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It has happened!! Your worst fears have come true and suddenly you've found
out that your spouse is living a double life-the life of a sex addict! You've found the evidence, you've cried the bitter
tears. You've asked yourself and God over and over-why, why, why??? Where do you go from here? How do you
stop this pain that has invaded your once happy life? How do you come to terms with your husband's addiction?
What things can you do to help?? What things will make his addiction worse? I truly hope to be able to answer
some of these questions for you! Before you leave this site, you will be better equipped to pull your marriage and your
life back together!
What you should do first...
- First and foremost, Do Not blame yourself!!!! Your husband's addiction has
nothing to do with you, your looks, your body, or the way you act!! It is most likely a problem that he has dealt with
long before you came into the picture!
- Secondly, Don't act before thinking! Right now, there are so many emotions
running through your mind!! You may feel sad, angry, confused, cheated, abused, mistrust(your emotions will run the
gamut!) Don't make any rash decisions or say something that you will later regret!
- Do pray without ceasing and let the Lord carry you. He loves you so very
much and you are beautiful and precious in His eyes!!
- Prepare to talk to your husband about what you know and what you have found!
The talk...
The talk is something that you will not be able to avoid for
very long! What you have found out will eat away at your insides until you talk to your husband. It takes courage
to take that first step, to bring it up! It is vital though, to start the healing process and restore your marriage!
This talk will be the first, but must not be the last! You will need to keep the doors of communication wide open from
now on. How can you go about discussing this with your husband??
All women tend to go about this process differently, I will tell you from personal experience
what works and what doesn't. Some women will be so angry that they will rush to acuse their husbands and some will be
so hurt they can't even discuss it at all and keep it all inside! Neither of these are very effective methods!
What you should not do...
- No matter how angry you may be, try your very best not to hurl accusations at him.
- Don't bring up every "bad" thing that he has ever done!
- Don't accuse him of things you don't know to be fact.
- Don't bring up divorce or seperation(it is way too premature at this time).
- Don't do all of the talking! Let him explain his side of things(no matter
how angry what he says makes you, don't interrupt).
- Don't let any of his excuses or accusations, detur you from your mission-that is
to get it all out in the open and in the light!
Things you should do...
- Do let him know that you still love him!(this is very, very important)
- Do approach him with a forgiving heart(You may feel that you can never forgive
him, but you must remember that forgiveness is a commandment from our Lord!)
- Realize that yes, your husband has sinned and yes, it is very wrong, but his sin
is no greater than any other sin in the Lord's eyes!
- Do try your best to remain as calm as possible, but also let him know how you are
feeling and let him share his feelings with you.
- Do let him know that you will help him in any way possible, that you will support
him, and stand by him!
- Prepare yourself for the coming battle.
The battle ahead...
You are about to start a roller coaster ride that will bring you
up and down and eventually to healing! The better prepared you are, the easier this ride will be!
The first thing that needs to be done is for both you and your
spouse to have individual and marritial counseling. The marriage counseling is important to help renew the bonds of
your marriage-the individual counseling is very important for you both. Your husband would benefit greatly from a good
Christian counselor(one who is a sex addict himself, preferred). You may feel more comfortable with a Christian female
counselor.
I won't discuss the things your husband needs to do, for we
are concentrating on you and your needs right now! I have another page for the addict that you may want to check out
and have your husband visit.
There are a couple of very big mistakes that you can make during
this recovery period! They are as follows:
- Whatever you do, do not join your husband in his addiction! Many women fall
prey to addiction by thinking that if they watch movies and look at porn materials with their husband that it will save their
marriage-IT WON'T!! This will only lead to more heartache and put you under a great risk of becoming an addict yourself!
Avoid it entirely!!
- Do not try to "police" and "hound" your husband! You are not going to trust
him in the beginning and you might think that if you constantly keep after him, that this will help him to resist-IT WON'T!!
By constantly hounding him and accusing him and keeping track of his every move, you will find the opposite result and your
intentions will back-fire on you!! If you constantly accuse your husband, he will begin to think that he may as well
do it, if you think that he is doing it even when he's not!(just something to really think about!) Doing these things
will only drive yourself mad and won't lead to any real source of help for either of you!
- During the recovery period, it is very important that you and your husband keep
the leval of intimacy up! From sources that I have read, a man needs a sexual release about every 72 hours! If
he doesn't have this release, as an addict, he may seek pornography and masturbation! I know how difficult it is to
make love with your husband after you have found out! You constantly feel you are being compared to the women in the
magazines or on the net! You wonder is he being fulfilled by you, or the images stored in his memory! With gentleness
and loving, the two of you can renew the intimacy that the demon pornography has robbed from you! It takes time and
dedication, but it CAN be done!! Hang in there!
This too shall pass...
You may think right now, that the devastating pain you are feeling
will never go away! I'm here to tell you, that it can and it eventually will! Trust me, it does take time and
there are gonna be days that you think it's gone, and then one little memory will trigger the flood of tears.
- In the beginning, the emotions you will feel will go back and forth. Normal
emotions you will feel:
- anger, hurt, mistrust,jealousy,-you may feel cheated, abused, You may feel hatred
towards your husband(try to remember to hate his sin and not him!!),you feel embarassment(it is embarassing to think about
your friends and family finding out!), you may even blame yourself! All of these are normal, but it is what you do with
them that can make or break you!
Things you can do to ease the pain...
- First and most important: Lean on the Lord!! You will not be able to make
it through without Him!!
- As I stated above, counseling definitely helps!(it is best to find a Christian
counselor because the world tends to find the behaviour of your husband normal)
- Keeping a journal is very important and can be a great stress reliever! You
can even have a journal online! You will not believe how much this can help you work through your thoughts and feelings!
- Sharing with others going through what you are is another way to both learn and
to cope and also be a source of strength to others! You can join us in the forum if you like! We would love to
have you!! You will find the link to the forum below!
- Educate yourself on pornography addiction. There are many resources available
out there that help both the spouse and the addict. The more you know, the better you will be able to get through this!
Visit my books page and you will find a vast resource of media to help you! Here is the link:
Resources
Visit us in the forum!!
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