First, a little background: I am married w/five children. I have struggled with pornography (or equivalent) since I was 5 years old. Although I am not into hard-core pornography. I am very attracted to women. I am as much or more addicted to stories than pictures. My wife is a great woman and very attractive. However, she is not very excited about sex – more of a duty than anything. I believe pornography has created a need in me that my wife be very desirous for sex with me. When she is not, I greatly struggle to be attracted to her. This need has been so pressing that in the past I have sought to expose her to pornography in order to light a fire of desire in her. She has resented me for these efforts. At times I have felt that another man might be able to light this fire in her. As a result, this has become a fantasy of mine. In the distant past, I even tried to get an LDS (married) friend of mine to flirt with her. She found out and again was very angry with me.

At times I feel obsessed with looking at beautiful women and talking with them – friends, co-workers, etc. I have never had sexual relations (physically) anyone but my wife since we’ve been married.

I really don’t know what to do. I guess I really am looking for solutions that have actually worked for people. That is why I found the following comment by Howard on 9/20, very interesting:

“I was involved in pornography before returning to the church. I weaned off slowly by turning first to more loving images, then to progressively softer images.”

Although this approach goes against my understanding of the gospel. I realize that I may err in my understanding.

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.check out youporn.com
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.you know you will
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.one of your kids probably looked at porn on the computer that your on right after you went to bed last night.
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.check…haha

“Yes, God will know, but so far he has been silent on the issue”

Are you kidding me?! God does speak out repeatedly about the harm of pornography thru the Prophet and other General Athourities. A great deal of the topics in General Conference for the past like I don’t know 4 years if not more has talked specifically about the problems of pornography. A couple of months ago quite a few articles in the Ensign were directed towards pronography, even if it is used between a man and his wife to “inhance” their love life is just wrong. One if not both of you WILL become addicted and any type of addiction is wrong. Now I can’t say whether or not Pornography should be likened to Adultrey…but either way it is a sin to look at another man or women in lust. And if you have to justify it in any way then there must be somthing tugging at you to make you want to justify it. As for what anon chicken was saying about the loss of the spirit in her home after pornography was in the home, I don’t really think that it was nessecarily loss of the spirit, but maybe it was the spirits way of telling her that something was wrong, I know when I have that pit in my stomach it is because I know something doesn’t feel right, but I always know that it is something bad and it is never a good feeling to know that something bad is happening. Now the spouse who is viewing pornography will slowly lose the spirit. I mean every time you ignore a prompting you are becoming more and more desensitized to what the sprit is prompting you not to view. I think that reguardless of whether pornography is like committing adultry it is just plain wrong no matter how you spin it.

#64- “One of the most common signs of the start of an affair is the sudden drop off in intimacy and sex drive. … The lack of spending time at home was the second biggest clue to him cheating.”

I remember those points being offered as indicators but I also remember they were excused (at least in one couple’s experience) as primary markers in some, but not all cases. One couple shared that at the time of the husband’s affair, they were having sex on a daily basis. In some instances it’s not unusual for a husband to be away from home for extended periods of time. Company trips, deployments, TDY (temporary duty assigments in the Army) and other stints are the norm for some families. That seemed, to me at least, that the affair came as a surprise to that wife since this “classic” sign was absent. I’m not saying there weren’t others, but it’s easy to overlook something (whatever the other signs may have been) relatively minor when the obvious was/is absent and the established norm for some includes absences or longer work days.

“So, IMHO men who get involved with another woman are not in-love with their spouse.”

I agree with you there but in some cases only. My first husband was not or fell out of love with me (he was counseled, though I didn’t know at the time, by a Church leader to get married to “fix” his problem – that was a punch in the gut for me). He was not interested in sex, never wanted to discuss the issue or others and began to look elsewhere for connection. Porn had consumed him. In this, my second marriage, it’s not the case. Perhaps since he’s not as far into the spectrum as my first husband. Time-wise, they had both been addicted and using for nearly an equal number of years. The difference has been made in second husband’s greater desire to abstain. Though not successful, he at least fought the urges for longer and much harder.

Porn isn’t the problem, it’s only a *symptom* of the problem. The greater problems, in instances of porn addiction, lie in the straying spouse but can be prevented when he/she learns how to ask for what they need, such as emotional connection, and regular practice and application of communication skills. It also takes willingness and work from their spouses to prompt, listen and provide space when needed. Men are typically portrayed as sex-driven maniacs, void of emotion or a desire for true intimacy. This is not at all the case and is sometimes a big hurdle for them to see and embrace.

Kind of like when we talk with our partner about who they can marry after we die.

Best examples of polygamy are widows and widowers who re-marry without loosing love for their first partners or loving less the second.

And seems to be easier to do the older we get. I can’t see 20 year olds loving two people at the same time.

Maybe you guys should have watched Big Love to see how it all works.

I actually do appreciate the application of this discussion to this post for those few (in my mind) who used polygamy in the Church at that time as a quasi-pornographic fix, but I don’t want to derail the central discussion of pornography itself. If we can continue this direction and still focus on that core issue, great; I am all for it.

I don’t see polygamy as having to be either the evil result of horny men’s libidos or a sign that God doesn’t love women. I’m sure you don’t believe the latter, so I think it is clear you believe the former. However, I think you are overlooking the clear pain and anguish it often caused the men, as well.

I am appalled by the cases like the one you mention, but I also have read enough accounts to know that wasn’t the norm. I’m not saying it was an isolated exception and everyone else practiced it in wonderful, Disney-esque way. That would be ludicrous. I also know it was more painful on the whole for women than for men, and that many women particularly had to divorce themselves emotionally more than many men did. However, I also know it was very hard for many, many men – and my reaction was against the apparent idea that the men were horny and happy within the system.

I know that wasn’t stated, so I apologize again if you didn’t mean to imply that. My reaction probably was a result of hearing that exact argument too many times in my life.

the author of the book on Oprah based much of his research on men and their needs.
You must be assuming that plural marriage was not of God then or you would realize that God knows more about men than Oprah’s author.

I am familiar with actually bringing a new love into an old relationship and I know others who have without falling out of love with the first woman. Could the opposite happen? Sure, but it would be a mistake to assume that is the norm without data to back up your assumption.

Plural marriage existed in one of my lines as well, but my GG grandmother’s experience seemed quite different than yours.

Hawkgrrrl,
Sure, I’ve never been equally in love with any two women at the same time or at separate times. Every love has been unique.

Don’t be insulting, you know I like you. This is an area I happen to have some pretty strong feelings about. At least humor me and try to see my point.

I’m trying to show that men who fall in love with other women (whether or not it’s a polygamist relationship) fall out of love with the current spouse. I say that because the author of the book on Oprah based much of his research on men and their needs. He had some fairly convincing studies showing the emotional effect of trying to foster a new and loving relationship with one woman while committed to another. I think the parallels apply to both types.

When people discuss polygamy, I think they don’t actually mentally go through the processes involved in bringing a new love into an old relationship. If they did, they may start to empathize with these women who were forced to choose between believing the prophet and sharing their husbands (with all that entails) or leaving the religion. If you can start to feel what they must have felt, you start to see why this was evil. For me, reading my GG grandmothers journal of being pressured at 15 to marry her uncle was revealing. The hatred (from her aunt) that existed in the home after their marriage became so intolerable that she was forced to live in a separate cabin some distance from the main house. Her new husband only came over to spend the night on special occasions, but other than that, never spent time with her. Therefore, I think the emotions are very much the same for polygamy or adultery, it’s a betrayal of the “ones” a great marriage can have if nurtured correctly.

Let me clarify a little. On a recent episode of “Oprah” a Dr. (can’t remember his name) was interviewed about a book he wrote on men who cheat, why they cheat, and how a woman can tell. One of the most common signs of the start of an affair is the sudden drop off in intimacy and sex drive. Several others have also written about how men become somewhat obsessive with their new found love and talk about it with close friends they feel they can trust. These conversations invariably involve putting down the poor spouse and disclosing faults. A man who is engaged in this type of behavior would hardly be considered in love with his spouse. He may say that he loves her, but he isn’t interested in spending time with her or having sexual relations. The lack of spending time at home was the second biggest clue to him cheating.

So, IMHO men who get involved with another woman are not in-love with their spouse. Incidentally, the good doctor on Oprah also said that secret obsessions with porn are an indication that your husband is on the road to adultery. This isn’t to say that every man who likes porn will move on to cheat, but the odds greatly increase if he is secretly indulging.
I guess what I’m saying is that I respectfully disagree with Howard but do agree that there are always exceptions to the rule. Perhaps he is one of them.

At the end of the day, I see no way for polygamy not to cause extreme pain an anxiety for women and therefore must either conclude that God doesn’t really like women and therefore commands men to look outside their marriage, or realize that polygamy is an evil practice that never should have been part of the restored gospel.

But what is “hooked”? Some people get hooked (i.e. over indulge) on…
Sure you can obsess and over indulge on almost anything. But porn seems to be unusually addictive. http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2004/11/65772

Is such a natural inclination categorically bad, the so-called “natural man”?
The way I see it is the “natural man” is well…natural, that is simply an intrinsic part of us. I don’t know if God put it in us or if it is a by product of our creation but he certainly knows the natural man is there and he makes use of it. For instance I was lead by the Spirit to Christ through the repentance process, in other words my sinful acts as a natural man eventually lead me to Christ. We are expected to eventually transcend the natural man and become Christ-like. You said it well “something to be controlled, as well as something to learn from”. I believe that our sex drives are truly a gift and a necessary one at that, without it who would multiply and replenish the earth?

Something to completely sublimate?
Well, if you’re talking about sex, the church would obviously want us to control it and contain it within marriage. Another choice is to completely explore it until you master it. This basically inoculates you to the addictive tendencies, but it would be very difficult to do while remaining in the church.

Do you see the difference? On the one hand, the inclination is framed as something sinful…
Imho our sex drive is neutral. What we do with it determines if it is sinful or not.

Feels like a blunt instrument. What is “normal” and what is “sick”?
I agree. Judge not least ye be judged.