No Guilt-Free Onions (Part One)

It became clear early in our relationship that my wife is sensitive to smells. She insists on a certain brand of sausage because it reminds her of the kind they had on her mission. When she is pregnant she probably could make her way through a pitch black room by smell alone. Pregnant or not, she can smell whether I have had raw onions or garlic in the preceding 24 hours just by smelling my breath. In fact, she refuses to kiss me if she smells it. So whenever we have hamburgers, she jokingly (ok, half-jokingly) says that if I want any action, I better not eat the raw onions.

Back to that in a second. The first week after I told my wife I had relapsed was really difficult. I felt like I was doing everything I could to make a serious life-change: I had confessed to the bishop, I was studying the scriptures and talks, I was reading about sexual addiction every day, and I was working harder at home and at work. I was feeling a lot of resistance and temptation. I was also feeling withdrawal from my addiction and from screen-based entertainment, which we had agreed to forego for a month as a family.

During one of our nightly discussions that first week, we read the first chapter of a marriage book entitled The Sex-Starved Marriage. In it there was one paragraph addressed to wives that stood out to me:

I want you to be fully informed about what your spouse might be feeling or thinking so that you can prevent unnecessary heartache. I also urge you to consider the unfairness [in the statement that]... goes something like this: "I know you're sexually unhappy. Although I don't plan on doing anything about it, I still expect you to remain faithful." Hello, can you see what's wrong with this picture?

That night we also talked about a euphemism she had heard at a women's conference--the woman referred to sex as "polishing the husband's armor." As if the husband is going off to war every day and it's the wife's job to fortify him or else he's not fully protected.

And the last thing I want to mention was something our old bishop had said the first time I confessed. He said that now more than ever it was important for her to make sure I felt satisfied.

As we talked, I expressed how much I wanted to feel close to her, especially physically (though not necessarily sexually). So later that night when I wanted to cuddle with my wife--and don't mistake me, "cuddle" does not mean "have sex"--I was a little frustrated when she kind of gave me the cold shoulder. I wasn't expecting sex. I wasn't even expecting her forgiveness--all I wanted was some affectionate reciprocation! Or so I told myself.

Notwithstanding all that advice and how justified I felt, within 24 hours of that discussion we had decided to have 90 days of celibacy in our marriage. Here's why, and why I think all three of those--the author of The Sex-Starved Marriage, the woman who referred to sex as "polishing" her husband's "armor," and the bishop who encouraged my wife to make sure I felt sexually fulfilled--were misguided in talking about sex in that way, especially when it comes to marriages affected by sexual addiction.

The problem with the bishop's advice was that it puts the burden of the husband's recovery on the wife's shoulders. Not only is that unfair (giving the husband ammo against the wife if he fails), but it's not even possible. More sex is not going to fix the problem of lack of sexual control in a marriage! I repeat: the problem is a lack of sexual self-control...the answer needs to be more self-control, not more sex! It's a bottomless pit that will not--cannot--be filled. By images, masturbation, prostitutes, or even a well-meaning but misguided wife.

The problem with the "armor polishing" advice is similar. It implies that the lust temptations a man faces will be lessened if the woman satisfies her husband sexually. I don't know if this is true of not, but I'll share a personal story to illustrate that it's a misleading way of thinking. When my wife was pregnant with our last child, we were planning on her being induced a week or so before her due date. Because she wasn't progressing fast enough, the doctor prescribed doing "the wild thing" with me often to soften the cervix. This led to a week and a half of near-nightly sex. I wish I could tell you that I didn't have any relapses during this time because I was sexually satisfied by my wife. But I can't. Because it doesn't work that way.

One more note before I move on. Another reason this advice troubles me is the implications that if the husband fails, the wife was partly to blame. She wasn't attractive enough, or good enough in bed, or willing to do it often enough. To those who think that, let me be clear: there's nothing wrong with the wife! There's simply no competing with the addiction. To the sex addict, the brain has become hard-wired to expect new and progressively erotic situations. She could be the sexiest supermodel with an abnormally high libido and she still wouldn't be attractive or sexy enough to satisfy the black hole of his desire.

The difficulty with the reasoning in The Sex Starved Marriage has to do with the violation of trust accompanying addictive behavior. This isn't just a matter of the absence or presence of sex. When a person promises they will hold sex as a sacred thing only between them, then turns to something else to stimulate themselves, the trust between them has been seriously damaged. Adding more sex isn't going to solve anything. In fairness, I'm sure the author knows there's more to it than that, but sending this single message to an audience of sex addicts and non-sex addicts alike, without some sort of caveat, seems problematic to me.

This is where I kind of contradict myself: there is such a thing as physical touch as a love language. There is bonding that comes through appropriate sex between a husband and wife. A (worthy) husband will feel more satisfied in his marriage if his wife initiates more sex. I think each of these well-meaning advice givers have good intentions and correct ideas for many marriages...my concern is that more sex will do nothing to cure the underlying problem in a marriage marred by sex addiction--lack of sexual self-control and an addiction to lust. If anything, it can cause contention, lack of self-esteem, and slower recovery.

Back to the beginning--my wife is sensitive to smells. The smell of an onion on my breath will kill her sex drive as surely as the image of a hairy obese man in a speedo will kill mine. I've come to the conclusion though, that it isn't just onions that make me "smell." If I've violated her trust, even if she doesn't know it, I will stink spiritually. She may not even know why she doesn't feel like having sex. She may even go through with it because all the advice that encourages her to support me in that way. But not only will it not strengthen our marriage, it will continue to drive a wedge of unfulfilled expectations and manipulation between us. In part two I'll talk about why celibacy is necessary to start the healing process in a marriage scarred by lust addiction. In other words, why there is no such thing as guilt-free onions.