Going To Try Again

[gtpgurl]

hi I'm new here I started posting in the PTSD forums about myself but I didn't get a very good response with my issues so I'm hoping maybe this will be a better place for me. I am just going to copy and paste my original post because it is so long . thank you in advance for any understanding and help. And if this is also not the right place for my specific issue if anyone knows where to direct me I would be very appreciative I am just looking for understanding and support.

Hi, I'm new here. I am just looking for help and support and advise. I was in a bad relationship for a long time. There was severe physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Pornography was a very large part of the physical/sexual abuse. 99 percent of the physical and sexual abuse revolved around pornography. It has been 8 years since I left that relationship but I am still not ready to talk about details.

Now in my currant relationship I keep finding out he's been looking at pornography. I had explained to him my situation in the very beginning of our relationship. I am diagnosed PTSD, OCD, AD an BPD. I told him all this and that I was very strongly against the use of pornography and that I also viewed it as a form of cheating. He said he understood.

Now there have been 4 instances in the past 4 years that I have discovered he was looking at it. He apologized and promised over and over that he would not look t it any more, but I keep catching him. I also keep wanting to believe that he will stop. I can not express in words the amount of pain it cause me, and the memories and feelings it triggers. I think the most hurtful part was seeing on the computer that the day aft I gave birth while as in the hospital (supposedly he went home to sleep a fix the bathtub) he went online to look at pornography.

For along time I thoughtt was a once in a while thing. I have recently learned it is an everyday sometimes twice a day thing. We have an excellent sex life, usually everyday except for the past 9 months due to the labor. So its not a lack of sex that drives him. Now I'm doing it as A job to hopefully keep him from looking again and hurting my self both physically and mentally in the process.

I genuinely love this man so much so that we decided to have a baby several years ago and after struggling to conceive I now am a mommy of a 8 1/2 month old. If he just would stop I could say life is almost perfect. I just can not get over the hurt and distrust he has caused me due to the pornography and lies. I'm just looking for some understanding. Please don't post mean comment Iv'e heard them all before. And please no... "it's normal", "all men do it". I do understand that for many it is normal, however it is not normal or ok for me.

 

[Nebulustrix]

Sorry to hear about your struggle.

One thing you may not know about pornography is that it is very addictive. It is possible that your significant other truly wants to give it up, but is having difficulty doing so. It is literally like a drug, triggering hormonal responses that require him to expose himself to more and more in order to get the same "high". In many way, it is even more dangerous and damaging than addiction to an actual drug because it can be so much more difficult for people to recognize that they are addicted and they need help.

If the pornography is the only issue you are having with you current relatonship, I would study up on addictions and try to approach it with him with that in mind. Perhaps you can convince him to attend an addiction recovery program.

 

[gtpgurl]

I have discussed that exact issue with him several times he says its not that kind of thing and he doesn't know why he does it he just does.

I went on my Facebook activity log because I wanted to look up all the recipes I had been sharing so that I could put them on my Pinterest . We share a Facebook account so I came across all of the search history of stuff he had been searching. There was a lot of pornographic stuff and I noticed that sometimes it was every day, rarely twice a day but there were chunks of time we're there was nothing from a couple days to a week or two. So im not sure its an addiction. kind of almost seems like it's what he does when he gets bored. Idk.

I try to explain it to him I have PTSD surrounding the subject because of the kind of abuse. My exact words were "I have PTSD like what a soldier can get... you know". He was soldier in the war a long time ago. He knew a lot of people that got PTSD. So he says that now since I put it that way he gets it and he won't do it anymore. Of course I have heard him promise that he wouldn't do it anymore many times. So naturally I don't believe him.

Just really wish I didn't care what he does with his own body in his own time. It shouldn't matter to me.Bbut it does and it hurts a lot.

 

[Meadowsweet]

I'm sorry that you find yourself in this place. It is a difficult situation, because on one hand, a man looking at certain kinds of pornography is considered normal or acceptable to many healthy couples. But it is hurtful to you, and part of being in a relationship is being sensitive to the others needs.

I sometimes see the hard edge of PTSD as being like an allergy, eg, most people can eat peanuts and be unaffected by them, even enjoy them. But if one knows their partner has a peanut allergy, then they should be mindful of bringing peanuts anywhere near them, because it will make their loved one ill.

Maybe that is an analogy you can use to describe the effect this has on you. Going by reading what you've written here, it seems that he is caring, but that perhaps he just doesn't see the extent of the reaction this situation creates for you, and doesn't respond to the significance and importance that this has to you.

Something I've come to accept over the years, is that however well you explain PTSD or abuse, someone without that experience in their life has a mind that works so differently, they can't get it even though they might genuinely want to and try to. It would be like going back to cave man times and trying to explain an i-phone... it can be so far away from anything they've known that their mind simply can't grasp that reality. I think if you feel you are in that situation, it is a measure of your own patience and love to keep trying to slowly teach him what it is to be you.

In the meantime, here is a good place to open up, to talk and to vent, as you go through that process.

 

[gtpgurl]

It is so hard to find places or people where I can honestly open up and talk about this issue. I always get the response of "get over it", "it is normal", "that's what men do". I understand that for many people this is true, however for me it is not something that I can handle in a relationship.

It is so hard to put in words the amount of hurt and pain I feel. There is no way I'd ever to be able to explain it to him so that he would understand exactly what it does to me inside. Like you said no one knows unless they've been through it.

I can't really handle getting into details about it but it was for almos 10 years every night being force-fed drugs and having scenes from those movies re enacted on me. Extremely horrible and brutal physical and sexual abuse.

I have never even told him that much of it. he knows there was abuse and it involved porn somehow. He is the one person I might actually feel comfortable with talkin about everything that happened, but there's no way I would really be able to. I would be afraid he would never look at me the same or ever wanna touch me again.

I really just wish I could erase it all for my memory so that it wouldn't be such a big to me for him to look at porn. I really wish I could just not care.

 

[gtpgurl]

I just found out he did it again yesterday I had a complete mental breakdown I self harmed for the first time in a year and a half. my anxiety was so high I could barely keep anything down yesterday I threw up so many times. my whole body aches today, I feel so drained and hurt and helpless and hopeless.

 

[Nicolette]

I'm sorry @gtpgurl. I understand how some things just never leave you and the toll that takes on your very being. I too hate men watching porn and would find it disrespectful considering your history - but that's my opinion.

I worry when people self harm - that what another person can do is capable of distressing you so much to push to you such limits. I really don't know what to suggest sorry but I'm happy to listen.

 

[gtpgurl]

I just don't know what to do it just hurts so much. I had therapy the other day and we were talking about exposure therapy and I got so flooded at just the thought of exposure therapy that we have decided to do exposure therapy to exposure therapy.I just wish I didn't care so much about what he does with his body and what he's looking at while he does it. because of my trauma and its specific relation to porn I just can't get over it. I wish I didn't care I wish it didn't bother me because it wouldn't matter and I wouldn't be hurting. so I guess the idea is if exposure therapy works then hopefully it won't be such an issue for me anymore. I am just at the end of my rope I don't know how much more I can take.