u/Acrobatic_Leek3865

I've been doing a lot of reading, but I'm still struggling with my husband’s porn addiction and the aftermath of finding out how serious it was.

For context, I had found porn on his phone a few times throughout our relationship. Each time, I told him how deeply it hurt me. To me, it felt like cheating - fantasizing about other women and getting off to them while barely touching me intimately. I begged for more sex, which is humiliating to do and the lack of affection turned me into an angry person.

Last Monday, I caught him on our living room camera after I thought he had left for work, and I’ve been shattered ever since.

Since then, I’ve gone to a couple support meetings, and I have another one Monday. He’s finally acknowledging it as a real problem. He’s started attending meetings too and is looking for a therapist.

But I’m struggling badly.

1. How do you stop crying all the time?

I’ve tried distracting myself and doing things that used to bring me joy, but something always triggers me again. I’ll remember what I saw or start thinking about it, and I immediately spiral and end up back in bed crying.

I was laid off recently, so I’m home all day. I’ve tried treating job hunting like a full-time job to stay busy, but once those thoughts hit, nothing else matters anymore.

I know healing takes time, but I’d really appreciate hearing coping mechanisms that genuinely helped you get through the early days.

2. How did you start feeling okay about yourself again?

I look in the mirror and cry. I’ll try to put on makeup or lipstick to feel pretty, then wipe it off because I suddenly feel disgusting and wonder what the point is.

Being pregnant has made this even harder emotionally. He tells me I’m beautiful and says he loves my body, and logically I understand addiction isn’t about me - but emotionally, it still destroyed my self-esteem.

3. How do you take back control of your thoughts?

I feel trapped in my own head. He says the scenarios I’m imagining aren’t true and that knowing details won’t make me feel better, but my brain keeps obsessing anyway.

I keep asking myself:

*Why wasn’t I enough?

*Why was he looking at other women in lingerie and swim suits that look nothing like me and then going to porn afterward?

*Why didn’t he desire me the same way?

I feel stuck in a constant cycle of intrusive thoughts that I can’t crawl out of.

4. Did you tell anyone in your real life?

I made him tell his mom, and he suggested I confide in someone too. But when I tried practicing what I would even say out loud, I felt pathetic and embarrassed for staying.

At support meetings, I’ve heard mixed opinions - some people say don’t tell anyone because people won’t understand, while others say secrecy makes it worse.

Did telling trusted people help you heal, or did you regret it?

(I'll take any advice for what helped you in the beginning to cope as my normal coping mechanisms are not working for me.)

I found out a week ago that my husband had been watching porn every single day - after asking him three other times to stop and I viewed it as cheating. Our intimacy had been fading for a long time - he stopped initiating or being interested in sex, and when we did have sex, he often couldn’t stay hard. I kept telling myself he was tired or stressed.

The day I found out, I thought he had left for work. I checked our camera in the living room and saw him masturbating instead. When I opened our bedroom door, he immediately pulled his pants up and shut his phone off. That moment is burned into my memory. The way he was looking at her....getting off. He has never looked at me like that. He denied it at first. I said you don't watch TikToks with your phone on the side and your pants down. He admitted it at that point.

When I first confronted him, he told me it was happening 3-4 times a week and deleted TikTok. He would see a thirst trap and get turned on, then masturbate to it.

Later, I logged into his account and realized it had actually been every day. It was multiple TikTok videos, some even of the same girls. He would sometimes search for certain girls. After confronting him again, begging for honesty even if it hurt me, he admitted to watching it 7 days a week. He would get turned on by the girls, then watch porn.

Holidays, the day we conceived our baby, my birthday, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, even the day we bought our first baby clothes after finding out we’re having a son. While I was begging for connection and wondering why he didn’t want me, he was choosing that instead.

I can't get myself to stop looking for more of it. It feels like an out of body experience and I know I'm just hurting myself. What's worse is I was laid off two weeks ago and can no longer afford therapy. I don't have anyone to talk to about this.

What hurts the most is that I cried to him so many times about how distant we had become, and he never told me the truth. Meanwhile, he was disappearing for “laundry” or other excuses in 30-minute increments to watch porn.

He says he’s ashamed. He says it escalated over time and that he doesn’t actually want the things he watches. He’s been listening to me cry, holding me, reassuring me he’ll change. He went to one meeting but said it didn’t help, although he says he’ll keep trying. I told him he needs to tell his mom about his addiction and he hasn't yet. I can't be the only one to bear this weight.

But I don’t trust anything right now.

I check his phone activity constantly from the app and blocked a lot of things. I panic when I wake up and he isn’t next to me. I replay everything in my head. I can’t look in the mirror without crying because I feel like I’ll never look the way those women did to him. He tells me I’m enough, but I don’t feel like enough. I asked him why we are even together and he cries at the thought of me asking for a divorce. I gave him a choice - he quits and we stay together or he does it again and we are done. It could be two weeks, two years, 20 years - I don't care. I don't want to fight for attention with someone on his screen when I'm right here and have needs too. He stopped trying in our relationship for girls on a screen.

I’m ashamed to admit that we’ve been having sex, because after he falls asleep, I just lay there crying. I'm thinking about asking for us to take a break from it when he gets home tonight because I fear he is not really dealing with his problem and because porn is blocked, he is using me instead. It just felt nice to be wanted again.

I keep thinking about what happens after I have this baby. What happens when my body changes? What happens when I can’t give him attention all the time? I feel like I’m trying to breathe underwater.

The hardest part is that the person who hurt me the most is also the person I want comfort from.

............

Update: Thank you for everyone's kind words. It means a lot and its been nice to vent and hear similar stories to feel less alone. I went to my first S-ANON meeting the same night as this post and while that group may not have been for me, it was refreshing and I did learn some things. I will be trying other groups to find the right one. Over the next few weeks, I'll be buying some books to help me navigate.

What I learned during that meeting is that it's not just him that needs to change, but I do as well. I grew up bottling up my emotions until they were extreme and that led to outbursts. I learned to bury myself to make it more appealing for others - but that's not healthy.

After the meeting, I asked my husband to talk. I told him everything I was feeling. During the meeting, he called his mom (she lives out of state) and told her everything. She texted him after and he showed me without prompting. He apologized for waiting so long and said he was scared to admit it, but I think it helped.

I have previously told him from other advice - how would you feel if you caught me like that? Knowing I didn't want sex with you and wanted to only fantasize about other men and what they would do to me? What would you do if you innocently caught me and I lied to your face about it? I think that really put it into perspective for him.

I told him if I could make him take a magic pill to change, I would. My dad was an alcoholic (passed in 2024) so I know all about addiction. I told him I didn't want to be like my mom and stay with someone who was hurting me. I want him to change, but he has to want it for himself - and right now, it sounds like he does want it.

He's been communicating more now than our entire relationship (10 years together, 4.5 years married) and it's refreshing but I'll admit I'm still struggling and he knows that. He has a date for us planned on Friday - it was nice not having to plan for once. I previously communicated that I missed his touch (non sexual) and he's been making it a point to touch me in some way - holding hands, cuddling, hand on back, hugging. He's on his phone way less and more present. He doesn't get mad when I bring up the same thing - he wipes my tears and keeps reassuring me.

Only time will tell as it's only been a week, but for me, I needed to stay this time to know I truly tried now that I feel he is and is taking it seriously. I'm hopeful that with time, it will get easier and it won't consume my every thought. But I know that I have healing to do and so does he. Thank you for letting me vent.

I (31F) caught my husband (36M) masturbating to a girl on TikTok this morning, and I honestly don’t know if I’m overreacting or if my feelings are valid here.

I’m currently 5 months pregnant and was also laid off two weeks ago, so I know my emotions are already heightened right now. But this situation really hurt me.

The main issue is that we’ve already had multiple conversations about this before. I explained that it makes me feel uncomfortable and insecure, especially during pregnancy when I already don’t feel attractive or confident in my body. For me, it’s not just “watching something” - it makes me feel like I’m not enough and like he wishes I looked like someone else. This is probably the fourth conversation we’ve had about it.

I also want to add that I understand a lot of people see porn as normal in relationships, and many women are okay with it. But I personally am not, and I was upfront about that from the very beginning of our relationship. This was never a hidden boundary or something I suddenly changed my mind about.

What makes this harder is that even before pregnancy, we were already having intimacy issues. At one point, I found recent porn communities on his Reddit when he was showing me something on his phone. I was upset because he was masturbating and consuming porn while also telling me he was “too tired” to have sex with me.

At the same time, he kept reassuring me that he wanted a baby. I honestly could have gone either way about having children, but I remember repeatedly having to remind him that there’s only one way to make a baby, and that requires intimacy with your spouse. That period already left me feeling rejected and confused.

So now, seeing him masturbating to a random girl on TikTok during my pregnancy just reopened all of those feelings. I think the fact that it was a real/random person instead of traditional porn made it feel more personal to me somehow.

After this happened, I asked him to delete TikTok, and he did, but now I feel like my trust is shaken. He keeps reassuring me that he’s attracted to me, but part of me struggles with the idea that if that were true, he wouldn’t feel the need to look at other women and fantasize about them while I’m awake in the next room.

We can’t really afford therapy right now since I’m likely going to be out of work for a while, so I guess I’m just wondering - how did you move past it or rebuild trust?

I also want to add that I don’t want to leave my husband. I love him, and outside of this issue, he’s been supportive in a lot of ways. I think part of why this hurts so much is because I don’t feel chosen or desired.

I also think I might not feel this devastated if we actually had a healthy intimate relationship, or if I was constantly turning him down and he felt neglected. But that isn’t what’s happening. What hurts is feeling rejected sexually while he still has sexual energy for other women online. That’s the part I can’t seem to get past.

I (31F) caught my husband (36M) masturbating to a girl on TikTok this morning.

I’m currently 5 months pregnant and was also laid off two weeks ago, so I know my emotions are already heightened right now. But this situation really hurt me.

The main issue is that we’ve already had multiple conversations about this before. I explained that it makes me feel uncomfortable and insecure, especially during pregnancy when I already don’t feel attractive or confident in my body. For me, it’s not just “watching something” - it makes me feel like I’m not enough and like he wishes I looked like someone else. This is probably the fourth conversation we’ve had about it.

I also want to add that I understand a lot of people see porn as normal in relationships, and many women are okay with it. But I personally am not, and I was upfront about that from the very beginning of our relationship. This was never a hidden boundary or something I suddenly changed my mind about.

What makes this harder is that even before pregnancy, we were already having intimacy issues. At one point, I found recent porn communities on his Reddit when he was showing me something on his phone. I was upset because he was masturbating and consuming porn while also telling me he was “too tired” to have sex with me.

At the same time, he kept reassuring me that he wanted a baby. I honestly could have gone either way about having children, but I remember repeatedly having to remind him that there’s only one way to make a baby, and that requires intimacy with your spouse. That period already left me feeling rejected and confused.

So now, seeing him masturbating to a random girl on TikTok during my pregnancy just reopened all of those feelings. I think the fact that it was a real/random person instead of traditional porn made it feel more personal to me somehow.

After this happened, I asked him to delete TikTok, and he did, but now I feel like my trust is shaken. He keeps reassuring me that he’s attracted to me, but part of me struggles with the idea that if that were true, he wouldn’t feel the need to look at other women and fantasize about them while I’m awake in the next room.

We can’t really afford therapy right now since I’m likely going to be out of work for a while, so I guess I’m just wondering - has anyone else dealt with this? How did you move past it or rebuild trust?

I also want to add that I don’t want to leave my husband. I love him, and outside of this issue, he’s been supportive in a lot of ways. I think part of why this hurts so much is because I don’t feel chosen or desired.

I also think I might not feel this devastated if we actually had a healthy intimate relationship, or if I was constantly turning him down and he felt neglected. But that isn’t what’s happening. What hurts is feeling rejected sexually while he still has sexual energy for other women online. That’s the part I can’t seem to get past.