# Is my husband addicted to Porn?



## dzz (Apr 24, 2014)

I've had many issues with my husband - he's chased several women he works with over the years, but without success. He has been dealing with depression and anxiety his whole life, and attributes a lot of his behavior to that. Recently, we went through several months of marriage counseling after he went out for drinks with a woman he works with, held hands with her, and - I can only presume - hit on her, to which she responded "I am not sexually attracted to you." At those words, he flew into a rage, and texted me to let me know he was a bad husband and wouldn't be coming home that evening. This is a woman he has fantasized about before and, I believe continues to fantasize about. There is another woman who he had an emotional affair with for some time - probably years - but when she texted him at 10 pm one evening and I was close enough to see his phone light up when her message came in, I put an end to that. 

Marriage counseling went well. We were growing closer, sex has been great, he wasn't on his phone as much and seemed much more "present" and happy - and he's assured me over and over without prompting that he loves me and our family and he doesn't know why he did the things he did before except that he got caught up in fantasies until they began affecting his real life. So, since things had gone well for six months, we decided to put therapy on hold and agreed to contact the therapist again if we felt it was needed.

That weekend his family visited. His parents stayed in our finished basement, which is normally my husband's retreat in the evenings. I woke up in the middle of the night and realized he wasn't in bed. He was downstairs at 3 am in the living room balancing beer bottles on his knees and clicking around like mad on his phone - but seemed very relaxed, too. He saw me and said he'd be to bed soon. He often says that, but doesn't do it. My guard was up after that. I noticed he didn't put his phone down all weekend. It was relentless. At one point, we were having dinner together on our own at the table and he was poking around on his phone and I said "You know, it makes me feel like the most uninteresting person on the planet when you do that." He looked over, smiled, and put his phone down and said he was sorry and that I was right, it wasn't nice. He snuck off later for one of his "naps" which involves poking around on his phone as usual and he was up all hours again that night.

The next morning his phone lit up while he was showering. I could see he was logged into a cam girl site. He had paid for a premium membership that weekend and was viewing/chatting in camgirl chatrooms all night long and during his "naps." He sent one of them a glowing message on her public message boards about how gorgeous and smart they are and how cute their hair is and that she should never change.

Meanwhile, I'm taking care of our three year old, eight year old, and his parents during their visit. 

Now, I know my husband looks at porn. He has for years. I'm not sure when it started - he probably always did it to some extent - but I think it really took off after our first daughter was born. She was a colicky baby and needed a lot of attention. He basically made it his mission in life to be available as little as possible and I think that's when this really began. He's been on revenge porn sites, regular porn sites, he signed up for ****** ******* - but wasn't a paying member (he was busted when that scandal broke and he felt he had to tell me since I joked about whether I would find his email address there - not knowing I would!), and, as I mentioned, he's put me in a terrible position more than once when his relationships at work crossed certain lines. I angrily confronted him about the camgirl site membership (done in the same week we had decided to cease marriage counseling) and told him how upset it made me to see he's put himself in a position to now communicate with, pay, and reward women for doing sexual acts for him live on camera. He flew into a rage about how my dirty fingers should not have been on his phone and that I violated his privacy. Nothing about violating our marriage, or how he put himself in a position where he could strike up an intimate online relationship with someone, thereby violating my trust. He assures me that he loves me, but something feels really wrong about all of this. He loves me so much that hours after having sex with me, he's online with cam girls. He does it in the middle of the night when I'm asleep. He does it when he works from home one day a week. He does it at 4:30 on Sunday afternoon while his parents are visiting from out of state.

Am I being oversensitive about this? My husband is on depression medication which he claims is affecting his sexual performance. He sometimes experiences ED, but he says it has nothing to do with me and everything to do with his medication. He said he feels less like a man because of that and turns to porn. To me, it looks like somehow my husband of almost 11 years, has become a porn addict. Also, I feel really icky about cam girls. I truly feel like that crosses a line in our marriage that I'm not comfortable with at all. I feel ugly, undervalued, and used. After things calmed down following my confrontation with him, he told me it's just porn - they're just doing a job. He's minimized it, but he hasn't stopped logging in and watching. I know, because he fell asleep doing it again last night and he doesn't know I saw him. 

I'm starting to wonder if this is what modern marriage is. Am I supposed to deal with this? Is this just how men are now? Is porn so ubiquitous that it's unreasonable to expect that my husband should see how some things are crossing the line to infidelity? In the thick of our fight, he told me I was paranoid. He also told me he thought it was a better alternative than fantasizing about the women he works with. All I could think of was all the things I've forgiven from him, and immediately - when I finally feel like I can trust him again - he pulls something else and ups the ante.


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## uhtred (Jun 22, 2016)

It sounds to me like there are a huge number of problems here, and porn isn't the worst. 

Personally, I separate "porn" from "camming". The first I think is OK if it doesn't interfere with a couple's sex life, the second feels like cheating. 

He is camming, hitting on other women and who knows what else. That is all very serious infidelity in my book. I wouldn't get sidetracked into a porn discussion (which some people think is OK), but concentrate on the infidelity that very few people find acceptable.


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## SentHereForAReason (Oct 25, 2017)

uhtred said:


> It sounds to me like there are a huge number of problems here, and porn isn't the worst.
> 
> Personally, I separate "porn" from "camming". The first I think is OK if it doesn't interfere with a couple's sex life, the second feels like cheating.
> 
> He is camming, hitting on other women and who knows what else. That is all very serious infidelity in my book. I wouldn't get sidetracked into a porn discussion (which some people think is OK), but concentrate on the infidelity that very few people find acceptable.


That was my first thought from the first sentence alone! 

Porn is a by-product of this dude's real problem, which is much worse than the porn alone. He has and IS outright committing infidelity and NO, you aren't being oversensitive to this. With someone with his past history, he needs to be full on, doing whatever it takes to make you happy and prove to you he is a suitable husband. He's not doing that at the least and at the worst, he's still a cheater at heart.


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## personofinterest (Apr 6, 2018)

Yes, he is addicted. Yes it is a problem. And YES, in this case, porn IS a big problem in your marriage. Period.


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## jlg07 (Feb 24, 2017)

"Am I being oversensitive about this? " NO you certainly are NOT being too sensitive.

"he's chased several women he works with over the years, but without success." THIS is infidelity, and it seems that you rug-swept and allowed him to get away with this with no repercussions?

"I'm starting to wonder if this is what modern marriage is. Am I supposed to deal with this? Is this just how men are now? Is porn so ubiquitous that it's unreasonable to expect that my husband should see how some things are crossing the line to infidelity? "
NO, NO, NO, NO. This certainly, to me (and I'm a guy) is infidelity. You SHOULD NOT have to put up with him on Cam sites paying money to them that should be spent on YOUR FAMILY.

" he told me it's just porn - they're just doing a job." Yeah so do prostitutes -- is THAT ok then?

SOME porn use may be ok provided a)it's ok with your spouse, and b) it doesn't start to interfere with your sexual relationship. CAMming to me is just too much like prostitution -- yeah, it isn't ACTUAL physical touching, but the level of interaction that is possible there is just too much -- its cheating, not "porn".

You husband really does have a porn problem -- I think maybe you need to look into this with the marriage counselor and do NOT let him sidetrack and minimize the issue.

BTW, VERY sorry you are going through this.


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## *Deidre* (Feb 7, 2016)

I think my only question is why are you staying with him? He sounds like a joke of a husband who blames depression and all these other things on his bad choices. He has no respect for you, or himself, for that matter. Why are you staying with a guy who has zero respect for you? He's addicted to women, at work...fantasies of women...porn...apparently all women, except you. That's the problem in your marriage, not a porn addiction. If he kicks this ''habit,'' he will just start looking for women to obsess over in another way. I understand why people stay if there's one moment of bad judgement with a partner in a marriage, but your husband has shown a pattern of bad behaviors, that he doesn't seem like he wants to change. Your marriage sounds like it's been mainly about catching him doing the latest bad thing, regarding other women. You can't make someone change, they have to want to change. 

Is this the life you want for yourself? Is this the marriage you imagined? You deserve way better, and no ...this isn't ''modern marriage.'' You married a jerk, who is interested in the benefits he gets from marriage, but doesn't want the responsibilities of it.


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## SA2017 (Dec 27, 2016)

dzz said:


> I've had many issues with my husband - he's chased several women he works with over the years, but without success. He has been dealing with depression and anxiety his whole life, and attributes a lot of his behavior to that. Recently, we went through several months of marriage counseling after he went out for drinks with a woman he works with, held hands with her, and - I can only presume - hit on her, to which she responded "I am not sexually attracted to you." At those words, he flew into a rage, and texted me to let me know he was a bad husband and wouldn't be coming home that evening. This is a woman he has fantasized about before and, I believe continues to fantasize about. There is another woman who he had an emotional affair with for some time - probably years - but when she texted him at 10 pm one evening and I was close enough to see his phone light up when her message came in, I put an end to that.
> 
> Marriage counseling went well. We were growing closer, sex has been great, he wasn't on his phone as much and seemed much more "present" and happy - and he's assured me over and over without prompting that he loves me and our family and he doesn't know why he did the things he did before except that he got caught up in fantasies until they began affecting his real life. So, since things had gone well for six months, we decided to put therapy on hold and agreed to contact the therapist again if we felt it was needed.
> 
> ...




NO! This is not how marriage look like these days. This is how selfish cheaters look like! 
My husband has some of your husband's traits and that's the reason why we live separated in our home. He now wants to have counseling, but I will only accept a addiction therapy for him. otherwise, I know he will NEVER change. I am tired for this constantly disrespect and lies and so should you. 

you are married , you guys are ONE and there is no such thing as "privacy". when a dude has sex with me, privacy is over! privacy my arse!!!! he is BS'ing you big time. Just as my husband did it all the time.


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## She'sStillGotIt (Jul 30, 2016)

dzz said:


> He has been dealing with depression and anxiety his whole life, and attributes a lot of his behavior to that.


Do know how lame this is? So basically, I can go out and start stealing from stores, cheating on my husband, acting inappropriately whenever I feel like it, put us in hock up to our eyebrows by gambling away every cent we have, drive recklessly and total our car, join a sex hookup website, and do anything *else* I feel like doing and then excuse it all away with 'depression' and 'anxiety?' What a crock of **** THAT is.



> ...and he doesn't know why he did the things he did before except that he got caught up in fantasies until they began affecting his real life.


He knows *exactly* why he did it. Because he found her attractive, he wanted to pursue her, and he wanted to have sex with her. It's not rocket science. And if she'd actually found him attractive, I hope you're not naive enough to actually believe he wouldn't have been ALL over that opportunity, because he would have.

Surely you're not going to try to blame porn for his idiocy at work, drooling over women and hitting on them? Do you honestly think that this type of stuff with men acting like this *only* started happening in the last 20 years because porn has became so readily available on the computer and it's the 'evil' that drives them into doing it? My father acted this way his entire LIFE and the entire time he was married to my mom before she divorced him in the 70's, and that was LONG before computers and 24/7 porn even existed. It sounds more like your husband has turned to porn only *because* women aren't attracted to him in real life so he has to resort to camming and porn. But A-M is a hookup site for married people to meet each other in person and have affairs, so it's obvious he'd still prefer a woman in the flesh to porn or cam girls. Sadly, they're all he can attract so he's going at it with gusto.



> He flew into a rage about how my dirty fingers should not have been on his phone and that I violated his privacy. Nothing about violating our marriage, or how he put himself in a position where he could strike up an intimate online relationship with someone, thereby violating my trust. He assures me that he loves me, but something feels really wrong about all of this. He loves me so much that hours after having sex with me, he's online with cam girls. He does it in the middle of the night when I'm asleep. He does it when he works from home one day a week. He does it at 4:30 on Sunday afternoon while his parents are visiting from out of state.


Why are you trying SO hard to keep someone like this in your life? He's SUCH a douche bag.

You remind me of my mother. She was constantly dealing with yet another discovery of **** behavior from my dad, the serial cheating skirt chaser who was always looking for an opportunity - just like your husband is. But women were actually attracted to my father and he took advantage of it every chance he got. It sounds as though your husband can't attract women in real life and instead has to continually resort to the computer. But DO know that if women did find him attractive, it would be extremely naive to believe for one SECOND that he wouldn't be jumping on every opportunity that fell in his lap.

Is this guy REALLY worth the high price tag he comes with? I sure can't see how that's possible, but it is what it is, I guess.

Does he have a porn addiction? Who knows. But since he seems to have an iron-clad Get Out of Jail Free card for anything he does - blaming it depression and anxiety - he can apparently do whatever he wants and be excused for it.

You *do* know that every time you swallow yet another **** sandwich from this guy, you're continually lowering your standards, don't you? Every time you accept more crap from this liar, you let that bar slip a little bit lower.


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## Blondilocks (Jul 4, 2013)

Your husband has one problem - and, it isn't depression or anti-depression meds. It is that he is a bona fide, grade A ass hole. There is no med or cure for that condition. 

You've tolerated him for 11 years. How do you think the next 20 are going to make you feel? Forget about marriage counseling and start getting your ducks in a row to file for divorce.


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## MZMEE (Apr 17, 2018)

There are more serious issues here than just the Porn. The Porn is just an outlet to avoid the bigger issues. It is his way of escape no different than the person who drinks to escape their problems. Then all the infidelity. He is using women and porn to escape something greater. I'm not quite sure why you are so accommodating but everyone does what they feel is right for their marriage.

So yes he most likely is addicted to porn/sex to escape a greater problem. Fix that greater problem and the porn may go away. You really need a good marriage counselor but he also needs personal counseling to deal with whatever is causing his unhappiness and depression. You really can't fix your marriage until he fixes himself instead of checking out with porn.

Good luck!


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## dzz (Apr 24, 2014)

Well, we're set up to go to counseling again. I hear a lot of the advice here and, honestly, a lot of it reflects exactly how I feel every time I am deceived by him. Then a couple of days pass and I can see he's genuinely remorseful (probably only because he's been discovered, but in any case...), and I see how he is around the kids - who love him so very much - and I think about the life we've built together over 15 years and the man he was when I married him nearly 11 years ago. I think about all that and it makes me want to fight the good fight. 

But, I appreciate the advice and I understand where it comes from. I wouldn't be on here if I didn't know there were real problems in my marriage. And I know that many of you have lived through this and speak from experience. Things will calm down for us for a while, probably go really well, and then he'll get restless again and try something else. Also, for the record, he is an attractive man. He is very gregarious, can be extremely charming, and is an intelligent person. I think part of the reason he hasn't gotten too far in his pursuit of women he knows is because 1) his personality is a little eccentric, 2) he can come across as very arrogant without realizing it (because he is arrogant - especially about his profession), and 3) he's married with two small children and the women he has pursued thus far know that.

I'm not naive. I've told him outright and in our counseling sessions that I feel like the only reason he hasn't cheated is because he's been shot down when these women sense he's going in an inappropriate direction and that I'm afraid of what will happen when he tries this with a woman who doesn't turn him down. I want to be able to trust him. I don't want to come home to another phone call from a man telling me that he's "a bad husband and won't be coming home again." I know a tiger doesn't change its stripes. I know I need to get myself in order and steel myself for the possibility that he will do something utterly unforgivable one day or simply not come home.


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## SunCMars (Feb 29, 2016)

She'sStillGotIt said:


> *Sadly, they're all he can attract so he's going at it with gusto. [pay for play types] *


ref: The husbands ability to score. 

No! 

Not sadly so....gladly so, by all but him.

If he could get most that he sought.
Well, not only would you be violated...endlessly.

You, OP, would be broke. 
Every cent, every dribble would be spent, sent into, onto other women.

What does this man give you that is worth any little thing?
Money, financial security?

Or, is it just a little shade over the center of your ring finger?
To keep it and only it from being sun burned.
You, being man-burned, burned up/down, all over, by this flagrant philanderer.

His cheating dog-heat even burns your mind.

Get out.
Find a new man.
One who is happy with you and your charms.




The Host-


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## dzz (Apr 24, 2014)

I see your points. I think, instead of "porn", I should be asking myself if he's a sex-addict, which is just as bad. Our counselor mentioned it once, but he brushed it off as if it didn't apply to him. I think he needs the titillation that comes with receiving attention from attractive women. And I think getting that attention in secret - the naughtiness factor - is a real thrill for him.

At one point, it was obvious that he could not look at any woman - in real life or in print or on tv - without checking her out. He says things like "Well, look at her?!" when he doesn't like the way a woman looks - especially ones in powerful positions. That **** rubs me the wrong way. I'm trying to raise our girls to understand that there is so much more to them and to other people than appearances.


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## Openminded (Feb 21, 2013)

Yes, you definitely do need a plan for when the day comes that you've had enough of his ****. I would have thought his actions so far would have been enough but apparently not. So prepare yourself for the inevitable.


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## TJW (Mar 20, 2012)

dzz said:


> I see your points. I think, instead of "porn", I should be asking myself if he's a sex-addict, which is just as bad. Our counselor mentioned it once, but he brushed it off as if it didn't apply to him.


I think you should believe him. He does this for his jollies, and, because he can. He believes his reward from his porn and his philandering is better than the reward of being a true, loving, and faithful husband and father. This does not meet the criterion of addiction: "continuing a behavior, in spite of incontrovertable evidence that one should stop".

In your husband's perspective, the evidence he should stop is not there. Your assessment of him is 100% correct.

However, the evidence that he should no longer be your husband is clearly in plain sight.

Just now, however, he can remain a cake-eater with impunity.


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## She'sStillGotIt (Jul 30, 2016)

dzz said:


> I see your points. I think, instead of "porn", I should be asking myself if he's a sex-addict, which is just as bad.


LOL.

Didn't take long for THAT over-used arm-chair 'diagnosis' to show up in this thread. It never does.

He's no more of a 'sex addict' than you are.

He's just your typical horn-dog married man looking for a cheap thrill. They get tired of the 'same old same old' at home and start shopping for variety and something 'new.' They feel deprived that they can only experience ONE woman because they're married, and feel they deserve some variety and spice in their lives. And as long as the old lady doesn't know, then ignorance is bliss - right? I've lost COUNT of how many men I've known over my lifetime who had this exact mindset - and acted on it whenever they could.

Good luck with a therapist magically squelching his desire for strange because it ain't going to happen. I'm just being honest with you.


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