Hey guys, thanks for the support. It is good to know that there are a lot of other people out there with struggles similar to mine. I guess I should go into a little more depth to my issues.
I've been watching some form of porn or another since I was around 12 years old. It started out as late night cable stuff, then as my parents got a computer with internet, it evolved into more and more hardcore internet porn as I got older. I don't feel that I had a real problem until I was in college and I was watching daily, sometimes 3 to 4 times a day. I would do it mostly when I was bored or lonely, I didn't, and still don't, fantasize about watching porn during the day when I'm not at a computer... most of the time it?s an opportunistic urge that I can't predict or control most of the time.
I got married to my wife last year in July. While we were dating, my wife and I both watched porn. We lived about 800 miles away from each other so that?s how we justified it. I think she watched because I wasn't there and she needed to release sexual tension periodically. I rationalized to myself that that was the same reason that I watched, but it really wasn't. I watched because I had conditioned myself since the age of 12 to be addicted to porn.
Once we were married we moved in together, she stopped watching porn because of our marriage. I continued to watch behind her back because I could not stop myself, I watched for the same reasons as before; it was purely in the moment and not pre-planned whatsoever. Over the past year, she has caught me time and time again and expressed to me that continuing to watch, made her feel inadequate and not beautiful. It was difficult for me to explain that that's not how I felt at all about her. I do think she is beautiful and a wonderful mother to my child, but I could not overcome my addiction to porn. Also, I should probably mention, that during the time we dated, I was sexting other girls. I never followed through physically cheating on my then girlfriend now wife, but I do consider myself a cheater in that I texted girls things that I never should have. Honestly, I feel like the time I was sexting other girls, was a form of pornography for me. It was instant gratification in the form of words on a screen and pictures that I could access from my smartphone. So that in itself buried myself deeper in a hole that I couldn't climb out of, until now hopefully. Currently, I have been able to give up sexting other girls by removing those people in my life through deleting them on facebook and my phone contacts. So I guess I have made small progress.
So, after a few arguments and last straws, I am here trying to fix myself because I know this is what I need. I did consider going to the people at my church to talk about my issues but, I'm not very comfortable with putting all my issues out to people who think I'm a nice guy, a great husband, and a good father. I feel like coming out would ruin that image.