Kids Don't Have To "Catch" Dad Watching Porn To Be Affected

Last week I was out with two "normal" friends, who are not in-the-know about my situation.  The conversation turned to porn, which didn't fluster me like it used to, and Lisa told us of her good friend, an eighteen year old girl, who, when she was ten years old, had gone downstairs in the middle of the night for a drink of water and saw her dad on the computer.  When she snuck up on him to surprise him, she saw that he was watching porn.  She and her dad didn't talk about it for another eight years.

The girl and her dad are now communicating about his addiction, and things are better, but my friend added, "Her brother is sooo messed up, and I'm guessing he also caught his dad looking at porn."  

Say what?

Newsflash here:  KIDS DON'T NEED TO CATCH THEIR DAD LOOKING AT PORN TO BE MESSED UP BY IT.  JUST LIVING WITH AN ADDICT DAD IS ENOUGH TO MESS THEM UP.

One of the most harmful lies addicts tell themselves:  "I'm not hurting anyone but myself."  Yeah, right. 

So how do addict dads mess up their kids?  Here are a few ways:

*Addicts feel intense shame.  
*This shame causes them to isolate themselves from people they love, especially their kids who usually need something.  
*Addicts withdraw emotionally into themselves.  
*Addicts are impatient and selfish and defensive. 
*Addicts have a hard time keeping their word.  
*They let others down when they don't do what they promised.  *Addicts view the world as hostile and other people (even their own children) as enemies.  



As a mom, I am not off the hook: my attitudes and behavior also greatly affect my kids.  None of us lives in a bubble.  Families are as interconnected as jigsaw puzzles.

I had a tough day today, and I was retraumatized, and I went into survival mode with my kids, like just get-through-the-day mode, and that is NOT good parenting.  My kids responded to the tension by trying to stifle their arguments, then a couple of them made my favorite cookies and delivered them to me, and then they ended up fighting like crazy.  I could tell they had no idea how to respond.

I tried to force a fun activity that we had planned earlier, but that no one but me actually wanted to do.  When that didn't work out, I blamed others for my disappointment.  I pouted and allowed myself to be a victim, all of which is not as much fun as it used to be.  

Next time I will go ahead and do what I had planned, even if no one comes with me.  I would've been so much happier.  I confess I still feel selfish thinking about what I actually need.

My prayer tonight is that God's grace will come down and fill in all the empty and painful places in my children's hearts.  And I guess in mine too, and in my husband's.  We all need a transformation over here. 

Brad Wilcox said,"The grace of Christ is sufficient to cover our debt, sufficient to transform us, and sufficient to help us for as long as that transformation process takes......Grace is the presence of God's power."    Ensign, Sept 2013

Questions About "Normal" Sexuality

I know all humans are sexual beings.  It's how we are made.  It's part of God's design.

But I have some questions......umm ......what is normal sexuality and what is addiction mentality?

How does a kid, whose brain is changed by porn before puberty, even have a chance at learning normal sexual attitudes and beliefs?

How can parents (we), whose entire marriage has been laced with sexual addiction, attempt to impart normal sexual attitudes and beliefs to their (our) kids?

I am messed up in this area, and I know it.   This type of messed-up-ness isn't something I want to pass down to my unsuspecting kids, yet I do not have answers to these questions.  

Slips and Sobriety

This week marks eighteen months since my husband disclosed his addiction to me for the second time, after going underground with it for over 14 years.

I don't feel as if I have ARRIVED anywhere, but I am sure happy to be in a different place than I was eighteen months ago!  Anywhere is better than where I was.

Just to keep me grounded, Mr.W had a slip last night.  It wasn't about lust this time, rather he broke his own boundary and went to a place alone, that he had said he would only go to with other people.   Several hours later, when he told me, he protested weakly that he needed to go there to take care of business for our family.

Nice try, but we both knew he was on shaky ground, and that there were many other options.   Our counselor says there are always LOTS of options in every situation, but we need to learn to see them. Today he admitted how risky it was for him to be there alone, and he apologized.

Sobriety has lots of enemies, but Complacency seems to be dressed for battle and looming the largest at this moment in time.  This week Mr.W learned that several of his SA friends had relapsed after more than a year of recovery.  NO ONE wants to hear news like this.  Every gal alive in my shoes knows that relapse is an everyday possibility.

In the past months I have learned many things.  Here are a few that come to mind:

1.  Sexual addiction is NOT to be underestimated.  People in long-term recovery give up everything to stay there.

2.  Sexual addiction recovery takes LOTS of time and effort.

3.  Complacency is scary.

4.  Joy is also very scary.

5.  Life goes on in good times and bad.

6.  People can survive unsurvivable losses

7.  I can survive unsurvivable losses.

8.  Brains can heal.

9.  Hearts can be healed, but it takes time and effort and more time and effort.

9.  God has not left me alone in this.  He prepared a boatload of people to help me, all before I even knew what was happening in my life.