frustrating. He is deployed right now so everything has to be on hold. I don’t want to bring this up while he is far away and going through the stress of a deployment. I am trying not to cry. I have to be strong for my baby girl. I pray each of you has peace and healing comes swiftly. God Bless.