You want to feel close to your partner.

You also notice that porn feels easier than partnered sex.

There is nobody to disappoint. Nobody trying to read your face. Nobody who might notice if your erection changes, if you come sooner than you wanted, or if you don’t know what you want at all.

Then comes the uncomfortable question: If I want my partner, why do I keep choosing this instead?

From the other side of the bed, it may sound different: Why is there room for porn, but not for me?

In my conversation with psychosexual therapist Lisa Etherson, we explored a possibility that can get lost when the discussion is only about stopping a behaviour: some people may be avoiding how they expect to feel about themselves during partnered sex.

Lisa’s Shame Containment Theory proposes that sexual behaviours can help keep painful beliefs about being unworthy or not good enough from becoming an overwhelming experience of shame. It’s a lens, not a diagnosis of you or your relationship.

Sometimes the fear is about being seen struggling

Lisa described men in her work for whom porn and masturbation feel less exposing than sex with another person.

Her question is what they fear might happen if someone else witnesses a sexual moment that doesn’t go as expected.

An erection changing might become, in someone’s mind, proof that they are inadequate. Coming quickly might turn into certainty that their partner will stop wanting them. A pause might feel like a rejection before anyone has said a word.

That doesn’t tell us what the partner actually thinks. It tells us there may be a frightening prediction in the room.

This is what Lisa invites us to notice beneath the familiar language of performance anxiety: not only fear that something will happen, but fear of the sexual shame that might follow.

Sometimes solo sex is just solo sex

People can enjoy masturbation and porn without either being a problem. Solo sex doesn’t need to justify itself by improving partnered sex, and partnered sex isn’t automatically the better or more legitimate experience.

You may want time alone. You may enjoy a different kind of stimulation. You may have preferences or questions you haven’t explored together.

Shame is one possibility to consider when a pattern troubles you. It is not a reason to decide that every private sexual experience is avoidance.

Nor can a blog tell you whether a behaviour is compulsive, why you do it, or what kind of support fits. If it feels difficult to choose differently, causes distress or disrupts your life, that deserves an individual conversation with a qualified professional.

What changes when we ask why, not just how often?

Here is something interesting researchers are asking: what might we learn about porn use if we ask about people’s reasons for it, alongside how often it happens?

A separate 2026 study collected responses from 309 couples a year apart, examining porn-use frequency, eight motivations and problematic use alongside sexual satisfaction, function, distress and how often partners had sex.

The abstract reports two examples. Among men in this sample, stronger motivations to use porn for sexual pleasure and self-exploration were associated with better sexual function for them and their partners. Among women and gender-diverse participants in this sample, problematic use was associated with lower sexual function for their partners one year later. These were associations, not proof of cause, and gender-diverse participants represented only 2% of the sample.

What interests me is the opportunity to ask a more specific question: what is someone looking for when they turn to porn, and what is happening in their sexual relationship?

Source: Bőthe et al. (2026), “Associations Between Frequency, Motivations, and Problematic Pornography Use and Sexual Well-Being: A Dyadic Prospective Study Among Couples,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, public abstract.

What does the behaviour make easier?

One of the useful parts of my conversation with Lisa was moving beyond the demand to stop long enough to ask what the behaviour is doing for someone.

You can ask that question without deciding to keep everything exactly as it is.

Consider a particular moment, rather than trying to explain your entire sexual history:

• What was I feeling before I reached for porn?
• Was I looking for pleasure, privacy, relief, distraction or something else?
• What felt more difficult about approaching my partner?
• What did I expect would happen if my body didn’t respond as I wanted?
• Did I feel able to choose what happened next?

Use these questions as a starting point for reflection. There’s no correct answer, and you don’t need to find a childhood explanation for every choice.

You may discover that the pattern is less about avoiding your partner than avoiding a feeling. You may discover something different. Leave room for that.

Understanding does not cancel the impact

If you are the partner who feels shut out, an explanation about shame may help you understand something. It may also leave you thinking: Okay, but I’m still hurt.

That matters.

Curiosity about a behaviour doesn’t erase a broken agreement, dishonesty or disconnection. It doesn’t mean one person has to become more sexually available so the other feels better about themselves.

Nobody owes partnered sex as proof of change, attraction or love. Nobody has to abandon a boundary to demonstrate compassion.

The conversation needs space for both people’s experience, including what has happened and what each person is willing to do next.

A conversation that isn’t a confession or a trial

It may help to have this discussion outside a sexual moment, when neither person is being asked to perform or decide whether sex will happen.

If you recognize yourself in the avoidance, an opening could be:

“I’ve noticed I’m choosing sex on my own when I feel anxious about us having sex. I want to understand that better, and I also want to hear how it’s affecting you.”

If you feel shut out, you might say:

“I don’t want to guess what this means about me. I want to understand what’s happening, and I need us to talk honestly about our agreements.”

The first conversation may not be easy, and it may not be the last. You may want support from a qualified sex therapist, individually or together when that feels safe and appropriate.

More information, less guessing

Lisa’s perspective doesn’t require you to declare porn harmless or harmful in every situation. It asks you to become more specific about this person, this pattern and this relationship.

What feels easier alone? What feels at risk together? What has been difficult to say?

Those questions leave more room for an honest answer than deciding, before the conversation starts, that someone is broken or that their partner simply isn’t enough.

In Why Men Choose Porn Over Partnered Sex, Lisa Etherson and I talk about shame, sexual coping strategies and the pressure that can follow people into partnered sex.

Listen to my conversation with Lisa Etherson.