anabanana

hi debonair. sorry you're feeling this way.... i think alot of women struggle with the whole porn issue. i know it's difficult for me to understand the need for it, and it's hard not to feel inadequate in some way. the internet has definitely revolutionalized the whole porn industry and made it a much bigger presense in our lives- i mean before at least you had to go to a store to rent a movie or buy a magazine. now you can easily access large amounts of porn, and i think it's much easier to shrug off a magazine or dvd then finding thousands of files on your bf's computer or whatever. do you think he is specifically focusing on one group of women when he does his porn stuff? i know it's hard not to harp on what these porn women have or represent that you don't, but it could be completely insignificant that the porn he was watching had black women. it would be problematic if he was specifically seeking out black women in his porn searches, or if he was fetishizing a group of women... but it could all just be a coincidence. what has he lied to you about? does he know that he has seriously damaged your trust? when you share yourself with him, is it ever resiprocated? does he open up with you? do you feel that he genuinely loves you? in my experience, men are notoriously bad communicators. my husband sometimes completely forgets intense emotional discussions we've had. he just completely shuts off emotionally. this is so frustrating, but we've been talking about it, and he tells me now when he feels he is starting to close off, which has helped since then at least i know what's going on. i know it's cliche, but he really needs to work on his communication skills. does he know how you feel?

hello. i have been put on wellbutrin XL 150 mg. this is my 3rd day. i am nervous about using this drug and wanted to hear people's experiences with it. what changes did you notice? any side effects? any and all insight is appreciated.

really? i find it despicable... he is a teacher, and he has desires for his high school students. honestly, if it was friend or something, i might even be able to shrug it off. but it is my partner... this information is too much for me to handle. not only do i not trust him at all, but now i have lost all respect for him. i don't think i can repair this... and i don't think i want to. what troubles me is that he did spend a good amount of time with these girls, in a mentorship capaicyt mind you, so there must have been something about their personalities as well that worked for him, right? or do men really not factor in immaturity and other undesirable flaws when they have a physical attraction to someone?

well, he says it is totally physical. he had one on a student last year and one this year- the last one got transferred to an alternative program a few weeks ago. after i questioned him about it, he said he masturbated to thoughts of them a couple of times. so i guess it is physical.

well, my husband just told me has had 2 crushes since he has been working with teens- one is 17, the other 18. he has talked with co-workers (also married and in their mid-20s) who say it is not a big deal. anyone out there in the education field who can give me some insight?

hi there. congratulations on having a beautiful new baby... it must be alot of work, and i have alot of respect for you as a new mother. i also wanted to tell you i am sorry if your husband does not make you feel wanted or desirable... however, in my experience, i think that has much less to do with him than with you. for exaple, when i gain some wight (i am 6 foot, so nobody can notice but me), i start to feel really crummy. this is not really associated with anyone making me feel this way, but is more me not feeling desirable, and lacking confidence in myself. my husband can tell me i am beautiful a thousand times and it won't mean a thing because i don't feel that way. you should do what you can to make yourself feel foxy. sexiness is all about confidence. alot of men communicate non-verbally, and maybe your husband has a hard time saying those things out loud. did he use to compliemtn you alot in the past? have you told him you wish he complimented you more? i wouldn't be surprised if he didn't even know you were feeling this way. telling him you need more affection won't hurt... maybe he feels the same with you- do you tell him he's handsome? do you reach out emotionally and physically, or do you put most of the expectation on him to initiate everything? maybe he feels just as insecure. anyways, i think everyone here is right. take some time out for romantic nights for you two. let him know how you feel- if not verbally, write him a letter or an e-mail. my motto is, you should share everything with your partner because not telling him doesn't make the feelings go away. it is best to lay your cards on the table so you can start working on resolving things before they start to fester and come out in negative ways. we are all different people and we process things differently. it can't hurt to see where all of this is coming from from his end, since it's probably not as bad as you think... anyways, best of luck. hope you're braving the alaskan winter well!

hello friends, thanks again for everyone's comments, and my apologies for not responding earlier. i have been out with a good friend of mine all day, and only got home recently. let me just elaborate on some details, so you have a clearer picture of the context. we are both 25 year old new yorkers. he is a high school drop out prevention counselor and i am an immigration attorney. you can imagine how difficult all this has been for me to stomach since my profession is based on notions of honesty and respect for the law. also, i think it is important to mention (and i may be saying this to make myself feel better) that the teens he works with are 17-22 year olds. they are all kids in the system who are "aging-out" of the public school system and alternative programs need to be figured out. i completely agree with everyone's comments. we just had a talk, and i told him that i am willing to work on anything he tells me, but if he lies to me again, i am out. he decided to let me read his journal, but didn't want to be here when i did it so he is now walking around somewhere. when he gets back, i will ask him about his teen crushes. i don't want to be completely judgemental and equate it with pedaphilia, but the power dynamic of the student/teacher dynamic definitely freaks me out. honestly, i am not sure i can do this. he is a very kind, mellow man. we have known each other since we were 19 (haven't been togethert that long by any means). the power dynamic in our relationship is definitely off- i am a very strong personality and verbalize everything. he is the first partner i have had that i feel i can be completely honest with. i have told him i expect the same from him from the very beginning, and he has led me to believe that our relationship was built on complete honesty. it is most certainly not, and this makes me feel very betrayed. he is definitely emotionally immature. he wants to give me what "i want" but that does not a relationship make! i mean, * * * *, i can get intense, but i feel that my husband should not be such a coward where he cannot share important things with me because he is so afraid of the repurcussions. he comes from a very repressed family- they didn;t even start hugging each other until i showed up. they are wonderful people, but don't talk about things that need to be put out there. i, on the other hand, come from a family that probably says too much, and we hurt each other sometimes, but at least we expose everything, and nothing is bottled up. he is the definitely weaker than i, which has been a problem for us for years. i encourage him to be more open, more courageous, to speak his mind and not be afraid of confrontation, but it's his temperament to not do those things, and sometimes i feel guilty asking him to change. he is an awful, awful communicator. he is the kind of person who puts a band-aid on a gushing wound and expects everything to work itself out. he just doesn't want to deal. in the last few weeks, he's really been trying to show me he can change because i think he has stopped taking me for granted. i am worried that he is only doing counselling to keep me, and not because he really thinks he should change. he is in counselling now to tap into his feelings and to learn how to communicate better, and to figure out who he is. i never knew he was so emotionally repressed, it's really quite amazing. i feel like i am with a complete stranger. this whole teen crush thing is a whole new development. i am curious to see how things go when he comes back. there are obviously intense shame issues for him around this issue... and i am not really sure i can deal with it. i work with teenagers as well and i am worried it will impact my own work since i will constantly be thinking of it. anyways, thank you all for your comments. please, keep them coming.

thank you all for responding. i just read it all- i've been out of the house all day, had ro get out. i will post again in a couple of hours. i really appreciate everyone's insight.

hey all. here's a quick break-down of what's going on. any and all advice is greatly appreciated. my husband of 1 year (we have been living together for 3 years) is a high school drop out counsellor and an after-school tutor. i know he looks at porn occasionally, which is fine with me- i do too. what bugs me is that he hides it from me. so, anyways, a few weeks back i brought my computer into work to have an IT person clean it out. during this process we found over 10,000 porn files on the computer, many of them being teen porn. now, my husband was working during the day and going to school at night, so when he found the time to look at that much porn is completely beyond me. so, anyays, i confront him about it and want to know whether he has a crush on any of the teenagers he works with. he doesn't respond to that, but tells me about another crush on another girl at work (she's 23) and lists all these emotional reasons why. i flip out, kick him out of bed. he leaves me a couple of messages the next day acting like nothing happened- i don't call him back. he doesn't come home that night. the next few days are awful- we talk about this crush, about the porn, he keeps changing his story around, blablabla. finally, he tells me he never had a crush on this other girl and the teen porn sites were all of legal age. he tells me he told me he had a crush on jasmine because he was angry with me for thinking he likes teens and was lashing out. so, the next week is great. tons of sex, candles, cooked dinners, the works. he starts going to counselling since he is such an awful communicator. i get him a journal so he can have a safe space to write stuff down. things are going well, except i still have this sneaking suspicion he is lying to me. well, i read his journal. i know, that's bad. but it turns out he has crushes on some of his teenage students. this worries me. and he had a crush on the other girl because he likes her and her body reminds him of me. but he admits to actually having a crush on her, which is significant since we had been fighting about that for weeks, and i just wanted him to tell me the truth. he has consistently lied to me about this, and now i also find out her has crushes on teenage girls at work. so, i am completely disgusted by the fact that he has crushes on his teenage students. am i right to be very concerned? how should i handle this? i think i am going to break it off, which is going to be so hard... i just absolutely don't trust him at all and feel completely betrayed and like i am living with a stranger. please, i need advice. thanks all.