[HalfPint]

Hey dave. I hope everything turns out with you and your wife. I know that the "cleanup" after trying to get over looking at porn is difficult. I'm still not 100% done with mine. I haven't talked with my family about it. I don't feel the need to, but I think it will help and provide a little closure. I would like to encourage you to talk to your wife about the money. I'm no expert, and I've never had a relationship (I haven't yet had a girlfriend even and I'm saving that for after college), but I do have some experience with lies and with money. My mom and dad for years had a relationship built on lies and money. For years my parents lied about things and used money wrong. Today my family is in extreme debt because of it, and my parents still don't have the best relationship. It is getting better though, and the reason that it is, is because they told each other the truth, they told my siblings and I the truth, and are doing better with money. The storm only gets worse before the silver lining. Its working out with my parents because they still do, kind of, love each other. They want to stay together for me and my siblings and because they believe its the right thing to do. If this is the path you decide to take I hope that everything goes well for you. I definitely would hate to see anything happen to anybody.

On the subject of the masturbation. I just felt like I should tell you why I'm so apposed to it. My reason for quitting masturbation along with porn is because 1, I do believe its a sin, but thats just my belief. 2, Its not so much the action but what it takes to make it happen. The images, the thoughts that I have to bring into my mind in order for masturbation to take place and the images and thoughts that take place during masturbation make me lust over and over. I tend to use the images that I saw in porn and the literature that I read when pictures didn't seem to work. A guy from my church once talked to me about it. They said this, and this is from a Christian perspective, no intentions of shoving the believe on you if you don't believe it: "Its unclear to anyone if masturbation is really a sin, but in order to masturbate, most people need to lust, most people need to bring images into their heads to prepare them for it, and to aid them along the way, and that lust, those images and words are a sin, so theres a reason to stay away from it". Thats one of my reasons I stay away from it. I respect you whatever your believe is, however.

Like I said before, I hope everything turns out good for you in your journey against porn and I hope everything turns out good for you with your wife.