My husband was exposed to a lot of deviant (and illegal) porn as a child and through his tween and teen years. He became a porn addict really young but quit when he realized how harmful and wrong it all was in his older teens.
He was deeply traumatized by it. It allowed him to be groomed by adults into a plethora of harmful, sexually sadistic actions. He came to devalue and objectify himself, thinking he was only good to be used by other people. He tried to kill himself more than once.
Years later, he still has upsetting flashbacks and reactions, and normal activities he cannot do or finds deeply distressing, like petting a dog, for example, or some tv shows. Being around children upsets him because he worries they’re being groomed the way he was.
When our child was born, my husband suffered a psychotic break. His past loomed large in his delusions; he thought there was a group of pedophiles stalking us, and he had to protect us from them, or our child would be taken.
His past with pornography has been a significant stressor in both our lives. We’re finally to a place where most of our days feel “normal”, but we’ve come a long way. There was a time we couldn’t even go to the grocery store without issue. Because he was an unsupervised child, he was easy pickings for predators, and porn just made the whole process easier.
