POSA™ Blog

Dear Posarc:

I'm totally lost in a very painful sea and your website is helping me more specifically than any other resources can.

I struggle through a cycle of various painful concerns, but for the last several days my main concern has been my body image. Logically, I understand that I could be Helen of Troy and it wouldn't stop him from looking at porn. But, I have thoroughly internalized the message that I'm not pretty, sexy, or "fit" enough to really do it for him.

Can you point me in the direction of help with this?

Thank you,
Lauren Jones

Dear Lauren-

Since there is such universality in your question and this exact issue only gets brought up in my private sessions with clients oh, about 10 times a week, I thought I'd write a blog post to respond to your question. I know so very many others feel as you do. I certainly did.

Here's an e-mail that just came in which I'll share because I know it's a big day for POSAs to get triggered.

Dear Lili:

My husband and I have been fighting all day already and now he's stormed out of the house on his way to the local sports bar to watch the Super Bowl.
Reason for fight: I asked him if he will be fast-forwarding over the cheerleading part of the big event and he became furious, claiming it's not at all something he considers a trigger for his acting out. He's saying that since his "thing" was porn, seeing NFL cheerleaders is so far removed from porn that it's ridiculous, and clear to him I need to get a hold of myself!
On top of that, he's saying I ruined all the potential for his fun evening of sports and that I'm in need of a good therapist to help me with what he calls my anxiety.

Please advise me!
Cindy

One of the challenges of working with a topic for many years is that one can end up burrowing deeper and deeper into more complex aspects of the topic. One of the risks can be possibly losing touch with how a newcomer to the topic may still be struggling with "the basics". So while still engaging my interest in delving into the more complex aspects of progressed behaviors in addiction as well as chronic infidelity, I am devoting some time and webpage space to apprising newcomers of what they might expect as they find themselves in a strange new world of sex addiction or chronic infidelity with all its pain and confusion. Here, then, is Part One of the new series:

Sexual addiction, including pornography addiction, is one of the most harmful in relationships. The shame with this addiction for the addict and the spouse, the betrayal, trauma and stereotypes linked to the addiction are often devastating.