My husband and I have been together for 6 years (married for 3). He has always stated that he never had an interest in pornography. We even watched the movie Fireproof and he agreed with how the wife was feeling about her husband veiwing pornography online.

I've always periodically viewed our history on our computer at home because we have teenage boys in the house and I've always been so happy to see that everything was always cars or computer geek stuff, until one day. I found a woman name that had been searched and when I clicked on it, took me to a porn sight. He admitted he was the only one home and that he did it. He states he was watching tv and something came on about octomom doing porn so he searched that and then he saw another link and clicked on that then he saw a list of videos and clicked on one of the videos. The thing is, he lied and said he only looked at the first page and then went out, but i had seen the links that were different colors and could see where he had clicked. He finally admitted that he did click but that he thought he deleted the links from our history.

This by itself tells me he knew he was doing something wrong, disrespectful to me and secretive if he had to delete it.

When asked why he searched octomom's porn pictures to begin with he said "i dont know". Then I asked why he had to search this other woman and he said "i wanted to see what she looked like" I said her picture is on the page you clicked on, why did you click a video?" and he said "i dont know".

Now how can a man who can tell you his thought process in every other thing, every other arena, any other time, not be able to tell me his thought process that afternoon? Why would a man who was never interested in pornography (and I believe him since I've never seen anything in our history before) all of a sudden out of the blue, be curious?

And is "i don't know" an acceptable answer? I feel if he asks me where the car keys are and I say " I don't know" then it's acceptable, but if he asks me why I turned right instead of left I'd be able to tell him what I was thinking that made DO that...like "oh I was thinking the restaurant was on the other side of town" ...

Is it wrong to want it all? My husband's body, heart and mind? because I think if he's looking at porn, I'm certainly not in his mind whether he's imagining sex with them or not.

He promises he'll never do it again, and since starting to read the His Needs Her Needs outloud with each other, we've talked more the last three days than we have the last three years, but I just still don't buy that "i don't know" is an accepable answer. We had a very hard time getting through the honesty chapter....

Thanks for your thoughts...

Lorelei432

Welcome to Marriage Builders, Loralei. I am somewhat alarmed at the arguing you do with your husband. You do understand that arguing is a massive lovebuster?

Secondly, he answered your question of why he looked at octomom yet you continued to badger him. He said he wanted to look at her. It is obvious he is interested in looking at porn and I don't know why you would ask him such a goofy question. What do you want him to say? I would stop asking that question over and over again, because it frustrates him and there is no answer that is going to resolve the situation.

Instead I would get a keylogger on the computer that he doesn't know about and see what he is doing when you aren't watching. He may be looking at porn much more than you know.

And most of all, if you want your husband to be in love with you, you need stop badgering him and stop arguing. The discussion you described made me cringe and was bound to be a huge lovebuster for him.

I understand arguing is a Love Buster, and I reread what I wrote that made you cringe because we weren't arguing when I was asking the questions. I felt hurt and betrayed and he even agreed that I had a right to ask questions. He didn't try to make excuses or defend himself other than saying "i don't know".

I wanted to know if that answer is supposed to be accepted without question, because even as parents if a child does something wrong and you ask them why they did it, and they say "i don't know" they still get punished.

The only punishment that really came to my husband was that he broke a trust I had for him. I had always believed porn was a "non-issue" for us so now, like you pointed out...he can be looking much more than I ever knew.

My goal by even questioning is to find out his though process (especially when it was out of character for him) to help discover what's going on or what's missing in our marriage and how and what I could do to prevent his desire to even look at porn.

However, I feel that putting a key tracker on the computer goes against the Radical Honesty thing, and me being the secretive one then. The RAdical Honesty is also why I felt the "i don't know" answer was just a cover against telling me the real reason, which he might think would hurt me".

I don't know, maybe I'm way off here, but I honestly don't do anything when my husband isn't around that i CAN'T or WON'T do when is IS around...

But he is your equal, not your child. And when I read your post it seemed you were treating him like a bad little boy. And the question is really ridiculous. We know why he did it: he likes porn and he had the opportunity. The solution is to remove the opportunity.


Instead of going through that, I would focus on removing the opportunity and then focus on making your marriage GREAT.


It does not go against Radical honesty; Dr Harley recommends doing this. Snooping is a good way to uncover potential problems in your marriage and address them. It is also a great way to build trust when you know what your spouse is doing when you are not watching.



However, he did answer you and you didn't accept his answer. I would suspect the badgering he received would greatly discourage him from being radically honest in the future.

'I don't know' might be the whole truth. Either way, it is disrespectful to keep asking as it implies he is lying when he may not be.


Yes, this is the right way to approach the problem - a joint issue to be resolved in a positive way.


Dr Harley says we are all hard wired to have affairs and that snooping is good for marriages. You have already seen how this works in practice via this wake-up call. Both of you should be entitled to snoop on the other whenever you wish to.

thank you both - you both have made valid points and I appreciate your input. You're right, he's my equal, not my child.

He did tell me though, that if things were reversed and I had done something behind his back and answered with "i dont know" that he would have the same misgivings/reservations about my honesty.

He and I are committed to each other and I have every confidence that we'll figure it out....but I doubt I'll come to the forum again with a question.

I don't think I would ever tell someone their question is goofy or ridiculous (even if I thought it), because obvious it's something weighing heavy on their hearts or minds. I was hoping to get clarity, which I did get some, without judgment.

thanks again for your insight and have a nice day ladies.

That is very probably an honest answer and is what I would expect from someone is watching porn or having an affair. The simple answer is that he likes it and he had the opportunity. Finding out WHY is a waste of time. And badgering him with the same question is a huge lovebuster.

It takes precious time away from finding solutions. The solution here is that you remove the opportunity. Put a keylogger on the computer and perhaps a porn block.


I am pretty straightforward and I thought you were sincere when you asked for opinions. I wasn't aware you seeking validation for badgering him for saying "I don't know." I hate to see when someone is wasting their time with a line of reasoning that is unhelpful. That question is very unhelpful and is a distraction from taking pro-active steps to resolve the problem.

Dr Harley counsels AGAINST trying to find out the "why" of bad behaviors in affairs and that principle can be applied here:


In other words, what are the conditions that led to his porn watching? Easy availability of a computer that doesn't have a block on it. Change that situation and you will be removing the opportunity.


That's ok because the purpose of the forum is not to resolve specific conflicts, but to learn the skills to do that on your own.

To boil it down to a Dr Phil sized bite, "Why ask why?" MB is more concerned with what, as in what are you going to do. It's not really interested in why it was done.

What are you going to do?
What Love Busters are you committing?
What Emotional Needs are you neglecting?
What Extraordinary precautions are you taking?

MB is a what program, not a why program. You can ask why all day long and not accomplish a single thing.

Sexual arousal shifts blood from certain centres of reasoning in the brain, which then may lead people to make decisions that they later regret. This is true for both men and women. However, men are wired to respond to visual stimulation far, far more than women. Because our brains treat imagined images much the same as actual images we see with our eyes, when a guy starts to think about someone naked he gets aroused. As a man becomes aroused, his reasoning centres shut down, to an extent. Yes, this means that the stupid jokes about men thinking with their penises actually have some scientific basis to them. In a practical sense this means is that as a man thinks of sexually arousing materials, such as porn, he loses the ability for sound judgement. The more he thinks about it and the more he immerses himself in porn itself, the more focused he becomes on the object of his excitement, to the detriment of his rational mind. This is why men often come out of a pornography session and all of a sudden are struck by the reality of what they did in a way that just did not hit home to them while they were in the midst of it. It is because those areas of the brain that had shut down to allow them to singularly focus on sex are now firing back up and a wave of consequences hits them.

So, yes, "I don't know why I did it" is a very realistic response. However, this does not absolve him of responsibility. What it means is that the time for thinking this stuff through and avoiding it is when something first occurs to begin the mental stimulation process. Prevention before action starts is the only way to predictably avoid problems. For that, read the book.