Partners of Sex Addicts: It’s Only Porn

I told myself it’s only porn.

I told myself it didn’t bother me.

I told myself all men do it. It’s no big deal.

I told myself it’s not really cheating.

I told myself I was overreacting. It shouldn’t matter because at least he’s not with another woman.

I told myself I should believe when he said he had it under control.

I told myself I don’t really notice all the other lies.

I told myself that little voice inside that kept whispering, “something is wrong” was mistaken.

I told myself I didn’t feel pressured to compete with those images on the screen.

I told myself that trance in his eyes wasn’t about porn.

I told myself that when we’re having sex that he’s really with me.

I told myself I must not be satisfying him if he still needed that.

I told myself I wasn’t enough – not woman enough, not beautiful enough, not sexy enough.

I told myself I didn’t feel alone in this marriage.

I told myself it wasn’t chipping away at my spirit.

I told myself that resentment was not setting in.

I told myself I wasn’t becoming a porn cop.

I told myself my respect for him wasn’t starting to fade.

I told myself the porn wasn’t leading him down a dangerous path.

I told myself it wasn’t affecting our kids.

I told myself he wasn’t becoming a shell of the man I married.

I told myself I wasn’t slowly dying inside.

Have you told yourself, “It’s only porn”?

Dr. Janice Caudill is the founder and Clinical Director of McKinney Counseling & Recovery. MCR offers individual, couples, group therapy and multi-day intensives for partners of sex addicts and wounded hearts struggling with sex addiction, infidelity, love addiction or love avoidance, intimacy anorexia, or relational trauma in the McKinney, Plano, Allen, Richardson, Frisco, Carrollton, Lewisville, Dallas and surrounding areas.

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