My First Entry

It hasn't been very long since I found out about my husband's pornography addiction.  In fact, it was only about two and a half weeks ago.  Unfortunately it feels like its been a lot longer than that.  The battle has been very real.  We were married in the Salt Lake LDS temple last year and have not even reached our first wedding anniversary.  Especially as a newlywed, this is a difficult thing to deal with.  Prophets and apostles are definitely accurate when they have warned that pornography will cause "sweet relationships to sour and marriages to wither."  Before we were married, I felt prompted to ask my husband if he had ever had a problem with pornography.  It was after a Priesthood session where the topic had been addressed.  He lied to me and said that he had never had a problem with it.  I have quickly learned that with any addiction, dishonesty seems fairly inherent.  I have struggled with the fact that he has looked at pornography, but I struggle more with the layers of deception and lies.  It is difficult to know that my husband has been living two lives and tried so hard to keep me from knowing the truth. 

After I discovered the pornography, I was flooded with a large range of emotions-predominantly shock, disbelief, sorrow, anger, and even physical pain and sickness.  I decided to write in a notebook each day to help me deal with my feelings.  Each time that I have written, I have felt a lot more clarity, but sometimes it is difficult to find the strength to write about all of the things that my mind is forced to process at this time.  I've also found that my hand really hurts from all of the writing!  I had considered keeping a journal on my computer, just as a document, since I can type a lot faster than I can write.  And then, as I searched the internet for resources that would be helpful to me, I came across a few blogs written by people who were also dealing with the pornography addictions of loved ones.  It was a huge help to me to be able to read their struggles and emotions.  Finally, someone who knew exactly how I was feeling.  Because of this, I have decided to keep this anonymous blog online.  It will help me to process my emotions through writing and I will be satisfied if it helps even just one other person.  Because of how important the writing process has been to me, my posts will likely be fairly lengthy sometimes.  

I will probably spend my next few posts copying directly from the journal that I have written during the last few weeks.  Then, hopefully I can record my current feelings frequently.  Before I record my specific feelings that I have already put in my notebook, I will convey a brief overview of the last few weeks.

I caught the pornography on my computer on a Sunday night and as soon as my husband and I were alone that evening, I confronted him about the files that I had found.  He lied to me and tried to pretend that the files had been accidentally downloaded because he thought they were something else.  Due to the graphic nature of the file names, I knew this could not have been the case.  He continued to lie to me and I remained very calm.  I told him that I wanted to believe him but that his story simply did not make any sense.  Shortly after, he admitted to me that he had struggled with problems with pornography since high school.  He told me that it had started again about a month ago.  

The next day we met with his father briefly.  I guess his whole family knew about his pornography problems.  During our meeting, my husband confessed that it had not just been the past month that he had been viewing pornography.  He had been looking at it again for almost six months (over half of our marriage).  After we met with his father, we met with our Bishop.  He spoke with us kindly and told us that we should look for professional help.  Later that evening, we decided that we would go together to my parents because they live within about an hour and tell them in-person about his problem.  We decided to do this because I knew I wouldn't be able to talk to very many people, but I would need to at least be able to go to my parents.  Furthermore, my parents would be able to tell that something was wrong and we didn't want them to worry.  My husband agreed that it was a good idea to include them in the process.  Since then, I have met with a trusted professor (I am still a college student) who is a marriage and family therapist.  I trusted her with the situation and she referred me to a personal counselor, a therapist who worked with pornography issues, and a program for couples dealing with pornography issues.  The counselor that she referred me to didn't have any openings for weeks, so my first meeting with her will be tomorrow.  I think it will be helpful for me to have a professional to speak with openly about my feelings.  My husband and I have also met with the therapist who works with pornography issues weekly, and have contacted the leaders of the program for couples.  The program starts in two weeks and we are planning on attending it.  That's a brief recap of the situation and how we are handling it.  My next posts will be portions of my journal from the last few weeks.