Roots Push Through Pavement

The way a seemingly weak weed works it's way through and cracks concrete, the way the roots of a tree wind their way right through pavement or a road.  My feelings will find a way out.  Like water finds a leak, inevitably burrowing slowly and unstoppably.  I'm like that boy with my finger plugging the whole and the damned dam of pressure behind my emotions gotta go somewhere.

If I'm talking to her, she'll say something for my anger to latch onto.  If she walks away, I resent that.  I want her to stay while I walk the tightrope trying to balance my anger so she doesn't see it.  But maybe she will, but I hope she doesn't, or does.  I don't want her to mention the elephant in the room, nor do I want her to walk away. 

I am a tightly wound ball of anger, resentment, neediness and sensitivity, coiled and ready to deploy, a spring ready to be sprung, a mess of contradictions and conflicting desires that are impossible to resolve!

Sight: the favoured sense of a porn/sex addict

She's upstairs finishing her morning routine.  I am drawn and... can I say it... 'repulsed'?  That's such a strong word.  I feel shame allowing that feeling, uncomfortable writing it.  But I feel a strong guttural pull toward her knowing she's showering, cleaning herself, making herself ready and there's something alluring about that.  It seems like she's 'available'.  There isn't the usual barrier of clothes.  She's in our bedroom, or near it.  I have sexualized so many things (underwear, nakedness, etc.) that I instinctively keep away while she's showering and walking around in various states of undress.  I feel anxious and triggered.  My memory is stronger, the fantasy of immediate and context-free sexual encounters (which I programmed and reinforced over many decades of consuming porn).


But what about that word 'repulsed'?  I don't want to admit it.  I don't want to write it down.  But, she's gained more weight recently than ever in our marriage.  I used to get turned on by looking at her body, but now I often look away when she climbs into bed naked (the way her body sags isn't nice to see).  I feel guilty, but while I am drawn to her while she showers and dresses, I am simultaneously repelled by her flab and dumpy shape.  My addiction is never far away, so I want sex--any time.  I love her and I appreciate her for who she is, her care and companionship and our conversations, and yes, the pleasure and connection of us enjoying sex together.  But I have to touch her and kiss her to get turned on.  Maybe it's because I'm getting older (I'm not a teenager anymore, that was over 30 years ago) so it might be more about my body than hers.

What a strange feeling to be drawn and repulsed at the same time.  And when we are intimate, those times when it's not ideal, I feel a stronger pull than ever.  When sex isn't satisfying, I want more sex.  The sex that isn't fulfilling creates a stronger urge than ever for more more of that same thing.  Like that anology of a thirsty person drinking salt water, only to end up more thirsty.  I want sex but need to step back and see that there's something else that I really need.  The strongest and most powerful physical experience is what I want, but I will only get what I need if I look somewhere else.

I am learning that there are no wrong feelings, that I need to acknowledge and feel this repulsion, so I can let it pass through me (healthy) and move on.  It's no reason to be ashamed or label myself as 'bad' because of feeling something that I don't like.  The feeling isn't me.  It's not my decision, judgement nor a belief nor permanent.  Writing about this is helping already, but I know I need to talk about it honestly and with people who are understanding and who are not judgemental.  Being heard is really important for my recovery and it communicates that I am worth (and I have) value. I'm worth talking about my feelings. I'm worth forgiving myself and practicing being compassionate toward myself.  As I struggle with this, hearing myself say these things out loud and knowing I'm being heard and seeing others model accepting me, helps me to follow, join in, and accept myself too.

Better Self-talk & New Mantra

Today I noticed her annoying habit (which isn't sexy) or maybe it was that she's gained weight or just the doldrum boring familiar bedtime routine.  Whatever it was, I thought,

"I don't like this" but then I thought, "But I can accept it".
That seems healthier.  I acknowledge the feelings and verbalise the reality, then, and only then do I put it in context and say something about my relationship with this reality.  It used to be more like,

"I don't like this".  "Why can't it be like (insert fantasy here)" and much rumination and anger and longing followed.

"I feel disappointed, but I can accept this reality which is better than fantasy."

Distortions, Thoughts & Emotions, oh my!

I've been reading about and pondering the cognitive distortions used in CBT for a while now. They make sense and I can identify with them, but there's always been a disconnect between the idea and my problems.  I've never been able to use cognitive distortions personally.  It's like they are concepts, but very individual and 'in my head' and of an analysis and academic perspective.  When I'm struggling I'm all in my emotions, overwhelmed, confused, angry and not thinking clearly.

But this week the two converged.  I was in the middle of my addictive obsession, trying to think through the confusion of what seemed like thousands of thoughts behind a few very strong feelings.  One of my 'core lies' messages was intelligible though, "She doesn't want me".  Looking back on it, I think it was really more like, "She is annoyed with me", or "she's annoyed about something and it's coming across in her conversation with me".  What a huge difference between the first and the last of those three messages.   I could take the 'core lie' and expand it to it's ultimate destructive and hopeless conclusion as well:

"She doesn't want me"  descends to "No one wants me, I am not loved and I am all alone".  Seeing it in the cold light of day it is obviously rubbish.  I've got a loving family, thoughtful colleagues, a supportive church and friend network.  I get on with some of my neighbours and on and on.

But in the fugue of my addictive pain, these lies seem very real and I can't rationalise about them.  It feels like I'm stuck in a room with horrible messages playing on a loop.  They are not clear, but they are relentless.  I used to respond by going deeper into my addiction where the numbing would quieten those thoughts.  But the addiction was somehow temporarily distracting them from me, but somehow it feed them and making them stronger for next time.

So, what about these distorted thoughts?  

By LoudLizard

Selective Abstraction:
I based my conclusion that she doesn't want me, that I'm not loved, that I'm alone... all on one fact, that she was annoyed with me or didn't seem to want me in one way at one time.

Minimisation: 
I downplayed the fact that she's been married to me for a quarter of a century, that she says and shows that she's committed to me, she's patient and understanding of my struggles.  I downplayed all these things and drew my conclusions on one negative and temporary thing:  That she was annoyed with me or didn't seem to want me in the way I hoped.

Personalisation: 
This isn't so clear in this scenario, but it does seem to be my default assumption whenever anything goes wrong.  Someone makes a mistake, I automatically think, "Shit, that was me!" when usually it's not at all.  It's accompanied by fear and some wrong assumption that mistakes are fatal.

Arbitrary Reference:
Again, I draw the conclusion that I'm unloved, I'm not wanted, I'm alone, not quite arbitrarily, but definitely illogically and incorrectly.  I didn't bond when growing up, so I didn't feel or learn to feel loved or attuned.  My parents thad their own problems that distracted them and made them unavailable, so, yes, I did get a strong sense that I wasn't wanted.

Magnification:
Definitely making a mountain out of a molehill when someone being annoyed with me or not propositioning me in the way I like gets exaggerated and distorted into, "I am alone and unloved"!

Overgeneralisation:
Again, it's understandable why mental health issues make us think of craziness because my feelings translated into thoughts because of long-held deep and unexamined beliefs that seem insane!  Everyone can see it's crazy to think I'm alone because I'm not getting what I want or maybe what I think I need.

This shows a lot of filtering, black & white thinking, over-generalisations, catastrophizing emotional reasoning and mislabeling (cognitive distortions) which are deep and not gonna change automatically or without dedication and work on my part.

Resentments: listing them to help them along their way

I resent her.  Mostly physically and it all fits under the umbrella of being a 'real woman' and not the porn fantasy that I brainwashed myself to expect for all those decades:

She's getting older, flabbier, saggier.
while porn gave me never-ending variety and youth and physical perfection.

She doesn't want me more than anything else. She's sensible and practical.  There are scenes in movies and TV where people rip each others' clothes off, oblivious to the rest of the world in their passion and overwhelming desire for each other.  Porn makes me expect this (and her gagging for it with no connection, no foreplay, no work on my part).
Then there's TV shows where lifelong partners undress and talk about their day while climbing into their own side of the bed with their habits formed over many years.  They might might read in bed, they might kiss, they might talk about making love, but they often don't.  Real life means talking about our sex-life, alongside talking about other relationships and practicalities.  Not always sexy.

She doesn't represent fertility.  Her impending menopause has not only put a damper on our love life, but it simultaneously reminds me of both us being in the last half of life and how diametrically opposite from young-sex-fantasy our reality is.  Instead of vagina being a mystery of pleasure and desire, with the period being an ignore-able symbol of her youth and fertility, it's become a reminder of the unsexy practicalities of her childbearing past (along with her drooping breasts and permanently pointy nipple--mutilated by breastfeeding,--something else that's unsexy and not about me.  Every period is an unwelcomed guest which should have left the party long ago.  We're too old now and just want to watch TV and go to sleep.

More Realities.  She burps, she shits.  
I've held women to a double-standard and I haven't minded them working harder to look better, to be attractive even when sexuality isn't relevant.  I can fart, but she shouldn't burp.  Of course her bowel movements are smaller and shouldn't smell.  They should be dainty and really she shouldn't shit at all according to my narrow view that ignores reality and focuses on fantasy and sex for pleasure.

I've ignored the parts of reality that don't fit the idea of youth and idealized sex.  I embrace her breasts as erotic zones, sex organs, a way to turn both of us on.  But I resent the natural and normal changes they've had from the miracle of feeding our beloved children.  I've worshiped her sexuality as a way to make me feel powerful and alive and happy.  I wallow in the peace of mind from knowing she's committed to me and will be here for me for the rest of our lives.  While I simultaneously resent her getting older and changing.  I can't justify having her, enjoying the comfortableness of 25 years' of intimacy while simultaneously yearning for someone young.  I'm not really wanting someone else.  I'm wanting that stupid impossible fantasy of porn.  Porn never gave me children, who really do give my life meaning.  Porn never listened to me and understood me, only an ageing and flawed woman can do that.  Someone to love is what I need as much as someone to love me.  I am working to leave behind the fantasy from porn so I can embrace the real her, and real love (giving and not just getting), which involves pain and lack as well as satisfaction and real connection.

What I Need (on two levels)

On one level, I feel I need sexual stimulation and gratification.  It's my 'go-to' way to self sooth and cope with pain and celebrate and fend off boredom (it's the answer to everything, really).  This supposed need isn't rewarding.  It doesn't delivery what it promises.  I think this is related to dopamine as I'm always chasing and wanting and only feel worse after receiving the fix on this level.  I'm drawn to it but ultimately left bereft.  It's shallow and selfish and it's causing harm to my oh-so-important lifelong marital relationship.  This need seems to run on autopilot.  It's always there and seems to have an endless fuel supply.

I have another need, that can operate at the same time, but on another level. It's a need for connecting and a need to give and love and experience real love.  This need is linked to the big picture and the long game.  I need to know I'm doing the right thing with my life.  I need to grow and improve and give.  I need to mature and develop.  I need to know that when we are intimate, that she's really there because she wants to be.  If we are together out of a sense of duty or if she's just trying to stave off my Baser Needs, my Egoic ID and animal needs, then the real me is left disappointed and unhappy.  This need seems to be related to seratonin as when I feel this quiet and subtle feeling, it's satisfying and there are no cravings related to it.

The only way I can experience authentic satisfaction is by engaging my mind and my heart and accepting that my monkey brain will have to be quieted and my Baser Needs can't be in the drivers' seat.  This means pain, this means discipline.  The problem is that I surface into this higher level of existence periodically.  But I live most of my life unable to tune out the thumping base of Need and screaming nerve endings of physical sexual desire.

I have to keep cultivating the Higher me.  I must keep learning about what my body is doing and I must keep handing over my 'needs' spiritually so I can keep on remembering what my autopilot keeps forgetting:  I am more than my subconscious pain and automatic urges.

I know why I am not good at handing pain from what Gabor Mate teaches.  I know why I am drawn to sexual stimulation.  But knowing isn't enough to overcome it.  I need to keep internalising and understanding while practicing handing it over. I need to wash my brain with the fact that I don't need what I keep hearing I want and need hundreds of times each day.  This obsession can ease and this compulsion can fade.

What it feels like (today)

Two years since M.   I have been meaning to write down the small but significant ways that life has improved.

But first I want to try to capture a little of the overwhelming feeling that I'll call, 'The Funk'.  It's like being depressed, but I feel it mostly around her:  the object of my addiction.  She's the one who insists on treating our sex life as if it involves choice!  Ridiculous!  I'm angry and resenting her not giving me sex, or if that, not really wanting me in our sex.   But she picks up on those negative vibes and reacts by not wanting to come near me.  So the very thing I want, I push it away through my heavy and weird wanting.  Sex isn't really what I need.  What I need is to feel loved and accepted and wanted--yes, sex is my preferred delivery mechanism for all these.  But it's not the only way, and sometimes not the best way. 

It's a quiet weekend together.  We have time to talk and enjoy being together.  There's no reason we might not be intimate together this weekend..... Except me!  My mood, my funk is strong.  I'm very quiet.  It started with my counter, my fair-meter.  I woke up thinking about how she decided to not give me sex last night.  Which then reminded me how often she's done that lately.  Which then reminded me how long it's been since she actually wanted me sexually, enjoying making love to me!.

I'm sitting in a restaurant with her but I can't pull myself out of my wordlessness.  Then she asks me how I'm doing.  I don't know where to start.  I think she's criticizing me for struggling.  I think she's just trying to get me talking so she can give me a quip for how to change my attitude.  I know these feelings are too much about her to talk openly about.  I settle on a partial honest statement, "I don't feel needed by you".  It's true, but I say it because there's a sexual interpretation as well as bigger one.  I try to think of something to say, but 9 out of 10 of my ideas are negative, and most of them are about how I'm upset that she's been neglecting me.  She can feel the 'vibes' coming off me.  My mind is stuck going 'round and 'round about how I'm not wanted, not needed, not enjoyed.  I want to feel better but I'm depressed because I can't.  I know the only road to intimacy is for me to be normal, yet I can't help being needy.  The state I'm in is not attractive, yet I need her to be attracted to me.

Still, what are some of the little things that are different/better after 2 years of no porn:

1) I'm not obsessed about every way she's showing her ageing.  I notice, but it doesn't make me angry, it doesn't take over my thoughts.

2) I'm content with my age.  I walk past older couples and I don't dread the 'writing on the walls'.  I walk past younger couples and I don't yearn for her and pine and ache to be with youth.

3) I can almost always get to sleep at night without sex.  I used to get so angry, that often I'd miss out on that nights' sleep.  I'd be very full of resentment of her the next morning, and maybe through that next day.  Not anymore.  I might be mad for 10 or 20 minutes, but I usually sleep okay and am not harboring or ruminating on it the next day.

4) I can be at home on my own all day, several days in a row and rarely does my mind turn toward addictive sexual gratification.  I used to be hopeless on my own at home, now it's.... just.... fine!

5) I can be at home with her, no one else in the house, and not obsess and get worked up and obsessed until I'm angry and unable to communicate (because of fantasizing and being unable to stop thinking about having sex right there, right then.

6)..

Pep Talk

Is my addiction another part of me?  So many of us refer to 'our addict' as a separate identity, a personified part of our personality.  Is it my inner child that needs to be loved and healed?  Or is it a demonic possession that needs to be rejected and ejected?

I definitely am learning that I need to keep practicing self-kindness and I seem to have a blindspot preventing the good in me, the idea that I am truly loved, it can't seem to get into my heart.  My Ego knows to try to grab affirmation and the shallowness associated with love.  It's my default, and the spiritual program of action is digging a new trench.  What Ego yearns for is empty and never satisfies.  Taking my focus from the lifelong paths and longworn methods of comfort and escape is scary and painful.   It hurts as it's letting go, maybe killing the hope of eternally living in the fantasy of something that I never really had in the past:  never-ending youth.


So, let's practice writing some of the stuff about myself like I'd encourage anyone else to say about themself:

Yes, you feel loss, but you are still in the fight, and you're about to get your 18 month sobriety chip!

Yes, you are still working to accept life as it is, but you don't have to accept the imagined next month or next year or next decade yet.  You only need the nourishment and resources today for today.  Tomorrow will be taken care of when tomorrow becomes 'today'.

Yes, you are helping others, listening, caring, understanding and making a difference.

Yes, you are realising that you are loved.  As you allow the lie that you 'need sex' to be put aside, it makes room for God to bring healing.  On the other side of the pain, on the other side of the healing tears and fear-facing courage is some more freedom, a step in the direction of living in a new and better way, 

You are doing a good job of working to rely on Him, asking for His help, expecting it and trusting. Forget perfection, you are doing fine, you are doing well, you are doing great.

Emotions will go up, they will go down.  You will live, you will die.  You've decided it's better to accept the less-than-ideal today, fact the imperfection of tomorrow, but truly live.  Better to live today in a world that's not a fantasy, than miss out as more real life passes by.  Ageing has meant some things have gotten worse, but isn't it better to be here now than not?

True impact of Porn

She is tired and doesn't have the energy to talk and connect (a prerequisite for sex).  I feel angry or resentful, and continue to do so the next morning.  I've brainwashed myself using porn.  Now I think she should always be there, ready 'on tap', willing and enthusiastically keen.  Porn takes the male perspective of always horny, ready in seconds, stimulated by a little visuals.  Then it portrays women that way.  Well it used to, back in the 80's when I was formative and consuming it a lot.  So I've programmed myself to see it as default and normal for us to start sex for no reason, with no real preamble.  I've focused on the physical and obsessed with the orgasm.

I pray that my brain will be mouldable again, this time to see her as her own self, with different turn-ons, and especially for me to see her as more than just sexual.  Praying isn't enough.  I need to talk to people about this, I need to write about this, reflect on it and keep doing my meditations.

The characters on Brooklyn 99 joke about porn in a way that trivialises, normalises it and ultimately endorses it.  Cool-cool-cool-cool-cool-cool.

Creating for who

I think creativity, expressiveness, is good for our mental health.  Making something is therapeutic.  It doesn't need an audience, it doesn't need to be showcased.  It's the making that's important, not the viewing.  It's the creating that counts, not the displaying.

But we all want our creations to be appreciated.  We put a little of ourselves into them and we hope someone appreciates our work (our self).  Creating is a good quiet and thoughtful activity, like a meditation.  We would do well to focus on the benefits of the process (concentration, developing skills, expressing something intangible) and de-emphasizing the end result, and especially how it will be received by others.

Our desperation for love and acceptance and to 'be known' tugs us toward obsessing on how our work (our self!) will be received.  We can easily fantasise about wowing people, about bowling them over, adoration and fame!

So I'm saying art is primarily for the artist, there's more than enough benefits in creating for the creator, with no need for acknowledgement or appreciation.  Yet people are elevated by art created by others.  We all want our art to help others as much as it can help us, and sometimes it does help them.  But we should be able to separate the audience from the artist and value art for the good it does to it's creator (when in her workshop, working in solitude and quiet concentration) without needing it to then be displayed in public, bought by an aficionado, or appreciated by the like-minded..

seeing beyond now

Learning concepts of a different alternative recovery support group to the popular 12 steps, I've been shown to think of short term perspective versus long term view.

This seems relevant to my blindspot, my mental insanity, the hole in my soul.

I can't seem to choose the long-term benefit of better relationship with my Ever Loving Bride and benefit of a clean conscience when faced with a right-now pleasure.  Why is sexual stimulation more important than being able to look her in the eyes peacefully?  Why does an orgasm right now always win over everything else?

Impulsivity, as shown on Russell Brand's documentary on addiction, is part of the problem.

I had a positive 'ah-ha' moment yesterday.  I was feeling blah and down and of course my mind labeled it all as result of not getting sex; counting how long since we've had 'good' sex.  Then I thought about how true it is that my addiction isn't really about sex.  It's about emptiness or lack or isolation.  That must mean the sad feeling I was attributing to missing a chance for sex really was about something deeper.  But it wasn't about sex.  I guess it's another way of saying, 'This, the sex you are obsessing about, isn't really what you need', which was my mantra for whenever I saw a young female form and was drawn to stare or inhale it spiritually. 

Daily Inventory from a new perspective

Step 10: Continue to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

It occurred to me, out of the blue, that my selfishness may run through all of my sexual relationship with my ever-loving wife.  How bad is it?  Do all of my thoughts regarding sex amount to obsession?  Do all of my desires live totally on the side of selfishness?  Do  I really think of our love-live outside of what I get from it?  

It's hard to know.  Some think there is no such thing as altruism.  Anytime we do something that seems to be for another, we can't escape from the fact that we are getting something out of the interaction--and thus our own benefit is always there.

What does sex look like that's giving as well as enjoying getting?  I can imagine being giving by NOT initiating sex, by NOT expecting it.  But how do I engage and enjoy our love-life in a less selfish way?  I guess being easy-going about whether it happens or not is one thing.  I guess when we're into it, if I'm focused on her and her pleasure and desires and preferences.  I do that, so maybe I'm not completely as bad as I feared.

But it's an important question I want to ask myself regularly:  'Was I selfish in my love life and attitude toward my love-life with my Bride?  How can I exercise the opposite of my character defect (selfishness) in this context today or tomorrow?  I guess I can ask my Higher Power to help me to not expect sex, take it or leave it, and be 'easy' about whether it happens or not.

Here and Now

Learning about Smart Recovery, I'm liking some of the tools and having a love hate relationship with the psychology.  I am drawn to understanding how we work and very much want to take this knowledge to help others and myself.  But I see the humanistic philosophy that we can be understood with the assurance and completeness of science as childish and naive.  I am embracing mystery and I sense we experience a lot of life and truth through art.  It's so much more than just ideas and facts.  There needs to be a lot of space for nuance.

Anyway, last night was a very tough time again.  I didn't want to 'act out'.  But I was gutted and angry because I'd slept badly the night before and got another no that was very disappointed about.  The SMART stuff says it's not the action that upset me, it's my belief behind it.  So, my tiredness warped my perception causing me to have less long term perspective thus I obsessed about the short term.  I was aghast that I couldn't have sex (again!).  I was unable to see that I'd get sex in a few days.  There was even a hint that in about three days we'd have some time.  But I only saw that as a slap in the face.  It seemed a world away, a lifetime away.  It seemed it might as well have been never.  So I got out of bed and eventually was hungry enough to eat (although I didn't want to give-in to that urge).  I ate more than I wanted.  I felt a compulsion to fill my stomach, hoping it'd make me feel better, maybe help me sleep -- although it never does.  And I guess I got some pleasure from the taste (very short term).  Doing the Cost Benefit Analysis, it's sobering to see how the benefits of acting out (I'm using eating sugar, especially in secret) is all short term and the costs are all long term. 

Control & Saying No

I love the feeling of power and control when she's really turned on and really wants me.  I know I'm going to climax, but what's thrilling is feeling like I am in a position to give her what she wants, which is what I want (orgasm).  Guilt free sex is when she (seemingly) enjoys it just like me.  I want the moment of her desiring me to last. I want the moment of me having this power continue.  It's the fantasy of being desperately desired.  I wish I could experience that every time I'm sad or anxious or bored, but instead it's a small gift that comes unexpectedly--occasionally.

As the months since I've looked at porn or masturbated approach one year, my unreasonable expectations are fading.  My obsession is still waiting to surface, but it's not as strong either.

I can sleep now most nights, and if I don't, it's never due to not getting sex.  I can contemplate not getting sex tonight, and grapple with getting it tomorrow or soon--without too much distress.  I can wake up after not getting sex and not be angry or resentful.  I can interact with her throughout the day without being driven to withdraw in anger or resentment.

Making SAA phone-calls still helps me hugely to see the improvement and my good actions.  I still gloss over my progress and focus on my weaknesses and selfishness if left to my own perception.  I need someone else to remind me I'm doing well.  Plus helping them helps me immensely.

Two nights ago I said, 'let's go to sleep, it's late and we're tired'.  Which is unusual enough, but it was after she'd touched me intimately.  That's not happened for over fifteen years of our marriage, probably more.  The lie that I 'NEED' sex permeates to thinking that if I'm touched there, turned on, then I MUST find completion and resolution and satisfaction.  But that's not true.  She was flabbergasted and amazed that I said that and that I followed through by not being upset or unable to live with my decision.   One thing that made it easier is that I had decided I'd do that hours beforehand.  My motives weren't great.  Silly of me to imagine I'd be punishing her by saying no to sex with her, just because I'd hate that.  She doesn't mind.  But as we touched and hugged my anger eased and I did think of going with the flow, reversing my plans and enjoying the sex that was available.  But I managed to stick with it, stubborn if not angry anymore.  It was so much easier to be the one in control and with the power.  Still not fun to turn down sex and an orgasm.  But I think it showed her I'm not quite the slave to it that I was, even though I haven't yet told her of my silly childish motives that I started with.

Connecting the dots

My friend is amazing.  She is an author and a public speaker.  She gets paid to teach therapists.  But more amazing is that she was severely traumatised as a very young child--yet she helps therapists to help people who's story is like hers.  She was abused.  She was raped.  She was even used in the production of pornography when she was very young.  Horrible, but she is a real inspiration now.

Learning a bit about her story has made me think differently about my own porn addiction.  She has made real the victims and survivors and abused who are the fodder of porn.  I can say I've never had anything to do with porn involving children.  I'm not attracted to violent porn either.  As a matter of fact, before I gave it up for good, I was finding more and more of what's out there follows a theme that disturbs me:  aggressive, demeaning, suggesting violence.  What is this shit about choking?  Who gets turned on by that?  And girls gagging is supposed to be a hot?  Anyway, today I made the connection between the 'innocent' porn that I spent years using and the children who are abused--like my friend was.  And she was three years old!  It's the same industry.  It's all the same world.  The free porn on those websites "everyone" uses is getting more and more horrible.  Plenty of people use that then find they need more aggression, more violence.  They get turned on by 18-year olds in cheerleading outfits, but then some must move on from women to high school girls.  By participating in the "legal" and "bonafide" porn industry, I was still contributing to the bigger world of pornography--the one that abused my very good friend when she was only a three year old!

I'm so sorry, I don't know how I avoided seeing this before. I knew intellectually that stripping and prostitution and porn are all linked. But I guess I felt better justifying myself saying that looking at mainstream porn had no connection to illegal porn.

Exposed Pain and Brokeness

It doesn't matter if I know I'm going to get what I want tomorrow.  If the fact hits me the wrong way that I can't have it tonight, I'm screwed.  We talked about making love, like a mature couple with many years of marriage. We planned it and agreed.  This doesn't match my fantasy preference for unbridled passion that comes from within our gut, or heart, our uncontrollable instinct!  No, it's a planning and diary-ing exercise like budgeting our weekly shopping bill, competing for time like washing and ironing and cleaning chores.  The furthest thing from fantasy or desire driven impulsively being wanted.

Anyway, we were shattered (again) and so we would make love in the morning. She would wake up early and make time. I was to wake her up at 8am.  So I laid beside her hearing her breathe and sleep so deeply.  Does she need the sleep more?  Is that the kinder thing to do is let her sleep?  I feel myself morphing into a martyr--poor me! She doesn't really want me (again, still).  The lie that I'm all alone, unwanted, not desired, in the way, an inconvenience and annoyance.

I morph into someone donning sackcloth and covering my head with ashes, saying, 'woe is me!'.  Look how much life sucks for me.  That's self pity and self absorption-emerging automatically from the idea of letting go of the idea of our planned lovemaking time. Damn my selfishness (addiction) is shrewd and sly and quick and devious.

All these ideas, that bring me down and turn my head inside out.  The program helps me with actions.   I will pray.  Thanks God for keeping me sober yesterday, and  please help me to treat her well today and not use her or be selfish toward her.  Thanks that I don't need sex.  I give it over to God right here, right now.  These typed words are prayers.  Please help me to be selfless, or at least a little less selfish.  Please help me to be willing to talk as I don't wanna withdraw in a huff and sulk from something that I've generated in my own head.   Thanks for a good relationship, for not being alone or lonely.  Thanks for a blessed sex life.  Adult and real, not fantasy.  Thanks for communication and connection and vulnerability--which is really better than orgasms.

 

Ageing

What a fun title: ageing.  Sigh...

But I think working the 12-step program is helping me to let go, not only of my never-ending obsession and expectation for sex.  But it's helping me to find grace and acceptance for my situation, my lot in life.   I think I'm accepting the fact that I am ageing.  And, more related to my obsession, that my wife is ageing. 

Any painful change looks different once I've adjusted to it and accepted it.  My sons growing up and 'leaving the nest' was painful.  It's hard to describe, because I have words for thoughts and ideas but not so much for feelings.  If felt hard.  It hurt.  It wasn't easy or nice.  Then, about a year later, the situation was the same but the feelings were different--better.  Purely because I'd adjusted to the change.  I'd talked to people about it a lot, I'd gotten my mind off it and focused on other things some too.  And time had passed.  Now it's fine that our nest is emptying.  We can even see the good in it, although all those things that made it hard are still there.  It's perspective that matters.  New perspective comes as a by product, not something that can be conjured.  My perspective has changed and makes this loss okay because I spent time considering it.  And I knew that it was right, and I kept that in mind while I felt it wasn't.  My feelings were gently and patiently guided toward what I knew.

So how does all this empty nest adjustment relate to my adjustment about getting old, especially my adjustment to her getting old?  It's the same.  I felt it too much to bear that she was getting wider and saggier.  It hurt every time I was reminded (just like it hurt when I thought about my sons leaving to lead their own lives).  But I talked about the fact that it was natural and right for my wife to age.  I talked about how I prefer her to anyone else I could visualise.  I let myself feel sad and robbed, but I reminded myself what I knew, that I am fortunate and have a wife to be thankful for.  Eventually, the talking (and praying and reflecting) carried me through the change until most of my feelings eased and I wasn't sad or feeling robbed by time anymore.  I was freer to live in the knowledge that I'm fortunate. 

I used to resent getting older and I didn't want to be associated with middle aged folks.  I wanted to run with the cool kids but just didn't belong alongside them anymore.  When on long hikes it frustrated me to see so many wrinkled and grey grandparents there as I didn't want to be in their club. I wanted to be in with the younger ones. 

This was strongly linked to me feeding on the visual stimulus of young and attractive women.  I've done it since I was a kid and I wasn't just addicted to it, I was drawn to it.  Looking at a younger woman made me feel better and made me want a chance to look again for more exciting or comforting feelings.  I was about eighteen when I had a crappy camera and would drive around with a friend aimlessly.  But it wasn't aimless as I was looking out for attractive women and I'd snap their photos like a creepy stalker.  I'd try to smile and flirt to make some sort of connection with them and reassure myself it was all good clean fun.  But it was part of my obsession and fantasy of objectifying and drinking in the pretty faces, long soft hair, and young shapely figures.

More than thirty years later I am trying to break the deeply ingrained habit of objectifying women and visually drinking them in. I have a fantasy of a perfect young woman who is out there somewhere to make me happy and somewhere deep inside me I'm still automatically assessing them all to feel a little better while looking out for my nirvana.

Fountain of Youth & Drying Up

Got my 9 month chip last week.  So I must keep in perspective that things are going better than ever regarding my addiction and sobriety.  But as I adjust to one degree of change and accept and let go of my obsession and expectation for sex... There's more of the same over the horizon.

We're getting older.  Will her interest in sex wane after menopause?  Will her ability to orgasm, or even have sex drop like a boulder from the edge of a cliff?

My obsession since a teen was looking at attractive women.  I was looking at women in their twenties thirty five years ago, and I'm still doing it now.  I fight against it with some help, thanks to the 12-step program.  But as I shopped for a perfect body to 'consume visually' through porn, I have always been clocking and noting thin waists, nice shaped rears, etc. Same when in public as when browsing porn.  As my ever-loving wife and saintly patient bride of 25 years gets older and larger and saggier, I geet angry at the growing difference between her and those twenty-something-year-olds' everywhere.

My ideal is to see beyond her sagging skin.  My aim is to appreciate the woman inside the flab and fat.  The most satisfying lovemaking is face to face, connected and synchronised emotionally and even spiritually.  I promised to have and to hold in sickness and health.  While young and as we grow old together.  I need to kill the fantasy that those young women hold the key to my happiness.  That drinking in their youthful beauty will satisfy my thirst.

Cigarette packs have more explicit and shocking warnings trying to try to scare addicts away from killing themselves.  The fountain of youth is a archetypical fantasy with a warning label saying, 'don't be tricked, you'll loose the life you have pursuing an immature hope for eternity'.  See how enjoying the good (but imperfect) real life in front of us is smarter than throwing that away for an untouchable fantasy--like the allure of mermaids and the way they drive sailors to the rocks, to insanity, to their death. 

These young women, in reality, are just women with their own flaws and humanity.  They poo and menstruate and have their own insecurities and are selfish.  Besides, they are going to be sagging and wider around the stomach in twenty years, like the rest of us all.  Their beauty and youthfulness is just a snapshot in the never ending march of time.

I don't really want a younger wife.  I don't really think sex with someone younger would satisfy or fix my problems.  It's my midlife crisis and my sex obsession trying to get me to do something destructive.  The ego screaming out in pain for a drug that won't satisfy the itch.

I really want to accept my amazingly loving bride, with her trajectory of ageing.  I want to accept my fate that I'm in the last half of life and teen fantasies don't suit me anymore.  Maturity means putting others first and I can do that, while I unsubscribe from this ego driven self absorbed fantasy channel that I've been running in my head since I was a teen.

Streak

How long has it been?  Four days?  Been tired, mostly my decision.  Mostly angry annoyed or resentful.  2 days ago it was her having her haircut So Short!  Really got pissed about all that.  12 steps say I can get rid of that redentment.  Talking to guys about it helps too.

Now she is downstairs at 9am on a Saturday.  When I suggested we go to sleep (without making love) yet again last night I thought we'd have this morning.  Damn.  Now I can go seek her out, stay here.  I wish I didn't feel needy and in a way desperate.  I wanna keep saying no, until she finally initiates it.  I'm pissed that she can live without it so flippantly.  Am I jealous that I can't be easy like that?

Fighting against the automatic

What can I learn from being in this tough place?
First, remembering what I have heard when this happened recently, a dear friend in recovery spoke words like these, 'See this pain as a necessary part of your caring and loving God helping you to heal".  That was beautiful.  I felt so angry, that I was seeing it bitterly and resentfully.  But, of course, I do actually believe that my HP (Higher Power) is loving and caring and very close by.   So a reminder that helped me bring that perspective into this pain was a sweet moment.  I remember where I was when this was said to me.  It was a memorable encounter.  I think the cognitive facts and deep truths behind that conversation transcend words, and something spiritual happened in that moment.  I remember the wave of emotion that washed over me. Sadness, a cry of pain, accompanied by something sweet (bittersweet) and cathartic.

So, what else can I get from being there again?  The simple and practical are the pain points to be aware of.

It was painful when she dropped the bomb, "Let's be flexible and play it by ear, there might not be time for us to make love today".   I went from in control and happily looking forward to intimacy/affection/closeness/talking/quality time/love making/orgasm.... to.... unknown, no control, feeling rejected, feeling devalued and the lowest priority.  I don't know how I felt really.  I imagine I have a strong sense of others' feelings and I often am clueless of what I feel.  I was resentful.  I was appalled.  I was angry (although I didn't feel it, really).

The other flashpoint was the next time we talked face to face.  Could I be nice, would I be passive-aggressive?  I think i had adrenaline pumping through me.  I felt like I was in turbo mode.  But it wasn't taking me anywhere good, faster.  It was so automatic.  I was hyper aware of her mistakes (perfectionism), super sensitive to how she wasn't giving me what I wanted (self absorbed).  'Ah, here I am listening to you (and your imperfections and silly little worries) yet you won't give me what I want (need?)'.

Another touchpoint was when I randomly did something which she thanked me for.  My obsession immediately assumed she'd be grateful and I pictured her responding to my sexual advances--oblivious to the facts that nothing really had changed a bit since she said, 'no'.  The last touchstone was the countdown clock.  She had agreed to be somewhere (for someone else besides me!) and so the silly illogical obsessed me continued to hold on to selfish hope and fantastic imaginations that we'd somehow 'do it' as hours whittled down to less than an hour, and ultimately minutes.  The stupid selfish lie (bogus promise) of those old porn 'quickies' that started as immediately as pressing play on a video clip haven't faded enough yet.  Talking to others where I could express my anger and remind myself by admitting to them what the healthy me really wanted helped, a little, over time.