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3 Lessons Learned from an Ex-Porn Addict

Last Updated: August 12, 2021

The following is a video of Michael Leahy, author of Porn Nation: Conquering America’s #1 Addiction. While the video is lengthy (about 45 minutes) it offers a startling picture of Michael‘s past relationship to pornography and how it nearly destroyed his life.

Our friend, Francois Driessen, is the director of this growing body documentary footage. So far, all of the videos have been filmed on location at Covenant Eyes and around our community.

Several things strike me about Michael’s testimony.

1. The Escalation of Porn Addiction

Michael is not alone in his story. Many people confess to the downward spiral of watching pornography. What starts with curiosity turns into a habit and then becomes an obsession. What starts as soft-core turns to hardcore. What starts as pictures on a screen turns to a desire to act out these fantasies with real people.

No, not all escalate the same way, but research shows the more porn we consume, the more we want to consume it.

2. The Personal Cost of Porn Addiction

Michael’s story of personal loss is heart-breaking. He understands firsthand how pornography feeds a warped understanding of intimacy. He also understands firsthand how pornography can destroy a marriage.

“Free porn” is a misnomer. Pornography always costs somebody something. In Michael’s case, obsessively watching pornography cost him almost everything: his sexual sanity, his marriage, and his children.

3. The Social Cost of Porn Addiction

One of Michael’s main messages as he travels from church to church, from campus to campus, is this: Regardless of how much one uses pornography, it is, by its very nature, exploitative and dehumanizing. If men want to stop being a part of the problem and starting being a part of the solution to sexual exploitation in our culture, then they need to stop buying into the glossy media that equates a person’s worth to their sexual prowess or the sum of their body parts.

Comments on: 3 Lessons Learned from an Ex-Porn Addict
  1. LivingThisNow

    Wow! Thanks for the testimony, it hits so close to home.

    I’ve only watched up to 15min so far, but had to stop and comment because this is happening to me right now.
    My husband and I also had the “perfect marriage” that all our friends looked up to, the “million dollar family” that had it all, from a nice house in the suburbs and nice cars, 2 kids and a dog, amazing vacations and adventures together, but inside I was slowly dying.
    I knew about my husband’s porn addiction for several years. The pornography and lack of intimacy related to it was the one thing we ever fought about. I always thought our marriage was great apart from that one area, and he truly was a great husband otherwise, so I set it aside to focus on the good. I did not realize how big an impact it could have.
    Two years ago, after much denial on his part, I’d had enough, and finally confronted my husband about getting help, and he saw a counselor, admitted his addiction and got an accountability partner.
    I was completely bulldozed by his affair when I thought things were improving, and am in the process of separating with 2 very young children.
    Pornography is not a minor thing, it is destroying my marriage, and threatens to ruin my children’s lives because their daddy is not emotionally available for them like he should be.

    • Brock

      I’m truly sorry to hear about that I would hope things have changed for the better but I just wouldn’t know your situation but what I do know is I struggled with pornography myself and I was pretty young once it started and I’m still not quite old enough to get married but I do know the field of addiction I know it has a lot of potential to ruin the individuals life but also the people that person is around specifically in a marriage I really do hope things work out and I hope my little reply may have had a positive impact in some way well God bless you and your family.

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