She thinks it’s cheating, he thinks it’s no big deal.\u00a0 Neither are right.\u00a0 The truth lies somewhere in the middle.\u00a0 Honestly speaking, porn creates a lot of clients for counselors.\u00a0 Since the widespread popularity of the internet, the availability and intensity of porn have increased exponentially.\u00a0 I call it an epidemic.\u00a0 It’s crazy when you think about it.\u00a0 Porn is available to any degree, any time someone wants it and just about any place you can get a cell phone signal.\u00a0 So is porn just the root of all evil?\u00a0 Are people who view it just weak and perverted?\u00a0 No, no, and NO!<\/p>\n
I’m not here to debate porn.\u00a0 I am simply here to state that it can, and does, cause problems for people.\u00a0 By the time people hit my office to discuss porn, there is a problem alright, and it is BIG!\u00a0 Wife has caught him and rages constantly over his ‘sin’, or he’s gotten so caught up in the fantasy world that he’s taken it into real life and cheated, or worse\u00a0 (something even HE thought he’d never do), the cops have come and seized all the computers from their home, or worse yet – he’s lost his job and maybe even his family.\u00a0 Please don’t minimize this article thinking, “Ah, that’s not going to happen to me!”\u00a0 These are all real <\/em>examples of real <\/em>people who have sat on my couch in excruciating pain over these exact\u00a0situations – and they all minimized their behavior once, too.<\/p>\n So what is so bad about it?<\/p>\n 1) Porn creates a fantasy world for people to escape.\u00a0 This escape allows us to run from our feelings, problems, fears, failures instead of dealing with them.\u00a0 Much like how an alcoholic uses alcohol, porn is a way to numb out.\u00a0 Porn provides for us something that we don’t know a more mature and healthy way of getting<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 The problem with escaping to the fantasy world is that the problems are still there when you come back, and\u00a0eventually are aggravated by this unhealthy coping mechanism.<\/p>\n 2) Porn sets up a standard that cannot be duplicated in real life in a long-term relationship.\u00a0 Bodies change!\u00a0 Time and the stress of life bring extra weight, stretch marks, wrinkles, scars, age spots, sagging skin and graying hair despite our best efforts to stop it.\u00a0 Constantly looking at the perfect airbrushed bodies online will give you a disappointing comparison when you look at your loving, faithful wife’s aging body each night.\u00a0 Further, the fantasy offers emotionless, problem-free, pleasure-only interactions with someone who can’t see your faults and failings.\u00a0 No one can offer that to you here on earth consistently.\u00a0 We want <\/strong><\/em>the fantasy (all-good) relationship but simultaneously need <\/strong><\/em>long-term love, acceptance\u00a0and connection with one person.\u00a0 If your wife is workable, she can give you the (realistic)\u00a0best of both worlds, but YOU have to meet her in the middle.<\/p>\n 3) All of this avoidance means there is a build-up of emotion, pain, fear, disappointment, etc.\u00a0 When we don’t deal with this growing mass, it becomes bigger and we need MORE<\/em> fantasy and escape to get the same result (numbing out).\u00a0 This is where people wind up divorced, fired, in jail, or otherwise humiliated beyond belief.\u00a0 Your coping mechanism (porn) has become an addiction when it negatively affects your life.\u00a0 Since it’s all done in secret, it is easy for you to minimize and justify until\u00a0it hits the fan and\u00a0blows up in your face.\u00a0<\/p>\n What\u00a0is porn providing for you?\u00a0 Has viewing it caused problems in your life?\u00a0 Do you only view it in secret?\u00a0 Have you tried to\u00a0stop?\u00a0Is your wife making a lot of noise about it?<\/p>\n It’s embarrassing to talk about, I know, but I implore you to find out the role porn plays in your life now.\u00a0\u00a0Doing so\u00a0could possibly prevent a world of hurt for yourself and your family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" She thinks it’s cheating, he thinks it’s no big deal.\u00a0 Neither are right.\u00a0 The truth lies somewhere in the middle.\u00a0 Honestly speaking, porn creates a lot of clients for counselors.\u00a0 Since the widespread popularity of the internet, the availability and intensity of porn have increased exponentially.\u00a0 I call it an epidemic.\u00a0 It’s crazy when you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[394,399,488,433,400,427,448,424,497,490,442,492,499,493,500,429,447,494,1205,501,420,430,495,436,485,451,414],"class_list":["post-3966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marriage","tag-abandonment","tag-affairs","tag-being-healthy-in-a-relationship","tag-cause-of-depression","tag-cheating","tag-conflict-in-relationships","tag-coping","tag-counseling","tag-disconnectiong","tag-fighting","tag-giving-too-much-in-relationships","tag-individual-growth","tag-intimacy","tag-job-loss","tag-marital-conflict","tag-marriage","tag-marriage-counseling","tag-mental-health","tag-porn","tag-raging","tag-recovery","tag-relationships","tag-rock-bottom","tag-shame","tag-therapy","tag-tragedy","tag-why-people-cheat"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3966"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3966\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4564,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3966\/revisions\/4564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healingheartsofindy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}