I remember feeling that I deserved whatever I got. I mean, a sense of self-worth was always something that I was dealing with, particularly when I was watching or viewing pornography, or sexual encounters, because I felt like I wasn't worth anything, that I couldn't overcome this. I could not live with myself. My level of shame had just skyrocketed. All I heard about pornography is that it was horrible and that it was bad and that it was a problem that men had. And here I was, an 11-year-old girl, and I was mortified. I would have been thrilled if I could have died at that point in my life. I didn't want to tell a single soul. And I never would.

That's a very natural thing to want to just give up and to feel like there's no way out--"I can't believe I'm doing this again." So it's normal to feel that way. But it's a lie. I don't know that I've ever worked with anybody who kept going that wasn't making improvement. Shame contributes to that feeling that "I can't talk about this issue with anyone else, because if someone knows about this behavior, they're going to know that I'm a bad person." I think there's a healthy sense of shame that we need to recognize. And a healthy sense of shame says, "I did not act according to my beliefs," or "I did not act according to my identity and my true self." And I think when that becomes an unhealthy shame is when people go beyond saying, "I don't like what I've done," to "I don't like who I've become." A healthy sense of shame can lead someone to repentance and seek forgiveness and, again, to be restored. An unhealthy sense of shame is going to increase that secrecy and that silence and that sense of isolation because a person no longer feels worthy of help from others. They don't feel anyone will accept them. We have to learn how to break out of that shame cycle. And in my experience, the way to do that is to help someone get back to their sense of worth: "I'm a child of God with infinite worth." And they learn to separate their behavior from their worth. And so when the shame kicks in, then they can go, "OK, I made a choice that has negative consequences. I made a choice that I don't feel great about. And I still have worth." That's really one of the very biggest things that's helped me, is just knowing that I'm not the only one and there's not some really horrible thing wrong with me. As long as you are trying, that's what Heavenly Father is asking for. He's right there when you fall. And even though you don't feel Him--you feel so much shame, and you're just thinking, "I screwed up again, I've broken so many promises"--He's right there, ready to pick you up again. If we understand that our sexual desire is a creation of God to draw us into union with another, then we need to protect that. We're in this together. And to me, that's freeing. That's the start of healing and recovery--not just for individuals who are deeply broken, but for all of us, because the messages of recovery for someone addicted to pornography are the same messages we all need. We all need healing. We all need community. We all need to recover a sense of who we truly are, who God has called us to be, who He made us to be. And this is a journey we're on together.