u/Dazzling-Exam2239

For those of you who left, how and when did you file and inform your spouse?

For those of you that are planning your exit, what are your plans?

I’ve considered mediation to possibly be less expensive, yet I don’t see how an avoidant, passive aggressive porn addict that can’t tell the truth about many things, keeps things hidden, will not discuss anything, will be

*open and cooperative in mediation

*would not be passive aggressive if we were to live in same home through this process (90 day waiting period whether counted or not)

I’m considering filing temporary housing orders so he can go stay with friends or family while I sell the house (neither will be able to afford to stay) and he won’t be able to afford rent.

What are your experiences, thoughts, etc?

For reference, I’m planning to file, and working out the rest. Minimal has changed since two marriage counselors (2-3 years ago); the CSAT did nothing and he was back on thirst traps and doesn’t consider it porn, lied to me for over a month about it, finally admitted and despite going to individual counseling for the last 4-5 months to learn how to communicate better, does none of the homework, no curiosity about me or how I am and four years dead bedroom.

He can at times get very angry, yell, slam things, etc, so developing a safety plan. No, he has never physically harmed me.

Happy to hear your story of pros, cons, staying the course, what you did well at, if you would have done differently, etc.

Thank you.

In a couple months I will do the 80 patch testing where they put them between shoulder blades and above lower back to test for various chemicals, other allergens and five metals including nickel (I will ask for the list) which the PA said would also include common cosmetic irritants.

I can also do a forty patch of metals only at a later date. Recently watched the movie Supergirl and imagine myself lying in a cave between to suns looking just like her, dying of the reaction lol. If you did these tests, what was your worst reaction?

As a person already dealing with chronic Lyme disease, Babesia, Bartonella, CIRS, MCAS and POTS, I wonder how much this might potentially trigger a reaction that could set me back.

Since learning about possible SNAS, I’ve cut out chocolate, working to cut out grains, wheat, etc. as well as doing low histamine and freezing foods after cooking, etc. I’d already developed a sensitivity to avocados, black pepper, rice (maybe because cooked in instapot which likely has nickel?)

I quit drinking out of metal containers and got the Yeti Yonder plastic water bottle at REI, which I love because it doesn’t leak. We also started getting bottled water and looking into a countertop or kitchen sink filter but most don’t seem to filter nickel. We can’t afford the whole home system currently.

I deal with TMJ due to jaw clenching (got a mandibular splint for lower teeth that is surgical grade platinum (will have to contact company to verify content), 24/7 tinnitus, dry eye, dry mouth, vaginal adhesions and micro tears, Lacey purple rash over body, scalp irritation, fragrance and diesel exhaust, backyard smoker smoke, light sensitivity.

I seem to react strongly to getting hair foiled/bleached or teeth whitening, so I also suspect hydrogen peroxide sensitivity.

Between the autoimmune conditions, perimenopause and vaccine injuries, I can’t be really sure what caused what. After speaking with doctors, it seems fairly common for nickel allergy after having had braces several years as a teenager and earrings turning green, causing piercing bleeding.

I can’t even wear my Fitbit or Garmin anymore because there are welts on my wrist where the battery or charging ports are.

I’m also looking into my cosmetics, most of which has fragrance or parfumerie even if not strongly scented, and recently bought some Omiana mineral powder samples to try out (limiting iron oxides and some of the more harmful ingredients).

There’s a lot here, my body has gone haywire since covid, multiple vaccines which were a condition of keeping my job at the time as well as house and car payments, you know the drill. Looking into nicotine patch protocol to detox spike protein if we determine I can safely do so after the patch testing.

Personal experiences welcome on the above as well as any recommendations for water filters, etc. I’m not wearing any jewelry anymore and looking at sewing some type of fabric over Jean rivets as they feel like they burn holes through my hips where they touch skin.

This really sucks, was already at my wits end over the 24/7 tinnitus and doctors are no help whatsoever in that arena.

Has anyone used Omiana mineral powders in plastic jar? They sell samples for $4 so I’m waiting on a few to arrive.

There was another brand recommended via search for low nickel, etc. and some European brand says they also test for green chromium I believe. But it seems like if low in nickel, they have iron oxides or vice versa.

I have little white bumps on eyelids and under eyes, on chin and lips so I’ve quit wearing eye shadow. Previously had issue with minocycline prescribed by dermatologist, turns out it caused silver toxicity and turned my brown micro bladed eyebrows a beautiful silvery blue (not!!!)

Just sad tonight - my husband commented if he can run x miles tonight he will sign up for a run later this month.

DDay four years ago, a couple of marriage counselors and a CSAT, dead bedroom, and he can’t make the effort to wear a cpap or get a better one and claims sleeping in separate rooms caused dead bedroom.

Wait, you can run x miles a week and you can’t walk twenty feet to another bedroom? And initiate? I’ve obviously given up and hypervigilance and hypersexuality was just about the end of my sanity over porn.

Yes, I’m working on leaving but sad some days…twenty years down the drain yet he’s more interested in sports and hobbies and give those his energy. I quit begging and being interested. If he put that energy into counseling, I probably wouldn’t be here. I guess a plus is I’m learning to love myself and the patterns I saw are my superpower and now I know to observe next time and not reveal my dealbreakers.

Just deeply sad and lonely. Learning to be my own comfort.

But still…you can run that many miles yet not interested in minimum effort for connection. And I know exactly what he’ll say, everything is going good, so why do we have to talk about it?

Because! I’m still young and want connection and physical affection and intimacy, ya dummy!

How many of you went from okay or good sex life to your partner not wanting to hold hands, kiss, hug, give you a million reasons why they couldn’t have sex, and everything became an obstacle?

The dog, they ate too much dinner, they drank too much, etc, etc, etc and then you drove yourself crazy because they wouldn’t tell you anything…the I don’t know, I don’t remember excuses?

Even now, he finally went to counseling yet still won’t talk about anything?

I feel like we are in middle school and I have to do the breakup. Why else the terrible behavior? Working on an exit plan.

If you have left, how did you tell your avoidant you were leaving/divorcing? He’s also very intimidating yet passive aggressive so I’m worried about retaliation because he’s not a person that’s going to be mature and discuss things.

Yet I’m going to need to sell the house because we can’t afford it. His behavior is bad and I can’t imagine living with him after I tell him.

He thinks everything is fine as long as we don’t talk about stuff. He denies watching Facebook thirst traps that just started back up two weeks ago and claims he just scrolls past and didn’t watch the full reels. We’ve been in dead bedroom for over two years.

He says he thinks about it sometimes but will never bring it up.

Women in perimenopause/menopause: I’m wondering if nickel and or other allergies can result in genitourinary conditions like micro tears or adhesion of vaginal tissues and or if hormone replacement therapy, whether compounded or synthetic testosterone, progesterone, estradiol, estriol or DHEA - can the metal tubes or capsules absorb into creams, gels or possibly contain nickel or other irritants?

Wondering because I’ve tried both for five years with little improvement. I’m awaiting the patch test; learning about low nickel diet and looking into my cosmetics and well, everything.

Have significant lacy rash over whole body, red spots, explosive diarrhea, red hands, milia on face, mosquito bit like hives, pores that fill daily with sebum, starting to have slope is like symptoms on scalp…and past dermatologist put me on minocycline for several months for undiagnosed skin condition and I ended up with silver toxicity, which turned my micro bladed brown eyebrows silvery blue!

Dry mouth, 24/7 tinnitus, TMJ, migraines. I’ve read systemic nickel can cause many issues. Even mostly quit eating chocolate.

What have you done when your partner relapses? I had that feeling we all get, things going good for awhile, then BAM, it’s back. The thirst traps and likely other things too.

I’m lonely, upset about dead bedroom, him claiming he’s one of the 1% that can quit cold Turkey. Nah, he’s back on FB with the thirst traps.

Do you confront? Or just say, well I’ve got the ick for him, I’m sad, and I’m planning my exit anyway.

Personally I’d love to make a PowerPoint presentation with the spreadsheet downloads of dat/time and click link so we can watch together or better yet, just tag his mom in all the reels so she can see how much she’s enabled his terrible behaviors? Really, he’s the apple of her eye. But I don’t want to end up on dateline NBC so I guess I won’t lol. In his mind I’m just supposed to ignore it.

I’ve read the betrayal trauma books, still in therapy, addressing ADHD…consulted two lawyers, a divorce coach.

I just feel…flat. No more hypervigilance, hypersexuality- now in full on hypo mode and could care less about dead bedroom or his antics, defensiveness, circular logic or his story that he ‘accepted responsibility for his actions’ and ‘quit cold Turkey even though other men can’t, it’s just my problem I don’t believe him’.

Dude, I caught you, called you out, you denied, even with just a spreadsheet of Facebook Reels history thirst trap downloads! Not even counting YouTube, Instagram, etc. that was not accepting responsibility. So tell yourself whatever story you need to and how you are so great because you finally are in individual counseling, with a female, of course, can’t find a man counselor, who isn’t even a CSAT.

So what steps help you get your fizz or spark back? I feel lifeless; no female friends, no affection from spouse and now in dead bedroom because of him.

I feel like I’m walking through mud most days, my brain churns and I cannot seem to find joy or motivation anymore.

I’m scared to leave because my career tanked, I’m making half what I used to, mid fifties, the reality is not good. Moving out would take over half my paycheck.

Feeling discouraged. Please share your hacks, defining moments, whatever it took you to return to land if the living and trust yourself again. Thank you.

So after a year of being off Facebook, he now rejoined under premise of group to rebuild auto motor and now he’s watching back to back reels of Lumber Barbie. This is either at work on break or in the restroom at work or at home. He just told me last night he only plays games on his phone now in the bathroom and doesn’t access Facebook in the bathroom.

She’s half my age, obviously fit from chopping down trees and while not necessarily provocative in traditional sense (she’s actually wearing clothes), it’s obvious he enjoys watching this and isn’t watching guys chopping down trees. It feels like a replacement, once again.

It’s just one more reason I can’t feel safe. And this is why we are in dead bedroom, his energy is still going elsewhere. Even after a month of me not bringing things up, he still made no moves.

I never thought I’d be here…again…in a million years. Tell me about dead bedroom, your experiences and even thought he said he’s completely stopped porn, here we are in dead bedroom with all the usual excuses and then some. I don’t believe for one minute he’s not messing around in the shower or whatever.

Help me with what to look for or your resources that helped you.Thank you

DDay 2022, year 17 of marriage where I finally figured out he’d been lying to me since Day 1, knowing porn was a dealbreaker for me from previous marriage.

At first it started with every excuse in the book why we couldn’t be intimate, unkind behaviors and contempt, hours in bathroom with phone and watching young single girls camping on YouTube while working in garage and hanging alot with single best guy friend who follows OF girls on his social media, which is how I started downloading everything my husband was viewing.

Now it’s four years later, two marriages counselors later and him going to a cast for 3-4 weeks and quitting because he didn’t have an addiction, of course not.

He wouldn’t wear his cpap to prevent snoring, finally got one a few years ago and I needed my sleep, so I set what I thought was healthy boundary, if you are not going to wear your cpap, then please sleep in living room on mattress because I needed my my sleep.

So now because he won’t sleep in same bed because HE chooses not to wear cpap consistently, and cannot just roll over and poke me when he’s in the mood, intimacy is no longer “convenient” for him. And twenty feet away in living room means he’d have to walk to the bedroom and actually possibly speak with me and interact like I’m a live person with feelings.

I totally realize how ridiculous this sounds typing it out. We are now eight months into this. This doesn’t seem like a healthy adult relationship any longer, it feels like I’m dealing with a petulant child as well as feeling like one. I don’t like me anymore.

I’ve wondered if this is intimacy anorexia, if he’s content just being roommates…he claims he’s just stopped all those activities but I also know he wasn’t honest before, so likely not now or is he asexual, just not attracted or I’ve even wondered if he’s gay because he used to be homophobic (which also bothered me because he was so mean about it) and couldn’t even bear to watch men kissing and now doesn’t even flinch seeing on tv. Now I just wonder if I’m a beard, or he’s just waiting for me to end it?

What has been your experiences? Before all of this, he liked to kiss, be affectionate, intimate frequently and now he doesn’t even want to discuss sex and deflects every time. Please share your good, bad and ugly as I’m trying to understand patterns and possible signs.

Has anyone else gone through Michelle Mays 12 week program? I’m listening to The Betrayal Bind after reading it a couple years ago. I’m looking at doing this program, please share your thoughts if you have.

I left my first SA/PA partner, was single mom for seven years, got remarried to the prince that said he didn’t need or use porn only to discover 17 years in it was all a lie.

Husband would not participate with two marriage counselors over 1.5 years, he physically went; CSAT was a bust and now he’s in individual regular counseling, with a female counselor of course, can’t pick a man counselor. And he won’t talk about anything and repair is nil with supposed white knuckling because he doesn’t have an addiction and now dead bedroom for last year or so because anything I bring up is criticizing him, so again, no repair and lots of ambiguity and looping for me.

Trying to get unstuck.

Update: I searched Reddit and general consensus is program is overpriced for what is deliverers and stick with the book. So if any of you are willing to share your experiences about the program, or other programs or things that helped you reach clarity or unstuckness, or anything else about my post, I’m all ears.

Deep down I feel like he will not change because the integrity isn’t there; he cooks dinner and shoes things through doing chores or making me happy but we aren’t a partnership anymore and there is little communication outside of logistics.

Previous marriage for me ended in divorce due to emotional, physical and sexual abuse because I wouldn’t participate in swinging lifestyle, training film parties with other couples. As a young mother with new baby, I left because I did not want to raise daughter in this type of environment for obvious reasons, also being survivor of childhood sexual abuse.

Met and remarried now husband 21 years ago. I shared my history, dealbreakers and he assured me he was not like other men, not into porn, was a Christian, yadda yadda yadda. Silly me.

My question is, for those of you that consider porn, direct lying, leaving out facts, etc. as cheating, how did you set boundaries or at what point did you leave? This also includes emotional reliance on his single best male friend, inability to address issues with his mother’s behavior towards myself (negative), his ex fiancé (positive). How many times did you need to be hit in the head with facts knowing your personal wasn’t your person or that they might just not be into me?

4 years into our marriage, his buddy texting him pornographic lewd images of elemental oh his birthday. He was mad I saw it - it popped up on his phone, which was next to me on kitchen counter while I was washing dishes. Previously he stated he was an open book and had nothing to hide. At Christmas another friend sent him a digital subscription to a high class mens digital magazine he could access on his phone so I wouldn’t know about it.

17 years into or marriage I discovered, after several months of rotten behavior, every excuse in the book why he can’t be intimate, we started marriage counseling. He watched me cry, plead, ask what was wrong, denied any problems and then through monitoring social media, seeing all the thirst traps and porn he was watching, every single day based on history, I finally confronted him.

Initial reactions were that I must have cameras in the house and he accused me of filming him. No, just saw all the history, dates, times, every damn day. No, he didn’t want a divorce, doesn’t believe in it. Meanwhile, he’s spending 3-5 days a week hanging with his best single friend that became an absolute jerk, and based on history social media, is where my husband started watching and following all the same OF girls and other women, etc. This friend is also good friends with my husbands mother and they all three hang out and drink (I don’t drink for medical reasons) and he knew this when we married.

His mom doesn’t like me and he’s even said in the past I no longer need to make the effort because he said he sees how she treats me. Fast forward to this block of time the porn usage got really bad and now I’m the villain for catching him.

He claims he’s stopped cold Turkey on the porn two years ago and we’ve basically been in a dead bedroom situation since the with one second kisses goodbye in the morning before work and before bed.

He more operated by omitting things now, claims there’s never been anyone else, but in the last couple years his ex fiancé has been messaging him she will be in town, can they visit with the parents, etc. my husband acts like we will all get together in the messages, said nothing to me about it then cancels in the messages, saying I can’t make it. After years of not speaking to her or not even wanting to be in the same room with her, they are suddenly messaging in the last couple of years and she recently messaged asking my husband to take her to visit his dad, who is in a memory care home. I finally confronted him about this. He said he thought it was weird she asked him that. He denies anything has happened yet I’m just not sure. The ex fiancé still sees my husbands mother and still calls her “Mom”.

Yep, it’s taking me a long time to process this person says they love me but most other actions show I am not. Any talk of divorce, he says he doesn’t believe in divorce. It seems straightforward yet also confusing.

I can no longer trust him. For those of you experiencing similar things including dead bedroom, what did you do? It’s obvious porn became such a large issue as to affect our relationship as well. He won’t talk about anything, even with counseling.

So the CSAT I interviewed, my husband went 3-4 times an nothing happened. He’s finally seeing a counselor bi-weekly for individual counseling. Of course, the counselor is a female and not a CSAT and of course, my husband bristles at me saying porn addiction. He cannot quit alcohol either, had triangulation with his mom and single best guy friend.

The first 15 or so years of our marriage was pretty good, or so I thought. The year or two before the pandemic, he started being mean at times, generally increasing. Then 2022 after several months of marriage counseling and him denying he wanted a divorce, I discovered the porn habit. He was mad I figured it out and accused me of having cameras on the house which honestly I wish I could have.

Then the last two or so years we now have what I learned is called “dead bedroom”. Me chasing him for intimacy and him giving me every excuse in the book why not.

My dilemma beyond this is 1. How to leave a 21 year marriage with house and all that and 2. For those of you whose husbands are avoidant or just plain will discuss absolutely nothing about their progress, how do you deal with this?

I’m working on leaving - knowing even if I’m in reduced circumstances it will hopefully be better than second guessing every thing I do or say and can be free if someone who thinks it’s ok to lie to spouse since before marriage and then treat them like garbage and share nothing - the whole point of him going to counseling was to learn how to communicate, none of which he is doing and gets defensive, won’t even tell me when counseling is but will tell me other appointments.

Honestly baffled at how awful people can be to one another. I divorced my last spouse after two years of this garbage and sadly thought I’d found my person only to find out I believed the whole “I’m not like other guys, I’m not into porn”.

And for any of you with husbands with mom issues, that’s a while other ball of wax. Counselor says they project issues with mother onto us.

For those of you that left your long term marriage or relationship, how did you leave?

Meaning, if you weren’t making a lot of money, how and when did you file for divorce, find housing, if you couldn’t afford your house (we will likely have to sell). I’m looking into housing and legal resources, looking for your experiences and what you wish you had or hadn’t done or tips that helped you.

I haven’t discussed this however we are now in dead bedroom situation, which started long before I asked him to move to living room because of snoring and he wouldn’t wear his cpap machine and I wasn’t getting sleep, he’d rather say I’m not interested, blah blah blah.

It’s more that I just can’t get over it and done with the disrespect, lying and omission and that he won’t even discuss anything and is still very defensive and claims he needs more time and I expect perfection overnight and he’s never been to counseling??? We’ve been to two different marriage counselors, one man, one women and this was a disaster because she said porn was ok even after I vetted her first then she changed her story.

I’m sad and never imagined I would be in this situation, and he’s wasted some great years in our marriage and I’m working on trying to leave, mid fifties and tired of being alone together. Any guys reading this, no please don’t message me about getting together.

Thank you for reading.