Sufferer Ex Had Internet Porn Addiction

[Kintsugi]

I have been struggling with this for 6 yrs. now. I see that people are looking at a certain set of criteria to be diagnosed with PTSD, & we don't fit the usual criteria, meaning we were not affected with PTSD because of the most well known causes.

They are not the well known causes. They are the requisite causes. That's why they're called criterion.

Her symptoms is how the PTSD is diagnosed, not what the usual causes of PTSD are.

You can have symptoms that resemble PTSD without having the trauma necessary for a PTSD diagnosis. You can have trauma that would meet the criterion and not develop PTSD. PTSD is diagnosed specifically with both trauma and symptoms held in consideration.

Men who were in wars & later develop PTSD, sometimes feel like they're being bombarded with stimuli that induces painful situations. And sadly, women whose husbands use porn, especially when it goes on for yrs, feel the same. They feel cheated on, rejected, deceived, lied to, betrayed, tricked, fooled, etc. Their self esteem hits rock bottom. They feel unloved, unwanted, undesired, etc. They feel like a big fat NOTHING in the eyes of their husband.

You can suffer immensely without having a diagnosis of PTSD. Trust me, people do it all the time. I hope you find the help you need for your suffering. Nevertheless, you can't get PTSD from a porn-addicted spouse alone.

 

[Friday]

I They feel cheated on, rejected, deceived, lied to, betrayed, tricked, fooled, etc. Their self esteem hits rock bottom. They feel unloved, unwanted, undesired, etc. They feel like a big fat NOTHING in the eyes of their husband. The only way I can describe is this. I loved my father dearly & when he passed away, I was devastated. This is 100 times worse. I feel as though my entire family is murdered ever day. That is how a woman with PTSD from a husband's porn addiction feels. Don't underplay it to the women who are suffering from it. We are standing at the edge of a cliff & we want someone to help us or we fear we may jump. That is how this form of suffering feels.

Feeling like a big fat nothing, is different from your life actually being in danger. If I put a gun to your head? You'd feel like something. Not something you'd like, most probably. Also, it's pretty amazing how, when your life is actually in danger? The last thing you care about is... Pretty much everything on that list.

You keep using real big bad things as metaphors for what something relatively minor in comparison feels like. Even adultery, which is not severe enough for PTSD (and generally has a 2-5year heal time, not a life long change in the physiology if your brain), is used as a metaphor. I assure you, since a lot of the people here have actually had their families murdered, people they love killed in front of them, been tortured, been raped, been kidnapped, been assaulted... It's insulting to have our real lives used as a metaphor.

Our lives, and our experiences, don't feel the way you imagine them to.

 

[.Bubbles.]

Wow, is this a bad joke?

Some outrageous comparisons in this thread :|

 

[vincent85]

You have to be kidding me? People throw around PTSD like it is a sympathy badge or it is socially the "thing to have" or to be compared to. I am not saying your husbands porn addiction did not cause you distress, depressions, anxiety, etc. However you can have subsequent symptoms of PTSD that are similar to some of the issues we experience, but you do not have PTSD. If you really had PTSD you would understand, but you don't. Unless there was a traumatic event that happened that you are not telling us about, you do not have PTSD. This is not a competition to who has suffered the most, I thought this was to help each other through our common shared experiences through what we go through with our PTSD.

I was physically abused, beaten, and abandoned as a toddler by my mother. Later in life I was in two combat tours overseas while in the Army and was wounded while leading a mission. I do have PTSD and know others that are constantly on the brink of suicide from very traumatic events in their lives and they have PTSD. I have been around it so much that I know usually when people do and do not have it, because I know the symptoms first hand from living it and seeing others around me who have it. I will be so bold to say that you making such a claim that you have PTSD on a forum like this and presenting it to people who have truly suffered on a whole other level is insulting. Please educate yourself more and know the different between common stress from unwanted experiences and actual traumatic events that cause PTSD.

 

[blue.eyes]

Mtgirl--I too got my first diagnosis of PTSD after discovering my boyfriend was a sex addict. It's been downhill from there...other experiences subsequently triggered PTSD. I think there is a HUGE misunderstanding here. Porn addiction can trigger PTSD that brings emotions and flashbacks of prior sexual trauma. It's a delayed reaction. That happened to me before I got PTSD from being triggered from other traumas. I found out my bf was heavily immersed in incest and underaged girl porn sites, which for the first time, triggered my symptoms of past rape and pre-teen sexual abuse. This did not mean my bf's porn addiction caused the PTSD; it means the experience *triggered* a cascade of symptoms that were well aligned with PTSD....

I have PTSD from several events, and I was in the military as well, but the porn addiction experience triggered symptoms just the same. One major component was the objectification--where someone dehumanizes you as sociopaths do. In my past traumas, as with many other survivors, I was dehumanized, treated like an object for someone else's gratification rather than a human being with feelings. Porn/sex addicts virtually end up dehumanizing people, viewing them as objects. It is anything BUT recreational porn viewing, and nothing to dismiss. I'll repeat--being a partner of a sex addict is nothing similar to a partner 'viewing porn'. The betrayal and deception and gaslighting is very triggering, and they always eventually escalate to extreme stuff like child porn.

I was a victim of a sociopath at one time. That my bf put me--who slept in his bed nightly and proposed to me-on a CD disk with pre-teen girls and other strangers whom he objectified, was super triggering to find out he kept a token of me, that I was just an object like the collection of girls and women of his porn conquests. He also gaslighted me, lied to me, deceived me, and betrayed me for his cheap sexual gratification--much like people who seriously abused me in the past.

I'm making an assumption here that the original poster's problem with her husband triggered PTSD from a past trauma rather than being the cause of PTSD. It can trigger PTSD over and over and over. I tried to help my bf, but after time realized that the only way out is to distance oneself from the person with the addiction. Sad but true. I've never been the same since.

 

[itsazooinhere]

I totally get where you are coming from. I too am diagnosed with PTSD, due to my husband's porn addiction. I have been s...

I'm going through the same. It is most definitely a form of trauma. Sexual betrayal is extremely difficult to deal with. Many of our symptoms are the same as someone suffering from PTSD. Whether anyone wants us to claim the title or not...we are trying to cope with Post-traumatic stress.

Much love to all of you that are in pain over your husbands/boyfriends/S.O's "prostitutes by proxy".

 

[Ronin]

Ríght because some not being paid attention to for a moment is exactly like years of sex work.

Or sexual slavery.

Or a combination of both one can't make sense of years later.

What about you take the door out, dear.

 

[Like minded]

Hi Nicolette, unfortunately yes it does in fact cause PTSD. I have been diagnosed and treated by two sep...

I totally understand where you are coming from!! It does cause PTSD and a whole host of other issues. I'm dealing with the same problem...alone. Every time there is a trigger, I shake! The professionals don't understand this issue yet. I've been to a couple of psychologists seeking help with my partner. They just don't get the rage, hurt, betrayal, controlling behaviour etc etc. I feel that I also have become a totally different person since I discovered what was happening right under my nose. And the correct term, I believe, is not porn. It wasn't porn that upset me, it was webcams, Craigslist, emailing women in every forum available to him, in order to find someone to make a porn video with! That is not porn!!! That is cheating! That is sexual addiction. And that behaviour does cause PTSD to the partner.

 

[joeylittle]

The professionals don't understand this issue yet.

Because it doesn't exist. I'm sorry - I am certain your pain is real, but your self-diagnosis is not.

Locking this thread because it's run its course.