Hi Bodget,
Having earlier written a long post for Abbie, I thought I'd better come here and say hi, too - I won't make this one quite as long, however, as I'm running out of evening!
I'm glad to read that you're still fighting this battle against porn and the effects it has had on you and those you love. You seemed to have a different attitude in your last post, and that's also good to see, even though the process you went through to get there wasn't comfortable. Keep up the good work!
I know that face-to-face communication is very hard for you, especially when there's so much emotion involved, but having made a start in communicating (albeit a very painful one), I hope you two will be able to keep some sort of honest communication going with each other? As another SO, I know that my husband also found it really hard to talk to me about stuff - after I would drag information out of him in a highly emotional state, he would say "see, this is why I don't talk, because it gets you so upset!". Which, of course, would get me even more upset, as the reason I was upset in the first place was because he hadn't been communicating with me...it was a vicious circle! So we had to learn together how to talk without all the negative emotion of past hurts getting in the way - and that's a long and difficult process. He had to fully understand that no matter how hard he thought a conversation was going to be, I needed him to be brave enough to do it - emotionally, I needed him to "prove" to me that I was worth fighting for, that I was worth him overcoming his fears of communication to show me that he was being honest again, that I, our marriage, and our son mattered to him. At the same time, I needed to learn to calm down and wait for him to come to me with his thoughts, and not to fly off the handle if I suspected anything was wrong, but rather to talk rationally about my fears and let him confirm or deny them either way - emotionally, he had to feel safe enough around me to risk himself, to show his vulnerability to me, knowing that I wouldn't lash out at him for no reason. (That bit's important - I still reserved the right to go crazy if I found out he'd been lying to me again!)
Storm was so right in what she wrote - I think it's a common reaction in many SOs, and I hope you can understand what she means.
I can't urge you strongly enough to seek counselling with your wife - even if, as you say, there is no way back, it may yet provide you with a different way forward - and you owe it to yourselves and your daughter to try to get communication happening between you and Abbie again. It's so easy in this sort of situation where trust has been broken and there is so much negative emotion in both partners, for each to get bogged down in either blaming the other for all their stress or being paralysed by the feeling that everything is so bad that there's nothing you can do to make it better. Unfortunately that doesn't lead to any sort of healing for either party, and in fact generally ends up creating a great stinking mess that ruins the lives of everyone who gets dragged into it. So my strongest advice to you would be to find a way to communicate without the anger on either part - which is where a good counsellor (and a lot of bravery in facing up to one's own part in the situation) comes in.
Of course, I can't speak for Abbie as to where she stands with your relationship at the moment, but if you do want a chance to heal things between you - to either head for a reconciliation or at the least more amicable separation (if only for the sake of your child, caught in the middle of all this conflict: believe me, she'll be feeling it) - I strongly advise you to talk to her somehow in a neutral setting. Or, if you still find it too hard to talk in person, perhaps try writing out all your thoughts and feelings to her? You're good at writing your thoughts here on the forum, so just take those thoughts "sideways" to her, perhaps?
I know I hated it when my husband clammed up and wouldn't talk to me - I know now that he just didn't know what to say, or how to say it...but at the time, all I saw was that he didn't think I was worth fighting for, that he really wanted porn more than me or our son. That hurt, more than I can ever describe, and it wasn't until we managed to start talking that we started to heal each other and ourselves again.
Oh look, this did end up being along post after all. No surprise, I guess...
You're doing really well to stay porn-free, so keep fighting, and remember why you're doing this - to heal and free yourself from the clutches of "pure evil". Continue your battle and be someone others on this site look up to as they start their own battles.
Good luck
