Our Story, Part 6

We saw our bishop on a fairly regular basis.  He was so helpful.  I am glad that we always went together to see him.  He spent as much time in our appointments talking to and about me as he did with my husband.  I felt validated and supported in those appointments.

During these first few months, I was really roller coastering.  After the relapses in December, I really really desperately really hoped that Cyrus would never do it again. I felt like I needed him to STOP if I were ever to heal.  Everything depended on it.  In a way, I was right. It would be really difficult to heal if I were continuing to be injured.  But unfortunately, that is what happened.    Over time, a pattern emerged; after relapsing, he had a period of regret and determination that carried him through for a while, but eventually he would inevitably succumb to temptation and relapse.  That period of time seemed to be anywhere from 6 weeks to 3 months.  He occasionally caved in fewer than 6 weeks, but he was never going longer than 3 months.

I really just couldn't understand it.  If he was able to resist for weeks at a time, why wasn't he able to always resist?  I had always believed that addiction to anything included frequent use, but once every 6 weeks does not qualify as frequent.  

For the first several cycles, I would desperately hope that his most relapse would be his last relapse ever.  I would build that hope way up as weeks went by until I would believe that life was going to be normal for us.  And then he would relapse and tell me, and I would feel like I had been hit by a bus.  This may be a cynical response, but eventually I completely gave up hope that the last-ever relapse was behind us.  It didn't feel worth it to hope that, and I had clearly been proved wrong every time I had hoped for that.  Instead, my attitude swung all the way to the other side of the pendulum.  I lived with (and still live with) the assumption that more relapses are in our future.  The most I let myself hope for is that the time between relapses will expand more and more until there are periods of years between relapses.  Again, I don't know if that is ideal or healthy, but it the way that seems to be working best for me.

So once I believed that an upcoming relapse was inevitable, a strange and frustrating phenomenon began to emerge.  He would tell me of a relapse, and I would be deeply hurt and upset.  Then we would gradually both come back together after the latest round of damage to our relationship.  Then life would go back to normal.  Then, as the 6 week - 3 month time frame arrived, I would begin to feel anxious and edgy.  I felt wary and even angry and defensive.  I was on guard of being hurt again.  It was frustrating to Cyrus, because my most disruptive reactions were occurring after long periods of him doing well.  My attitude was not matching his current or recent behavior.  But I just felt scared of the pain that was coming.  And eventually, it would arrive and we would begin the cycle again.

It felt pretty terrible for my emotional landscape to be so strongly determined by his actions and cycles.  This helplessness I felt with my own emotions is one of the things that eventually led me to seek treatment for myself.

Our Story, Part 5

I can't believe that in my last post, I forgot to include the fact that Cyrus was unable to keep his "January 1st" promise to me.  He made it until December.  To his credit, he voluntarily disclosed to me quickly that he had messed up.  But it was so hard to accept.  It was the first time he had directly and obviously broken a firm promise to me.  Why had he promised that if he was not able to keep the promise?  Why wasn't he able to keep that one simple promise?  I could have kept the same promise.  In fact, I didn't look at porn from September to January 1st that year.  It has been easy for me to stay away from porn.

So, we continued to slog through.  I'm not sure what part of our story to include next, so I think that I will interrupt this narrative to discuss honesty.  I feel like there are two components to the betrayal of the spouse of a sex addict: there's the sexual acting out, and there's the dishonesty to hide the sexual acting out.  Most women I have talked to (and there are many women I have talked to) agree that the lying harms the relationship even more than the sexual behavior.  It just feels intolerable.

I have had to deal with implicit dishonesty (not disclosing to me something that I didn't know) much more than explicit dishonesty (lying when asked a direct question).  There were almost eight years of implicit dishonesty.  The dishonesty was the fact that my husband was a pornography addict and I did not know it.  At any point, he could have told me but he did not.  I never asked him about  pornography at all, since I was sure that he would never.  So there wasn't any explicit dishonesty on this topic during that time period.  But dealing with the fact of 8 years of implicit honesty has been difficult.

Since D-Day, there has been almost no implicit dishonesty, and as far as I know, no explicit dishonesty at all.  In other words, as far as I know, Cyrus has never lied to me when I have asked him a direct question.  And there have been very few incidences of sexual acting out when he has not quickly come to me and disclosed what had happened.  There have been a few times when he told me later that he had not disclosed to me what had happened at the time, but he did eventually disclose them, and did not directly lie.

It sounds like I am trying to defend him, and that is not the tone I meant this post to take.  The fact that he has ever acted out with porn absolutely SUCKS ROTTEN MEAT, but I am still glad that he has not enlarged the injury to me by hiding the situation from me, and by not directly lying when asked.

I feel fairly comfortable in my assumption that he has been and continues to be honest because of two things:

1. His life now shows evidence of the recovery efforts he is making.  He is changing into a different, more connected, present and caring man.  I don't think he could be as different as he is from what he used to be if he were continuing the behavior and hiding it from me.
2. He has voluntarily disclosed so many uncomfortable incidences to me.  He has started conversations with absolute dread, knowing that I would be both completely pissed and completely hurt.  But he has found the courage to start those conversations, over and over.

Anyway, the reason why I am focusing so much on his honesty is that it makes me feel like we have the best case scenario within this worst case scenario.  My husband is a porn addict, he took a long time to tell me, and he has continued to relapse much longer than I was prepared to deal with.  But he voluntarily told me, I have never caught him acting out, and he is committed to both honesty with me, and strong efforts toward his own recovery.

I told Cyrus years ago that it is my right as his wife to react however I would like to to his relapses.  I can be gracious and forgiving, or I can be an absolute bitch and throw a fit, or I can draw a firm line.  It is up to me, and it is my right to decide.  If he does not let me know when those relapses occur, he is depriving me of my right to react.  It is not right.

Also, it is terrifying to stay in a relationship and try to invest myself in it if I do not know where I stand.  What if the ground I am standing on is shakier than I think it is?  What if there is no ground under my feet at all, and I am about to plummet a la Wile E. Coyote?  How could I possibly be vulnerable emotionally or physically with my husband if I do not know whether he is being faithful to me?  Isn't that just setting myself up to be unimaginably hurt (again)?  No thank you.

So despite the fact that I am married to a porn addict, and despite the fact that I have felt so much pain, there is a part of me that also feels grateful.  My husband is now committed to being honest with me.  I can trust that I do not have to wonder whether there is ground beneath my feet, because he will tell me when there is not, or when it is uneven or shaky.  That is not to say that everything is smooth sailing in our relationship; there is still so much trauma related to his addiction.  But at least, he is not compounding that trauma by being either implicitly or explicitly dishonest.

Our Story, Part 4

During D-Day, Cyrus told me that he wanted to give me time to cope with the new information.  He promised me that for that reason, he would not under any circumstances have any exposure to pornography before January 1st.  D-Day was in September.  

I really believed that we were dealing with pornography addiction only as part of our past.  I believed that telling me meant that he was ready to put it entirely behind him.  I was positive that he would keep his promise to me about January 1st.  I was sure that if he could go those several months until January, then he wouldn't go back to it at all.  Why would he?

I really did believe that my husband would never again look at porn after the day he told me that he had a problem.  I was very wrong.  But I'm glad that I initially believed what I did.  Grieving the past was very overwhelming.  It feels like I would have crumbled had I known that years later, his addiction would still be a big part of our lives.  Cyrus has been sober for over a year, for the first time ever, and it has been more than 8 years since D-Day.  We're doing well, and we have come so far, but I didn't know that it would take this much time and effort.

Our Story, Part 3

I woke up the morning after D-Day feeling disoriented (and maybe a little panicked?).  Had that conversation really happened?  Cyrus leaves for work before I wake up so he wasn't there to touch base with.

I sort of robotically went through what is required of a mother of small children, but my mind was miles away.  I was just trying to understand what I had been told.  Every once in a while, I would feel a surge of shock and emotion at what my husband had told me.  He had been watching videos of people having sex?  He had been seeking images of naked women?  He had a problem with lust?  WHAT????? Really???  I thought he was crazy about me.  I thought he didn't have eyes for anyone else.  I thought I was the one he wanted.  I felt sick to my stomach.  My stomach was actually churning.  I was feeling real physical symptoms brought on only by the intense emotion I was feeling.  Several times that day, I found myself standing over the toilet, dry heaving.

And thus began the most challenging week of my life (so far?).  I still genuinely felt the sadness at the fact that my favorite person had been suffering alone for so long.  But I was starting to absorb the implications for me.  I was not the only woman he saw, and I had believed that I was, and I desperately wanted to be.  My emotions were so strong.  I felt like I was churning in the ocean.  I felt like I was being spun in the surf, and that I was desperate to breathe, but that I didn't know which way to swim to get air.  Which way was up?  I had no clue.

When Cyrus came home after work, I could think of nothing else besides his disclosure, and our new reality.  I tried to drop discrete hints (that the kids would not understand) about how I had been feeling.  I couldn't wait for the kids to go to bed so I could share with him what it had been like.

I think in hindsight that he was surprised that I wanted to talk about nothing else.  He was feeling like we had had this big momentous conversation, so heavy with emotion, and he was ready to get back to a little more normalcy.  I can't remember specific details for specific nights that week, but I know he pretty quickly slipped back into his normal routine, and didn't seem that interested in talking (and talking and talking and talking) like I wanted to do.

Within a day or two, I told my husband that I was ready to talk to our bishop (ecclesiastical leader).  He was caught off guard.  He told me that he wasn't sure whether he wanted to confess to our bishop what had been going on.  I told him that the reason why I was going to talk to the bishop wasn't for Cyrus's benefit; it was for mine.  He was my bishop, and I needed his support while I adjusted to my new reality.  I told my husband that he was invited to join me at the bishop's office, but that he didn't have to.

In the end, he chose to join me.  His hand was shaking in my hand as he told our bishop that he was a recovering porn addict.  In hindsight, calling himself a "recovering" addict was absurdly optimistic, but it helped him get the words out, and it was true as far as we knew.

I think D-Day was on a Tuesday or Wednesday, and I had been asked to give a talk in church that Sunday.  I stuck with the plan and prepared my talk during the week of D-Day.  Since I could think of nothing but the disclosure, I found myself scared that I would not be able to keep the news out of my talk.  I could just imagine myself at the microphone on the podium saying, "My husband is addicted to pornography."  I actually became frightened that I would be unable to keep myself from saying that.  But I didn't say it.  I got through the talk.

And I started to adjust to the shock of my new life.  There was so much heartache and reality to experience, but after about a week, I at least knew which way was up.  More to come soon . . . .

 

Togetherness

Feeling wonderful about the fact that I get to go to this:

 

Our Story, Part 2 (D-Day)

Over 8 years ago, late one evening, at the end of a deep and connected conversation, my husband told me that he needed to tell me something.  I could tell it was important.  He stopped and breathed heavily, not making eye contact for at least 60 seconds.  It's a good thing I have had practice in waiting to hear what he would say.

In those moments between finding out that there something big that I would soon know, and actually knowing what it was, I felt my pulse quicken and the hairs on my scalp raise.  My mind raced.  What could it be?  I was unaware that there were any secrets between us.  What about him did I not know?  I could only think of two things: either he was gay (and in love with a specific man?) or he was into porn.  What else would inspire this momentous disclosure?  Of the two, honestly I believed that homosexuality was more likely.  They both seemed nearly equally absurd, but attraction to his own gender seemed slightly less preposterous.

He started by reframing my understanding of his history.  He told me that as a teenager, he had had a friend with a huge stash of pornographic magazines.  He and another friend had made this first buddy their personal library.  They would check out a few magazines at a time, and exchange them for more a few days later.  Over time it had progressed to occasional movies and become more and more of an engrained habit. 

Eventually, Cyrus had left for college at BYU (an LDS Church-owned school).  He spent his first year there preparing to be a missionary, and had been largely successful in giving up his habit.  He then became a missionary for two years and was able to stay away from pornography entirely.

[At this point in the conversation, I sincerely believed that he had permanently given up his porn habit entirely when he was a missionary.  I could not imagine living cleanly and spiritually for two years and coming home with new knowledge and zeal for religion, and then getting sucked back into disgusting and degrading behaviors.  Maybe some pervy guys, but not my husband.  Cyrus had been an exemplary missionary.  He was who I looked to as an example of righteousness and closeness with the Lord.  He got it.  I knew he did, at least in those first several post-mission years.]

He told me that within a few months of being home, he had found himself returning to his old habits, but that in the years he had been away from it, internet pornography had sprung from its depraved origins.  He had successfully stayed away from it during the months between the time that I had returned from my missionary service and the time we had gotten married.  He had never told me about his old problem during our courtship because he had honestly believed that it was in his past and that he would never go back, especially once we were married and he would have a legitimate outlet for his sexual energy.

But then.  He told me that he had again slipped into old habits within a few months of our wedding.  His use had been sporadic, but like a dog to his vomit, he had found himself going back to it over and over. [Hint: Cyrus did not use the "dog to his vomit" phrase.  I found that analogy all on my own later.]  

I was dismayed and stunned to hear that there had been any incidences of pornography use during our marriage.  And then my heart sank as his story continued to progress toward the present.  There had been increased use, peaking during the out-of-control period of extreme video gaming while he had been in graduate school.  I felt utterly raw when he said that he had been unsuccessful in his many many attempts to stay away from it forever, and that in fact his last exposure had been within the last few weeks.

Cyrus told me that he had been feeling for months more and more desire to finally boot it out of his life, and that he had come to believe that the next step in moving toward that goal would be to inform me of his real situation.  In other words, his disclosure was entirely voluntary, with absolutely no prompting from me.

This is the part of the story that makes me feel fortunate, if fortunate is a word that can be used in such a desperate and scary scenario.  He chose to tell me.

But.   BUT.   If you had asked me the day before Disclosure Day what were the chances that my husband was addicted to pornography, I would have said, "Zero."  I honestly believed (because it had never occurred to me to wonder otherwise) that my husband had never once sought out pornography in our nearly 8 years of marriage.

I felt so much compassion for him that night, and so much gratitude that he had decided to tell me.  I wondered out loud that he had been bearing this burden for half of his life, and that he had been bearing it alone.  I told him that I wasn't even feeling sorry for myself, but that I felt sorry for him that he had been suffering silently for so long.  I think Cyrus appreciated my empathy, but he wisely warned me that I probably wouldn't feel the same way in the coming days.  And he was right.

Our Story, Part 1

Cyrus and I met in college.  We were both seeing other people when we met, so there was no romance involved; we just became best friends.  And when I say "just" became best friends, there was no "just" about it.  We quickly and easily slid into this easy connection where we deeply related to each other and enjoyed spending time together.  It took no effort.  It was just relaxed and wonderful.  It was so innocent!  We were so innocent!  There really was no romance involved.

We spent several years apart (for LDS missions) and by the time we got back together, both of our prior romantic relationships had ended.  We had stayed in touch and still felt deeply connected.  Romance easily added itself as the last essential component of our friendship.  We already knew each other so well that by the time we came to see that we had romantic feelings, there was no wondering whether we would be compatible.  We were just absolutely delighted that we had found a way to continue our friendship permanently.  We really really wanted to marry each other, and so we did.

He's still my favorite person I have ever met.  I am drawn to him.  My heart doesn't wait around to ask my permission before it reaches toward him.

Our adjustment to the early years of marriage seemed normal to me.  We got along and didn't fight.  I had difficulty adjusting to him getting over the obsessive phase of a romantic relationship.  He didn't lose interest in me, so much as remember that he was also interested in other things.  He would get absorbed in something, and I would feel pangs of desire to again be the entire focus of his attention and so I would try desperate and inane attempts at conversation to try to get him to look at me again.

In hindsight, I think we were both slightly unusual in this situation.  I was somewhat extreme in how desperately I wanted his attention and validation.  He was somewhat extreme in the amount to which he would temporarily disengage.  I feel like learning to be emotionally self-sufficient was a trait that I needed, and that Cyrus gave me reason to develop.  If it had stopped when it reached an appropriate level, I would have been in great shape.

But neither Cyrus nor I understood the amount of desire for connectedness that was healthy and appropriate in a marriage.  He trained me to not look to him at all to have my emotional needs met.  The message that I heard from him and that I came to believe was that it was unhealthy and unfair to expect him to be there for me emotionally.  So I took it to heart and tried so hard to not be a needy wife.  In his defense, he believed what he was preaching; he wasn't trying to trick me.

Anyway, so this dynamic in our relationship led to him having the freedom to do whatever the heck he wanted with no repercussions.  It led me to believe that loving him meant being ok with whatever he chose to do.  So when Cyrus got deeper and deeper into his video gaming habit, and less and less emotionally available to me, I just watched it happen, and did my best to suck it up and be self-reliant.  I tried to rely on the Lord to meet my emotional needs.

One last dynamic to describe before telling what happened: for some reason (probably cultivated by him) I felt responsible to buffer between my husband and the unpleasantness of life.  He was an overburdened graduate student, so I did everything I could think of to lighten his burden.  I had so few expectations of him other than completing his education.  I did the lion's share of the childcare, home care, financial duties, social obligations and everything else I could think of.  If he was hungry, I brought him a sandwich.  If he needed to apply to a graduate program, I did the entire application, leaving only the essay and the signature for him to complete.  In hindsight, if I believed that loving him meant making his life as easy as possible, why did I believe so certainly that he loved me?  He did not go out of his way to make my life as easy as possible.

You'll notice that nowhere in this post is there a reference to pornography or sex addiction.  It's because for the first nearly 8 years of our marriage, there was no reference to pornography or sex addiction.  I was completely and entirely unaware.  I will save that component of our marriage for the next post.