Reader’s Question

I recently married a man I had been dating for a year. He is a very wonderful man. After we were married for 3 months, I found out he was visiting an adult dating site. I confronted him about this, and he claimed he was only going to this site to watch videos, and he promised he would’t do it anymore. I believed him and never brought it up again.

I recently caught him at his computer visiting porn sites again. He admitted he was back to his old habits. I don’t understand this. We have a healthy sex life. Still, I have noticed changes in it over the last few months. He just doesn’t seem as interested. I initially attributed this to the fact he got laid off from his job which happened shortly after we were married. He hadn’t been out of work for that long a period in over 15 years. He is now back to work.

My husband and I have been watching porn together because I felt if I did this he would have less need to sneak. But I still don’t fully trust him because he has more than one email account, and I only know one of them.

Am I wrong to be concerned? I am this man’s third wife. He was divorced for 14 years from his second wife and lived a pretty racy life with hookers. He claimed he didn’t want a relationship but was horny. I have not hidden anything from him about me. He has full access to my computer, my email accounts, etc. because I have nothing to hide. I was also sexually abused as a child, which went on for a long time, although I am not sure how long as I think I have blocked some of it. My parents knew about it and didn’t stop it or keep me from my abuser. I thought I was fine with it and it had no real effect, but lately I have been having nightmares as for the first time in my life my husband does not make me feel safe. I would like to know if I am making too much of his porn use as it does bother me, makes me feel cheated on, and makes me feel like I will never be enough.

Thanks for your time.

Our Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

There is insufficient information to assess whether your husband has an unhealthy sexual “addiction” to porn or other sexual behavior problem. But the fact that your husband has a long history of sexual sensation-seeking behavior of various types and that it has now begun to affect your relationship in several ways indicates that there is definitely cause for concern. Besides that, it’s quite likely your own sexual abuse history has predisposed you to some distorted thinking and judgment when it comes to matters of this sort.

It would appear that both you and your husband could very well benefit from therapeutic intervention. It may be best to start with your own. As you work through your feelings and issues, it might become a lot clearer to you what kinds of limits and boundaries you need to set and enforce in your marriage.