"COME ON HONEY! THEY'RE ONLY PICTURES! What's the big deal?

Come On, Honey! They're Just Pictures! Why are you so Mad?

My cycle of addiction started with alcohol and then progressed to weed. It moved to speed and pills, and then anything that could eliminate my "feelings" and having to deal with yours. One of the crazy paradoxes for me was that as addictions held me tighter and tighter and I knew I was losing control my threshold of what got me to "where I wanted to get to" grew more and more. Enough is never enough for a guy like me.

My addictions moved to people, love, pain, codependency, and sex. I always made my way back to booze, though, because it was old, reliable, and easy to get, then easy to "forget". When one addiction stopped giving me the desired rush, I slid into the next or combined addictions for full blown chaos.

When I was "living" on Mannheim Road in Stone Park in the Late-90's, the town provided every sin, addiction, and vice a drunken addict, like me, needed to thrive. There was more going on between Lake Street and Grand Avenue than the Las Vegas Strip. That was my experience, although I am sure it is much different now. It is here I found porn. This is a subject I hate to relive, because it almost cost me my marriage to Squeaky. I share it because I don't think Disney will be calling me in the near future to star in their latest family film and I think a lot of guys think like me.

When I was living at the transient motels, or in my car, porn was a deep, dark addiction for me. My relationships were nonexistent and broken. The sicker the video or magazine, the more exhilarated and horrified I felt. It was temporary escape from thinking about me, but it simultaneously fed my self-loathing because I knew my actions were wrong. The rush of watching taboos being broken fed me like ants on a sugar drop.

I have heard guys are visual and gals are auditory when it comes to stimulation. I suppose that's why I am excited at the vision of my wife in a nighty, and she loves when I stroke her hair and giggle with her in bed. From the time I was little and saw my first Easy Rider magazine, I was hooked. The girls were exotic and seductive. They all seemed to be calling out, "Tommy! I'm waiting for you." I felt this was harmless, and maybe, to some men, it is. For me, this was the same as looking at the Mona Lisa or some other art piece. It was just a two-dimension image, and no one got hurt from my fascination with just looking but I got a rush.

I have never cheated on my wife whether drunk or sober, but I do have to say I was unfaithful to her. After we moved in together, and I had stopped drinking for a few years, I rediscovered porn, not in stores or magazines but on the world-wide web. I was smoking pot and taking speed, but it wasn't enough for me. The boundary-free erotica buffet the Internet offers was a click away. Sometimes, I would search for completely vile subjects and, sure enough, a picture or video popped up. Now I’m not talking about little kids or animals, but I was drawn to viewing two ways, four ways, freaks of nature, women/women, men/men, and violent encounters. These were subjects I had no desire to participate in, in reality.

Now, I love my wife, and she satisfies me in every way. I can honestly say it wasn't even the imagery that turned me on. It was the rush and high of exposing myself to such decadence. There were late night log-ins when my wife was asleep and quick check-ins when I got home from work. It was the same cycle as booze. The planning, obsessing, using, and remorse were the same. Only the “candy” changed. However, that phase of my life, marriage and perception of pornography, changed when she discovered my dirty little secret.

The hiding and concealing of my habits were part of the high. Doing something naughty and getting away with it was half the enjoyment. One day, while working on the family PC, she found me out. I don't know how. I believe it had something to do with "cookies" but in reality, I was relieved to be found out. She was devastated and hurt to the point of being inconsolable.

 "How could you do this?" she screamed

 In the typical male response, I replied nonchalantly and coolly, "It was no big deal. It was just pictures, like the Mona Lisa or Baywatch, just naked!"

I was quickly schooled in the depth of pain it caused her.

“You don’t find me attractive!” she screamed.

Not true.

“I don’t satisfy you!”

She did.

“I could never look like or do the things those people were doing!”

I never expected it from her. It meant nothing to me.

“It means everything to me!”

With every tear-filled statement, I felt smaller and smaller, like a shrinking cartoon character.

“Would you be happy if I watched those same images when you’re not around?”

That hit home. Definitely not! I have not looked at porn since then. Guys think of porn as pictures. Women see it as a reflection of what they can't be or what they perceive the man is missing in his life. Once again as an addict, I pushed my wife's feelings out of the way to satisfy my urge to get high. It took a long time to regain her trust. For many days after the confrontation, I saw the depth of betrayal in her eyes.

These days, I have no secrets from my wife. If I get the feeling it might be wrong, I don't do it. I discuss my friends on Facebook and don't accept friend requests from people like "Sizzlin Suzie." Kris has full access to every part of my life. It feels good to know I have nothing to hide. My wife is everything a man could want in a woman and more. I can now put her feelings before my impulses. By not doing things that may potentially hurt her, I have no fear of what she may find. My wife is all woman, and all I need.

Guys before you open up that mag or video with your buds, picture your wife doing the same thing. If you are comfortable with it, talk to her about it. Turn-about is fair play. But if that little voice inside you tells you it's wrong, listen to it. If only we all spent more time listening to that small still voice....