Intense feelings of resentment towards wife - Help!

[B_Rosky]

Lately, I?ve been having intense feelings of resentment and general bitterness towards my wife. I?ve been in a SAA for about a year now, and I just joined Rebootnation maybe two months ago. I haven?t visited a p-website in over six months, but I still struggle with masturbation and p-subs.
A year ago, my wife found my porn stash and basically said if she finds porn again, she?s leaving, which is why I joined SAA and got started on this path. The problem is that my recovery has been an incremental progression, not a ?flip-the-switch? and I?m fixed kind of deal. There have been slips and relapses, of which I have told my wife and been honest. I feel as if she is demanding perfection instantly.
Additionally, when we do have sex, I?m terrified of doing anything that may upset her. I don?t feel confident in bed, I?m afraid to request any new/different positions. I don?t want to be addicted to porn, but I still want to feel like I can express myself sexually, in the context of a healthy relationship.
She has also said to me on a few occasions that she has no sympathy for me. Not that I?ve asked for sympathy, but I was exposed to internet pornography when I was 10 and I?ve been hooked pretty much since then. I?m 28 now. My parents didn?t care what I did on the internet. They gave me a laptop and looked the other way. There are days where I really wish I had had better parents, but that?s not something I can control.
I just get to this point in my mind where I?m giving this my all, I feel like I?m taking all the necessary steps, I understand that it?s a problem and that I severely broke the trust that I had with my wife and I?m doing everything I can do NOW to get better. But I just feel like she may hold this over my head for the rest of my life, and that makes me angry I suppose.

If anyone else has dealt with anything similar I?d love to hear how you dealt with it.

Thanks,
-B

 

[Fappy]

Hi B-rosky.
I dealt with something very similar up until about six months ago, when I realised porn was the problem.
After several failed attempts at intercourse with my wife, she began to give up on the idea of sex with me. At that time I was heavily into porn, but had no idea that it was the source of my ED.
She stopped initiating sex and I was too scared of not being able to perform that I too stopped trying to have sex. I had porn to satisfy me, why did I need to try so hard for a wife that doesn't even want me anyway? I thought.
Instead of recognising it as PIED, I thought it was due to some deep seated resentment manifesting as ED. So naturally, I blamed her. I felt such intense resentment, even hatred, toward her. I thought, sure she doesn't want to hve sex with me, but at least she can service me orally or with her hand! terrible, I know. I even went so far as to call her a bad wife!
Then I realised the source of my problems. Porn. My wife had nothing to do with it. But in my mind I had no one else to blame but her.
So these feeling of resentment you have are not real. They are just an illusion your mind has created to distract you from the real problem. Im sure your wife wants to help you.
This reboot thing has helped so much. Im only about 40 days in and I have my sex life back! It really is magic.
The material that you read on here and the advice you receive from other users is all true.

Fapp.P

 

[Vincent]

My dear friend, I am very sorry to read about your problems. I can understand your feelings, although I am not in the same position as you are. My GF ( together for 7 years now) is fully aware of my addiction, never had anything against porn (she always knew about me watching it and we talked a lot about it). However, i don't think, she takes the "addiction" seriously. She supports me but she thinks its something ridiculous...well, I do not.

You are in a very difficult situation. from what your wrote I read a lot of anger and resentment towards your wife, but also a feeling of self accomplishment from you. You write you have already gone a long way until now. And that is awesome and much to respect. Your problem now stems however from the fact, that you want your wife to see that as well. You want her to acknowledge the fact of your efforts resulting in a betterment.

This however - and I am sorry to say this to you since you are in a difficult position - is YOUR accomplishment. And only YOU should be praising yourself.

Your wife may say that she has no sympathy for you regarding your addiction. Well, that is only half the truth. Since she wants you to take her demand serious, she probably tried to express it as strong as possible. This does not mean she really does not feel for you. At least I hope so. Since you wrote that you still have sex - I had kind of a year of abstinence because of relationship problems - and are still discussing, she has most certainly not give up hope on you.

Your job now:

Build the respect for yourself up again. This is the only way you will get out of the "pleasing my wife" mode. As soon as you get in the position, where you want to make everything nice and cosy for her so that she is benevolent you are in the position of a child, and she will play the role of the mother. I know this, because I was in that position. And I not only lowered my respect for myself. Also everybody else lost their respect for me and my GF not really taking me serious was the outcome. I felt like the lesser version of a man.

Be the man again for yourself. You said you ditched Porn for over 6 month!!!!! WOW!!!!!
Then you also can skip the whole sexypic stuff. You are strong, man!
What happened, doesn't matter now any more ->


To conclude it with some harder words (and again I am sorry if I am too direct -this helped me the most however!):

Right now you are rebooting for your wife - you need to start rebooting for yourself!

And, man, I am so damn sure that you can do it. Show your wife that you are the real deal in your own regard. She will respect you for that and the also appreciate your efforts!

I wish you all the best!

Vincent

 

[Attos]

You can't re-build your marital relationship by focusing on fixing the sex issue (and by how you feel about your bed performance and how you struggle with your addiction and her/your feelings about  these issues).

Rather, try to work around that.

Which beans just be nice to your wife, care about her needs, be compassionate when she feels upset or angry (even angry towards you).

In many successful relationships, the sexual aspect plays only a small role (and is never the foundation).

You say you wish your parents would have cared about what you do on the internet. Well, you wife does, and you should feel immensely happy and full of gratitude.

 

[B_Rosky]

Vincent:

WOW! I think you hit the nail on the head my man. As much as I hate to admit it, I think my wife and I have had the "mother, child" dynamic going on for a while now. I think your words were the kick in the butt I needed.

Fappy:

Thanks for reminding me that this resentment is most likely an illusion my brain is playing, probably in a grand scheme to get me back to using P.



I still am having trouble completely letting go of these resentments, but their not as bad as before I made this post. Thanks too all of you for pointed out the reasons why my wife probably does care about me/our relationship.

I think now its time for me to really focus on developing my personal confidence.

Thanks again to everyone. I'm so glad I found this community.

-B

 

[Mbg]

I too am an SAA member!  Glad to see others in SAA on the forum.  Having been in a 12-step group you likely know a little about the 4th step. When taking this step we make a moral inventory of ourselves which includes specifically our resentments.  This is challenging in trying to come to terms with resentments and search for our responsibility in these resentments.  You may have already come to terms that your addiction has damaged the relationship between you and your wife.  Part of coming to terms with it means trying to see it from her point of you an understanding what part in the relationship struggles were in your control.  I feel for you man.  My wife has been supportive in my recovery but I know this is not always the case.  For some, living with an addict has been too destructive and many relationships do not survive the addiction.  For you, try to focus on your recovery to better yourself, and not for the sake of your marriage.  Don't beat yourself up about your past.  Perhaps talk to your wife about looking into a codependents of sex addicts group.  COSA from what I understand can help people in your wife's position.