"he obviously has a secret life." No he "obviously" doesn't. It's mind reading. Did you talk to him about it in a non-judgmental way? Did you two talk?
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
oh, i see. i should wait until i know that my lying h is cheating. yeah, his shemale addiction is a secret life. yeah, we talked when i caught him. then, i caught him again. how much talking should i do?
Didn't say that. I just asked if you two actually "talked" or did you just start reading him the riot act? And I mean really talk.
If you talked to him the way you're coming across now, honestly, if I were your H, I wouldn't listen and vise versa.
So you are saying that you saw him watching porn and so assume he has an affair, so you're getting an AIDs test based on that assumption. Is that correct?
Again, the more details you can give the better.
Look, do you want to save your marriage? If you do, then you're going to have to start listening. If you don't want to save your marriage, then why bother posting on a marriage saving website?
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
a. Get an STD test to make sure you are safe - your health is first priority - never mind your husband on this one - just go do it for yourself b. If you confronted him, made it clear he was causing you pain, and he refuses to stop - he's very likely addicted c. Treat him like any expert advises you to treat an addict d. Don't waste time dealing with him if he's not cooperating e. Make it clear under no uncertain terms that him acting in any way that hurts will result in divorce
Consequences should shake him up a bit...
f. If you pay for the internet, cancel it g. If you can control your internet router - lock it down - treat your home network like any other door on your home - you lock it up and keep the creeps out of your home h. Make your spouse fully aware you won't tolerate this business in your home i. Tell your husband if he is going to continue hurting you that he can leave
Remove any temptations from the home
j. check your phone bill for 1-900 calls k. check your cc invoices for mysterious purchases
l. Collect all the evidence and be prepared to confront him with an ultimatum m. Tell him he stops hurting you or he leaves the home
The advice immediately above here is NOT good advice for resolving your issue with your husband.
What it appears to be is that you and your H have a disconnect as to what you think is acceptable. The best thing you can do is to get a professional involved. Michele has sex coaches, and/or you may be able to find a therapist or clergy member with your similar background that can help you and your H navigate these discussions.
Don't throw in the towel....you can work through this. Don't let your fears run wild.
I'm sorry you are going through such a tough time.
When I replied to your post, the picture I had of you and your situation was that of a young woman in an otherwise happy marriage stumbling on your husband with his secret (mainstream) porn stash.
I didn’t get the feeling that your H was addicted – of course addiction to anything is a whole different kettle of fish. I also didn’t get the impression that he’d been deliberately dishonest about his “thing”, I assumed he had a habit of privately viewing porn and he did this secretly because he didn’t feel comfortable sharing it with you (because of his hang-ups or yours) – and you finally caught him at it. My gut reaction to your post was that you guys hadn’t really talked about it, you got upset and he apologized and that was that.
My gut feeling was that you reminded me of myself as a younger woman who loved her husband, but was pretty niave sexually and thought “good girls don’t get too sexy”. In hindsight, my xh would have liked me to be a lot more sexually adventurous, and as an older woman whose now had more exposure to adult sexuality, I’ve realized it would have added a whole new level of intimacy to my marriage that I didn’t even know existed.
Your later posts clarify that his thing is less mainstream than I assumed and “he can’t stop”. I’m not sure what that means. Often when men say they can’t do something, it means they don’t want to.
I guess I’d still say to you, be calm, talk to your H. He’s your husband and you love him right? His thing may not be, and probably isn’t, about you. It’s about something that’s going on for him.
Marnie , I maintain (and I’ll respond to Superman’s posts separately) that just because he’s looking at kinky-stuff on the internet absolutely doesn’t mean he’s cruising gay bars in real life. A lot of people have a fantasy life that they’d never act on. You need to talk to him – and you need to do so in a loving way so that he feels he can be honest with you – if he’s defensive and feels attacked he’s less likely to be honest with you (DB 101!!).
Blessings ☺
V
Never make someone a priority, who makes you an option.
you guys, i tried to talk to him. i told him how hurt I am and how unclean the whole house feels now. i calmly suggested that it might help if we spoke with our parish priest about this. he just laughed at me.
Can I call you Superman? You’re words are fasting than speeding bullets!! (haha )
It is interesting how we all read other posters stories through our own eyes. You certainly saw a different story than the one I saw.
I didn’t perceive that Marnie’s husband was lying to her, I perceived he viewed pornography privately and she caught him at it. I guess because that’s my experience in a marriage where we were both too sexually immature and inexperienced to have honest conversations about sex and sexuality. It’s a pretty common problem among married couples – and it’s not about “lying” and it’s not about disrespecting your partner or being deviant– it’s about having hang ups that make it difficult to discuss those intimate issues. It’s about communication.
I think too many marriages suffer because of one or both partners inexperience in discussing their sexual needs because they feel embarrassed or concerned about how their partner would take sexual tastes they’ve developed as younger people. If you get turned on by say, feet, and you are embarrassed about that because it’s a bit of a weird turnon, it’s just easier to satisfy yourself with a shoe catalogue than introduce your wife to your fetish. Ya know? Does that “damage” a marriage? It’s not ideal, it would be great if he could tell his wife and she could enjoy foot massages every night – but it’s not the end of the world if he keeps his personal fantasy life to himself.
I completely agree with you that in a good marriage there should be no secrets - although I’m not sure I’d agree that committing to a person for life gives them rights to your fantasy life. Surely it’s healthy to have some secrets of our imagination?
I also didn’t get the impression from Marnie’s first post that she felt in any way unsafe. She said she had a good marriage and a good sex-life.
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In short... I dont have issue with porn being used here, but I do take serious issue with HOW he was going about consuming it... And I take even more serious issue with you sidestepping his disrespecting marmie here... I am quite offended ...
I’m sorry I offended you and I’m very sorry if I offended Marnie. As I said, I didn’t perceive the behaviour was deviant, rather, solitary -for a whole range of reasons.
I don’t agree however that his behaviour is really about Marnie, his behaviour is about him and Marnie insofar as it affects her. Is it disrespectful for a man to view porn in the privacy of his own home without discussing it with his wife? Yeah, it is – he should have talked to Marmie about it and they should have had an agreement that she was comfortable with – but I reiterate, all marriages aren’t perfect, and people are inexperienced in talking about this stuff, so yes, I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
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Pornography addiction, or more broadly overuse of pornography, is excessive pornography use that interferes with daily life. There is no diagnosis of pornography addiction in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), and as with the broader proposed diagnosis of sexual addiction, there is debate as to whether or not the behaviors indicate a behavioral addiction.
Marmie hasn’t posted any evidence that her husband’s use of pornography interferes with daily life. Not everyone who uses porn is addicted to it and I certainly didn’t get the impression that was the case from her first post. It’s interesting that you jumped to that conclusion. It is certainly a worst case scenario … but a rather alarmist one.
I think it’s best if we agree to disagree on your analysis of pornography per se. I don’t have the energy to debate your references, but suffice to say I don’t accept the premis that use of adult content material leads to people becoming serial killers and/or sex addicts. I think that’s an extreme view of a complex issue. I’ve actually just completed a study on what linkages exist between access to adult content material in Indigenous communities and incidence of sexual abuse and there is no correlation in that population.
Likewise I don’t accept my comments to Marmie about exploring what was going on with her husband was not analogous to having a drink with a drunk (although I got a giggle out of that line – what’d I tell you, faster than a speeding bullet! ) I didn’t perceive he had a “problem” I perceived he was a fellow with a perfectly normal private fantasy life.
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The fact is Walking and Bond this so called husband is coercing his wife into changing their sex life.
What? Am I missing some posts? What is he coercing Marmie to do? He’s waiting until she’s asleep and looking at dirty pictures.
Sometimes I wish I saw things as clearly as other seem to. It seems simple to just say - It’s too risky to tolerate any behaviour in a spouse that deviates from some arbitrary set of rules around the marriage contract – demand perfect “marriage contract” behaviour or roll out of town. But I guess I see that we are all human and rather than jumping to the worst conclusion about our spouses behaviour in the first instance it’s sometimes helpful to take a step back and think about how big a deal it really is.
It could be a really big problem – and if Marmie and her husband are able to talk to each other about it openly and honestly they can work it out together. It could also be a storm in a tea-cup. Ya know?
V
Never make someone a priority, who makes you an option.
Okay comments like this isn't talking. It's you judging. It's you saying, "well you're going to go to hell if you don't stop."
"i calmly suggested that it might help if we spoke with our parish priest about this."
When you said this on top of the above statement, it's no wonder he turned you off.
During your conversation, did you REALLY TALK to him. I mean where you listened and not just condemn him. Did you ask him why he was doing it and if there were something wrong with your sex life? You mentioned that you had a pretty good sex life. Maybe he thought otherwise.
Again, I'm not condoning what he's doing, but if you want to save your marriage, getting to the root of it openly without being judgemental is the way to go. IMO saying that you were going to get tested for AIDS because he looked at porn is a little over the top. But that's just me.
Did he give you a reason why he did it, or do you think he was to scared to because you would condemn him and hold it over his head?
Put yourself in his shoes for a minute. If there were something you did that you knew he didn't like, say for example spend money of large ticket item. Would you like to be condemned for it, or would you like to feel safe enough with your mate that you could go and talk openly about it?
That's what it comes down to. Tolerance, compassion and understanding goes both ways.
M-43 W-40 2D - 9 and 5
Emotion, yet peace. Ignorance, yet knowledge. Passion, yet serenity. Chaos, yet harmony. Death, yet a new life.
)
) I didn’t perceive he had a “problem” I perceived he was a fellow with a perfectly normal private fantasy life.