Heartbroken85: An Ongoing Story of Survival, with or without him

[Heartbroken85]

I decided to start a journal covering my journey up to this point and from this point on.

First, finding out how I got here. Wednesday, August 6 my boyfriend and I had yet another fight over one of the only things we disagree on: his inappropriate interaction with women.(I’ll post my original post soon). I was just fed up with feeling hurt and run around on so I slept upstairs. I barely talked to him the next day. Thursday night, sobbing like my heart was being torn out of my body, I pleaded with a stone faced boyfriend to explain to me why he didn’t care that I was going to leave him for not changing his ways? His answer was that he felt like I was trying to control him and that he didn’t want me to leave. It was my decision. I slept upstairs again that night. Friday morning I left for work silently so that I wouldn’t wake him, and delayed going home, dreading the weekend alone with him. That afternoon he left me a message, “I know we have a lot of stuff to talk about but I just want to get away for the weekend…�. He went camping with a friend. I breathed a sigh of relief. I didn’t want to deal with this this weekend either.

Friday night, I holed up angry in my makeshift bedroom upstairs, I still refused to be in his bed even with him gone, and began to surf the internet. Honestly I was planning on finding instructions for some way to hack into his computer and his different accounts and deleting everything in them. For some reason though I was lead to search support for people living with PAs and SAs instead. I found ThroughTheFlame.org. I read story after story that sounded like I could’ve written it myself, word for word. I was crying again, but this time out of relief and sorrow that I am not alone in this. That there are people out there going through the same thing as I am, feeling the same pain and being torn by their love and devotion to their spouse. I cried so much tears were streaming down my face and soaking my shirt. After hours of reading and getting encouragement, I decided to post my own cry for help:

My Relationship is Being Torn Apart
Posted 8/9/08
My boyfriend has never tried to hide or deny his addiction to porn from me even admitted early on in our relationship that he believe that he was addicted to sex. In fact when I breach the subject he tries to make me feel guilty for not liking it, justifying himself by telling me that his ex's would watch it with him and that they would watch it on their own as well. He is a self proclaimed porn addict and I feel like he uses that excuse as justification to look at it everyday. He'll get home from work and get right on the computer to view it for a few minutes before dinner or get up early so that he can look at it before work. He doesn't hide it from me and sometimes he even invites me to watch it with him even though I tell him it makes me uncomfortable, I don't know why he wants that. He doesn't masturbate to it either, and it doesn't really get in the way of us living our lives. We still go out to movies and dinner and visit people. We still have sex regularly, with mutual initiation. But his daily need for it breaks my heart and makes me feel so unsatisfying to him. It makes me feel like I'm not enough to satisfy him sexually. It makes me feel fat and ugly. The worst part is he tries to convince me that it is perfectly normal and that my feelings are unwarranted and stupid.

His problem is not just normal porn either, he gets a thrill from knowing the women in the pictures so he's joined a website that offers the chance to look at amateur stuff and talk to the people who displayed it. He also has a knack for meeting and becoming friends with girls that will send him provocative pictures of themselves. He also engages in sexually explicit conversations on the website, in his emails as well as through text messages on his phone. He denies any of it when I confront him, but then he refuses to prove it to me and accuses me of being controling and invading his privacy. He hasn't cheated on me physically (yet), but I can't help but feel the things he's doing is unfaithful to me. I've asked him time and again not to talk to the people he claims are just his friends now but who are the same ones who have sent him naked pictures, but he just acts like I'm being unreasonable and gets mad at me.

I know that I'm not seeing the worst of it either. He keeps his laptop password protected as well as his 3 e-mail accounts. He also makes sure that he never saves text messages or pictures in his phone. I've looked in his phone before to find evidence of conversations and all I’ve found were a couple texts from the tail end of a conversation. Sometimes responses like "I don't think your girl would like that" or one time "yeah, now I'm all horny for you". Even though the whole conversation wasn't in there I had a horrible feeling the rest of the conversation wasn't much better. When I confronted him about it he tried to assure me that there wasn't anything to be worried about in their conversations and then got angry at me for invading his privacy. I just hate his need for top secret security and privacy all the time. I also know that he doesn't keep the nude pics he receives on his phone, he keeps them on his password protected online gallery provided by the phone company.

I've been sleeping in a separate room from him for the past few days. The first night he asked me to come back down to be with him because he missed me and didn't want things to be that way, but I knew that if I did come down, I'd wake up in his arms and forget the whole situation like I always do. So I was resolved and I wanted to stand my ground until we could come to a solution. The second night he didn't even bother. I asked him why the porn and his "friends" were more important than me and he told me he felt like I was just trying to control him. We've slept apart since then. I don't know how much more I can take. I love him so much, but I hurt so bad. I've been feeling so depressed. I've been crying so much, I'm even crying now as I write this. I don't want to leave him, but I can't do this. I've asked him to get counseling and help. He just tells me he wouldn't feel comfortable with talking about it. I told him about different pastors that I know wouldn't judge him, but he just got angry at me.

We've been together for two and a half years and have lived with each other for one and a half. He tells me that I'm the only one he loves and the only person he wants to start a family with and spend the rest of his life with. He's told me before that he's never met anyone like me and that I'm different from anyone else he's dated and that's what he loves about me. But it's seems like he doesn't care that he's sacrificing me for his porn/sex addiction, even though he keeps telling me that breaking up is my decision, that I'm bringing it upon myself. I've told him over and over that I can't live with the stress and depression that it brings me. I just want to know that there is hope for him, and for me. Hope for our relationship. I don't know how to make it work even though I love him sooooo much.

I finished that and began composing my letter to him. Instead of sleeping that night, I put into 5 pages exactly what I was feeling. What he was doing to me and our relationship. I’ll post my letter in another post. When I was finished, I began packing. I wasn’t going to be around the next night when he got home and found his letter.

Saturday, August 9, I was able to sleep without pills or painkillers for the first time that week. I can’t say that I felt good, but I felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my chest and I was finally breathing normally again.

[E-dub]

I am in shock after reading your journal. It is really terrible what your boyfriend is doing to you. I am a pa and also in a relationship. But I feel terrible for what I have done to my gl. You deserve better that this. I know that it might be hard, but if your bf has no regret or shame with his addiction, it isn't your fault for not helping him. I think you moving out was a great step. Your bf needs to see what he is doing to you is wrong, and change this fact.
Again I am really sorry for what you must be going through. I will put out some good thoughts for you, because you deserve the best.
E-dub

[livada]

I cannot but agree with what E-dub said.

Yes, terrible miscalculations and delusions, and hurt-projectiles that PA makes are one thing. Not being able to see that at all, and rationalize by accusing the other side who just wants to live normal, undisturbed life, is something else - its beyond pale, indeed.

The only way you can set this straight is, in my humble opinion, to give him ultimatum: do - in which case I'll offer all my support - or die. If he fails to take it seriously, or even consider it, he is not worthy of your love.

May God protect us all from the evil within our souls.