Reflections

I went to my sister's Bachelorette party tonight.

I mean, need I say more? Every WOPA reading this can probably relate and read into that one sentence and just sort of know what is coming next.

I actually had a pretty good time. The food was great, the conversations were pretty fun. The first part was mostly just like a bridal shower. It wasn't until the second half that any of the "naughty" stuff came out when she opened up presents... I felt like I was watching the whole thing on TV. I would nod knowingly to the other married women and laugh at how the unmarried women just speculated and giggled. 

I feel like I have come a long way. In the past, I know that my instant feeling would be to instantly push the addiction onto other people. You know, kind of a "just you wait until you've been married for 10 years and your husband tells you he has a porn problem." But at this point, I have met so many hurt women by this illness that I sincerely wouldn't wish this upon my worst enemy.

Mostly I left feeling okay- good even. But as I drove home and reflected, I got a strong feeling in my gut that I just couldn't identify.

But then I saw my husband when I got home and I knew what it was that was weighing on me. 

I am sad. I am grieving the loss of something that I don't think I ever really had: A healthy sex life. It's funny, but I couldn't joke about it. I couldn't do much more than nod my head one way or the other. It's funny because even my sister noticed and asked "is this weird for you?" and then to her friends "we don't talk about this stuff in our home." Which is true. We don't- but that wasn't the reason why I was quiet. 

I was quiet because I couldn't comfortably talk about any of my own sex life because mine is so riddled with confessions of acting out- followed by weeks of me not feeling safe enough to even touch in bed due to trauma flashbacks, let alone have sex with him. 

I didn't want to think about that while I was there. It was nice to just hear happy wives talking about their healthy sex lives and know that there is such thing in the world. Honestly, it was refreshing in a way.

Then I got home and it was just weighed so heavily on my chest- and I got pretty damn angry/sad. And realized that this is another thing that this addiction stole from me. My sister being the spiritual gem that she is also shared a quote from Elder Holland about how intimacy between a man and a woman literally bonds a man and a woman physically and spiritually. She talked about how that is the part of it that she really wants,.  It was so sweet, and I could tell that the spirit was there when she said it.

I mean, isn't that what we all want? Isn't that what we crave for when we are intimate? I know I do. I guess that is the part the hurts-- that is why this is so traumatic for the wives.  It takes a piece of our soul that we bonded to this man we are married to and makes us question it.

But for me, there is good news. Because I have an older brother who has my back. And he has yours too, if you'll let him.

 4 ¶Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

 5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed

First check the label

Shower time is my thinking time. My mind races a mile a minute, and I come up with some of my best plans. My very wise mother-in-law says it is because there is no technology to distract our brains, and it is the only time we have our thoughts all to ourselves. Today in the shower while I was thinking about one of the triggers I had the night before, I half-mindedly pumped the bottle of shampoo and tried lathering it into my hair, but it just wouldn't sud up. So I added more water to it thinking that was all it needed. When that didn't work, I inserted a thought into my already very distracted brain "Man my hair is greasy today!", and I pumped another handful of soap into my hair, when that didn't work, it had my full attention. I mean I have a pixie cut, really, I don't need that much soap to suds up the little amount of hair that I have! I started thinking about just how greasy my hair was, thinking about how gross I was for having grown over-active grease pores in my scalp overnight. When the third pump didn't work, I added a fourth thinking surely this last pump would do the trick... and it didn't! I scrubbed really fast hoping the speed would activate the suds. Doing a combination of both sort of worked, but not really- it still felt like it needed more soap to get the suds going. I felt like a greasy goblin!

I was out of options- I mean there really isn't much to washing your hair- so I decided to just look at the soap- maybe my son had dumped out the bottle and filled it with water- wouldn't be the first time that's happened. But then I remembered the consistency- it wasn't super watery, it was rather thick actually. Frustrated at this point- I looked at the label. And there it was as clear as day: Conditioner.

I angrily laughed. I had just spent a good five minutes trying to suds up conditioner! My conditioner bottle and my shampoo bottle are exactly the same- the are the same color and they have the same smell. 

I was immediately hit with a lesson to learn from that experience: Before looking at the logical reasons why my hair wasn't sudsing up, I had gone to the immediate conclusion that something was wrong with me rather than something being wrong with the situation itself. It's a lesson that I have to learn over and over again- and it applied to the trigger that I had been thinking about while this all was happening.

After the intensive, J and I have been working on our independent recoveries. It is HARD WORK. Surrendering EVERY trigger is exhausting- but I felt everynight that I was going to bed with a clean plate and without any resentment buildup for me to deal with the next day.

I trusted him to be doing the same exhausting work- and to be coming up with plans on how he was going to deal with the triggers if they happened in the future, and not sharing his lapses with me unless he surrendered them first and then had a plan to show me the work he was doing to avoid it happening again.

Here's the lesson: I had walked down at midnight because I had been watching Downton Abby later than I really should have, and decided at the end of it all to at least try to find some sort of healthy physical outlet that I could use to feel connected to my body physically. I found a flyer online for a  co-ed softball league! I was so excited I jumped out of bed and went down to the couch where my husband is sleeping right now, to so him the flyer. When I got down there I saw that he was watching a show on his iPad. I was instantly triggered but do you know what my mind automatically told myself? "Oh, it probably isn't that show that he told you earlier that day that he wouldn't watch anymore- he told you he wouldn't- what's wrong with you? Just trust that he is doing his work." So I ignored the fact that I was triggered and showed him the flyer, and went up to bed.

Fast forward to 2:00  in the morning: I wake up to my little guy crying so I got up to go help him. J is in the hall looking like he has been  up for a long time. I get triggered because linking the two of those triggers together is alarming. But my brain refuses to acknowledge the fact that I'm triggered because it instantly thinks "Man, you are so flipping tired from going to bed so late, you shouldn't trust what your eyes are telling you right now- just because you look a certain way when you wake up at two in the morning doesn't mean that J has to look that way too."

Did you see what I did in both of those triggers:

I ignored my needs because I told myself that I was the problem.

But if I would have just looked at the facts just like I looked at the label on the conditioner bottle I would have seen this:

1. No matter what show he is or isn't watching, seeing J alone in the dark on a device is triggering. Period. End of story.

2.  After seeing that first trigger, it is also triggering to see him looking wide awake at 2:00 in the morning.

3. I have a right to raise a red flag when he says he is going to do something and then he doesn't. Like he said he was going to go running and then watched shows all day instead.

That is what it says on the dang label. There is nothing wrong with me for not trusting him yet. Just like I will be in the shower for the next few days: I will definitely be looking at the label before I pump any soap into my hand because I don't 100% believe that is going to be in the same spot every time like it was before.

I trusted after this weekend that he would do the work and that would be the end of it. But he didn't. And I don't trust him. And that's okay- because trusting him makes me feel crazy right now. I'm learning. I gave him a little bit of trust, and it made me feel like there was something wrong with me because I didn't allow myself to look at the facts because I wanted to trust that he was working his full recovery.

Truth is, that I was right in my triggers. He did act out. It hurts so much this time because I finally felt like we were on the same page about recovery. We had moved from almost divorce in my eyes to turning things around. This time confused me, but not really. I am going to keep doing the exhausting work- because divorce or not divorce this is my new life, and I am learning to love and embrace it. If he chooses to do his work instead of cutting corners then we are working towards the same end goal and in the end it will work out between us. If not, we are moving farther apart and that leads away from each other.

For the next little bit, it is just a wait and see situation.

The long and short of it

The good: I went to a weekend intensive at Addo Recovery with my husband and gained so many valuable tools that I need to process on here how I can apply them into my daily life.

The bad: After I asked for the five days, he didn't leave. He did invite me to go to the intensive with him and to a bishops interview with him and I feel like those both went well. He asked me on a date and that went pretty well. 

The hard truth: red flags have been thrown- bottomlines have been broken, and I don't know if I even want this to go any further. However. The intensive made me think about the reason behind what I was doing before and I want to really drink deeply in my own recovery again. No matter what happens, I am done numbing. I am done taking the easy road- I am ready to take the road that leads to the lasting happiness- I am ready for that change of heart. I'm in your hands, Lord.

Clarity when I want to see it.

Wow- writing my last post was just nerve-racking but so healing for me. It's so weird to feel so vulnerable and scared at the same time- My old therapist calls it vulnerability hangover. I totally had it. I was too scared to look at the comments so I just didn't! haha! But thank you for your kind words. Because I feel like my addiction is something that I have overcome, and that it's not the main cause of my trauma right now, it isn't going to be the main theme of my blog. I just wanted to have my whole story out there and the whole picture. It was hard to feel like I was being completely open and honest on here when I felt like I was hiding something. So thank you again for your words of support and love, tears were shed over here.

Part of what forced me to get back on the blog is that I have to admit something: I have been just plain awful at my bottom-lines and boundaries. AWFUL.

I was surprised to get a phone call from one of my old group friends that I hadn't heard from in a while who's husband was 8 months sober... and really missed talking about bottom-lines and boundaries and sticking to them in the way that we used to talk about it in group. Her hubby had acted out and she stuck to her bottom-line of kicking him out of the house.  She had moved out of state and away from family, and it was just so inspiring to see her automatically stick to her bottom-lines after 8 months of not having to.

And then here I am with a husband who acts out about once a week now, moved to a place that is closer to my family, and all of my bottom-lines are gone to pot. Seriously, they have slowly been inching back from "sleep on the couch" to "just don't touch me when we are in bed." Slowly but surely. 

And then yesterday happened: I got a disclosure that he had looked at porn twice while in the same room as our son. Granted it was while my little guy was sleeping- but I have a STRICT boundary and associated bottom-line with that. My Boundary: I do not ever want to have my son exposed to porn by his father. My bottom-line is this: Three strikes and your out. When I introduced that bottom-line (before I even knew what a bottom-line was) to my husband it was the first time I had found out that during one of the newborn night-shifts that he had looked at porn with the newborn in his arms. I told him in no uncertain terms that it was not okay with me- and that that was where I was drawing a line. He agreed with me, and I created the 3-strike rule. In my mind even THAT was generous. I didn't want there to be a second or a third time. EVER. As much as it hurts to get a "normal" disclosure, this kind of disclosure just rips up my insides. 

So yesterday morning, I got that disclosure which was strike three. I took a moment and took a shower and sobbed and sobbed. As a wife it hurt, but as a mother I feel like I have a job to do- to protect my child from this addiction. It is so heartbreaking when you bring a child into the mix. I knew what I needed to do: I needed to take some time for myself and reset my bottom-lines and boundaries. I also needed a bit of separation from my hubby to see if distance and space is what I needed. In my gut I knew what I needed to do- I needed to ask him to leave- and after some contemplation, 5 days seemed to be about what I needed from him. I prayed for peace and clarity, and thank heavens I did because I didn't expect what came next. 

So I went back in after my shower and I told him what I needed him to do. And he sat in shame and then he verbally attacked me. He hit every single part of me that he knew would hurt me- but I was able to see the reason why he was doing it.  I was blind-sited and hurt- but unwavering. He tried manipulating me- but I was able to see through it and held my ground.

It started to get worse and worse so I left with my son to drop him off at my parent's house, and I was able to hold it together until I saw my sister and I just broke down. I had a good cry- and luckily my sister was super supportive and told me that she would keep it on the DL- and started towards home again to get ready for a dentist appointment I had with my sister in law, but saw that the car was still at the house- he still hadn't left! I wasn't ready to see him again, so I went and used my tanning punch pass. That always relaxes me, and I was able to get my wits about me again.

As I drove back, I got a few texts from him apologizing for the words he had said. I was detached. Honestly I didn't care whether he apologized or not, I knew that he had been in addict mode that whole time and that he always regrets what he says when he is in addict mode. He does anything he can do to get what he wants.

The point is, that this is a hot topic of conversation- we really can't talk about it for more than maybe ten minutes before it gets infused with drama. He doesn't understand why my need for this time overrides him doing his own recovery work. I don't understand why- if he really wants this marriage to work- he won't give me the time and space that I need so that I can get myself into a healthy place and then work my boundaries and bottom-lines in a healthy way. THAT will help our marriage more than anything else could. I don't understand why he all of a sudden stopped supporting my bottom-lines. He can work recovery outside of the house- it is possible- it is plausible. I know that when setting a bottom-line, you have to be willing to do the thing that you are asking him to do if he says no. So this time when he said no, I started looking for places to stay, and he said fine he would leave. But then he didn't and it was late at night and he slept on the couch. For the last two nights.

So here is what I am clinging to right now:

1. We have an intensive therapy session tomorrow night and all day on saturday. I really hope that we can both get some clarity

2. The peace and relief that I felt when I just knew that I needed him to live somewhere else

3. The fact that while he is still in the house almost all day everyday that he is trying to give me a lot of space. At least there is that.

Here is what we are doing while we are in survival mode until therapy on friday night: We are doing an "in-house separation" He sleeps on the couch and we avoid each other. It works for now- sort of. He keeps saying that he is going to do one thing, but then he changes his mind and tries to cling on and hold on to us even tighter like he is going to lose us. 

I don't know. It's weird. I hate it. But I have clarity when I want to see it, and I have peace that I will come to the right conclusion as hard as it may be. Right now I am trying to still do the things that I was going to do when I asked him to leave the house for the 5 days. 

Vulnerable post that I've been working on for forever.

I'm going into it again, because I can't stop thinking about it, the women on the other side of the equation. 

I read this article and my heart just explode with about a million different emotions.

First, I was incredibly grateful and relieved that there was someone in this world who is fighting for these children

Second, I was so stricken by two of the things that were said:  "Human rights organizations agree there are at least 21 million victims of human trafficking in the world today, including 2 million children.

It is absolutely appalling to me that there are 2 million children in the world who are forced through this filth. But the part that struck me the hardest was the math that I did in my head: 21 million victims minus 2 million child victims means that 19 million of the other victims are my heavenly sisters and brothers.

My heart just ached with that figure.

And then I read this line: 

“The problem of child sex slavery is 100 percent the societal consequence of our pornographic world,” Ballard explains. “Pornography is a drug. Adult pornography is marijuana, and child pornography is the cocaine. When people move on to child pornography, eventually they want the real thing..."

My goodness, I feel like my life has led up to me reading that article- some dam inside of me broke. Can I explain?

It all began last week. 

Monday of last week I watched this video on Addo about a woman going public through her blog. (I think you have to be signed in to Addo to see the video, and if you don't have a log-in, you should get one!) Watching that video was just so eye-opening to me. 

Then I happened across this article by fight the new drug with russell brand talking about what viewing pornography be it soft or hardcore porn is doing to brains. And then hearing him be real about it- that it feels wrong, and that its extremely hard for him to stop- just matter-of-fact like that- no shame in it.

and that led me to that article which broke this incredible dam inside of me, something that I want so bad. Something that I have been dreaming of ever since I can remember. The reason why I am a women's studies minor. But something that I have felt like I could never do because I truly felt like I was a bad person. I felt like the rest of my life I would be playing catch up to the really good people, and despite the fact that I have a huge testimony of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, I felt like I was damaged goods.

So here it goes: My "biggest and worst secret" I haven't told anyone ever besides maybe 5 people- and even that is a recent thing. The thing that I don't want to be a secret any more because it's something that I am actually extremely proud that I overcame- and still am overcoming every day:

Guys. I was addicted to romance novels and masterbation from the ages of 12-21. TEN YEARS. I have been sober for 3 1/2 years, with a six month period right before that. The one-time break that I had when in between is when I realized that I had been white-knuckling it in hopes that marriage would fix my cravings, and it didn't. And that was it- I have been clean ever since. IT WAS HARD. I forced myself to find new hobbies, to focus on other things. I did it cold turkey it- which I know is not common- but combined with my work as a WoPA, I feel I was able to heal emotionally to the point where I didn't feel as damaged.

I am shaking as I write this. Who does this? Who writes their deepest darkest secrets and puts them on the internet for everyone to read? Oh! I do. haha. For some reason, it has been okay for me to put my hurt about my husband's addiction online, but not to be hurt about this.

Writing this when I know my only audience is women who have been hurt by a partner's addiction- or people whom I respect and trust enough to have access to this blog is hard. I am scared of judgement. I am scared that people will think less of me, and I am scared that I will lose this little support group that I feel I have on here. 

But I am putting this up here because it is a part of my story! It is a part of my healing. It is a part of who I have become. I am putting this up here despite of the fear- perhaps as a way to abolish the fear all together- to prove to myself what I tell my husband frequently: You are not the addiction- you are you, and overcoming this will make you a stronger you.

So. Here I am declaring that I will not be afraid of my past anymore. I am not damaged goods. I will not keep it a secret that I will take to the grave like I thought for those 10 years that I would. I will not be another person who contributes even one millimeter towards that awful world of trafficking- in fact, I want to help fight against it.

I always was one of those girls who wrote in her diary thinking "One day when I have changed the world, someone is going to read this entry in my diary and say "Look, that was when she was just a normal little girl and now look what she has become." I have always wanted to change the world. I watched girl rising (here is a link to a trailer), and get all fired up thinking that someday I will do something to help girls like these amazing, brave, and beautiful women.

But that feeling always went away when I thought about the things that I had done for those ten years; along with the fact that I feel that those choices had me thinking that marrying an addict would save the both of us. I thougt of where my choices have gotten me, and I would think that I had lost my chance to do that. To change the world for the better.

I am sometimes embarrassed because I change my career plans so much- but I am realizing that it is because I am always trying to find something that will make me feel as fulfilled as my original goal to help these women I am so drawn to: to start or run some sort of organization to help these girls that my heart sings out to all over the world. So I say I will become a doctor or a dentist or a lawyer- all for the intent of helping people- hoping that maybe I can do doctors without boarders, or some other cool thing that would at least be similar to helping these women that I am so drawn to on the other side of the world- but nothing has hit the mark for me yet.

I still don't know what I am going to do- but I want to be true to myself and true to who I have always wanted to be. And I am going to start by owning the struggles that I have- my own personal ones- and stop deflecting and pushing onto my husband. I am ready to stop worrying so much about him- he is doing a good enough job at doing that himself- And I am going to focus on me and explore what I am going to do about what I want out of my future. Is this how changing the world starts? I don't know- but just writing this post is changing my world, and right now, that's all that matters.

The process

Recovery-wise: Yesterday was amazing. Seriously awesome. 

J chose on his own to go to therapy. Say What?? Yes. You heard correctly- he chose to go to therapy on his own. 

I am used to being the one in our relationship to be doing recovery work. I got comfortable in the role and I liked it. I liked being the one to bring up hard conversations. I liked being the one who controlled where I was going. I got used to the idea that I was moving away from him as I did recovery work and he didn't. I liked being able to say: It doesn't matter what he does, I am going to take care of myself and let him be a big boy and be in charge of himself.

Welp. Now that he is doing recovery, I am thrown for a loop. I don't know how to describe it so I will try to process it on here.

I think I liked how easy it was to NOT trust him at all as he didn't do any recovery work. I liked how hard he tried to make me happy in other ways- like waking up with the little one so I could sleep in and helping me clean the house. I liked being successful roommates who didn't have to think about anything sexual/lovey-dovey in our relationship because I didn't feel safe.

Now that he is not just saying that he is doing recovery work- but actually doing the actions of going to therapy, signing up for group therapy every wednesday, being in the present moment, and opening up about the hard topics- I have never felt more confused.

I loved it while he was at therapy, I loved thinking about the fact that he had done therapy while he was away from me at work, but once he got home from work and was around, physically, my body was confused.

For so long I had been pushing away, I didn't realize how him doing recovery work would make him look more attractive to me... and yet there is not very much trust there. It's so confusing.

My mind subconsciously goes like this:

He went to therapy today!! :D

The therapist is a girl and he said he thought she was pretty. :(

He wants to connect!! :D

How long is this going to last? :(

Ugh.

Let's just go back to how genuinely happy and excited you were to see him?? 

When was the last time that happened?

*insert return to happy feelings*

I think I want to kiss him!! :D

*insert flashback of kisses I gave just so he would forget about the porn women* :(

Is that how I am feeling now? 

Am I just kissing him because I want to or because I don't want him to look at other women?

It is so stupid that I can't just enjoy a kiss from my husband

*insert bitter feelings*

Just smile and walk away so you can figure this shiz out, Ash.

And so suddenly it becomes very confusing for him too!

Consciously this is what happens:

Me: HI!! *super excited to see him*

Him: Opens up about therapy

Me: That is awesome! *super happy he is wanting to connect about recovery work, super bummed that I can't get out of my head that he said his therapist was a girl and was pretty. Even thought that is so amazing for him to be able to connect with a pretty girl without having any sexual thoughts come to his head doesn't help me and my fear cycle.* So I go quiet.

Him: Wants to connect somemore

Me: Can't because I am in my fear cycle

Him: I JUST WANT TO CONNECT

Me: Sorry I can't be like your PRETTY THERAPIST 

then we go to bed and wake up the next morning:

I go back to thinking about how excited that we are both on the recovery bandwagon again!

Me: I want to kiss him so I do!

We kiss.

I keep stopping so I can check to see WHY I am kissing him.

Him: Getting mad, thinking I am toying with him. shutting off.

I close off thinking he is playing old tricks of "shutting off" so that I want to "fix it"

Why is it so much more complicated when we BOTH are working recovery? I ask myself. Shouldn't it get easier? 

The answer is no. When we are both looking at the hard issues it freaking sucks.  I have had a glimpse of the life we could have after the suck- I know it's worth it- but geez! It doesn't make it any easier.

Also, I guess I am feeling a bit inadequate with my own recovery work. It is so much harder to sift through the crap when you're not forced to check in weekly with a therapy group; but I am really proud of the work that I had been doing on my own. And then J goes to one therapy session and faces about the same amount of junk that I have sifted through in a month! 

Suddenly in my mind HE is the one doing better at recovery than I am! Haha! Writing that made me laugh. I know how silly it sounds- it's my competitive side coming out. But I hate to be outdone. J does too. When we were in therapy together, it was rarely the two of us doing really good work together. It was usually one or the other excelling more than the other one. Either I was rocking it or he was. The other one was always in kind of a slump.

I loved being the one on top for so long- and now that he is working recovery, I hate it because I don't want to go into a slump! Haha! (this is so funny to me that I honestly feel this way!) I "know" it's my choice. 

This whole time- when he set an appointment for therapy, or when he talked to the therapist, they asked about me, and he said "She's a big girl, if she thinks she needs help, I am going to let her find it." Healthy way of thinking, right? I mean, it's what I was thinking all along for the last few months- That he is a big boy, and when he thinks he needs help, he can find it himself.

Well, subconsciously, I hear that and my egos all like "Seriously?? You are just going to climb on ahead and leave me here in a slump without giving me a leg up??" And then I get bitter.

I mean guys. I am a total mess.

But. Writing it out on here makes so much SENSE to me, even if it doesn't to anyone else. This messy mess is MY mess! And it's okay! It's all part of the process!

And recognizing that this is the way I have been thinking makes me realize that I can break that darn cycle we have going on! I don't have to be in a slump! We can BOTH be working recovery independently. I saw myself going into a slump because he was doing recovery work, and I resented him for putting me there. (BLAME)

And then I was going to just NOT go to therapy just to spite him and to prove to him that I could do an equal amount of recovery work without therapy- to prove to him that I was more awesome. (I mean the way my mind THINKS! haha)

So i am going to admit something on here that I never in a million years thought I would be saying when I first started writing this post: I need more help. I have more junk than I can handle myself, and I am going to call the therapist rather than wait for J to bring home a pamphlet or something. I am going to do the work for myself rather than waiting for someone to do the work for me. I am going to break this stupid Recovery Rockstar--> Recovery Slump cycle J and I are in and let his example bring me up rather than push me down.

I'm going to eat me a slice of humble pie.

Yet another way that Porn Kills Love

*Note: I said earlier that I would give notice if something that I write could be triggering. This is one of those posts.  It was one of those posts that was really hard for me to put into words how I was feeling- and I was about to just not post it- but then I decided that I wanted to hear what other people had to say about it. So please comment- this was a pretty vulnerable post for me to write, as I realize how judgmental I had been without realizing it- I hope it's my one step closer towards healing and receiving more christ-like love.

Whenever I have thought of the women on the other side of the porn equation- the women on the screen- I am filled with extreme emotions. I hate them- Don't they realize the pain that they are causing? Don't they care about us- the women on the other side? The women whose everyday real-life is being affected by their choice to pose for porn and the choice of our husbands to view it?

Every once in a while I would have a pang of sisterly-kindness towards them- and then I would get a disclosure and I would forget that they were humans- blinded by the pain that I feel when that happens.

This caused a state of disregard- I would forget about them- and my husband's addiction would become just that - a plain regular "addiction" again rather than a "porn addiction." I would forget about the faces on the other side.

Last night I indulged in my guilty pleasure: I watched the bachelor- Whether that is a healthy choice or not given my standing in life (because it is a mix of both) is not the point of this post- the point is that I got to see a side to porn that I rarely think about. 

One of the girls on the show (one of my favorites) revealed yesterday that two years earlier she was trying to start up a modeling career and had been approached to pose for a pornographic magazine, and she did. She was so nervous to tell the bachelor- worried that it would ruin her relationship with this man that she was falling in love with and wanted to get married to and start a family with. 

She pretty far it the show- all the way up to the part where each of the remaining girls gets to take the Bachelor home to meet their families. It was so interesting to watch. Her relationship with her family was so strained- her mom was wringing her hands, her brother wouldn't look her in the eye the whole time, and the nicest thing he said about her was that she was a "wild mustang". There was so much judgement in her Dad's eyes, and it was later revealed that he hadn't learned that she had chosen to pose in porn until one of his friends saw her online and made a comment to him about it. For one reason or another she hadn't told her dad fast enough, and he found out another way. Before he knew about the porn thing, the Bachelor had a chance to talk to her dad and commented on how what attracted him to her the most were her small-town values- her dad didn't say anything about it- he was silent for a moment and then just said that she was an independent thinker, and that she had a wild side,

Because of her experience of not telling her dad soon enough, she knew that she needed to be the one to tell the Bachelor about it before he found out about it from somebody else. It's really easy to read this guy this year on the Bachelor, the guy has a tell-tell sign that he is feeling uncomfortable- he coughs/clears his throat a lot. After meeting her family, she took him aside and finally told him about it. The words that she used were not proud- she listed off the reasons her life wasn't in the right place/mind frame when she chose to do it- and then I turned the TV off because the commercials hinted at her showing him the pictures. The point of this part is that he kept coughing/clearing his throat. He was uncomfortable. He had said the whole time that he liked that girl for her small-town values- and he eventually ended up not choosing her over the other girls.

The bachelor said that the reason why he voted her off isn't because of the "thing that she had said before" (he couldn't even specify as to what that was- that's how uncomfortable it of a conversation it was) But she went home devastated. Her prior choices had led to pain she never could have imagined.

Guys. I kept wanting to turn it off- but I kept being drawn to the TV like a mosquito to the flame. I couldn't stop watching because suddenly that girl behind the screen was a real life person. It's funny, because the whole time, I just wanted to take her and giver her a hug. I wanted to tell her about the atonement. I wanted to tell her that the person that she obviously wanted to become- the small-town, warm-hearted girl she had been the whole season up until that point- was totally obtainable through the atonement of christ. That she could be white as snow.

It totally ruined my vilification of the women behind the screen. They aren't all monsters. I learned in my "Human Sexuality" class (if that wasn't a triggering class for a WoPA, I don't know what is) that studies have been done that back this theory up- I learned that in a majority of cases studied (granted it's prostitution, not porn- but they are in the same family, and I imagine that similar thought processes go into both),  have at least one of the following in common with other prostitutes from their childhood or adolescence: Physical or Sexual abuse, family instability, poverty, dealings with exploiters, homelessness, and/or drug use. (if you want references, just let me know!) That is such a hard life! I'm not condoning the behavior that they use to cope with it- just that it is yet another reason why we need to end this sickness. Christ loves them. 

Porn kills love. 

Not only the love between myself and my husband, but even the potential love and happiness of the women behind the screen. 

The whole thing made me sick to my stomach with heartbreak- and so thankful for my Savior. He feels with us the pain that we feel- each and every one of us. Not only me- but the woman behind the screen too.