My f25 boyfriend m27 has said he is addicted to adult content especially when he drinks, and wants to get help. I don’t know if I can take it anymore.. Is it time for me to leave? (Long post)

Hello everyone. Prewarning that this is going to be a long post but a lot has went on in our relationship and I could really use some advice. I know that usually it’s just as simple as leave.. but if you have any experience that is similar, I’d love to know how it ended up and I want to give all of our background because the last time I tried to get advice, I was told that it seemed like it wasn’t the full story so here’s the full story.

Here’s the background : my partner and I have known each other since we were in fourth grade, him in 5th at first he was friends with my sister, my sister made other friends and eventually we started hanging out, we became best friends and we both came from a really bad environment. My home life wasn’t good, I started self harming, I was being abused by my stepdad, and my mom stood by it never saying or doing anything my older sister, however, was considered “the golden child” A+ student, athlete, could never do wrong. We had such opposite upbringing and I’m not sure why even to this day as an adult. My partners mom wasn’t in the picture, and his dad was living his own life by 13. My partner was living in an apartment that his dad paid for and would drop by to drop off groceries maybe once or twice a week. We bonded through trauma. When I ran away from home, it was to his place. And in seventh grade, I started dating his friend, even though I knew I had feelings for him. A year later, my family and I moved to another province. We talked occasionally, but eventually lost touch.

I found out that through those years he had been addicted to meth, heroine, coke, crack, alcohol, basically anything he could get his hands on. We reconnected when he lived in my city at 15 but at that time, my parents had divorced. My mom got addicted to drugs and started abusing me as well I had been living at our cities youth homeless shelter since I was 14. We plan to meet up, but it just never happened and again our relationship just disappeared.

At 22 we ran into each other in the same city at our train station, it sounds so cheesy, but I noticed this handsome stranger looking at me, something about him felt so familiar he came up to me and said I’m sorry if this is weird, but is your name ___ I said yeah and he said you don’t remember me? And it all just came flashing back. He was much taller now, put on a little bit of a belly, had a full beard and the hat that was always worn backwards with what was called wings back then, was now a neat buzz cut. He asked for my phone number and I gave it to him. He sent me his first name while I stood right in front of him and then my train was there. He gave me a hug and I just remember he smelled so good, he felt so warm and my heart fluttered.. He said I’ll text you and gave me a smile. And sure enough he did. We caught up and both of us had kids from previous relationships, I one son, him one daughter we both had week on week off custody.

We went on our first date shortly after , we went to an arcade, had a few drinks, laughs and played some games, I later found out that he had sold one of his old phones and watches in order to pay for the date.. when I think about that it just makes me wanna sob. Eventually, we started spending a lot more time together at 3 months he told me he loved me and asked me to be his girlfriend, at first, I said no. I had a lot going on and trauma from a previous relationship, when he asked me again at six months, I said, yes and at seven months and we introduced our children to each other, at about a year we started sleeping at each other‘s houses. At 14 months we moved in together, now I know that sounds really fast and if I could’ve done another way, I would have unfortunately my house flooded, at the time I was living in a two bedroom bi-level apartment and what started as a small drip from the ceiling caved in my roof and I had no choice but to leave with very little notice. At the time, my partner was also about to move and we decided to get a bigger unit together.

Three months after living with each other was the first time I found out he had been cheating. It tore me apart inside. I had a feeling for weeks that something was off. He was spending a lot of time by himself in our basement, he was drinking a lot, we weren’t being intimate anymore, and so I did what I should not have done and I went through his phone.. I found out that he had been talking to one of his friends, she had been sending him photos and sexting him. I felt my heart break inside my chest. He woke up the next morning and I told him that I was done. That was the first time that he told me he had an addiction to porn. We had a conversation and he told me even though I saw him drinking, he had been sneaking out to drink at night, his alcohol addiction was back, he said since we moved in together things had been really difficult.. obviously I have to mention that about three weeks after we moved in together he lost his job, he got laid off as they were overstaffed for their current season, he said that since we moved in together, I seemed miserable which again was not wrong. Even though I had previous relationships, I never saw myself living with someone. It was always just me and my son I have OCD and borderline personality disorder. I like things to be a certain way and living and sharing a life with someone was a really big hard change for me. He asked me if I would try to go to therapy with him and I said yes. I’m not sure why, but I forgave him.

We only ever ended up going to one intro session, one week after that he had a cancer scare. He had a tumour growing on the side of his head throughout his ear, a month later, we did find out that it was benign and after that, I asked one of my friends to give him a job, they gave him a chance doing construction work, but it was long days 12 to 14 hours decent money, but still I had been paying the bills all by myself for almost 5 months. Unfortunately, about a month ago, his grandfather passed away, and he really started to go off the rails. At that point, my son was in BC with his grandfather for the summer, and his daughter was spending a month with her mom because she had a new baby.

But I was absolutely miserable. Not having our kids around to focus on made me focus on the fact that I was in a relationship with someone that I didn’t trust, someone who wasn’t contributing to cleaning the house or paying the bills, someone that didn’t seem to want any in intimacy with me, and again he started going out a lot more and drinking a lot more, there were nights that he wasn’t coming home till 1 AM because he was “hanging out with the neighbours” and last night was the final straw. He came home extremely drunk. It was 1:30 in the morning when one of our friends/neighbors walked into my bedroom and said I need your help. I came downstairs to find my partner passed out on the floor. The neighbour and I lifted him onto the couch. The neighbour told me that he was sorry and he gave me his phone and keys. And so phone in my hand, staring at my drunk partner at that point, I already felt done, but the final mail in the coffin was going through the phone again I sat down and opened his phone and went through it and for the most part there wasn’t a lot to find, I saw a lot of porn, something that I really did not like was I saw some videos he had saved of himself having sex with previous partners, but they were saved a long time ago. I just never noticed them when I went through his phone the first time. And again something that was saved before our relationship even started I didn’t know if I could be mad about that, but then I found the fetish websites. Fetlife to be exact.. the most recent message was from 14 days ago when about 20 days ago, I broke down to him and told him that since the cheating I feel ugly, I feel worthless, I compare myself to every woman I see because of what he did I constantly feel on edge or like I can’t trust him, I feel like every time we have a positive moment it’s overshadowed by the pain he’s caused me and something and may just snapped.

The next morning he woke up and he said that he was sorry , he said that he was going to get help for his alcohol problem. He woke up and felt like he wanted to kill himself, he said he had been feeling suicidal for a long time, he said he had been feeling that way since his grandfather passed, it was like losing his dad. He said that I was the only light in his life aside from his daughter and he couldn’t wait for our kids to be home. I said if I’m a light in your life then why do you keep cheating on me? He paused and said what do you mean and I pulled his phone out of my pocket. He said why do you have my phone and I said when you came in last night, neighbour gave me the phone because you were so drunk, you tried to throw your phone when it died. And he said well there’s nothing in my phone, so why did you go through it and I asked him what is fetlife? he went red in the face and said he didn’t know what I was talking about. And I told him I took photos on my own phone so don’t play stupid right now.. he just went quiet.

I took a deep breath, looked at him in the eyes and said you’re a fucking loser and I’m done.. a tear roll down his face and he said what do you mean? I said “ exactly what I said, you have a woman at home who loves you, who stayed the first time that you did something wrong, this woman being me raises your daughter when she is here, because when you’re not working, you’re out doing some stupid ass shit with the neighbours. I’m the one raising her on top of raising my own child, I’m paying all the bills and I can’t even remember the last time you contributed to that even though you have a job that’s paying you $34 an hour that I got you. When you’re home, you are not helpful, cooking cleaning taking care of the kids is all on me. When I am at work, I come home to an even bigger mess, kids upset because of the way that you parented them. If you can even call it parenting you put them in front of a TV and if they piss you off, they go to their rooms. You are a terrible parent, you are a terrible partner, and no matter what addiction you have, the fact that you can look yourself in the mirror and say I have a beautiful woman that takes care of me, a beautiful daughter and stepson, and I’m gonna ruin that all so I can look at some pussy.. you fucking disgust me. now, being that you clearly have been using all of your money for alcohol and not saving it all I’m gonna give you a month, my son gets back tomorrow for school, your daughter gets back in a few days, so I’m gonna give you a month to save your money and get the fuck out because I’m done giving you chances” the whole time he was just crying and trying to hug me.

I said this is your last chance what do you have to say? He said “I’m so sorry. When these chats happened, I was blacked out drunk and I barely even remember them but you said you went through my phone and there was nothing else to find. I haven’t been cheating on you or talking to anybody else yeah I went on these websites when I was drunk and I’m sorry there is something wrong with me. But I’ve hit my low point, I don’t wanna lose you, I’m gonna start going to therapy and AA” I cut him off and said I hope that works out for you but no matter what you do at this point nothing is gonna change. I’ve been begging you to go to therapy with me as a couple and you never had time but now that I’m telling you to get the fuck out you want to go? You can’t wait until everything falls apart to try to fix it. I’ve been the only one trying to fix this relationship for months and somehow I’m still the bad guy. I’ve been begging you for intimacy and instead of giving it to me you’re giving it to women online whether you were drunk or not. At this point, I don’t think that I could ever trust you again.

We went throughout the day, just ignoring each other. He kept trying to come to me and hug me and talk to me and I would tell him just leave me alone.. I went over to a neighbor’s house an older lady who’s like a mom we had some drinks and because I had not eaten and almost 24 hours the liquor hit me a lot faster I came home saw him on the couch and just went up to bed. I fell into the bed and just started crying. He came upstairs as I was hyperventilating. He got into the bed with me and put me in a bear hug, he was saying “”feel my chest, moving up and down, feel my arms around you, what is something that you can hear? What are two things you can see” and kept going until I calmed down. When I finally did, he looked at me and said I’m so sorry. I looked back at him and said I don’t understand why you did this to me, but I fucking hate you. I pulled myself away from him and laid at the end of the bed, he sat there completely still, and I just continued to sob until I fell asleep. He woke me up this morning, saying that he was going to work. He put his hand on my face, kissed me on the forehead and said I love you and I’ll see you after work. I just turned over and went back to bed. When I woke up, he had texted me and said I made a therapy session for after work today.. I’d also like to attend an AA meeting if that’s OK with you.

I haven’t responded.. he always does this. He pushes me to my breaking point and then says he’s gonna get help. Thank God that at the breaking points, the kids have never been around when they are home. We push our shit to the side and we deal with it on the week that they’re gone. I’m just in so much pain.. I love him. I always saw stories of people cheating, and staying and thought how stupid they were, and why don’t they just leave but now here I am in this exact situation and I’m devastated, I would rather him get the help he needs and stay with him.. maybe that makes me weak or stupid all I know is that I’ve loved him since I was 10 years old and I never imagined it going this way.. I downloaded my old Tinder account I saw a handsome man, with a good job who had sent me a “super like” with a message saying how beautiful I was and he’d love to take me for coffee and no matter how much I looked at it and how handsome he was I could not bring myself to swipe and immediately deleted the app. And that to me it was even more devastating. I knew how much he hurt me. How much hurt and anger I felt towards my partner and I couldn’t do it. So how when he was claiming to love me could he do that to me?

I just don’t know what to do.. I’m scared to going back to a single parent, during this school year, I have full custody and I fought my ass off for it but that will mean that I find an apartment again and go back to doing it by myself on top of my day job and night job that I will probably have to quit. I will have to say goodbye to the daughter that I’ve raised and that I love so much. I will have to let go of the future that I wanted with this man since I was a child myself. This hurt so bad and I don’t know what to do. Both of us are not in a position to get a new place right off the bat. With my partner’s grandfather gone, he has nowhere to go and I myself don’t have any family.. so no matter what we are gonna have to stay with each other until we can both get our own place but I’m scared that I’m gonna let him back in and I’m also scared to be without him till it goes, the future that I wanted, and the man that I loved. But the man standing in front of me is not the guy that I wanted a future with he’s not the man that I loved he is an absolute stranger.. I just don’t know what to do. Any advice?