One day, early in his recovery work around sex addiction, Mark and I were standing in line at the grocery store, when I commented on a headline on one of the news magazines.  "I can't look," Mark said.

"What?"

"It's not good for me.  Those magazine and tabloid covers are awful.  I hate the grocery store checkout.  There's no place I can safely look."

I hadn't thought about it before, at least not in terms of recovery.

Most of the magazines were insipid and pandered to the worst in people, but when I wasn't tuning them out, I was mocking them.  I never thought of them as particularly worrisome or hurtful, at least not to me, since I wasn't threatened by (or aspiring to be) anyone who might be on the cover.  But that changed as soon as the first sex scandal hit the shelves (which, of course, didn't take long).

There would be pictures on the tabloid covers of the injured spouse, shell shocked or shying away from cameras.  And it would remind me of that very first day after disclosure when Mark and I drove to a friend's house to drop our son Austen off while we went to meet with a therapist.  I stood next to the car, wearing sunglasses to hide eyes that were nearly swollen shut with crying, and waved to them while Mark walked Austen into the house because I knew I couldn't speak coherently to anyone right then.

There would be the insinuations that it was somehow partly her fault and the implication that she did something wrong: that she wasn't sexy enough or was too cold or too demanding.  (And of course, there would be Cosmo right on the next rack with sex and beauty tips to make sure you wouldn't make the same mistake.)  I'd stand in line wanting to scream, "I did EVERYTHING to make my husband happy, and he hurt me anyway.  It's not my fault that my husband lied rather than deal directly with his problems.  And it's not her fault that her husband lied either."  I suddenly became a huge fan and staunch defender of Jennifer Aniston, whom I'd never particularly cared for before.

There would be criticism for her anger or her lack of it.  And I'd think of how I'd hit Mark until the thought it was making him feel better made me stop.  And how I stumbled through the following days and weeks with no real thought, blindly and automatically following some formula that was set before me for what I needed to do, waiting for the hurt to stop.

Then there would also be the picture of the mistress, always looking sultry, scantily clad and completely unrepentant (in fact often stating that she was unrepentant).  And I'd think of the women who had contributed to my pain and the near destruction of my marriage with white hot rage and hatred in my heart.  I'd feel betrayed by them as much as by my husband, and I'd spin into fantasies about how to inflict the kind of pain upon them that they'd inflicted on me.  Sometimes I'd skim the news magazines looking hopefully for their names among the victims of terrorist attacks.

And of course, there would be the husbands, sometimes with wicked grins as they left their wives for the other woman and sometimes sorrowfully begging forgiveness in an attempt to save their images, their careers, their marriages.  And I'd feel the same mix of anger and confusion and pity that my own husband inspired in me at the time.

And even when there were no sex scandals, it was still all about how I ought to do my makeup or wear my clothes or eat or cook or weigh or act in bed to ensure that what had happened to me wouldn't happen to me.  And I could only stand there knowing I'd done it all and it hadn't protected me from the same pain that periodically splashed across the tabloid covers.

The supermarket checkout line became a gamut I had to run rather than a fun distraction from the boredom of waiting in line.  I started averting my eyes just the way Mark did.  I ordered more food deliveries and spent more time shopping at specialty stores that didn't stock the usual mix of gossip rags and "women's" magazines.

Six years in to recovery, the magazines aren't the same trigger for me that they used to be and I see the players in the drama a little differently, with less (but not always no) anger and more sympathy all around.  I don't avoid the grocery store and I don't generally avert my eyes from the news magazines just because Cosmo or the Enquirer are up there being all awful.  But I still don't seek them out when there is a sex scandal, because, especially if I'm tired or hungry or stressed, I know I'm prone to fall back into old thought patterns and I may not be above the temptation to take up a Sharpie and ink out some of the teeth on Tiger Woods' mistresses.

"The level of sexual imagery in modern life is astounding. I knew intuitively this was true, but when you tune into it, you just can't believe it. I click on the Yahoo! finance page, and there's this blond model in a low-cut dress looking at a computer screen and nibbling alluringly on the temple of her glasses, apparently very aroused by the latest S&P 500 report."
~ A.J. Jacobs, The Year of Living Biblically

Years ago, when my husband Mark and I were first married, we went away for the weekend, leaving the little city (or big town) we called home to drive to a bed and breakfast on a ranch in the middle of big rolling fields of nowhere.  At night, we could look up and see a sky, not just dotted with a few twinkling stars against a vast blackness, but absolutely littered with more light than darkness.  But even more than the presence of stars, I remember the silence.

There were no cars rumbling past outside, no neighbors talking or banging doors shut, no fire sirens or televisions, no computer network humming and no cell phone coverage.  It was so quiet, I actually had trouble sleeping; the absence of sound rang audibly in my ears.  I didn't realize I was surrounded by a constant whir of background noise until it wasn't there, but when I went back home I was suddenly both very much aware of it and increasingly bothered by it.  Was it good for me to have so much noise in my life that I heard actual ringing in my ears when it was quiet, the same way I have on leaving a rock concert?  At the same time, that level of background noise was clearly normal in the place and culture in which I was living; could I get away from it?

In a way, moving from addiction to recovery felt the same way, as I began to tune in to the ambient noise of our culture.  Suddenly, that billboard or that song or that TV ad wasn't just part of a constant, and largely ignored, backdrop; it was the trigger that could bring the trauma of addiction rushing to engulf me again.  Being married to a recovering sex addict meant suddenly being faced with the need to avoid gratuitous sexual content in order to protect my own sanity.  And that meant becoming acutely aware of just how soaked in sexuality American culture is: everything from hamburgers to web hosting are sold on overtones of porn.  (And seriously, I can think of few things less inherently erotic than ground beef and Internet domain name registration.)

Recovery has also meant looking at patterns of alcoholism and addiction among our extended friends and family, and becoming similarly aware of the pervasiveness of alcohol, which is an integral, accepted, even expected part of everything from weddings to sporting events to birthday parties.

And once I did begin to tune in, I wondered, much as I did when I came home from those nights on that secluded ranch: had all that cultural noise (unnoticed, but loud enough to leave my ears ringing in its absence) been good for me?  I didn't think so.  So, from ad blocking software to a DVR to changes in my own routines, I've worked to beat back the noise our culture throws off and journey toward the quiet that I now crave.

I rashly went out Halloween costume shopping a few days ago. I'm not sure what I was thinking. Well, I know I needed to pick up a costume for my daughter — Yes, a few days shy of Halloween. I'm totally on top of it as a mom. — but for some reason I thought maybe I could find something cute for myself. You know, something suitable for a 40-year-old mother of two married to a recovering sex addict. There must be tons of costumes to fit the bill, right? At the very least there had to be a nice Hillary Clinton, complete with businesslike pants suit.

Instead, I prowled through the store grimacing, rolling my eyes and blowing exasperated puffs of breath like some kind of crazy person. I wasn't fussing, like most of the other customers, at the cost of the costumes (although, yeah, ouch! Shouldn't those things be marked down with just moments left to go?) but at the sexuality of nearly all the costumes for women and girls, with the exception of those for infants and toddlers. (Boys and men, I noticed, had a variety of different costumes available. Most of these were neutral in terms of sexual content, while even those with a sexual element (I'm thinking the orange "Department of Erections" jumpsuit with penis prosthetic) comfortably covered their bodies.)

The womens' and girls' costumes were a veritable Fredrick's of Halloween catalog.  There were tens of different variations on the same micro-mini barely covering the buttocks matched with the same plunging, cleavage baring neckline; I could choose to be any number of porn star characters: the cop porn star, the nurse porn star, the super-heroine porn star, this hippie porn star, the movie star porn star... It was like looking at Carvel ice cream cakes back in the day; Fudgie the Whale would look like a whale, while Santa would come out sporting a red cap topped by a suspiciously untraditional two tassels. (Apparently, Tom Carvel didn't get to the top of the ice cream game through extravagant purchases like molds that would be used only once a year.)

Needless to say, all those droopy eyes, pouting lips, fishnet clad legs and ample bosoms can be triggering for sex addicts and their partners alike. I can't dress up like that: not after the way it's been mixed up with feelings of trauma and degradation.  My husband can't look at anything like that: not after the way he's used it as a drug, an escape into fantasy.  I found myself wondering if there was a special Halloween store for Mormons and if they'd let me shop there. (You make the costumes yourselves, don't you? Sigh!)

Hanging out with my kids all day, going to their Halloween parties at school, watching them dress up with their friends, I sometimes forget (even having had experience with it in recovery) what a sexual (sexually objectifying?) holiday Halloween can be for adults. I think that I, married to a sex addict, with all of my complicated issues around sexuality, can just pop into a store and pick up a fun little costume for myself, not have it trigger the shit out of me. And I'd be wrong. Halloween is just too scary. Next year, I'll stick to eating cupcakes and shopping for modest pantsuits on the Internet.

Eight years ago, in spite of the fact that we were both exhausted by caring for our infant son, I found that my husband Mark was staying up later and later at night. He had to be up at 5 a.m. to get ready for work, yet I would wake some nights at 2 or 3 or 4 a.m. to my son, wailing for a feeding or a diaper change, and find Mark's side of the bed empty, cold, untouched. Then I'd glance to the bedroom door and see the eerie blue glow of the computer screen in the next room creeping in. And I knew he was looking at porn. Sometimes I'd ask him to come to bed, sometimes I'd just stew and wait. And in the morning, I'd wonder, "Should I be worried about this? If he is, is it a big deal? Is this ok? Is it normal?"

Those seemed like legitimate questions at the time. He wouldn't stay up every night. And sometimes he was actually doing some work, or starting off doing some work. (Hey, I'm codependent. I spied, so I know.) I knew he was looking at some porn, but I didn't have a problem with porn. It was one of those things guys did, right? And I even viewed it myself. But this seemed like a lot. Did he have a problem? Or was I crazy and overreacting? (I knew he fell on the side of crazy and overreacting. But if he was crazy then his evaluation of the situation couldn't be trusted.) I simply didn't trust myself or my own feelings. I wanted some neutral third party to say where the line should be drawn, to define exactly what was normal, what was ok, what was worrisome, what was a problem.

I was thinking about all this as I read an article about how his porn use is the equivalent of her pedicures, a way to relax and blow off steam. The author of the piece asked questions like "should you be worried?" and tried to reassure partners that, even if porn use bothers them, it may not be a "big deal." They may be overreacting. All of which made me want to punch the author in the nose and then send him to a therapist who could teach him not to invalidate people's feelings. (What? Are you saying I still have control issues? No worries, I'll lovingly detach and let him crash and burn and learn on his own.)

The reason I got fussy when I read that, is because it took me some time in recovery to realize that there is no "should" when it comes to feelings. And that lesson is still raw. It's something that I am apt to forget as I fall back into fretting over whether or not I "should" be upset or angry or worried. I'll wonder who is right and who is wrong and who is crazy and who is sane and what's normal and grind myself to bits hoping that the world will arbitrate in my favor.

But here's the thing: a problem is a problem. If something worries me, it's worrisome to me. If my husband was staying up at night looking at porn, and it was bothering me, it didn't matter if he was an addict or not; it was bothering me! And it was ok for me to be bothered by it even if it wasn't a problem for him. If my feelings about his porn use were interfering with our relationship, then there was a problem with porn use in our relationship. Likewise, if I'm spending money on spa vacations and my husband is getting anxious and irritable about that, if he's feeling threatened because I'm spending time having my pedicurist massage my feet rather than him, then my spa time is an issue in our relationship, even if pedicures are perfectly healthy and relaxing for me and he "shouldn't" be upset. It doesn't matter how he or I "should" feel, it only matters how we do feel.

Thankfully, we've found recovery programs and therapists that have helped us deal with our problems in a way that has acknowledged and respected each of our feelings, rather than telling us that the way to solve the problem was to convince us that we should stop having those feelings.

Image credit: Photo by kchbrown on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons

A few weeks ago, I got an e-mail from a woman named Paula Saardchit. She told me she'd found my blog while doing research for an article she was writing on sex addiction for her website, and she wanted to write and tell me how moved she was by my story. Of course, I was curious to know more about her site, so I googled her. And I found out that she helps women plan lingerie and sex toy parties. (And I know what kind of party some of you have in mind. No, not that kind! You know, this is like a Tupperware party, only with vibrators.)

When I found out about my husband's sex addiction, one of the first things I did was get out my big, black garbage bags and start dumping in porn, lingerie and sex toys. The sight of them, of anything that made me think of sex or by extension of my husband's sexual acting out, made me want to vomit. So off in a landfill somewhere are all the artifacts of my subconscious attempts to control my husband and keep his sexual attention firmly fixed on constantly exciting, porn star me: the dildos and the vibrators, the bustiers and fishnet stockings and the crotchless panties and the wigs and the costumes, the X-rated board games and the porn DVDs. Yeah, I tried it all. Well, except a stripper pole. That hadn't occurred to me yet. And thank goodness because how would I have carted that out to the trash?

I had been as conventionally sexy and exciting and adventurous and engaged as can be, and my husband loved it. But it wasn't enough. That endless, aching need of his wanted more than I could give. More than all the women in all the lingerie with all the sex toys in the world could give. And still I wanted to give it. Which is how I ended up there, with the black Hefty bag in my hand, sick to my stomach with shame and disgust and rage.

And now, six years later, I was on a lingerie party website, full of pictures of that conventional sexy I dumped in the trash, wondering what kind of sex addiction article Paula intended to write. As I glanced at the site, I saw that there was plenty of the usual "hot" and "titillating" sex selling, but Paula also genuinely seemed to see these parties as a way of empowering women to learn about and appreciate their own bodies. Black and white thinking is common in the lives of addicts and those who live with them, and I've been slowly working toward a place where, after fully indulging in our culture's idea of "sexy" and then fully rejecting it (from lingerie to makeup to shaving my legs), I am exploring more shades of grey. So, just because I can't incorporate lingerie and sex toys into my relationship in a healthy way right now, doesn't mean they are evil in themselves. There are definitely aspects of lingerie and sex toys that I'm deeply uncomfortable with, and even perceive as dangerous to women, but there was enough that was positive about Paula's site that when she asked if she could interview me, I said, "Well, send me your questions and I'll see."

When I saw the questions, I found that not only was I comfortable with answering them all, this would be a good opportunity to reach out to women who may not realize (yet) that their partners are sex addicts. (I mean, what better place to find a sex addict's partner in denial than out buying lingerie?) So, while many women may be using Paula's parties as a healthy expression of their sexuality, I (taking to heart that 12 Step message of reaching out to those still suffering) couldn't pass up the opportunity to plant some seeds among those who might be indulging in sexy, not as an act of empowerment, but as one of desperation and degradation.

Then had to take that last leap of faith that Paula would put it up as I expressed it before I clicked send. (Not that I have trust issues or anything!) And she did. The interview is up, and after having thought long and hard about linking out to such a potentially triggering site, I thought I would share it with you all, especially since many of you don't have sex addiction as part of your lives at all and may find it interesting. There is nothing in the content of my interview that I wouldn't post here, but images and links in the header and sidebar are related to lingerie and sex toys. So, one last time before the link...

Warning: Sex addicts and their partners may find images and language in the linked site triggering!

(If the thought of clicking through raises any concerns about your sobriety or serenity, please feel free to e-mail me for a copy of the information contained in the interview instead.)

And here's the link (isn't it cute that I'm an expert?): Interview with Mary P Jones at Lingerie Party and Adult Toys.

Image credit: Photo by thegreenpages on Flickr Licensed under Creative Commons

People (particularly women) who work in the porn industry are being abused and exploited.

Think about that statement. (You're already framing your argument, agreeing or disagreeing, aren't you?)

Now think about this one: People (particularly women) who work in the garment industry are being abused and exploited.

Different reaction? From what I've seen and heard, both online and off, I expect so. After all, mention abuse and exploitation in connection with the garment industry, and heads tend to fill with images of sweatshops: forced labor, locked factories, squalid conditions, low wages, sexual harassment, even physical or sexual abuse. But mention abuse and exploitation in combination with porn and suddenly you find yourself in the territory of feminism, religious dogma, sexual mores, free will, free speech and personal beliefs and experiences.

Imagine accusations of sweatshop conditions in the garment industry being countered with:

• "Sewing is an enjoyable activity; lots of people probably begged for those jobs." or
• "I have a friend who works in middle management for Nike and she's not being forced to work in a locked factory." or
• "Why is it inconceivable that someone could choose to make clothing? Shouldn't women be free to choose whatever employment they want, even if society doesn't value it? " or
• "Isn't work for clothing manufacturers better than working in a fast food restaurant?" or
• "Venus Williams is making a lot of money from clothing endorsements. It's outrageous and insulting to claim that she's some poor exploited victim of the garment industry." or
• "You're just attacking clothing manufacturers because your uptight religious beliefs don't allow you to wear t-shirts."

Yet those same types of arguments -- that not all porn workers are abused, that not all employers engage in unethical or illegal practices, that some people like and choose their jobs and are well paid for it, that some people enjoy decent working conditions -- are exactly the ones that are generally brought forward to counter claims that the porn industry is involved in human trafficking, forced labor, and physical and sexual abuse.

Nike has (and continues to) come under harsh criticism for its labor practices. Yet no one counters these charges by pointing to the good working conditions and benefits for employees in Nike's corporate offices. No one defends its sweatshop work as a matter of personal choice, in spite of the fact that most Nike employees are working for Nike by choice. No one frames the degradation of the female sweatshop workers as feminist empowerment just because Nike employs female executives and runs ad campaigns celebrate feminine achievement and power.

Sex is such a charged subject that when public dialog turns to porn we run off into separate camps: for porn or against. We start talking about whether porn itself is morally abhorrent or not and miss an actual moral wrong: the pain of some young men and women we consume in the name of entertainment. Porn has its sweat shops. Some of those employed in making porn are being abused, just as some of those employed in making clothing are being abused. Yet folks who wouldn't buy a pair of Nike sneakers or who would support regulations or unionization or trade agreements to protect garment workers, probably don't think twice about where that jpeg they just downloaded comes from.

Think about it now.

A year ago, when I was trying to get through to my husband that we were spending faster than we were earning and that our credit cushion was wearing dangerously thin, he had a brilliant idea, "Let's get another credit card." Yep. We're running out of credit, we'll get more credit, problem solved, ta da! (Our own family version of an Arctic National Wildlife Refuge drilling project.)

That was clearly not a good solution and not the one we took, but it was the most obvious solution, especially with credit card companies sending offers in the mail every day. In fact, the offers kept rolling in even as collection agencies called and lawsuits threatened.  And I have to admit, mad as I was that we'd gotten ourselves mired in debt, I was equally angry that credit card companies found it so very profitable for us to do so that they let us have access to more in credit than I've ever made in a year. Our credit is trashed at this point, yet we still get credit card offers every day, and all I can think each time I get the mail is: These companies are just like drug pushers!

I was listening to a piece on NPR a while back about a rise in underage prostitution in certain areas. A guest on the program noted that as a result of stricter enforcement of drug laws in these locales, many former drug dealers were turning to pimping, as a safer, more profitable business. And as secondary crimes and violence related to drug trade were decreasing, police were now dealing with more secondary crimes and violence related to prostitution. As I listened, I thought, "Either way the problems with violence in these cities are related to addiction." Because while some of the clients of drug dealers or prostitutes will be folks who rarely use, the most profitable clients, the regular clients, are primarily going to be addicts. Drug addicts drive drug trafficking. Sex addicts drive sex trafficking.

Those addicts are the regular clients that dealers and pimps want, the same way that the folks at the local bakery depend on me. They know me and make sure I get the good stuff: because I keep coming back again and again, and I tell my friends and bring them back too. I'm a sweet shop's big old cash cow. Businesses know they need to keep their regular customers both satisfied and yearning for more. So, credit card companies want people who will carry a balance and cigarette companies want smokers to suck down a pack or more a day and alcohol manufacturers (regardless of their ads giving lip service to responsible drinking) aren't really catering to people like me who drink a single glass of wine with dinner once a month. What they want, what they cater to in their business practices and their advertising, are addicts.

I'm not saying that business owners frame it that way I don't think most of them do (although some certainly may) but I do think we live in a culture of addiction where the way to make money is to indulge and reinforce the fantasies of your best clients: addicts. Billboards and TV and movies and music and Internet banner ads whisper the messages to us, the messages that may disgust and anger some, but that addicts want to buy: Alcohol makes you sexy. Drugs are cool. Credit makes you powerful. And everyone's a porn star.

And I believe we, as a society, are aching for recovery.

There are so many things wrong with it that I don't even know where to start using my keen intellect and rapier wit to skewer it. So, I decided to start by letting you all read it. That is, if you have the stamina to slog through eight pages of the author's rambling anecdotes masquerading as a theory with a scientific basis (No, really! Cheating is evolutionary biological destiny! After all, the author's sister Alice agrees!) rather than waiting for me to summarize it.

I probably shouldn't even link to it, since it's so clearly a piece designed to incense people and sell magazines, but it touches on some popular myths and misconceptions (happily perpetuated by the sexually compulsive who are not in recovery) that I'd like to discuss. So, eh, what the hell.

When I posted a few months ago (starting here) about how I came to discover my husband's sex addiction, I wrote a post about his porn use and promised to follow up with a post about my own complicated feelings about and relationship with porn. But it's only been recently that I've gotten my mind wrapped around the subject to a degree where I felt I could begin to write about it. This (Velvet Verbosity is sighing in relief) is the long awaited, can't-possibly-live-up-to-expectations porn post.

Photo credit: Photo by *nathan

I can't remember when I was first introduced to Porn. I know I'd heard about Porn before we actually met, and I was intrigued. Sure, there were folks who told me to stay away, who said that Porn was bad, or more than bad: evil. I heard all kinds of claims about the bad things Porn had done: Porn was nasty, Porn abused women, Porn was Satan's bitch.

But I thought Porn seemed sexy, exciting, fun; Porn was harmless and misunderstood; Porn was discriminated against by hopelessly dull and uptight women who were threatened by sex or by hypocritical men who sought to control women's sexuality while themselves secretly partying with Porn. Porn's friends and lovers were grown men and women, who were capable of wearing big boy and big girl underwear, but chose to forsake those for big boy and big girl thongs and crotchless panties instead.

So, Porn and I started hanging out; we had fun. I found Porn funny and entertaining. Porn liked to date bad actors who made me giggle. I didn't feel threatened by Porn. Porn kept my secrets and let me explore fantasies in a safe solo environment where no one was going to hurt or pressure or judge me. And I defended Porn from all attackers:

Ms. Anti-Porn: "Porn is immoral and people who hang out with Porn are bad people."

Me: "I don't think Porn is immoral."

Ms. A-P: "But God hates Porn."

Me: "But I don't believe in God."

Ms. A-P: "You are bad and going to hell."

Me: "Well, then I might as well kick back and enjoy myself with Porn in the meantime."

Ms. A-P: "But wait, Porn is degrading to women. I thought you were a feminist."

Me: "The women who get involved with Porn are adults who are making their own choices about their bodies and careers. The problem is not Porn but society's double standard."

Ms. A-P: "Their actions contribute to that double standard and drag all women down. You've been brainwashed by the patriarchy and are not really a feminist."

Me: "I think you're the one who's not really a feminist for not respecting women's choices."

Ms. A-P: "You're wrong."

Me: "No, you're wrong."

Ms. A-P: "No, you're wrong."

Me: "Whatever, you are boring and uptight. I'm going to go hang out with Porn now and have some fun."

So, I did. I hung out with Porn from time to time, alone or with my husband, with not a care in the world. Sometimes my husband hung out with Porn alone, and that was ok too. After all, Porn was a mutual friend. But then he started to get really serious about Porn, he was spending more and more time with Porn. He'd spend time away from me and our baby, out with Porn instead. And eventually, he met some people through Porn and got involved with them: sexual online chats, sexual e-mails, lap dances, sexual encounters.

It didn't bother me when we were casually hanging out with Porn, together or alone, but it did bother me when he craved Porn more often than the occasional fun evening together, when Porn usurped his life and mind to the point where he was obsessed with Porn to the exclusion of his own family, when he needed more than what Porn alone could give him, when Porn introduced him to other people.

And I started to see Porn differently. I wasn't angry at Porn. I still didn't think Porn was morally wrong, but I could see now that Porn was spiritually damaging and that the people who were involved with Porn were damaged people. Porn didn't seem fun and sexy anymore, Porn seemed hurt and lonely. Porn was laughing and carousing and spinning in wild hedonism to hide a deep pain. And the people involved with Porn were pretending to have fun, but I could suddenly see in so many of their eyes how degraded and ashamed they felt. I saw women who had been sexually abused hanging on Porn's arm, looking for reassurance and love. I saw men who had been molested strutting by Porn's side, trying to make it ok. I saw eyes glazed over with drugs. I saw lonely, aching emptiness. I hadn't been a voyeur to people's pleasure, I had been a voyeur to their suffering.

I was out of the Matrix; Porn was still inside it. And it just wasn't fun or entertaining anymore. It was painful and sad.

So, Porn and I, we don't hang out anymore. But we're both ok with that. Porn has lots of other friends, and so do I.

I'd feel a wave of aggressive sexuality coming from these women that would make my chest tight with rage. Everything about them screamed sex and seemed to say, "I want every man to desire me, and when a man desires me, nothing will prevent me from trying to get him to act on that, if he is what I want."

In the days immediately following my husband's revelation that he was a sex addict, I pressed him for details with sleepless fury. I wanted to know everything: to break the bond of secrecy he had with these other women, to reclaim my reality, and to try to make sense of what had happened and what was happening. I would make lists of tens questions as they popped into my mind during the day, so that I wouldn't forget a thing, and I would keep him up far into the night answering them, not letting either of us rest until I knew every word, every thought, every name, every touch.

I know this wasn't a unique desire; the first impulse of many wounded and betrayed partners is to want to know everything. And I know that many of them regret it; that knowledge stays with them and the images haunt them. But while it's true that those details did (and sometimes still do) bring a deep, piercing pain, they also did bring me some of that insight I craved and some of my first real moments of empathy: for my husband and the women he was with.

In one of those very early days, my husband was telling me about a sexual encounter. The woman he described was very sexual, very eager and willing to become intimate quickly. And yet, although they had sex, she refused to touch him. As she took shape through his words, I saw her arranging a casual sexual encounter with a married man whose body she wanted and shuddered at, to whom she revealed herself and from whom she wanted to hide. And the realization of her pain went through me like an electric shock. I shook with rage, locked for that one moment in a furious solidarity with the woman whose actions tortured me, as I hissed at my husband, "My God! That woman was sexually abused! How could you not see that? How could you use her like that?"

I started to see, slowly, that she wasn't the only one. The women my husband acted out with were, each in their own way, deeply hurt and damaged. In trying to understand the other side of my husband's story, I read books (because I'm a nerd like that) on female sex addiction. I read the personal stories of women like former porn star Shelley Luben. I got to know courageous, inspiring women bloggers who struggle with their own compulsive sexual behavior.

I learned how abuse, particularly sexual abuse, can lead women to seek out love in the only way it has ever been shown to them, through sex. I saw how sex could be used to medicate feelings created by the abuse: that they were unworthy, undesirable and unlovable. I saw how that aggressive sexuality that threatened me was a woman's way of seeking power over her abuser. And I started to recognize that when a woman made me feel uncomfortable and threatened with her sexuality, it was a sign, not of her desirability or confidence, but of some deep, past hurt to her body, mind and spirit.

A few days ago, I was chatting with some friends in recovery about celebrities when the topic of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie came up. And I said, "Oh, I hate Angelina Jolie!" It wasn't one of those dramatic uses of the word hate either. I thought about her and felt a sickness like a punch in the stomach. I've never met the woman, I know nothing about her other than her on-screen persona and the headlines I've seen on tabloids in line for the supermarket checkout. But I have truly always felt a tight, burning rage and disgust at the sight of her.

"Ugh! So do I," said one of my friends, who is also the partner of a sex addict.

"That's because you're both with sex addicts," said another. "She's sexy and you're threatened by her."

Duh. I hadn't thought about it lately, my hatred for Angelina Jolie was so long standing and unspoken that I'd virtually forgotten about it. But why had I always had such passionate negative feelings about her? What had she ever done to inspire irrational loathing in me? She was sexy. Sexy in the same distinctive, fierce way that always made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

And the proverbial light bulb clicked on, right over my head, and flooded every cobwebby room in my mind with light. Maybe Angelina Jolie was sexually abused. I could feel something like that in the aggressive sexual energy that was beating against me. And I experienced one of those moments where faces and images and sound fired at me in a rapid barrage, like a movie time traveler. The women my husband was with were abused. Prostitutes and porn stars overwhelmingly come from abusive backgrounds. Marilyn Monroe, the queen of sexy herself, the woman on whom so many women from whom that same threatening sexuality radiates have modeled their own image: Marilyn Monroe, was sexually abused as a child.*

And I sat there like some slapstick cartoon character, with stars dancing around my head, knocked to the ground by that falling anvil. What we call sexy, what we hold up as the standard of female sexuality as a culture, the sexiness we aspire to and celebrate, is the sexuality of abuse. In looking for feminine power in movie stars and models, in porn stars and pole dancers, we're aspiring to be victimized girls grown up, fiercely pretending to revel in our shame. We are modeling our behavior on a sexuality born of violence against women, of abuse, of molestation, of rape.

And I thought, my God. My God. What are we doing?