Should I be concerned?

[hope phul]

My husband who has been free of P & MB for 76 days, told me last night that he has struggled 3 times with an image coming into his head while we are making love. He said that 2 of those times he pushed them out right away and focused on me. The other time the image appeared, he pushed it out, it came back and it stayed for "5 seconds" and then he orgasmed and the image disappeared. He said he was very sorry. He wasn't trying to think of the P. He said he the thought in his head was "This is like (insert name of porn star)" and he thought of that scene. He doesn't think he was pretending I was her.

I guess my question is what should I do? Is that fantasizing about someone else?

He said that he has had an image pass into his mind 2-3 times the entire time we have been married before being honest about the P & MB 76 days ago. Does anyone have any insight to why he is having these images pop up now? He seems to be trying so hard to fight the thoughts and I don't understand now why they are popping up when he is with me when they usually didn't before?

The encouraging thing is that he came clean about it last night. The discouging thing is that it took me asking the specific question of has he ever fantacised about someone else when he was with me. The incident where he had that thought, happened 3 nights before he came clean.

Thanks~X(

[AirKeep]

hope phul, my opinion: If you feel you should be concerned about it, then that is fine, it sounds to me like maybe there's a part about what to be concerned about though. Is the concern the images, that they're coming up now, or trust or something else? All of those are understandable.

If the the thought that your husband may think of another women, even briefly, isn't that 'big of a deal' (sorry, don't have a better way to put that), even giving the setting that it's coming up, then there is something deeper. From your other posts, trust seems to be a really big issue right now, and I somewhat take what you've said here more along the lines of if he's thinking about other women, even admitting that it's happened a few times, is he really being truthful about it or about everything? In your position, I'd understand all of those thoughts. I can imagine right now, all of your senses are about on overdrive, and even little things start to take you down some roads you've never thought of.

Why they're coming up? I can't say either. I can tell you from my history, I can remember what the picture of the first time I saw P was, and that was almost 25yrs ago. They are buried, but still there.

I can only try to empathize and give one view point, sorry. I can't really get into the psychological part of this either, but again, my thoughts. With my SO, I never thought of other P-stars, but did think of a few people I did know. As much as I hate to admit that, I did. My SO told me one time as well, she had imagined me with someone else, not sure if she did while we were having sx, and that 'helped' her, but for her, she did mention at times she'd about have to take a 3rd party step outside of us kind of view of us in the act, in order for her to get where she needed to be. Hope that's not moving onto an entirely different conversation.

Do I think it's 'normal' to think of someone else, to have your mind 'wander' or have other thoughts come up? Not sure. Best that I know it happens. Unfortunately, how many times have I thought about, hmmm, what bills need to be paid, while I should be focusing on my wife. Of course, bills vs. other people, especially with where you are both at right now, that's not the same comparison. Short version: from talking with others, thinking of others does and has happened.

If the trust issue or something else is more of the issue underneath it all, then I guess just some thinking and understanding of it all, or communicating with your husband (as you did in asking him), will probably help. In letting him know, what feelings (trust, or lack of, or whatever else it may be) you get by him viewing the images, perhaps he can better communicate what he is feeling as well.

Sorry, maybe didn't help much.

[Searching4peace]

I guess my question is what should I do? Is that fantasizing about someone else?

He said that he has had an image pass into his mind 2-3 times the entire time we have been married before being honest about the P & MB 76 days ago. Does anyone have any insight to why he is having these images pop up now? He seems to be trying so hard to fight the thoughts and I don't understand now why they are popping up when he is with me when they usually didn't before?

I don't want to tell you to not worry about it, because I know the fears you have over the thought of your husband thinking about another person while making love to you. These "flash backs" are normal for someone trying to recover from pa, just as for us So's that "caught" our pa's in the act or as a result of the act we too have flash backs at the strangest of times. My husband has been clean for about 35 days since his last stumble, and that stumble in the grand scheme wasn't that bad compared to his past stumbles, but he still has times where the memories try to surface, but has worked hard on mental training to divert them. One thing we work on for our own love life is to keep each other engaged during sx. If I see him drifting off into his own mind for to long, I'll ask him to look at me that seems to help him. We talk to each other but that might not work for everyone, it's just how we roll, lol. I hope this helps, I'm sorry but I can't remember if he's on here? If not it might help for him to get info from the other pa's on their recovery, we have a great number of guys that have been sexually sober for several months if not more that can give him insight as to what they went through.

I'm so glad you're here, and that we can work to help each other.

Peace and love
crys