RowboatAndMarbles

Here's a thought: Go meet with your bishop. Talk with him about what's going on. Then have him call in your husband and tell your husband with the bishop there. Having another person in the room can keep the parties from getting abusive. Also, bambi, I want to propose an additional view of this situation and what you're dealing with. Often sex addiction is associated primarily with men and pornography. What we now understand, however, is that women can also be sex addicts although their acting tends to be less often with pornography. Women can be addicted to the emotional connection and this can lead to acting out with someone outside the marriage. I encourage you to consider the possibility that you have an addictive personality and that your decision-making was impaired as you became more and more involved with this other guy. In any event, addicted or not, you really should get professional counseling to help you address the issues underlying your compulsion (or decision) to act out. Telling your husband now or down the road should be dependent upon your having an emotional safety net to deal with the fallout. Sooner is not always better if you don't know what your getting yourself into. Consider joining a 12 Step group such as Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (SLAA) or Sexaholics Anonymous (SA) and associating with other women who are in similar circumstances but further along in recovery. Being able to talk with someone who has walked your path will be very helpful to you.

Theoretically, a bishop is a good resource for spiritual guidance. Practically, however, my experience as a recovering addict and my wife's experience as the spouse of a recovering addict is that while bishops are usually great at empathizing, they are often very short on understanding what sex and pornography addiction is really about and the damage sex addiction always causes to the spouse. My advice to SunFlower is to always, always trust your gut feelings. Always. The other thing I recommend is that you attend and get to know women in S-Anon. They will help you recognize and repair the damage (too often unseen or unnoticed) caused by your husband's addiction. S-Anon is better than just about any program out there (including the Church's) at helping women recover from their husbands' sex addiction. A lot of LDS are gravitating to S-Anon because they find other women there who have walked that path before and have answers. I really hope you'll forgive the self-promotion, but we've got a website rowboatandmarbles.org (*edit to remove link) that addresses recovery from sex addiction both for the addict and the spouse--from the Latter-day Saints perspective. There's a lot of good stuff there that can help LDS women understand exactly what they're dealing with when their husband has a "little porn problem." In particular, "edit to remove link" is a good primer about what to look for in a husband who is either in recovery or continuing to act out on his addiction. Gook luck to you! Remember to trust your gut!

Greetings. This is my first post. I wanted to put a plug in for a website that is dead-on with the topic of this thread. The site is rowboatandmarbles.org. I'm having trouble with the link, but I think you can click here. It has a unique perspective. It contains essays about sex and pornography addiction from Latter-day Saints who have successfully found recovery. The writers talk about what they've done to stop acting out with pornography and compulsive sexual behavior. They explain why it's so hard for many LDS men to admit they even have a problem. They talk about the changes they had to make on the inside with character defects that seemed to have nothing to do with sex and pornography. Most importantly they share how Heavenly Father changed them when they were unable to change themselves. The site also has essays from LDS women who are finding recovery from damage caused by their husbands' addictive behavior. They are honest and insightful. They give a huge thumbs-up to S-Anon which is a bit unusual because most posters in the Bloggernacle seem to think that the Church's 12 Step group is the only one out there that LDS women should consider. In fact, a lot of LDS women who have tried both the Church's 12 Step and S-Anon tend to stick with...S-Anon. The same goes for addicts. If they go to the Church's PASG program and then to Sexaholics Anonymous they realize pretty quickly that SA is actually much better at helping LDS men regain their integrity than the Church's own PASG meetings. Latter-day Saints who try SA tend to stick with SA. I guess the point I'd make is that there are a lot of amazing resources out there for LDS addicts and spouses, if they're willing to look a little outside the four walls of the Church. I encourage you to check out the site. The two most popular essays are "A Letter to the Wives" (What every LDS woman needs to know about sex and pornography addiction) and "The ABCs of Addiction" (The real reasons why so many LDS men can't kick the pornography problem). It's good stuff. Realistic but hopeful.