Punishment for betrayal

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How much can you punish someone for a betrayal?

My wife frequently wants me to read posts on a redditpage called "loveafterporn" since I confessed years ago I had been watching porn a few times during our rs, not an addiction but I knew she didn't approve.

On this subreddit it seems everyone is of the same opinion and almost always validate each others thoughts even if it's about ideas of controlling their partner. But limiting a partners online activity like they were a child feels sick.

And how long does a porn watcher need to be "in debt"? It seems like an excuse to be abusive.

[15years]

How much can you punish someone for a betrayal?

My wife frequently wants me to read posts on a redditpage called "loveafterporn" since I confessed years ago I had been watching porn a few times during our rs, not an addiction but I knew she didn't approve.

On this subreddit it seems everyone is of the same opinion and almost always validate each others thoughts even if it's about ideas of controlling their partner. But limiting a partners online activity like they were a child feels sick.

And how long does a porn watcher need to be "in debt"? It seems like an excuse to be abusive.

[PeteWitsend]

...

And how long does a porn watcher need to be "in debt"? It seems like an excuse to be abusive.

It is an excuse to be abusive. 

Of course, pwBPD don't need an excuse to be abusive, but when they get one, or when you open the door to it by not standing up for yourself or drawing boundaries around something, they take advantage of the situation. 

I think in a normal relationship, with mutual trust and forthright and fair information sharing, you could - and should - admit to a mistake and reassure your partner after they express some concern.  But with a pwBPD, you have to exercise some judgment here.  I'm not saying that you don't owe a pwBPD the same amount of respect that you'd extend to a non-disordered person, but I'd look at it this way: did you really make a mistake?  was the pwBPD truly wronged here, or are they just pretending to be? 

If you're watching porn so much that you're not functioning as a human being or neglecting your partner, then sure, maybe you did wrong them. And you need to apologize, make a change and move on. 

But if that's not the case, then by admitting you have "a problem" or however else the pwBPD is phrasing it, you've just opened the door to the pwBPD to take the "high ground" here, and constantly beat you up to deflect from their own behavior and justify all they've done wrong by what you've admitted to.

You need to close that door, metaphorically speaking. 

[HurtAndTired]

Hi 15years,

Just from my own experience, I would say that a pwBPD can hold a "wrong" against you for as long as it serves them to do so. My dBPDw regularly breaks out her "list of grievances" against me and goes through a "litany of my wrongdoings" whenever she is dysregulated. Depending on how dysregulated she is and how long I am willing to hear her go through a circular "conversation" this experience can, and has, lasted for hours. She will regularly bring up things that I did "wrong" from 13 years ago when we first started dating. Nothing is ever forgotten or forgiven.

From what I have read here on these boards, this is a pretty common experience for us "non" partners of pwBPD. Hanging onto every little thing that you have ever done "wrong" (real or imagined) helps them reinforce their disordered thinking, where they are forever in the victim position of the Karpman Drama Triangle, and solidly places you in the persecutor position. This helps them keep their fragile sense of self intact and alleviates them of having to face uncomfortable truths, such as feeling bad about mistreating you. Of course, they treat you badly...because you deserve to be treated badly! Why do you deserve this? Well, look at this handy list they have compiled of why you are such a rotten person that deserves it! It's not abuse, it's a justifiable response to YOUR abuse of THEM.

You have zero control over their disordered thinking. You can never get them to forgive or forget. It is not in your power to do so. They will continue to be angry about something tiny and blow it out of proportion (or something completely fabricated) and be angry about it forever. The good news is that you have 100% control over two things. The first is how long you let them chew you out about something. I have a rule where if my wife is angry at me and complaining about me, I will listen if it is something from that day...or even that week. I will try to engage her in a productive discussion, apologize once (and sincerely) if it is warranted, and take responsibility if it was indeed my bad. However, if she starts to be verbally abusive, I will exit the conversation and not re-engage until she can speak to me civilly.

If she starts bringing up things from months or years ago, I will try to steer the conversation back to the present day. I will say, "Have I done something TODAY that has upset you?" If she cannot find an answer to that, the conversation is over. Anytime that the conversation starts turning into the "litany of wrongs" I will give her one warning and ask the question about TODAY, and then excuse myself from the room (or house if necessary). I have told her before, and will remind her when necessary, that I will no longer discuss problems that are not about the present. Discussing problems from the past serves no purpose except to make everyone involved angry. We cannot go back in time and change anything. If I have ever messed up, I have already apologized (back in the bad old days, sometimes I apologized more times than I could count for things that I never actually did). This is why I now apologize once and once only, but sincerely, if I have actually done something wrong. My days of endless apologies are forever done.

The second thing you have control over is how much you let the "litany of wrongs" get under your skin. For real things like having watched porn a few times (if this is truly a wrong, every man and most women in the world are "guilty" of it) you have already apologized and put it in the past. Forgive yourself and let it go. Don't let her get inside your head and live there rent free for the purposes of making you feel guilty. Don't let her disordered thinking become your disordered thinking. Remind yourself that she has a serious mental illness and is blowing things completely out of proportion in order to cast herself as a victim and you as the villain in the narrative she tells herself in her own mind. I know that listening to that warped narrative for years can begin to gaslight you and make you doubt yourself. Don't. Don't get caught up in the FOG (Fear, Obligation, and Guilt) that pwBPD use to cloud our perception and judgment. Remind yourself that you are a good person and ask yourself if any normal person would judge you so harshly and for so long for something so minor? The answer is, of course, they wouldn't!

My wife gets bent out of shape about porn too, and frequently accuses me of constantly watching it. She even follows me to the bathroom thinking I am watching porn if I am out of the room for more than a minute or two. I have watched porn on occasion during our marriage, but no more so than any other normal person. But do you know what? I found out that she watches porn very frequently herself. Once she asked me to find something for her on her phone. She has an iPhone, and I am an Android guy, so I don't really know how to use her browser well. When I was trying to look something up for her like she asked, it displayed all the open tabs on her phone browser and like 90%+ of them were porn sites! For pwBPD, accusations are often admissions. When I asked her about the porn sites, she said she was "trying to figure out what kind of porn I was watching." HA!

I agree with PeteWitsend. Set a hard boundary about bringing up the past. It serves no purpose. Start excusing yourself from circular arguments and put a stop to the "litany of wrongs." She can't argue with you if you aren't in the room to argue with.

HurtAndTired

[Pook075]

And how long does a porn watcher need to be "in debt"? It seems like an excuse to be abusive.

To be clear, this isn't about porn...it's about the ability to forgive.

If I looked back at every single thing my ex-wife did to me over our marriage and listed it all out here, people would think she's a monster.  Yet we could do that with anyone here...list out the worst things they did over the last decade...and they'd be perceived as horrible people.

I always forgave my BPD ex and in most cases, I wouldn't even remember it a month later.  But she was keeping tabs on my "sins" and never actually let any of it go.

It sounds like you have to have an honest conversation- can she forgive you or not?  You can't live under eternal judgement so she must decide what the next steps are going to be.  Nobody should live under that kind of double-standard though; your wife has done lousy things in the past as well (because we all have, every single one of us despite our best intentions).

[kells76]

Hi 15years;

It sounds like your wife communicates that she wants you to read the subreddit page, and then you do read it. I am assuming that she knows that you read it (sees you do it, etc).

What outcome are you hoping for, when you agree to do that?

Are you achieving your desired outcome?

Does repeating what she wants you to do change anything?

[FindingMyGut]

I can relate, on steroids!

I did something seriously bad 14 years ago. But 13 years of punishment was not enough. I could not volunteer at our children’s school without him extrapolating and blaming me for being a people pleaser, not having boundaries, not prioritizing him, not helping him repair his self esteem, etc, etc. I was deep in the FOG, because I felt guilty, feared upsetting him, and felt obligated to do everything he asked as a way to make amends. His boundaries/demands just kept changing and I could never satisfy them.

Marriage counselling, 13 years of effort, 2 bad therapists and 2 good therapists later, I have finally put my foot down. I refuse to discuss it anymore, I will not engage in related criticisms, and I have boundaries in place to protect my independence.

It’s really not going well. But the FOG has lifted and I see the light. I’m on a path to peace and healing and I hope you can come to see the same. We all make mistakes. Would you forgive her?  Yes.  Trust your gut, stop beating yourself up, and stop letting her do the same.

Best wishes!

[FindingMyGut]

I should also add: the healthy response to something you cannot forgive / someone who is not respecting your boundaries is to end the relationship. If she truly felt threatened /unsafe /didn’t trust you, the foundation of the relationship is gone and without forgiveness it cannot be repaired. If she is not choosing a healthy response, it borders into manipulation.

[15years]

Thank you all for your response.

I would still like to discuss this more here because it is at the core of my rs-issues... Listening to her, I'm loosing my sense of what is a betrayal and what is a persons right to freedom. At the root of my uncertainty is that I understand and agree that men and women does not have an equal position when it comes to sexualized content online. I'm not "woke" and not the opposite either - I can understand that women feel more insecure about their partners activity online because there is more to be jealous about (not taking into account that you can probably also "betray" someone by seeking attention online).


Now she wants us to set up "guidelines" for my use of Spotify, because of sexual content in album covers and lyrics, that feels extreme and I told her I'm not going to do that. On the other hand, I do find myself sexually attracted to pictures I see on there, so I get the feeling that she's "on to me" and that I am guilty of what she's accusing me of.

One other aspect is that all the pressure and stress plus low relationship satisfaction makes me want to look at sexualized content even more. But that also sounds like an excuse to not hold oneself accountable... To me, this all is a jungle of what's right and what's wrong...

Please share any thought about this, the more the better Now all I get is my wife's point of view.