Found out my boyfriend has a porn addiction
Hey guys,
This is something I’ve found out about less than a week ago, and it’s been weighing really heavily on me. I keep thinking about how it affects the way my boyfriend sees me and, more importantly, whether I can trust that he’s actually serious about me.
Of course, when I found out, I had no idea what to think. I was absolutely hurt. Not only did I find out that he has what he considers a porn addiction, but I found out because I looked through his phone.
I want to preface that by saying we had a boundary around privacy and not looking through each other’s phones, and I genuinely respected that. I almost never looked at his phone. But eventually I became curious about why he wanted so much privacy. I started wondering what he could possibly have on his phone that’s so private.
His phone was unlocked, so I looked at Snapchat and found that he had been talking to women and trying to buy their content.
I was absolutely bewildered. This was something he had apparently been hiding from me for at least two years. We’ve officially been dating for about four months, meaning this was happening throughout our entire relationship, while he acted completely normal around me.
That was honestly one of the scariest parts. I kept thinking, “What else could he possibly be hiding from me?”
Since then, we’ve talked about everything and tried to understand when and why this started. He told me that he considers it an addiction and that he’s been struggling with it since kindergarten. He says a lot of it comes from shame, and that he didn’t tell me because he was embarrassed and afraid of how I would see him.
I feel really sad for him, but I also still feel weirded out and hurt. I’ve told him that I’m not going to shame him for struggling with this, but the secrecy and the conversations with other women crossed a boundary for me.
As of right now, I’ve decided to stay and see what happens because he has been very apologetic, and I genuinely love him. I want to see him get better for himself, not just because I want him to be a better boyfriend.
But I’m struggling with whether staying is actually the right decision.
Has anyone here been in a relationship with someone who struggled with porn addiction, especially when it involved secretly communicating with or attempting to buy content from other women?
Is this something that can realistically get better if the person is genuinely willing to change?
And if I choose to stay, what should I be considering or looking out for? What would genuine recovery actually look like versus someone just saying they’ll change because they’re afraid of losing me?
I’m not looking to shame him or have people tell me that he’s automatically a horrible person. I just want some honest perspective from people who have actually experienced something like this.
Any advice or experiences would genuinely mean a lot. :/