By AbbyA

She logged onto her fiance’s computer to check her email.  Instead, on the screen, was a recently downloaded movie.    She watched a few minutes of the sexually violent film that her fiance kept in his online library.  It was not the only one.  One film after another, she was sickened by the hardcore sexual violence.

Right now, I can feel my blood moving through my body as I recall her telling me about what she found.  I remember how she fell into her bed for days.  The sleep and dark and her mom seemed to be her only condolences.  She eventually reached out to a social worker who talked her through her near suicidal emotions.  After a couple of days, she started to talk again.  She had dinner with him.  I think it was his birthday.  She looked beautiful and had the plan to win over the pornography with their love and all she had to offer him.  Dinner didn’t go well.  He just didn’t see the big deal.  After all, his own mother shared that she and his dad enjoyed “soft” porn in their marriage.  She suggested that it could be helpful in a relationship.  A few weeks later, after a few more dinners and a couple of counseling sessions, she decided to marry him – – premised, in part, on a promise that he would not indulge in online pornography anymore.

She was pregnant for the second time now.  She didn’t know where he was much of the time.  He claimed he was depressed over his father’s death and stressed out at work.  He left in the morning, but not for work.  He spent his days downtown.  And, while she never knew for sure, her intuition told her he was watching porn films at theaters, going to strip clubs or spending time with escorts.  Right now, I can feel my blood moving through my body as I recall myself telling her that it wasn’t true.  That she was extremely pregnant, very emotional and that, the man I knew as her husband, would keep his word.

Now the mother of two, busy about her kids, her husband’s career, family/friends, she passes his computer at home.  She sees a few printed pictures of women’s faces.  She sees that these are his choices on a site for men with means.  She guesses his user name and password.  She logs on that site and sees he has been searching for and meeting with high-class hookers.  Right now, my blood curdles and my body cringes at his false promises and his sexual addiction. 

Right now, my heart breaks daily for her.  She is a single mother of two.  Trying to adjust.  Trying to recover.  Trying to find a safe place to exchange her emptiness for fullness.  Trying to believe that her children will not be harmed by the harm the three of them have undergone.  Trying to pick up the pieces of what went wrong.  Trying to make sense of what makes no sense.  Trying to see a hopeful future.

Right now, our world is spending

• 20 billion on adult videos
• 11 billion on escort services
• 7.5 billion on magazines
• 11 billion on phone sex, sex clubs and novelties
• 2.5 billion on cable and pay per views
• 4 billion on internet and cd-rom

“How shall I pardon you for this? Your children have forsaken Me and sworn by those that are not gods.  When I had fed them to the full, Then they committed adultery and assembled themselves by troops in the harlots’ houses.  They were like well-fed lusty stallions; Everyone neighed after his neighbor’s wife.  Shall I not punish them for these things?” says the Lord.  “And shall I not avenge Myself on such a nation as this?” Jeremiah 5:7-9.

Right now, I wonder how much goodness we withhold from ourselves.  Our sin turns away the good things that God has for us.  Jeremiah 5:25.  I think about this month’s subject matter – – Boys, Fathers, Husbands, Boyfriends and Everything in Between , you have so much responsibility to love the women in your lives.  Your sisters, daughters, wives, girlfriends and everything in between are more valuable than your need to fill the hole within.  Ephesians 5 is not unattainable.

I think about pornography and the sex industry.  I am not going to let any of us off the hook on this one.  Toying with pornography to please your spouse is not exempt from God’s standard.  The consequences of leaving your adolescent or teenager alone in his or her room with internet access falls on your head.  Feeling so alone that you entertain phone sex, chat rooms and meetings with strangers is not acceptable.  God gives us the power of free-will.  We can honor God with our bodies or we can serve the other gods in our lives.  1 Corinthians 6:19-20.

Right now, I think about FemmeFuel’s readership.  I think about how it is impossible that there is not at least one that is suffering from her significant other’s sexual addition, her teenager’s or even her own.  Right now, get out of the darkness, perhaps your sadness.  Don’t make excuses or water down what is revealed when the light shines down on your secret places, that of your significant other or your child.  Get into the light and shed the shame and addiction.

No temptation has overtaken you except that is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.  1 Corinthians 13.

FemmeFuel writers are here to share your burdens and walk victorious with you.  No shame or guilt included.

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