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Recovery is for "YOU", not "HER"

GYE Corp. Saturday, 31 December 2011

Someone wrote to Dov:

When I want to leave to get on the call, go to my office, go daven, etc... she yells at me and says that the only reason why I'm going anywhere is so that I can go look at porn... so I stay home to show her that it isn't my intentions to look at porn and that I really love her.


Dov replies:

A few blunt things to say about this. And I will be extra blunt by uncharacteristically using the "you" word, rather than "I" or "we" here. Bear with me:

You do not stay at home because you love your wife.
You do not protect her from her fears in order to show her how much you love her.
You do not stay away from porn because you love her.
You do not argue with her and try to prove to her that you are really sober this time or serious about recovery this time. All this is just the same manipulation you have always used to try and mold her mind to fit yours while you were acting out. Doing so is poison for you and bitter poison for her. She tastes it, and smells it - trust me.

Rather, you do all these things for selfish reasons - because you are tired of hell, lying, BS, stupidity, and the pain of acting out, and because you do not wish to flush your own - and only - life down the toilet. You recover for you. Period.

It cannot be about her. The more you try to show her how much you love her that way, the less she will see it. She needs to come to see it of her own volition. No one - least of all you - will be able to prove it for her.

Ultimately, I believe that you will need to stop fighting her in any way and let her go - and inform her in a pleasant way that you love her and that no matter how she feels about it, you need to go out to a meeting now for your own recovery, for your sobriety comes first. You can let her call you on the way there and let her talk to any random guy at the meeting and ask them if you were at the meeting the whole time or not. She can even talk with you all the way home from the meeting, if she'd like that. But you need to go, for if you are not sober, nobody has you - not her, and not yourself. You can also say that though you know you have no right to be believed - you are staying away from porn because of yourself, and not her. And you will need to show her you are consistent with your recovery work and let her know if you ever, ever, look at porn or lie to her in any way.

When she sees that you are doing it because you really believe you need it... well, that's a turning point for many a wife. Though they want the husband to be completely devoted to them, they know inside that first they really need a man who is a mentch for himself.

In other words, as long as your wife knows that you are staying away from porn because of your love and allegiance to her, she will never be secure. She will know deep inside that one day, were she to trip up and treat you wrong, off you'll go again with porn, another woman, whatever. The deepest romance cannot protect her from your disease. Only you can, in partnership with Hashem.

Besides, you can only feel good about devotion for a while - love is admiration of virtue in another (Rav Noach zt"l). And real love only comes from real virtue. It's like a husband who treats everyone like foul garbage - yet treats his wife like a queen. Sure, "it's nice to be the queen" (thanks Mel Brooks!) - but she knows it's not real. After a while, the only thing that matters is that her husband is a jerk - no matter how nicely he treats her.

And this all depends on you staying honest with your sponsor, group members yourself and your wife. But what do you have to lose by doing that? Trust me, life gets easier and easier the more open and honest I am. I think it'll get harder, but that is a lie my confused heart tells me.

Do you get me?

Much love and respect to both of you precious folks,

Dov