A
female
age
30-35,
anonymous
writes:My boyfriend and I have been together for almost 2 years now. As far as many things go, our life together has been great. Since I met him, I just knew he was my soul mate and things were just so perfect with him. I cannot begin to tell you how great things were for the first year and a half but suddenly, recently things took an awful turn. I noticed as of recently, he wanted to have more time to himself. While this made me a bit uncomfortable because most of the time, he always wanted me there as much as possible, I decided to shrug it off. I assumed he just wanted to play on his computer. As the time grew to be more and more I had to finally say something. While no length of time went between seeing each other that was unacceptable, I just had a feeling something strange was going on. While staying with me at my house,he would sleep over and leave at 5 o'clock in the morning, when he does not have to be at work til 9 and lives only a half hour away. We also always had a great sex life, I noticed it was becoming increasingly harder and harder for him to finish and no matter how long I tried eventually, not a single thing i did worked anymore.To my surprise one day while he was at work and I was trying to open an old college paper on his computer, I came across a list of porn sites with logins for each one and their password. While I am a very open person and do not mind him looking porn, I noticed that there was also a log in for sites that were live such as adult chatroulette and similar websites. This made me extremely uncomfortable and as I opened the folder in which this document was found, I noticed it was "hidden" on his computer. In fact, there were supposedly no documents in that folder at all. Having gained a lot of computer skills from my family, I know how to view hidden files. I opened up his control panel, clicked "View hidden files" and was I extremely surprised with what I found.Over 111 videos were sitting in the folder that he recorded of himself and other people in webcam chatrooms along with the document I first discovered. His webcam (that I never knew he even had) focused on his crotch, zoomed in so that was all you ever saw. I painfully watched as my boyfriend tried to talk to both boys and girls, and attempt to seduce them into masturbating wit him. He never gave out his real name or location, and to my knowledge never meet up with any of them. I never saw him orgasm from any of the chats, it just always ended with the other person either rejecting him or finishing and then he would use the "skip" button. This would go on between the hours that he would leave my house at 5 in the morning and the time he has to go to work. He also would get out of work early, tell me he worked a normal shift and just be on there until I came over. While the events I watched hurt somewhat, it was more the chats I read that I became completely wrecked over. There he was, calling other girls beautiful, pet names, and even saying that "everything on the screen was for them". As I watched more and more I realized that he said the same thing to each person, which made me feel a little bit better, but not much.After talking with him about it, he was completely mortified that I even found it. He explained to me it was a method he used a long time ago when he was lonely and while he is no longer lonely, he felt that it was a way he can mutilate and humiliate himself because he feels so depressed. The depression he explained, was due to his lack of exercise and unhappiness with himself and his body. When I had met him, he was in great shape and has recently lost his physique as he put off the exercise. His mom is very hard on him about it, due to her own problems with weight herself (she used to be anorexic, now just exercises and tans more than a teenager going to prom). While i see the stress he can be under from his mom, I have a hard time understanding why he resorted to this and if this is just what it looks like, he has a problem with online porn and chat. He is by no means fat, and I have never given him a reason to feel like he has to have this cut body to keep me around. I am by no means the most healthy and fit person in the world either. He is also very unhappy with other things at home, and at work. He related the whole ordeal to cutting himself, only his method was a lot less While he says all of this, I feel a completely different way. I feel betrayed and cheated on. I want to believe that this is the truth he is telling me, but part of me wants to say wake up! Something is not right! The other half of me says this can all be accurate. Ive been there and felt self conscious myself when his mom is telling us that we are eating poorly and getting fat. I feel that the chats were so similar and he said the same thing to each person that it seemed irrelevant who he was talking to. He talked to guys just as much as he talked to girls. I know he is not in the position he wants to be at 26 years old as far as a job is considered. While I say all of this, I do not think by any means he had any reason to do what he did and hurt himself and me in the process. Since this event, he has been nothing but back to his old self. He re-committed himself to me at the place we first met, closed every porn and chat account, and completely dismembered the webcam on his own to prove it will never happen again. I had asked many times if he was gay due to the nature that some of the people he talked to were men, but he simply said this was only because girls were harder to come by and he has no interest in men what so ever. I had forgiven him simply because I love him and pray that I find the strength to knock the images out of my head. He has gone as far as to get new underwear because for the first few days when he was changing or getting ready for bed (he sleeps in his underwear), it would just trigger the whole event back off in my mind since he would start by sitting in his underwear in front of the webcam. He knows how wrong it was and has no problem telling me how sorry he is. Our sex life a week later is back to normal.My question is really this. I understand that regardless of the answer he still has a problem that needs addressing but what is bothering me is can something like that be true? Was he doing it to really hurt himself? Do people do that? I know why most men do that and its not this reason, but instead for sexual pleasure. My boyfriend has done a great job in helping me move forward, but what can I also do for myself? I find myself worrying and brokenhearted when I have free time because it creeps up in my mind. I am still hurting after everything we went through. I still feel betrayed and cheated on and I want to shake that feeling. I need to feel strong especially since this may have been a way for him to hurt himself. I am not sure how to free myself of it. Thank you very much
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reader, anonymous, writes (13 July 2011): This is verified as being by the original poster of the questionThank you everyone. It was nice to get some advice on the subject especially because he will not let me talk about it with anyone. I am trying so hard to understand both him and my feelings toward the situation. I am still struggling with my feelings and some days are just better then others. I am also getting really upset now when his mom continues to come and comment on his weight every time we are eating. I was begged obviously not to tell his mom what happened, but I am so afraid he will get depressed again and look for someway to release it. I do not understand why she would make her son feel this way and its even starting to affect me and make me feel bad about myself. I have to remind myself that this is ridiculous because neither of us are even overweight for our age and height. Right now, my new issue is that his best friend is getting married and he is in the wedding, and I will have to watch him walk down the isle with another girl. While this wouldn't have bothered me before, I feel completely different now. I do not have the trust in him like i did before and it seems like my jealousy is completely through the roof. I am trying so hard to not put up my walls like he went out and cheated on me, but it still feels the same. I hope the feelings will subside in the next 4 months til the wedding. I hope I will be able to go and enjoy myself with him like I should have been able to. I really do appreciate your responses and it made me feel a lot better to let some of this out and tell my story.
A
female
reader, carebare  +, writes (7 July 2011):
Yes, honestly, I would believe that he was doing it to hurt himself as opposed to doing it for sexual pleasure.I have a friend who is bi-polar, depression and borderline multiple personality disorder. He is a straight male, but one of the things he used to do that started when he was maybe 12, was to go on webcam chats with older MEN and let them use him for their sexual pleasure. He says he was never really aroused by it but it was the feeling of being used and degraded that he kept doing it for. I understand that you feel hurt and that kind of behaviour is not acceptable in a relationship but take some comfort in the fact that he didn't do it for sexual pleasure. Your boyfriend needs to think about getting help.
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A
male
reader, anonymous, writes (6 July 2011): "I understand that regardless of the answer he still has a problem that needs addressing but what is bothering me is can something like that be true? Was he doing it to really hurt himself? Do people do that?"Yes, they do. Usually people who have been sexually abused or maltreated in their family of origin. His mother is an anorectic, this is a serious red flag warning."I still feel betrayed and cheated on and I want to shake that feeling."You were cheated on, and he probably has not told you everything. People often can't tell everything. Men, and women, who have issues around sex do a lot of serious crap in order to try to get it out of their head. Like sex in public bathrooms, under bridges, in parks, random strangers in random places, etc.This will give you an idea of how serious this can be.http://www.sexhelp.com/sast.cfmBy the way, if you are not willing to commit to really hard work with him, and he isn't willing to do the same with you, usually with a counselor, then move on because he will not be reliable more likely than not without professional help. He's got a serious problem. You can't fix it for him.
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A
female
reader, aunt honesty  +, writes (6 July 2011):
 You feel cheated on because you where cheated on. He may not have physically cheated on you with another person but this is just as bad. From what it sounds like in your post if I am honest I don't think he done this to hurt himself. By the sounds of things I think he feels he is not good enough for his mother and all she seems to do is judge him. This is going to lower his self esteem and also his confidence. Also you say he has gained a little weight which in his eyes is only going to make things worse for himself especially when his mother has huge issues with weight.
It does sound like he might have had a case of depression and this was his release. I think he may have done this so that people where showing him compliments, it may have made him feel wanted. This may have started from when he was a child. It sounds like his mother is quite judgemental and maybe he was unhappy growing up and never felt truly wanted. To me the people who where on the webcam don't seem to be the issue here. As you said yourself he said the same thing to everyone. I don't think he was looking for another woman or even a man, I think he may have just been looking for a release, for someone to give him a compliment. Yes it may have been mortifying for him and am sure he did feel humiliated and embarrassed afterwards.
As for your own issues that you are left with now. Am afraid there is nothing that you can do to make them go away. You have been hurt and the trust has been damaged. This takes time and effort to go away. It will take a long time for you to heal after this and to trust him again. It is good that he is making a huge effort to win back your trust. But you just need to have more time to move on from this. It is a hard thing to forgive someone for doing. Also it does sound like he may be craving attention so it would be good to make sure that he knows he is wanted by you. Good luck.
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