Happily Ever After: The Never Ending Story

It's been quite some time since I posted in this series, but I received a story this week that had me in tears and I requested permission to share it with you today. 

It is possible for a man to quit pornography and never once return. Unfortunately, that is more the exception than the rule. So what happens when your husband continues to give into temptation, year after year after year? What do you do when he repeatedly breaks your heart? Is there a point when you finally just give up on your marriage?

This is Michelle's story (very slightly edited for clarity). I hope it gives you the courage to hold onto your marriage, no matter what.

“My husband and I weren't Christians when we met/married. Our problem went beyond pornography. It wasn't a secret that he watched it when we married, and I didn't think it was that big of a deal. It was a gateway into sexual addiction for him. I discovered several emotional affairs (women who lived far away that he had no chance being close to as in pornography). They would exchange "I love you's" to each other. He went on a date with another woman when I was pregnant with our son. I thought he was just visiting an old friend, and I didn't think much about it. When I asked him to come home because I was having contractions, he said he would, but he stayed another hour or so to be with her. That was the beginning of serious problems for us.

I felt like he had an inappropriate friendship with the woman who introduced us. She would visit him at work, and he wouldn't tell me. He'd go out for drinks with her and tell me he was going alone. He'd stay home from work all day without telling me, and he was gone all day at least one day on the weekends (and I wasn't allowed to call him while he was gone). [H]e refused to be intimate with me. He would, however, watch pornography and be intimate with himself. I felt cheated. It didn't bother me as much as long as I felt wanted and my needs were being met, but when he refused sex with me for over six months, it became a serious problem.

My health deteriorated to the point where I was sick more often than I was well, and I lost my job. It was in this time period that we became Christians. We threw away all the porn, and he stopped drinking. He continued to withhold intimacy. He continued to have inappropriate relationships with other women. I found another woman's panties in our bedroom one day and lost it. He swore she gave them to him and that he didn't sleep with her. Meanwhile, he admitted to watching pornography and masturbating in the bathroom at work about every day, but I had to literally beg him to be with me.

We followed the right biblical steps. I confronted him personally, then took two witnesses with me. We went through a few marriage counselors at the request of those two. The first was a kook. The second, I felt, actually helped. I felt like things were moving in the right direction. He still wasn't being open and honest in any facet of our relationship. He was still being secretive with our finances, with his text messages, with his Facebook account, etc. I had been given access to his online accounts but not his bank account. We'd taken out a large loan to pay for a trip to the Mayo Clinic for me. Due to the stress from all of this, I was having serious health issues. When his parents offered to help ease the burden of our trip, he blew all of that money on I still don't know for sure what. I think a fair amount was spent meeting his other women or paying for pornography online.

He changed jobs without telling me or consulting me right after I lost my job, and he ended up only making about $60/wk total. We had two children to care for, and I was medically unable to work at that point. We ended up moving to another state for work. His financial habits were such that we were seriously in the hole, and I had no idea. When we moved, he couldn't even get a bank account. I took over our finances, and that made me feel a little more secure about that. He kept a secret bank account, though, and his mom regularly (and secretly) put in hundreds of dollars per month into that account. I have no idea what he spent that money on, but it was at a time when I was struggling to feed our children while trying to pay down my medical debt and all of his secret maxed out credit cards. We couldn't afford for him to spend money on himself, but, at the time, he felt like he was entitled.

I thought a geographic move would get him away from the other woman, but after only 6 months of living here, I found a message from her. It was clear, from her message, that he had been complaining to her about what a terrible wife I was. At the time, I could hardly get out of bed. When I wasn't sick, I was too depressed to move, and we couldn't afford my medication for either condition. I'd had to move away from my support group, my family, and my church family because of his poor decisions. Everyone clearly loved him, but most people thought I was weird. It just solidified, in my mind, how completely unlovable I was. I went to my preacher here desperate for help (we don't currently have elders), and he spoke to my husband. My husband denied that he'd ever been physically unfaithful, and my preacher told me I was stuck with him.

I felt like nothing would ever change. It had been five years of emotional torture at that point, and it felt like he didn't even care. His boss found out what was going on because his performance was affected. I was ready to separate after finding him having inappropriate conversations with at least 13 women and after 5 years of him choosing pornography or just himself over me. Anyway, his boss forced him to go to Sexaholics Anonymous (like, he had to have a paper signed at least once a week or he'd be fired). I agreed, on the advice of our preacher to go to marriage counseling again. I joined S-Anon to meet with partners of people with addictions like my husband's.

While I ultimately decided that S-Anon was not for me, I did learn a lot. My husband learned a lot from being in SA as well, though he has also since decided that it's not for him (he has a different job now, so he isn't forced to go--it's a sore spot with me sometimes, if we're being honest, because I really felt like it helped). We learned that his addiction stemmed from an inappropriate introduction to sexuality (his father handed him a Playboy at a young age to explain sex), lack of religious upbringing, and a serious fear of rejection. They said that the refusal to have physical or emotional intimacy with me was called "sexual anorexia", and, for him, it was because he was too afraid to get close to me for fear that I would reject him. Before he was born, he had a sibling who passed away when he was just a toddler. My husband was born about 10 years after that, and he always felt like his parents pushed him to live for himself but also for the other child. This resulted in him feeling like he was never good enough and trichotillomania when he was in 5th grade (he was tearing his own hair out from the stress). When our relationship progressed beyond a certain point, he was too scared for me to reject him both sexually or emotionally, so he rejected me instead. He carried on with nameless/faceless women in pornography because they could never reject him since they weren't really there. He engaged with women there was no possible future with because they also couldn't reject him in any meaningful way. He's still terrified to tell me the truth about anything he thinks he could get in "trouble" about with me--from things that are stupid to serious things.

The last time we went to counseling, I refused to sit in the same room with him. We each took half the hour allotted. I just refused to sit and cry in front of him in the counselor’s office ever again. I'd already spent so much time doing that, and I couldn't handle him seeing the pain he'd caused and not caring anymore. That's how it felt. Like I showed him my deepest, darkest pain, and he pretended to care in the counselor’s office but refused to enact any meaningful change. It hurt so much more when we'd make an agreement with the counselor and he'd renege as soon as we left because he just didn't feel comfortable doing it--as if I felt totally comfortable doing whatever they'd asked myself.

It took a long time, but I feel like we finally found a healthy place. I can ask him now if he's watched pornography, and he answers me (I feel) honestly. I've promised not to get upset if he just tells me the truth. I asked him today just out of curiosity because it's been quite some time since I checked in on him. He said that, several months ago, he clicked on some kind of click bait with women in their underwear or swimsuit models. That's miles better than the hardcore porn he used to watch, though we both agree that those pictures are as inappropriate as the videos he used to watch. He says that now he doesn't look at sex the same way.

[W]hen I found out he was still doing it after we became Christians I was angry and felt betrayed immediately. We'd all decided together that it was wrong, and we'd gotten rid of all of it that was in the house. I found out he'd been watching it and pleasuring himself while rejecting me for months and months at a time. I thought it must have had something to do with having his baby, because everything had been fine before I'd had our son. I'd been on pelvic rest for the majority of that pregnancy, and I thought maybe the months away had changed things, too.

There were years that I hated him for what he did. I hated him for letting it go beyond looking and for starting to reach out to real people. I wanted to die. I wanted him to die. I couldn't understand why God gave me this man who seemed like a completely different person until we got married. There were, of course, red flags that I thought about in retrospect that I'd ignored while we were dating. I isolated myself from my friends and family--as much because of my illness as because I felt unlovable and so unwanted. I felt like everyone loved him so much more than they loved me--even our children. Friends at church were much more willing to talk to him for hours than to me. Making friends came so easy to him, and it was so hard for me.

I felt like I'd failed at every aspect of my life. I'd failed to be a good wife because I couldn't hold his interest. I'd never been a wife who had ever (not even once) said no to sex in our lives. Had he tried to initiate at any point in our marriage, I never would have turned him down (except during my pregnancy for the safety of our child, but he never attempted to initiate during that time). He had never once attempted to initiate sex. It was always me. I felt like I was the one with a sexual addiction, and he made me feel like I should be going to meetings long before he ever started going. I don't feel like I was unreasonable. I only wanted sex maybe once or twice a week, but when he refused, I asked for it quite a bit more because my needs hadn't been met.

I really tried to throw myself into religion. I was a new Christian struggling with a husband I strongly suspected was cheating on me and who was absolutely entangled in sexual sin. I struggled with allowing him to be the head of our household. He was generally unwilling to accept responsibility while accusing me of not being a godly wife because I disrespected him by not allowing him to do his part as the man, and I felt like I'd failed God, too. I had no idea what to do because I tried to hand over responsibilities I'd taken over because I'd always been doing them (I had a child with a sketchy boyfriend years before I met him, so I'd been running a household before I ever met my husband and just continued doing it after we were married because it's what I'd always done), but my husband would ignore them or refuse to accept them. Then, I'd have to continue to do what I'd been doing and incur his anger because someone had to steer the ship.

We had a marriage counselor once who said it was ok to find reasons other than love to stay in our marriage. At the time, I was a stay-at-home mom, and I homeschooled our kids. I had no money to get a place of my own, and having permission to stay for financial reasons, even though I couldn't look at him, was somehow liberating.

Eventually, I think we got to a healthy place where he took control of our family. After a few bumps, he agreed not to make decisions without me (after the job debacle) because God put me in his life for a reason, and he was denying my purpose in his life by not using me as God intended. [W]e made an agreement about sex, too. It's obvious that I'm always going to want it more often than he does, but we agreed that I'd only ask for it when I absolutely had to have it to avoid sexual sin myself. If I ask for it now, he knows it's not just because I love him and want to be close to him but because I actually need it, and we agreed that he cannot refuse. It's somewhere between more than he wants and less than I want, but it works for both of us. I think he'll always struggle with addiction in some form or another. He's had problems with addiction to drugs (before we ever met, and this has not been a problem in our marriage at all), addiction to alcohol (has been a struggle during our marriage, but he's been sober for the last several years--he says this is the one he actually struggles with the most these days), addiction to food (which has resulted in medical issues for him and is still a struggle), and addiction to pornography/emotional affairs.

I'm glad now that I stuck with him. Our marriage is a lot better now than it was in the beginning. The first five years were the worst years of my life. I think, for us, the turning point was when I let him back in after the last contact with the other women (I think I slept in the other room for like 8 months and refused to look at him or talk to him for months because I couldn't do it and not say/do something I regretted).

We got pregnant, and I lost our baby. I think he was finally in a place where we were both feeling the same thing, and we had to let each other in to a certain degree. I needed him because I had absolutely no one else. A few months later, we had another surprise pregnancy that ended in heartbreak. I lost my mind with grief. I almost died when we gave birth to that baby, and I think that somehow solidified that I was a human being and that he actually wanted me around to raise our two boys (one of whom he'd lose forever if I died because that child would be forced to go to his mostly absent father if I passed away).

We waited several years, strengthened our marriage, and he helped me grieve over our lost babies. While we were trying not to get pregnant earlier this year, God threw us for a loop and blessed us with another baby. We're currently 25 weeks, and I really do feel like [my husband] puts me first in his life. I have no idea what his life is like at work, and I'm sure there's always that possibility that he's watching pornography in the bathroom on his breaks, but I like to think he doesn't do that anymore. I notice that he's usually going somewhere and doing something during his lunch break. He goes to the pet store to play with the animals, or he goes to the guitar store and plays guitars and drums. I think he does things like this to keep his hands busy. I feel like he's a lot more open with me, and I feel like he's much more devoted to our family. I feel like he's largely become the man I thought I married.

I still have trust issues. We talk pretty openly about it when I'm having an issue with it. I still check his emails and Facebook messages periodically. We have rules for conversations with the opposite sex. I always tell him if I talk to someone privately who's a man. I had a man who helped me with some bible study topics that I talked to over Facebook, and I was very open with my husband about it (he gave me permission). Once, my husband said something to me about how he thought I'd leave him for this man I was studying the bible with, and I cut off those private bible study conversations (even though I'd given my husband access to read all of the messages--there's just no reason to make him question me like I used to question him. I know how that feels). I ask that he tells me if he talks to another woman regardless of how innocent the conversation is. We're never alone in the same room as a member of the opposite sex. We never privately phone a member of the opposite sex without reporting to the other that it was done and what was said. Even if it's work related, I ask him to tell me. Even if it's a man at church contacting me about something church related, I tell him. It's just the right way to handle it. We do more things together. He doesn't go golfing alone anymore. We go together--even though I don't play. I drive the golf cart and heckle, and he plays. We got interested and invested in each other's activities. I have a non-negotiable 15min of his time every night after the kids go to bed that are just for me. Usually, we watch TV together, and he lets me lay my head in his lap while he pets my hair. That satisfies my need for physical touch without asking too much from him and doesn't trigger his fear of intimacy. We talk about our feelings a lot. I think he's less scared of talking to me now. I'm less scared of crying in front of him now. I feel like he recognizes his selfishness and entitlement early in our marriage and realizes that he was continuing his single life while we were married while I was continuing my life of control in my house from before we were married.

I remember a sermon I heard about difficult marriages. What stuck with me was that the preacher said something about spouses coming to him for counseling and wanting out for whatever reason. He said that the first thing he often said was something along the lines of, "Well, you picked him." I knew that when I said "I do" I chose him, flaws and all. My husband and I can joke now that, when we said "for better or for worse" we didn't look at the fine print on the ratio of better to worse. God never promised us our marriages would be easy. If our marriage is meant to reflect Christ's relationship with the church, then problems in our marriage often reflect problems in our spiritual walk.

I tried not to blame it all on him--though he was definitely doing something wrong and was going to have to answer to God for it. The only thing I had control of was my actions [and] reactions. I wasn't always acting like a godly wife. I nagged, complained, wailed, screamed, and was sometimes pretty awful to him. I tried what Paul wrote about regarding winning your lost husband without a word--even though he became a Christian during his struggle. I tried to remember to forgive him seventy times seven. God's forgiven me more times than I've ever had to forgive my husband. I tried not to look at it based on how much it was hurting me but rather how much it was hurting God. I remembered that my primary goal as his spouse was to get him to heaven with me.

I wasn't always perfect. I failed him in that as often as he failed me. My sins were in my reactions to his. Instead of helping a brother who was entangled in sin, I would react negatively and push him further into the arms of the sin that made him feel temporarily better. I had to change my mindset and try to focus on helping him rather than punishing him. That isn't supposed to be my job anyway. I promised to stop getting mad if he told me before I stumbled upon it, and I kept that promise. I prayed for him. I looked for cues that he was struggling. For us, it's when he stops saying the dinner prayer and asks our sons to do it instead (sometimes is ok, all the time means he's ashamed to talk to God--so I talk to him first and forgive him first so that he's less scared to go to our Father).

I think we're both all-in in our marriage now. As for it being worth it, I can say that I couldn't face life without him now. A family member is going through a terrible divorce right now due to adultery, and my heart breaks for them. After I talk to my family member, I look at my husband and say, "Let's never get divorced." It took a long time to get to that point, and, honestly, there were times when I would have given anything for a way out. There were times I went totally crazy wanting to plant surveillance everywhere to catch him in the act so I could go live alone or find a husband who'd actually care about me. Ironically, I don't think I'd ever find a man who values me as much as my husband does now, having gone through the fire together. I know he sees where he went wrong now and how selfish it was, and he sees how hard I worked to save our marriage (years of which were completely without him). I think he values the love I have for him now that the scales have fallen from his eyes, and I think he works really hard to give back the same love to me now.

I know he's going to struggle sometimes. I know he'll likely watch pornography again. He admitted to looking at inappropriate photos months ago, so I know he still slips. I also see how hard he's trying, and I try to remember that, in God's eyes, all sin is equal. Whatever sin I'm currently struggling with is just as bad as what he's struggling with. I try to help him with his just like I hope he'll help me with mine. My focus is being the best Christian wife and mother I can be and not on how much it hurts. I know it's ultimately not about me. His porn addiction isn't about our sex life, my body, or our marriage. It's about his feelings of fear, inadequacy, and selfishness. For us, it would have been hard to say, at the worst times, that it could ever be worth it to stay married. I never would have believed it. I had a friend whose husband committed adultery, and they had an ideal marriage by the time I knew them. I saw it, but I never would have thought that could be us. Now, I remember all the times I wanted my husband to die so I could be free, and I pray God keeps him around as long as possible because I'll never find someone who treats me better now.”

"Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven." Matthew 18:21-22

Even when it looks like the battle is never going to end, remember that the Author and Finisher of our faith is not done. 

Thank you, Michelle, for allowing me to share your inspiring story! 

Do you have a story of hope and healing? Email me at servingfromhome@gmail.com!