Hi all

I'm a husband of almost 17 years and a father of four. I've also been addicted to pornography since I was very young. My wife is having an emotional affair with a neighbor and I need some validation of my terrifying exposure plan. We are LDS, and all the targets understand that the word "Ward" in the letter refers to our local church unit. The (rather long - sorry!) letter I'm planning on using follows:

Dear friends and family

I�m writing you this letter because you are an important person in [wife]�s and my life. We�re facing some pretty significant difficulties as a family and I need you to know about them so that you can offer your support to both of us.

Many of you already know I�m fighting an addiction to pornography. This fight is going well - better than it�s ever gone for me. For fuller details, please see ***EDIT*** That has many of the details of my personal struggle as well as my progress. For those unfamiliar with addiction, it is easy to pass judgement. I ask you to refrain from doing so. This is a sickness that I finally have the tools to overcome. I would love your support in this.

As you can imagine, this has caused quite a lot of difficulty for [wife] throughout our almost 17 years of marriage. She has been very supportive and has been a key player in me keeping my life together up to this point.

Tonight she asked me to leave for a month so that she could work through some difficulties she�s been having regarding our marriage. I know that some of you supported her and even encouraged her in this decision. If my addiction were the only thing contributing to our marital situation right now, I would happily go as she asked. There�s another very large problem though.

Sometime around December 2014 or possibly earlier, [wife] became close friends with [OM] who lives in our Ward. They quickly started chatting/texting most days and into many nights. I became aware that this was a problem in March of this year while at a conference. I learned through the SMS logs on T-Mobile�s dashboard page that they were exchanging literally thousands of text messages per day. On learning that I knew about this, [wife] and [OM] immediately started using an app called Telegram to communicate securely and �secretly�, as advertised by the app. She has confessed to me that she is no longer in love with me, and that she is, in fact, in love with ***EDIT***, though she denies that it is an affair.

I trust her that the relationship is not sexual, but emotional affairs can be just as damaging, and I�ve failed to get her to consider this.

I sincerely hope that these issues are foreign and surprising to you. If they are, I ask you again to withhold judgement and offer us your support. Heaven knows we both need it. To learn more about pornography addiction,***EDIT***and to learn more about emotional affairs, ***EDIT***.

[wife] and I were made for each other and our marriage can be so much better than it�s ever been. We just need a lot of help to get there right now.

Thanks,
[me]


......

Our situation isn't as clean-cut as many, given my addiction and that her affair is emotional and not sexual. My wife has already exposed my addiction to many of her friends, so my intent here is to essentially force us both out of the closet. We need help!

Does this make sense? Thanks in advance,
Bob

To protect online safety, please do not post names or links to sites.

Thanks, Ariel - I thought I had removed all the names and wasn't aware of the danger of links.

Hi clean,

Welcome to MB.

I would strongly suggest you stick more closely to the template letters as this one muddies the waters so much.

She's having an affair and you need her to end it because you love her and want to recover your marriage. That's all anyone needs to know.

Your addiction has nothing to do with her affair and has no place in this letter. Also whether a physical affair or emotional affair you should simply refer to it as 'affair'. It doesn't matter what kind.

On a separate note though, I'm concerned that your addiction is considered a 'work in progress' instead of something that must simply be stopped asap. You will always have the addiction but that doesn't mean you have to exercise it.

You will not be able to Plan A at all until your pornography use stops. The way to do this is to make it impossible to access. You also need to be monitored and held accountable.

Are you willing to do that?

I think it is a very unwise idea to trust someone this blindly when in the grip of her own addiction. Her feelings tell her she owes you nothing, least of all honesty, while her feelings for him dictate that she must protect him from you and protect the affair from interference.

How many relationships go on at this intensity level, for several months, against their own beliefs, without even kissing? It's not realistic.



It's exactly as clean cut as any other type of affair. Your addiction might cause a loss of love or a decision to divorce - but it didn't create an affair or feelings for another guy. She put time and effort into developing those.

As for the affair being emotional, ALL affairs are emotional. That is the most dangerous aspect and characterizes 99pc of affairs. It leads to sexual feelings and sexual acts. If it hasn't yet, it is going to.

Here:

Dear friends and family,

I am writing you this message because you are an important person in the lives of xxxx and I. As some of you know, xxxxx has recently asked me for a separation, which has shattered my heart. To my shock, I am saddened to have discovered that the reason is because she has been carrying on an affair with a old boyfriend named xxxxx xxxxx who resides in xxxxxx. He is also married and has young children . The purpose of the separation is so that she can carry on her affair without my interference.

She refuses to end the affair. I want our marriage to recover from this affair. If you have any influence on my babe, please do what you can to get her to stop this dangerous affair. I want to stay married, but the affair must end.

As our friends and family, I am asking that you use your influence with xxxx to persuade her to end her affair and try to work on our marriage. Our marriage can be salvaged if she would only end the affair. Please support her in doing the right thing. Please support our marriage.

I would so appreciate your support and prayers.

Warmest regards,
_________________________

Dr H has successfully eliminated porn use for many people with swift, no nonsense advice.

Many of the members here have had a former porn addiction.



Here:

http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi8122_Pornography.html

I fear that if I use the template, she has an easy out to any friend that approaches her that it's because of my addiction. Then, in each case, I have to explain "yes, yes I do have this addiction and it made it hard on her, but she chose to have the affair..."

I also could really use the support. It wouldn't be better to preempt all those questions with a confession?

The purpose of exposure is to kill the affair. It is not intended to air all of your dirty laundry. If your wife says that you have a porn addiction, you can say yes, I do. However, that has absolutely nothing to do with her affair. It is unrelated. We expect her to blame shift, so that will be no surprise. Most people are smart enough to recognize blame shifting when they see it. [some are not, but that is ok]

As you are exposing her affair here are some good clips from Dr Harley on porn addiction.

Dr. Harley on the Scourge of Pornography

It's often the case that a BS has heard so much blameshifting for so long that they give it far too much credence.

Your friends will be objective and anyone with an ounce of sense will see the obvious truth that an affair is not a related response to a porn addiction.

Besides their response is irrelevant. The point of exposure is to ruin the image of the relationship in the mind of the wayward spouse. The end of the protective bubble of secrecy is often enough. If people want to condemn it too, great but not essential.

However it's highly unlikely anyone is going to tell her that your wrongs give her a free pass to harm you. She will say that - few others would.

Throughout your plan A you are going to have to appear confident and completely lacking in defensiveness. Never let it appear that you are listening to any nonsense about how you deserve this.

CleanBob, This reminds me of my story. I am also LDS, and I used to think that being LDS, somehow made my situation different from others on this site. I have since learned that it is the same script that plays out over and over again on here. Your wife has essentially become addicted to the OM, much the same way that you have been addicted to Pornography. My wife also claimed that she wasn�t having an affair, and that OM was just a friend. After I discovered my wife�s relationship with her boss, she just found a way to keep it a secret. Because of this, I spent 6 months in a false recovery while my wife continued to have an emotional affair, all the while watching me bend over backwards to be the best husband on the planet (cake eating)�

The key to end your wife�s affair is a full blown exposure. You need to simplify that letter, and spell it out, that your wife is having an affair with OM, and your marriage is threatened. You need to expose to your wife�s friends and family, and also the OM�s friends and family. Do all the reading that you can on this site, and learn Dr. Harleys ideas and principles. You can save this marriage, if you will follow what you are told from the posters here.

Believe me, you are not different at all from the many posters on here, and don�t think even for a second that because you are LDS, that nothing physical has happened between your wife and OM. She is addicted, and will lie right to your face, that is why it is important to do all the snooping you can, to find out the extent of their relationship. You need to learn how to recover texts from her phone to find out how deep this has really become.

Learn about plan A. Angry outbursts will only push her away. You need to be kind and loving, and be the best husband you can be. While becoming a full blown investigator in the background. Read up on VAR�s ( Voice activated recorders). You may be able to catch your wife talking to him on the phone.

In addition to being irrelevant to the affair, you sounds as if you have already exposed your addiction.

Focus on the issue at hand. Keep it simple and use the template indiegirl posted.

Make sure that you include your bishop in the exposure. The OM's wife will probably go to him for help.

The only way that I think it could be different is that MORE people will know and I would make sure that your kids know first since their neighbors and friends will know.

Does OMW know?

Btw...

You had "porn affairs" for 17 years. I see why you consider it a factor. But the others are correct. It is not an excuse. Poor OMW. Now one of your families will have to move.

I would also send your wife a Plan A letter at the same time as exposure, including details about how your "acting out" is OVER and detailing the steps you are taking right now to make it impossible for you to act out. Progress with porn addiction doesn't cut it. Making her your one and only does. No more slip ups, no more checking out other women. Learn to refocus your mind.

What technical accountability steps have you undertaken to eliminate ANY POTENTIAL for Porn viewing?

You still need to break up the affair on your Wayward Wifes end, but that is not a free pas as a reason to not eliminate completely your own discretions.

This is an opportunity for You to make significant life changes that are permanent.

LTL

Exactly!!

I haven't made any. We talked about this years ago and we ended up in a bad situation where we avoided it because we thought it would create resentment from me to her. It's clear to me now that this was a poor choice. At one point we bought a "clean router" but it didn't help. I'm certainly willing to put something like this in place.

I spoke with the OMW and she doesn't seem like she believes me. My wife knows I spoke with her and thinks I'm being malicious. I've spoken with my parents, her mother (father is deceased) and our Bishop so far. No letter yet.

She knows I spoke with my parents and expressed that she feels attacked and betrayed. She keeps saying I need to work on my own problems and let her worry about hers.