By Marilisa Walker
Following a heart wrenching break up of our nearly 11-year marriage, and after he ran our Chamber of Commerce award-winning businesses into the ground, stole all my money and drove off in our only car on a sizzling hot summer afternoon in August while I was taking a nap, I experienced “an overwhelming and overpowering feeling of not being able to make sense of it”—which is what I logged in my journal four months later.
Throwing myself on the kitchen floor and sobbing uncontrollably, while these antics provided some emotional relief but horrified my dog—yet was I still left with an irreconcilable quandary.
If I could only make sense of what happened between my husband and I, then I could understand it.
If I could understand it, then I could deal with it.
In the same way a patient sees a doctor for a distressing physical symptom, the doctor is rendered powerless to treat that disease unless a DIAGNOSIS is first given.
What are we dealing with, exactly?
My dilemma seemed to be rooted in, why, why, why when we seemingly had so much going for us, could our relationship and life end up in such shambles?
True, I can never go back in time insomuch as to restructure a nanosecond and change even one singular event for the better—or force a different outcome—yet it is my conviction that if I understand the dynamics of what happened: I can have an insurance policy shored up AGAINST that future time in which the same scenario will likely repeat itself—”I just met this wonderful man”—leaving me devastated and heartbroken with the proverbial rug pulled out from under me yet again!
I, justifiably, have a real fear and concern I might inadvertently find myself years from now, in the same unpleasant situation. After all, I have racked up two husbands now—both addicts.
“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”
Albert Einstein
Einstein was certainly one of the sharper knives in the drawer and his take on a situation is fairly reliable.
“Many women do not evaluate themselves or their relationships,” says Dr. Joyce Hamilton Berry, a clinical psychologist in the Washington, D.C., area. “Consequently, they do not recognize the similarities that attract them to certain types of men.”
Dr. Berry explains that when a woman repeatedly chooses the wrong man, those bad choices attempt to fulfill “needs” that sometimes go back to the woman’s childhood.”
Furthermore she asserts that “People seemingly are drawn to a specific character type; until you learn what it is that keeps you boxed in, you are never going to be able to extricate yourself.”
So this examination—diagnosis—on my part is born out of judiciousness, rather than sentimentality.
It is not out of longing for the relationship to be restored, for to restore such a twisted relationship would mean that I have no self respect at all—thinking I am no better than to be lied to, stolen from, and psychologically abused—this is emphatically not the case!
Our relationship was like an endless game of “go fish;” in vain did I try to match the other cards up to the face card that was showing—an impossible task.
The face card that was showing was “what he said,” the other cards that never matched were “what he did.”
What he SAID and WHAT HE DID were not congruent.
It was as if you looked outside to determine the weather, finding a snowstorm of unprecedented magnitude, you opted for sandals and shorts!
So, doctor, what then, based on your stringent findings, would you say is the diagnosis?
Pornographic Projected Objectification
This is a term I have coined myself, to the end that other women might get a handle on what, exactly, went down—because my situation is by no means unique and there are countless woman, girlfriends, wives, children, and employers left scratching their heads as to what in the world is wrong with this guy?!
It is my contention that Pornographic Projected Objectification is so prolific as to be staggeringly common. You know, similar to air—everybody pretty much breathes it.
If you expect me to escalate my theory of PPO to the tenor of a puritanically snubbed wife, with nothing but theological arguments against the wrongness of porn and a few dog-eared Bible passages (although I certainly could, having graduated from Moody Bible Institute School of External Studies—“The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it?” Jeremiah 17:9) consider these facts from SafeFamilies.org.
- As of 2003, there were 1.3 million pornographic websites; 260 million pages (N2H2, 2003).
- The total porn industry revenue for 2006: $13.3 billion in the United States; $97 billion worldwide (Internet Filter Review).
- U.S. adult DVD/video rentals in 2005: almost 1 billion (Adult Video News).
- Hotel viewership for adult films: 55% (cbsnews.com).
- Unique worldwide users visiting adult web sites monthly: 72 million (Internet Filter Review).
- Number of hardcore pornography titles released in 2005 (U.S.): 13,588 (Internet Filter Review).
- Adults admitting to Internet sexual addiction: 10%; 28% of those are women (Internet Filter Review).
- More than 70% of men from 18 to 34 visit a pornographic site in a typical month (comScore Media Metrix).
- More than 20,000 images of child pornography posted online every week (National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, 10/8/03).
- Approximately 20% of all Internet pornography involves children (National Center for Mission & Exploited Children).
- 100,000 websites offer illegal child pornography (U.S. Customs Service estimate).
- As of December 2005, child pornography was a $3 billion annual industry (Internet Filter Review).
- “At a 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, two-thirds of the 350 divorce lawyers who attended said the Internet played a significant role in the divorces in the past year, with excessive interest in online porn contributing to more than half such cases. Pornography had an almost non-existent role in divorce just seven or eight years ago.” (Divorcewizards.com)
I am, at my very core an entrepreneur; a business person.
Two very obvious things jump out.
- There is a DEMAND for pornography.
- There is a SUPPLY of pornography.
Yet it is neither demand nor supply that is of any consequence.
Instead, I am interested in the effect of its use.
When one is a heroin addict, no one delves deeply into the molecular structure of what heroin is comprised.
We are merely concerned with heroin’s effect on a life—and not the heroin itself.
Effects of pornography’s use
In a well balanced, thoughtfully written piece for the United Kingdom’s The Guardian, writer Edward Marriott investigates, Men and porn.
First Marriott lays the traditional groundwork of proliferation:
In the US, with the pornography industry bringing in up to $15bn (£8.9bn) annually, people spend more on porn every year than they do on movie tickets and all the performing arts combined. Each year, in Los Angeles alone, more than 10,000 hardcore pornographic films are made, against an annual Hollywood average of just 400 movies.
Marriott further writes:
There is a widespread sense that anyone who suggests pornography might have any kind of adverse effect is laughably out of touch. Coren and Skelton, former Erotic Review film critics, focus on their flip comic narrative, scarcely troubling themselves with any deeper issues. “In all our years of watching porn,” they write, in a rare moment of analysis that doesn’t get developed any further, “we have never properly resolved what we think about how, why and whether it is degrading to women. We suspect that it might be. We suspect that pornography might be degrading to everybody.
As for the extent of my own husband’s addiction, he once told me that he’s been evicted from his home choosing to spend his last money on pornography, a want, and not shelter, a need.
Obviously this thinking is not born out of sane logic, but of irrational logic, as addicts are not known, by their nature, to be bastions of rational thought.
Please bear in mind that I am not talking about a person who has a casual relationship with porn. I am talking about an ADDICT.
What is an addict’s most pressing obsession? SUPPLY.
Anything, and I do many anything, that stands between an addict and his supply, must be what?
Must be SACRIFICED.
So if I had money that could keep the supply coming, he stole it.
If I had assets that would boost consumption, he borrowed against them—secretly.
If I had employees that needed to be paid, he rather, paid himself first and wrote them hot checks.
If I had clients deserving a service, he instead, took their money but called on the date of the event to tell them, graciously, that he “could not be there,” but would be “by on Monday to refund their money. According to the Better Business Bureau’s complaint, Monday never came.
Wife, kids, job, business, reputation—does not matter. All will eventually be placed on the sacrificial altar of “supply.”
One third of the way through his article, Marriott drops the big bomb on every one’s mind:
Yet what about the millions who consume pornography, the men—for they are, despite pornographers’ claims about growing numbers of female fans, mostly men—who habitually use it? How are they affected? Is pornography, as most these days claim, a harmless masturbatory diversion?
In a moment of candidness, the writer provides us with a vulnerable glimpse of his own use of pornography:
For most men, at some point in their lives, pornography has held a strong appeal and, before any examination of its effects, this fact has to be addressed. Like many men, I first saw pornography during puberty. At boarding school, dog-eared copies of Mayfair and Knave were stowed behind toilet cisterns; this borrow-and-return library system was considered absolutely normal, seldom commented upon and either never discovered by the masters or tacitly permitted. Long before my first sexual relationship, porn was my sex education.
No doubt (though we’d never have admitted it then) my friends and I were driven to use porn through loneliness: being away from home, we longed for love, closeness, unquestioning acceptance. The women over whom we masturbated—the surrogate mothers, if you like—seemed to be offering this but, of course, they were never going to provide it. The untruths it taught me on top of this disappointment—that women are always available, that sex is about what a man can do to a woman—I am only now, more than two decades on, finally succeeding in unlearning.
It is safe to say that men who are addicted to porn find themselves vacillating between two lands—the reality of what a woman is—one who has hopes and dreams and parents and ate two pieces of toast with strawberry jam for breakfast that day, is worried about keeping the electricity on and earning enough money for her children’s daycare—and the antithesis porn—fantasy woman has no such affections, silly you, and is but hot n horny and ready to please.
Women then, in this fantasy world, must first be dehumanized before they can be used; and it only stands to reason, men who use them, must first be dehumanized as well.
It is clear to me that my husband was himself, first a victim—after which he then victimized me; a trickle down effect, if you will.
Victims are victimized themselves, the abused become the abusers; hurt people, hurt people.
In a most shocking interview, a male porn star, no longer in the industry, was asked to describe ways in which he was treated while on the set.
As he explained the humiliating regimen that he was subjected to go through to produce the all important climax shot at the end, a distinct and palpable change came over his countenance. This poor man was visibly reduced to holding back bitter tears.
“I was treated like an animal,” he said softly.
It’s all too easy to see the humiliating effects of pornography on women, to the exclusion of the suffering on the part of the men.
Everyone is dehumanized. Make no mistake. Everyone.
Embracing the lie
Marriott goes on to make a revealing point:
Pornography, in other words, is a lie. It peddles falsehoods about men, women and human relationships. In the name of titillation, it seduces vulnerable, lonely men—and a small number of women—with the promise of intimacy, and delivers only a transitory masturbatory fix. Increasingly, though, men are starting to be open about the effect pornography has had ”¦
Willful suppression of the truth only then leaves room in one’s life to then, predictably, embrace the false.
Is it really any great surprise that the rest of the addict’s life is merely the living and acting out of that requisite untruth?
This can explain how, as the cycle continued and became ever more central and necessary, lie upon lie had to be told.
First there is the lie—are you looking at porn again?
And then a lie had to be told about the lie, and so on and so on.
It’s as if the addict begins to see himself and those around him, in an endlessly distorted, maniacally cruel, fun house mirror. The horrible paradigm shift is complete.
“False words are not only evil in themselves, but they infect the soul with evil.” Socrates
One of the most damaging aspects of our relationship, which I had told him in many a fight regarding his use of porn and the financial disaster that would surely follow was:
“How could you look in my face day after day and lie?!”
And I also stated, “For me to stay in this relationship with you means that you are asking me to believe lies!”
Looking at the world through the murky lens of porn
Marriott makes his conclusion:
Even when in a loving sexual relationship, men who have used porn say that, all too often, they see their partner through a kind of “pornographic filter.” This effect is summed up eloquently by US sociologist Harry Brod, in Segal’s essay Sweet Sorrows, Painful Pleasures: “There have been too many times when I have guiltily resorted to impersonal fantasy because the genuine love I felt for a woman wasn’t enough to convert feelings into performance. And in those sorry, secret moments, I have resented deeply my lifelong indoctrination into the aesthetic of the centrefold.”
This is my point exactly—Pornographic Projected Objectification
I view it—the pornography. I project it—the pornography.
I look at nothing, not cognitively, not even consciously, without donning my porn goggles first.
Let me be blatantly honest—if you were to ask a woman what it’s like to have sex with a porn addict, they would tell you that there is a “disconnect”‘ during sex. While their partner is present in body, they are simultaneously elsewhere, for in the porn addict’s mind, the retrieval of pornographic images is a must. They have literally chemically conditioned their sexual response to ultimately only obey that stimuli.
Pornography’s chemically altered brain
Donald L. Hilton Jr. wrote an article entitled, “Slavemaster—How Pornography Drugs and Changes Your Brain.“ Following are excerpts:
Pornography is a visual pheromone, a powerful, $100 billion per year brain drug that is changing human sexuality by “inhibiting orientation” and “disrupting pre-mating communication between the sexes by permeating the atmosphere,” especially through the internet. I believe we are currently struggling in the war against pornography because many continue to believe two key fallacies:
Fallacy No. 1: Pornography is not a drug.
Fallacy No. 2: Pornography is therefore not a real addiction.
In the center of the brain is the nucleus accumbens. This almond-sized area is a key pleasure reward center, and when activated by dopamine and other neurotransmitters, it causes us to value and desire pleasure rewards. Dopamine is essential for humans to desire and value appropriate pleasure in life. Without it, we would not be as incentivized to eat, procreate, or even to try to win a game.
It’s the overuse of the dopamine reward system that causes addiction. When the pathways are used compulsively, a downgrading occurs that actually decreases the amount of dopamine in the pleasure areas available for use, and the dopamine cells themselves start to atrophy, or shrink. The reward cells in the nucleus accumbens are now starved for dopamine and exist in a state of dopamine craving, as a downgrading of dopamine receptors on the pleasure cells occurs as well. This resetting of the “pleasure thermostat” produces a “new normal.” In this addictive state, the person must act out in addiction to boost the dopamine to levels sufficient just to feel normal.”
As the desensitization of the reward circuits continues, stronger and stronger stimuli are required to boost the dopamine. In the case of narcotic addiction, the addicted person must increase the amount of the drug to get the same high. In pornography addiction, progressively more shocking images are required to stimulate the person.”
These facts deeply wound the spouse. How can she even begin to compete with very real chemical changes in her partner’s brain, let alone ignore the intense level of betrayal and subsequent rejection? The answer is, she can not.
Towards the end of our relationship, my husband could not even bring himself to have sex with me because he had already gotten all his pleasure and chemical fix from porn. A real woman doesn’t “do it”‘ anymore.
According to one website dedicated to helping those effected by the partner’s use of pornography, a hallmark sign of addiction is this:
Your sexual life has dwindled, or is dead. You may find that your partner is no longer initiating sex.
“And, last we checked,” writes a woman regarding her husband’s porn use, “being committed to a relationship meant finding ways to exercise your independence in a way that didn’t make your partner weep.”
As for me, I am resolved to no longer cry on a kitchen floor.
Marilisa Walker is a strategic consultant and staff writer for House 61, a shelter that serves those who have experienced sexual abuse, domestic abuse or are human trafficked.
I do believe we believe our own stories.
I am definitely going to order that book.
Thank you for posting Ms.Walker’s article. This is an exceptionally well-reasoned analysis of porn and the effects addiction has on the addict and his ‘victims.’
Following my shocking discovery in 2007 my then-husband of 20 years was addicted to porn and sex and, that his activities were taking place during work time, he twice assaulted me. Following his second assault he disappeared after a 23 year relationship.
After he literally walked out on me, a good friend of ours (male) told me while on a hunting trip with my X a few years earlier, X informed him X “had slept (not the exact term LOL) with hundreds of women; he didn’t care what they looked like.” This statement fits with Ms. Walker’s assertions of PPO.
Ms. Walker’s arguments are also supported by Dr. Patrick Carnes research. Dr. Carnes research reveals porn (and serial sex) are chemical addictions. And, like any other substance, the only way to continue attaining the ‘high’ requires an addict to increased the use of the ‘substance.’
Sadly, all the research in the world does not heal the consequences of the addiction; betrayal, lies, deceit and unwanted STD’s. Sex addiction is a taboo subject. Family and friends seldom have any knowledge of the problem and tend not to believe the facts.
As a result, a person who is the ‘victim’ of such an addict not only loses her relationship with her spouse, she frequently loses her family and friends. She becomes, “Just a bitter ex-wife who is mentally unstable.” WRONG!
Thank you for addressing what has become a serious problem in our society. Following my divorce, my now late father wrote a “Viewpoint” published in my local newspaper: “Easy Access to Sex Ruins Families.”
My dad was more prophetic than he lived to know. After his death in 2009, my entire family abandoned me. The thought of my X, a person they believed was a ‘nice’ guy, being a “sex addict” was more than they could grasp. In turn, his addiction ruined my relationship with my entire family.
The idea porn is harmless is no longer viable. The Internet has opened up an entirely new world of “third-party” sex; including sites which, IMO, are fronts for legalized prostitution.
My advice, get tested annually for STD’s; never put your life in ANYONE’S hands. And check your computers. If you know anything about accessing ‘Cookies’ and temp files, it’s easy.
Peace and Justice.
I lived with my first husband for 28 years through a pornography addiciton I discovered at year 25. All those years I had the “dots” but could not connect them until then. I was lied to,deceived, stolen from, my childrens bank accounts stolen from, always discovering secret loans, horrified and rejected when I would stumble upon his mansturbation when I would be available whenever he wanted it to be a “good wife”, then he emptied our 401K twice so that we could “start over our marriage fresh” i was abused because i was the one thing standing in his way of getting his “fix” so he would physically back me in a corner until I,out of fear would tell him to leave……then he would leave for 1-3 nights, I CAN’T TELL YOU HOW MANY DAYS AND NIGHTS HE WOULD JUST DISAPPEAR….AND THEN RETURN LOVING ME AND SO SORRY FOR LEAVING…….BUT I NEVER KNEW WHY HE LEFT OR WHERE HE WENT!!! WE WERE A RESPECTED CHRISTIAN FAMILY IN THE COMMUNITY ……I loved, forgave, prayed, sought 15 councelors……and was Mother Teresa,Suzy Homemaker and Pamela Anderson and homeschool Mom…. all rolled up into one for him TO SAVE MY FAMILY FROM DIVORCE AND DESTRUCTION…..AND STILL IT WAS NOT ENOUGH! I too wept uncontrollably on my living room floor more times than I can count when the addiciton was hidden and you are lied to, to your face and you know something is TERRIBLY WRONG but you are told “there is nothing wrong, it is YOU!!!!”. I ended with having only two things I asked for: 1. no more lies and 2. no more abuse. He walked out on me and left,telling and convincing my children “it was their Me”,as they saw my reactions, exhaustion,bewilderment, and anger.
That was 3 years ago….after that……my Knight in shining armor came along. I had studied abuse cycles and had my eyes open to an abuser, But this man was Mr. Wonderful. Cherished me, was everything I ever wanted or could have dreamed for……..until the wedding night. Then, I met and married a true psycopath. In 10 months I was fighting for my life,and he turned every living person on this earth against me.
You see I thougt it was bad what I lived in experiencing the above article…..but I divorced the porn addict of 28 years ONLY TO MARRY A PSYCOPATH BENT ON MY DESTRUCTION WHEN I DISCOVERED CHILD PORN, and he has to destroy ME to keep his facade hidden as he is “called to work with children on the mission field”.
AND NOW: The porn addict of 28 years and the Psycopath called to the mission field to work with children have convinced my children, neighbors,friends and Pastor that it was me all along……….that I am crazy,abusive and I run from every man that ever “loved me!”.
And I still am standing, I still believe in God, and I still have a sense of self-worth that tells me I will make it through this life even if it’s just me and God.
And I thought being in a 28 year marriage to a porn addict was bad…………
Feel like a fool, as I was only with the spath for 9 weeks when he dumped me by text. This was 6 weeks ago, been NC for 4 weeks, only had contact for the previous 2 weeks cos I kept letting him know what people were telling me about him {too late, wish Id known before}. He hates criticism, so this really angered him, not that he’d do anything about it because he is a coward. I am getting better and stronger but I still keep checking my phone to see if he has tried to contact me, I know he wont because I was a secondary source, he had another who had been on and off for 4 years, also I told him that I knew he was a sociopath.
He is a porn addict also, had loads of dvd’s stashed in his wardrobe, told me after 1 week of being together that he’d have to get me into porn. I told him NO as it is demeaning and pathetic. Told me that he’d buy me some kinky underwear from a well known shop in uk, told him I wouldn’t wear that tat, said he’d get me a nurse outfit, oh yeah, he spends loads of time in hospital due to his illness, not the mental one a physical one. When we had sex it was over rapidly and there was no connection, he never even took his boxers off just pulled them down and back up when finished. I confronted him about this and he said he couldn’t get a full erection …eh it’s not gonna be full aferwards.
He told me so many lies and I knew they were, sometimes I would confront him but I always let him get away with it.
I really don’t know what I miss about him.
bellaangel:
I’m so sorry 🙁 SIGH. I wish I could do or say something to make things right.
getaway:
Yours kind of sounds like mine in a way. Where are you in the UK? Just curious as I am in the US and so is X spath, but he is from Liverpool.
To STRONGAWOMAN
I do NOT believe that these men idealize, devalue, and discard.
I believe they SEDUCE, devalue, and discard.
It just feels like they are able to find value in you b/c of what they say, how they act around you, treating you as you deserve. But that’s only APPEARS like idealization. Really, the cycle is seduce. Sadly they don’t think good things about us ever, they just hide what they think b/c they have ulterior motives/hidden agendas and when they obtain what they want, then they devalue to wound you and assert that you were the problem (when in fact, it was them from hello to goodbye), and b/c it was a scam from the getgo, NOT idealization, they finally discard, which was the only outcome it was ever going to be.
Marilisa,
Fantastic blog writing. The topic of porn is huge and I think largely not discussed. Porn ruins everything; businesses, families, marriages…….. it’s all run into the ground. I agree with the post about the notion that we have not even begun to see the long term effects.
Young girls try to win over guys with trying to figure out how soon to “give it up.” They wear thongs, shop Victoria’s Secret, have learned to play games, accept the friends with benefits game, but have lost the way in seeking real genuine caring for another person, that involves healthy sexual relations. If they say NO, most guys just move on to the next “easier lay.”
We try to make sense of spaths and their habits whether porn, drinking, gambling, (name the addiction)but it turns us into over analyzers, hyper-critiquers doing the why? how? what if? IS they some way I can help? THE ANSWER IS NO, YOU CAN NOT HELP. If help is needed, the person themself must recognize it. Accept them for who they are, listen to your gut. ACT on your gut. GO NO CONTACT !!! NC,NC,NC.Purge them from your life. They will drag you down. Porn is their issue, not yours. All it will do is make you a co-dependent.
Oxy, I would love to hear your thoughts on Codep.
CathyAnn, of course he married you to fit in. Mine did the same and he had one hell of a ride off of me. You were probably his mask to the public. I know I was. Remember, spaths LOOK for who will hide them. They hate being exposed. They hate being naked—- unless of course it’s a 3some fantasy porn playout (Ok, lol, just trying to keep a sense of humor)
Athena- KEEP GOING on the NC. 8 weeks is a good start. I am about 8 months for NO talking, but just a few emails to try to finalize a divorce. I realized that for me, that insatiable urge to TALK to him was MY ADDICTION to him. (Oxy, I think that is the co-dep I am asking you/talking about). Athena, I can tell you that for me, the longer and longer the NC goes the greater the healing, the more I get on with my own life, and the clearer my thinking. They FOG you up. FEAR, Obligation, Guilt. They won’t take responsibility anyway, so NC is really the way to go.
These experiences with spaths and porn are breaking my heart!! I am so sorry for your suffering! Nobody understands how deeply painful and destructive the behavior of the spaths is, better than someone that has been through it themselves. It helps to see others that are healing and moving on! It helps to see that we are not alone in this even if it relationship cost us friends, family, jobs, and reputations. It seems like education is the key to fighting against these cold-blooded, intentionally malevolent psychopath!
@bellaangel
I AM SO SORRY FOR YOUR SUFFERING!!
Your story is similar to mine:
1st marriage was 23 years to an abusive alcoholic, tried to hold things together for the sake of the kids.
2nd marriage after 9 months was fighting for my life after marring a psychopath. Obviously now aware that I HAVE A BROKEN PICKER!
Psychopath parasite pedophile ex is in “recovery ministry” and he just moved on to a church where nobody knew his con artist ways. I was shocked when some of the church leaders refused to see the truth even with the evidence! People believe what they want to believe, sometimes only God knows why! He uses Twitter and two blogs to troll for his next victims online while he works the pity play to women in the church trying to find a sugar momma to support him. He has two separate worlds online one depraved nasty one and one where he debates theology with church leaders, (they have no clue, and they don’t want to hear the truth even though most of them have never met him in real life) I was fortunate that my family never liked him at all, so they were glad to see him out of the picture, but I lost my job at the church and some friends.
I have been looking for a healthy church ever since. I don’t want anything to do with a church or any other organization that throws victims under the bus to save face. There needs to be truth and accountability for everyone, no matter who they are or how much money or status they have. All of this suffering breaks the heart of God! The devastation and pain with these experiences can suck the life out of a person! There are people like the people here that understand, and there are others. There is hope! There is healing! Even as painful as the reality of losing relationship with friends and family is, those people have been greatly deceived, as we were!!
I just want to say something about the self esteem discussions here. After reading as much as possible about narcissists, PD’s, spaths, etc. I kind of am somewhere in between on the self esteem issue. I had one very frank discussion with my spath, when I think he actually had an interest in saving the marriage (propping me up/keeping the mask from falling off) and we were dialoguing on topics, and self esteem was the topic. He said “who says I have low self esteem?” I actually believe on some level these spaths vascillate. They hate themselves (very low self esteem) when they look inward. They don’t do it for long because it’s painful. The pain causes bad feelings, unhappiness, they blame, criticize others, kick the dog, then run to find pleasure (not happiness, but pleasure). The pleasure is the addiction: porn, sex, drinking… whatever medication they choose to dull the pain, dull the anxiety of dealing with the real feelings of low self esteem. BUT they leave the fix with FEELING better about themself, so if you think you are great, you are. If you act like how you want to feel (superior)then eventually you think you are superior, you act like you are superior, you are superior. Other people will buy your story. The spath/narcissist will believe his own story. It is TRUE to him! It doesn’t matter if they exploited someone, bullied, bulldozed their way (run roughshod was the term my spath used)the end result is feeling superior and a false healthy self esteem…..until they look inward again, until the mask slips, until the act fails, or the actor tires. Yes, it seems they can pose indefinitely. When the mask falls, some get it pulled on rather quickly.
Always ask: Does the behavior match the words? Is the talk genuine AND matches action? Is this the real deal?
Definition of addiction:
A promise that rarely delivers. That’s a good one.
A pleasure search that never fulfills. Also a good definition.
As for the porn sexual stuff: I too noticed that “he” quit kissing me, but still wanted sex. He started having sex with his eye closed a lot. I was bothered by the no eye contact. Then he went through a small phase of wanting “quickies” with me, but never cared about my being satisfied until I spoke out. I told him, I may as well be a blow up doll.
In sex addiction the substance is a PERSON. It’s using people and yes, they are dehumanized.
That is why sex is blind. (Love is not blind, love is looking, feeling, nurturing, caring) Sex is blind. The hormornes blind you. A counselor once told me…..that is why it is SO important to WAIT. Think of the sex hormones flying and it is as if someone gouged your eyes out. It is much more difficult to see the person for who they are. If the other person cares about you, they will wait.