If I put myself in the place of someone who has learned their spouse has a sexual addiction my first thought is, “I’m out of here.” That is a knee jerk reaction I image is shared by most that discover such disturbing information about a spouse.
Should that first reaction be the step you take? Is your marriage doomed to end because of sexual addiction? I personally don’t think divorce is the answer until you’ve turned over every stone and come to an educated decision about what is right for you and the marriage.
Below are things you can do that will help you make a final and educated decision about whether to stay or leave the marriage.
What to do About Your Husband’s Sexual Addiction
1. Do your research; find out all you can about sexual addiction. When researching you should not only focus on the spouse who is sexually addicted but yourself also. I have found that most people research the problems of the other person in hopes of finding a way to change them.
When faced with marital problems the only person you can change is yourself. When gathering information be sure to find out what about you got you there, it can tell you a lot about whether or not you need to stay.
2. Find a good support group. You local mental health association can put you in touch with a sex addicts support group such as COSA, an organization for those whose lives have been negatively touched by the sexual behaviors of another person.
3. Find a therapist who is an expert in sexual issues and family of origin issues. There may be issues you need to address from your family of origin that lead you to marry someone with an addictive personality.
4. Do not tolerate what you feel is intolerable. People married to sex addicts, alcoholics or drugs addicts tend to be co-dependent. Co-dependents have a hard time setting boundaries with others about what is and isn’t acceptable behavior.
The more adept you are at setting boundaries, the more self-esteem you will have and the more empowered you will feel.
5. Insist that your spouse become actively involved in a sex addicts support group. Not only does the addict need a 12 step program to address their issues, you, the wife, needs to see a willingness to work through their issues. If you stay in the marriage trust will need to be rebuilt and for that to happen the addict will have to show, via their own work that they are worthy of your trust.
6. Don’t threaten to leave the marriage unless you are serious. Empty threats to leave only reinforce the addict’s belief that he/she can behave inappropriately and you will still be there. It won’t take your spouse long to realize that you aren’t really going to leave.
Instead of threatening to leave take action. If your spouse witnesses you researching the problem, going to support group meetings and setting firm boundaries you will send a stronger message than an empty threat to leave will.
It has been proven that to change another you must first change yourself. Responding in the same manner to any problem in your marriage only prolongs the problems. If your spouse sees you changing the way you typically respond to problems they may be spurred into making changes in themselves.
When it comes to addiction of any kind, the addict won’t address their own issues until they are faced with the likelihood of losing what is most valuable to them. If you focus on helping yourself instead of focusing on fixing the addict you are more likely to elicit the change you wish for.
If, in the end, your spouse refuses to seek help the likelihood of him/her changing is slim. Whether they change or not is unimportant because what you have done is take action to educate and protect yourself. Your future and emotional wellbeing will no longer depend on what your sex addicted husband does but on what decisions you make about what is and isn’t in your best interest.
There is a process psychologist referred to as “detachment.” What I have described above are the actions of someone who has detached themselves from their spouse’s behaviors. Detachment is a difficult process to explain BUT I believe it is the most effective way to deal with an addict.
If you want to “detach” and do what is best for you, the addict and the marriage print out the points below and change your behavior accordingly.
- Accept and embrace your own inabilities to change the sex addict.
- Do not engage in snooping or watching the sex addicts every move.
- Accept that you cannot control the sex addict or what he/she does.
- DO NOT react in the same old way.
- Focus your time and energy on your life and what you want from your life.
- Set boundaries in a loving manner and expect respect and kindness in return.
- Detaching does not mean ignoring negative sexual behavior or becoming a doormat.
- Accept that, in the end, your marriage may not survive.
Some people define “sexual addiction” in pretty loose terms. Before throwing a shaming label on someone, identify whether it is a legitimate addiction.
Sexuality is healthy and normal but has a long history of cultural shaming from Puritanism and unhealthy cultural attitudes.
Shame can make any legitimate addiction much worse. A compassionate attitude, with good boundaries, will get better results than shame.
I disagree about snooping and I also deny the “codependent” labels far too often put on women. I have no issues with boundaries. The second I went through “D-Day,” my husband was out the door. After 1.5 years of recovery, he returned. We had open communication and rebuilt trust, boundaries in place. I never felt the urge to snoop because because I was overcoming my trauma by living day-by-day. But if I had snooped, I would have seen that he was STILL acting out. He fooled his sponsors (must they be codependents, then?), he fooled me, and he fooled my family. He’s an incredibly loving-seeming husband. He just can’t be honest. And so out again he goes but this time for good. Labeling me as a “codependent” only furthered my trauma. Just hearing the word is a trigger now.
Betrayal trauma is the only model which fits me and my experience very well. Please stop telling women that they are at fault for wanting to protect themselves from future damage. I have children. The responsible thing would have been to snoop and protect my family. This is how children get molested in these situations. Women detach and pretend it’s not on them to protect themselves and their family.
I’m curious, who labeled you as codependent? A codependent enables bad behavior. A codependent doesn’t make her husband leave, she makes excuses for her husband. She takes on responsibility for her husband’s bad behavior. From your comment, it sounds like you’re anything but codependent.
Love your answer, she is not a codependent, she is a strong woman and mother. I too have heard way to much about us women being codependent. We’ve been lied to and gaslighted, our hearts shreaded, cheated on and disgraced and We get labeled codependent! That has to stop! I’ve said many times…back in the day, They would have simply been a down right cheating jerk! And now they put a more medical name on them “sex addicts” so they can be sheltered while we’ve been working, running the household, caring for our children, cooking, cleaning and holding up the family because they were too busy!!! Do i have PTS, I believe so after 40 years of his lies and abuse! But guess what, I’m much stronger yet than he is or ever will be!
I am a husband of SA and I am in marriage 25years. I have 3 almost adult kids. I tell her to live a hundred times, but she don’t want. I no more sniffing because I already know what I will see. I ignored her in every day life, but she reacted and live like nothing happened. I can’t find the right formula to go out from this marriage without harming my kids. If someone of you know the right way I am ready to learn, to pay or whatever you want…
You have 3 adult children? What you do is sit them down, tell them your truth and that you don’t want to live inside that kind of marriage any longer. They are adults, they can handle it. Let their Mom explain her lifestyle to them while you file for divorce and hopefully find someone else to share your life with.
Thanks for your answer!
I really appreciate what all of you say here. I understand that this is place for wife’s but believe me there is very little or no places for husbands, so one reason for me to be here is that and another is to try to get help or advice from female point of view, or from “another side”.
So, no offense but 99% of people here with real life experience with an sex addict will know that things not going just like that, and they will know what I talking about.
So, after many times I truing with gentle approach to problem like ” honey, do you have something to tell me?”, or “I see that something is wrong, do you want to speak with me about of that?”… that my “gentle approach” was in the time when I already lost everything because of he for me strange behavior. In that my attempts to make her to open up one day (in one of million conversation when she looked me in my eyes and lied to me) I say that if she still denied that have problem, I will speak with she’s mother and with kids. When we come home after this conversation, she literally run from the car, go inside before me and immediately start to speak to my kids that I imagine that she doing all that things and start to count some of the things who she really do. For me, she is sociopath and extremely good manipulator, so she put the kids in the shock in attempt to save her credibility (do not say ass) by tell them part of truth and use their trust because she know that is hard for him to believe, and in the same time she use that against to me to show me as very seek person. Reaction of my bigger girl was screaming all night and thell me ” daddy, please go get help for you before is too late”… that I will never forget!!! In that moment I learned something what I didn’t know how looks before… I learned to hate.
So, it’s not so simple or just like that. I will sacrifice my self and never bring my kids in that situation until the moment when I find the right formula to leave that woman.
In my first post I try to be short because I assume that everybody here know what I want to say, because almost all sax addict acting and reacting in almost same way.
Any way I will appreciate any advice or help!
Greetings for all!
I fear how my husband will spin his actions to our grown sons. We are having trouble with his sexual issues, he wants to do things that don’t fit in a marriage, and he blames me for trying to change him and control him when I stand up for my dignity and our marriage. He is so emotional and angry that I’m challenging his sexual wants which don’t include me, that I fear he will do the same thing your wife did, try to poison our son’s minds against me and blame this all on me. I feel like approaching them first with a discreet explanation of what’s going on may be a betrayal of loyalty to my husband. It feels like trying to poison the kids against him, when it is simply the truth of what degrading things he expects of me. I’m so sorry your wife did this to you in front of your kids. I hope you can find recovery and peace after that. I pray my husband and me can keep it civil and respect each other, and not disturb our kids with this horrible mess.