Ep. 17: FINDING FREEDOM FROM PORNOGRAPHY ADDICTION w/ Shawn Bonneteau

Andrew Marcus:

Hey, this is Andrew Marcus from THE INDOUBT SHOW. Thank you for tuning in. We have a fantastic show for you today. We have Shawn Bonneteau all the way in Halifax. Now, he was a full-time coach with a secret habit, but now he’s transitioning to a full-time coach with a ministry called Deep Clean. Now. Deep Clean Signature Program offers an in-depth, biblically based and scientifically researched porn recovery system. And so with it, you get one-on-one coaching, you get group coaching, full access to a whole bunch of videos. It’s a fantastic resource and a great program that I know would be a huge blessing to you. And so we’re going to be talking to him about pornography. We’re talking about the damage that it does not only to the person, but to relationships, to the mind. It is so intertwined with all things.

And so we pray this is very resourceful to you. We’re going to talk about some of the science behind addiction and ways that we can actually experience true freedom. Yes, there is true freedom from this in Jesus. Enjoy the show. God bless.

All right. We have Shawn Bonneteau all the way from Halifax. How you doing, man?

Shawn Bonneteau:

Hey, Andrew. I am good, my friend. It’s good to be here, and it’s good to hang out even though we can’t do it like we used to in person.

Andrew Marcus:

Oh man. The glory days, bro. When we were in person. I do miss you, and I’m so grateful that you are joining us today. You are doing such amazing work, but tell us a little bit about your family. I know you’re in Halifax right now, but you are moving. Are you allowed to share some of that? I know there’s big steps coming for you and your family.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yes, well, you just gave it away so I got to share it.

Yeah, man. We are the Bonneteaus, Shawn. I’m 30 years old. My wife Helena is 27. We’ve been married over six years now, and we have a little daughter named Violet who’s just over two. We’ve been in Halifax, Nova Scotia for almost four years. Moved from the Vancouver area to the other coast of Canada. Felt like the Lord was calling us overhear to do the work that we do in and around helping men and women and marriages with pornography, addiction and unwanted sexual behaviors.

And over the last 18 months, this big discernment process of where does God have us next? And that has been pinpointed as the Czech Republic, which is where my wife Helena is actually originally from. And God has been doing an amazing work in our hearts, mine especially as I’m entering into new territory, learning a new language, and I have a real burden for Czech people. It’s a place of 1% evangelical Christian, 10% of Catholicism. And you can imagine the other 89% or so are more atheist, maybe some agnostics in there. So there’s a huge need and there’s a real culture of misogyny, which I just feel such a burden to speak into. So pray for us as we move across the world.

Andrew Marcus:

Wow man, that’s such a huge move. So you’ve been practicing your language. Can you share a word or two?

Shawn Bonneteau:

I can certainly do that, yes.

Andrew Marcus:

Oh, come on. I want to hear it.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Informal way to say hello is. Ahoj.

Andrew Marcus:

Nice.

Shawn Bonneteau:

And how are you is Jak se mas.

Andrew Marcus:

Jak se mas.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah. Ahoj, Jak se mas.

Andrew Marcus:

Ah, I like it. You’re going to be so good, man. I’m so pumped for you and your family, and we will continue to pray for you because your ministry is very important and what an incredible opportunity. So I want to dive into this. I know porn addiction and just the sexual brokenness that is happening in this world, it seems like it’s increasing at an alarming rate. So I want to talk about the bad news. I want to talk about the good news, but first, let’s sit in the bad news. Tell us some of just the statistics of where we’re at right now in society with porn addiction, with what it’s doing to us as a culture.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah, there’s lots of research out there, Christian research, secular research, a lot of it ends up getting done in North America, but there’s research you can find in Australia, in Japan, some of these hubs of where there’s a lot of dysfunction happening, like in Japan, I’ve seen research being done where men under 20 don’t even have interest in sex anymore. So we see that pornography is such a… There’s this quote from C.S. Lewis, like bad is spoiled good. And we see the enemy can’t destroy sex. Sex is made by God for goodness in marriage. So he taints it. He makes it fake and fabricated, and we see pornography as the perfect version of that.

So when we look at statistics, some of the main ones that I’ve used over the years, some of them are from Barna study, KingdomWorks Studios, other ones like Pure Desire, but pretty classic one you hear is between 65 and 70% of Christian men are watching pornography regularly. So that’s a pretty staggering statistic. My belief is that if someone’s using pornography even once a month, and that’s a consistent thing they’re doing, that would be considered an addiction because that that’s an idol that they can’t get rid of in their life. So that’s a high stats between 65 and 70%. And here’s one of the big kickers is most times we see this as a man’s problem.

There’s the famous and very horrendous book of every man’s battle. That’s probably a side topic we could talk about later or another time. But we see that so many times the church culture has been, this is a man’s problem. Women have to be careful of this as a man’s problem. It’s every man’s battle. But we see women watching pornography as a growing statistic. I think college women is one of the growing statistics, maybe the fastest growing.

They’re watching it because they think that’s what men want, and it’s a way for them to learn what men want. And that alone is devastating. So I’ve seen statistics where like 33% of women under 25 are watching pornography on a regular basis. And then here’s one of the big kickers, young people, young adults, 76% of young adults are watching pornography regularly. And that’s staggering because that’s our next generation of adults and parents and leaders. And that is really, really frightening. So just from a statistical standpoint of people watching pornography that really covers men, women, young people, we see that there are some staggering statistics that show us that what is being offered in the church isn’t working, what is being offered in the world isn’t working.

And we have this cycle of unhelpful resources or programs that are leaving us with an increasing statistic of people not getting free and feeling more shame. So those are just some basic statistics of pornography addiction. We could definitely talk about where else that leads to erectile dysfunction, issues with orgasm in marriage, in pastoral stats. So we can certainly talk about this too, Andrew, if you want to go in that direction.

Andrew Marcus:

So there is an outcome. It’s not just the addiction. There’s a lot of terrible side effects.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah. So that’s part of my story is erectile dysfunction. There’s statistics out there that show that one in three men under the age of 40 struggle with erectile dysfunction, which is basically where you are unable to get or keep an erection during sex. There’s also an effect on ejaculation with premature or delayed, based off of tolerance in the brain and how we’ve become desensitized with what we see in pornography. So this goes way deeper than just watching pornography. It ends up leading into… There’s this great book called The Great Sex Rescue by Sheila Gregoire. She has these staggering quotes about orgasm that 95% of men orgasm most times, and only 48% of women orgasm most times. And there’s between 10 and 25% of women that have or never will orgasm. And that’s just a sign that sexual education cannot come from pornography. And that men think they know what women want.

We think we see pornography as a great educator. We get married and we realize we don’t actually know how God made the female body. He made it to be beautiful. We see parts of the women’s body, the clitoris that is simply made just for pleasure. But pornography doesn’t show pleasure. It shows aggression, it shows selfishness, it shows all these things that go against God’s design for sex. So that’s a big, big thing. And one of the scary stats, you were a worship pastor. I’ve been around pastors. I have a big passion for helping the church and helping pastors. Only 7% of churches in North America have a program or a group of some sort that is focused on pornography addiction. 7%.

Andrew Marcus:

7%.

Shawn Bonneteau:

7%. And 57% of pastors say that this is the biggest issue in their church. So just-

Andrew Marcus:

Those numbers don’t line up.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Think about that. Yeah, very incongruent. And you can just imagine, no wonder there’s so much silence from the pulpit.

Andrew Marcus:

Wow. Yeah. No churches really talk about this kind of stuff from a Sunday morning or even as a staff on a staff team or whatever.

Shawn Bonneteau:

So as I was thinking about these stats and preparing for this time, I just thinking about the three key things that come from statistics like this are shame, lust management, and silence. And that’s really where addiction festers, because shame causes us to believe lies about our identity in Christ. Lust management doesn’t get to the root of the problem. So people just becomes zombies like group junkies. And silence just harbors pain. Often you leave church on a Sunday with this intellect, but you never really deeply feel it. And the silence of the real problems causes people to feel like they’re not allowed to share their deepest pain and struggles in the church, which is supposed to be a hospital.

Andrew Marcus:

So people are going to a hospital, but not getting the right treatment.

Shawn Bonneteau:

That’s right.

Andrew Marcus:

At least in this area of life. Wow. That’s crazy.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah. I think the beautiful picture is Jesus touching and healing lepers. It’s like if a leper walked into our churches today, would we see them as welcome? Because a lot of people feel like lepers when they’re addicted to porn, and they don’t feel like they’re even welcome to be themselves in a way of, here’s my junk. Can I talk to somebody about it?

Andrew Marcus:

Yeah. It’s really fascinating because a lot of people, when you keep it silent and you keep it in your head and in your heart, the enemy, it’s a great opportunity for the enemy to just say, you’re alone in this. But if you look at these numbers that you just shared, clearly if you’re watching today or listening, you’re actually not alone. The majority of young adults are struggling with this, what do you say, 76% of young adults? Is that what you said? 76?

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah. And statistically we see, yeah, you’re not alone. And one of the things I love sharing, I often share this in my first call with a potential client in an introductory call to see if we’re going to work together. I say, here’s you and here’s the problem. They’re separate. You are a beloved son of Christ. There is a problem, but your identity isn’t the problem. And it’s so important to separate that. And when we separate that, it helps people feel like, wow, there’s a safe place to heal. That Christ truly is the one who went out for the outcast to heal and to bring them into the kingdom. And I don’t think we’re getting that message enough.

Andrew Marcus:

It’s like the problem is attached to us. Wow. Okay. And those numbers that you gave us, are those recent numbers? I feel like they’re probably just continuing to climb, just with the smartphone and technology. I’m sure it’s just getting worse and worse.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Some of those numbers, I think were maybe Barna study and KingdomWorks Studios from May probably upwards to five years ago. So we know it’s only getting worse. And we also see that Instagram and Snapchat and these apps and softwares that aren’t pornography, have become pornography because what used to be soft core pornography is now just standard stuff you see on Instagram.

Andrew Marcus:

Crazy.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah, it is so scary.

Andrew Marcus:

It’s so scary, man. It just seems like it’s impossible to avoid. You just stumble, you’re on Instagram or whatever. Things just pop up and it’s a dangerous time in the area of addiction and pornography. So there’s a lot of bad, there’s a lot of bad, but there is good news and good news in many ways. Good news of course, of Christ redeeming and setting us free. Good news and practical. Okay. Yes, there’s 76% of young adults. Can this number decrease? I believe it can. And I know that you are in the ministry of bringing those numbers down.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah.

Andrew Marcus:

So tell us some of the good news.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah, and it’s cool because when those numbers get brought down, what I’ve found with the guys that I’ve been able to help is my goal for walking somebody through the process of healing is to really equip them to walk in freedom. And it’s like when we get baptized with the Holy Spirit, when we experience Christ, we want other people to know about him. It’s like when somebody gets free from the bondage of pornography, and it’s not just lust management or holding onto sobriety, but it’s actually freedom. They want to go and tell people about it. And I love that. I think that is really a testimony that there is true freedom involved. So for me, I just think of a few clients, even just fairly recently over the last year, even just over the last few months, I had one client specifically, and it’s just such a crazy story, but him and his wife had not had sex for over 20 years because of his addiction to pornography.

And he struggled with same sex attraction, and he was struggling with being honest and open with his wife. They actually lost two kids in their marriage together. So it’s so much pain, so much trauma and pornography, masturbation became an easy outlet for him, and that broke so much trust in his marriage. So there’s so much that got brought into this painful place of his childhood, his marriage, losing two kids, his addiction. And we worked for eight months together. And he sent me a message two weeks ago just sharing some updates on where he is at today and I started crying. It was mind blowing that he said, “that streak is no longer there.” And it just blew my mind. It just touched me so much. And he said that he’s been so impacted by what he’s learned about his identity in Christ and who he is today, that he wants to start getting educated and trained on how to help other people go through what he healed through.

He’s like 68. So what an amazing story. You can just imagine 60 years of trauma and pain and hiding, God redeems that in under a year. Not to say the journey ends there, but that is freedom. Where God is a God of redemption, of miracles, of healing, of restoration. And sometimes we think that this is every man’s battle. It’s this lifelong struggle. No, it’s not. And that’s an amazing testimony to say that. I think about other clients that I’ve had. One of my very first clients when I started doing this work over four years ago, he was struggling with same sex attraction, betraying his wife. They were really even wondering if they would ever have kids again because she could not trust him as a man. And they just had their second child so incredible. He’s a school counselor today. He wants to get trained to help other guys as well.

You just see that it’s this outpouring of not just quitting porn, but you become a leader of your family, become a father, you become a husband, you become a man of integrity. And I see that in a couple of pastors I’ve worked with where they begin preaching, breaking the silence because freedom is available. They begin sharing with their congregation about what’s available. They begin talking about life differently. I have one even, actually a guy from British Columbia, I have a pastor that I worked with, and just so cool to see how his family’s growing. The way he communicates in his church is growing, his leadership abilities are growing. And I’m talking about holistic healing here. The freedom that’s available goes way beyond just not watching something on a screen. It goes way beyond that. You learn what it’s like to have a mind that is renewed, to live confidently in your integrity.

And I heard it said one time that integrity isn’t being perfect. It’s doing the right thing nine out of 10 times. And when you do make a mistake, you own it, you explain it and you find healing. And I think that’s what it looks like to be free, it’s not perfection. But I know in my story, when I go through a hard time after I’m five and a half years sober and free from pornography, masturbation, my escapism is not to pornography or masturbation. The arousal that I have today for my wife has only grown year after year of experiencing sobriety and freedom because of the brain rewiring and the mind renewal and all these things that begin to happen. Our arousal changes. And when we look at the approaches that I do with guys, we actually break down the powers of shame even in the area of sexuality because the enemy wants nothing more than to make it seem like fantasy is only sinful.

That desires are only sinful. But at the core of even someone with an addition to pornography, the core of that is that they have deep desires and needs that were never met. And as a child, they learn to get those needs met in ways that aren’t healthy, and they’ve never been taught how to break those chains. So that’s a big part of the coaching. And when we learn that below pornography addiction is a longing for intimacy with a person, man, it is incredible because that opens up a whole new way of living. And when we satisfy the craving of connection and intimacy in a way that’s godly, we no longer have that craving for it in a way that’s unhealthy pornography or masturbation. And that is really where freedom is involved. Freedom comes in and says, wow, not only are you quitting something, but you’re becoming a full whole person of God pursuing that holiness we talk about.

Getting our needs met, our Godly needs met in ways through the Lord, through healthy connection and things along those lines. So I get really pumped about those things because I just see that’s transformation. When somebody’s deep needs of connection and intimacy of affirmation and validation begin to get met in God, in their spouse, in their friendships rather than not get met, and they run two things behind the scenes to escape or numb the pain.

Andrew Marcus:

Wow. It’s such good news. And I think some people who are listening right now are probably, what, five and a half years? So what was the main turning point for you in your journey?

Shawn Bonneteau:

So I always paint this really cool picture of I had no idea that there was an opportunity to quit pornography and be free from these things.

Andrew Marcus:

I don’t think most people know.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah.

Andrew Marcus:

I don’t think most people know they can. I think that’s an impossible task for most people.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah.

Andrew Marcus:

It’s just it’s going to be with me forever.

Shawn Bonneteau:

That’s right. So I didn’t grow up Christian. My mom was a strict Catholic. I never wanted anything to do with it. But when I was 22, I began church hopping at that time and was really met by the Lord on in one of those weekends that I was at a church in Maple Ridge.

Andrew Marcus:

Come on.

Shawn Bonneteau:

And the Lord met me in a sermon about the church of Thyatira and sexual immorality, which often would be a topic where people would go, oh no. That probably felt like shame. I felt so much hope for the first time. This pastor talked about Jesus being the answer. Hope in Jesus that he heals those areas of our life. It wasn’t about just stop lusting and quit those things. They’re so sinful. It was so hopeful that Jesus cares about me. And that really began this journey for me of what does it look like to give my life to Jesus?

What does it look like to expose sin in my life? And that led me down a road of getting baptized. That led me down a road of joining support groups for addiction. And I’d love to say that I just quit so quickly after that, but I didn’t because this is the challenging part of recovery, it’s not about just replacing behaviors. So it wasn’t really until I had my own personal rock bottom that I really made some changes in that rock bottom for me was when I realized that I want Jesus to follow me rather than I follow him. And that has been affecting my life and my marriage so much. I just couldn’t stand lying to my wife and to God and to myself anymore. So I had a man in the mirror moment on my 25th birthday where I got down on my knees and I told God that I am done doing all these things to fix my own life.

Lord, what do you say? What does your words say and what does it look like for me to follow you? And that began this new journey for Shawn of every day seeking the Lord for what does it look like to follow him today? Not tomorrow, not thinking about yesterday, but just today. And literally, man, after three months of doing that, there was some more things I was doing with journaling, thought renewal, getting vulnerable and becoming accountable to good, healthy people. Really, after three months of quitting pornography, Helena and I, our marriage took a turn that, we were married nine months when I quit. So about a year when I was three months sober, and I was able to look at her differently than I ever had before. I was able to laugh with confidence and didn’t feel this hypocrisy underneath the surface we’re having sex that became emotional, spiritual, physical, and that’s sobriety. I’m not talking about freedom here, but that’s incredible.

Only three months after quitting, that was also with doing some deeper internal work. But that’s insane. After three months. So three months snowballed into one year, snowballed into two years. After about two years of me being sober, I had done quite a lot of recovery work. It was great because I was sober. Mind was renewing, brain was rewiring. But I hadn’t really experienced the deep freedom that’s available in the recovery journey. And that really started happening in year three, and that’s really what I’d love to talk about with people. In year three, I started really learning about the deeper traumas of my life. What is my story of my experience around sex and sexuality, around arousal and desires, about even being loved or attuned to by my parents? Where did I experience trauma? Why are these things in my life triggering or arousing?

What’s the story behind all of that? And when I began to learn about how Shawn was programmed, what was the core of his belief system? Where did that come from? Who do I need to forgive? That’s really when freedom began to really open up. And from year three until now, it’s just been this journey of more and more freedom around understanding and healing my story. We talk about healing the inner child. We talk about renewing our belief system. Our identity in Christ only can be solidified in our own belief system when we remove all the junk. And you can’t just get rid of lies. You need to dismantle them and defy them and renew them. And that’s really where freedom begins to take root. And as you live in freedom, there’s like this new aura in your life. You’ll walk around differently. Man, I’ll never forget going to Safeway and getting some groceries and being able to look at the girl at till in the eyes and smile.

Can you even imagine doing something that simple? We don’t need to talk about marriage or a new sex life or anything like that. Just think about just something simple in your day, hopping on the bus and being able to sit beside an attractive woman and not feel guilty or ashamed or perverted. Being able to do simple things like go to the swimming pool and actually enjoy the time with your family. Instead of looking around at everybody around you, actually having confidence that your longings are met or able to get met in ways that don’t have to be sexual or less driven, that we can be affectionate beings. We can be people that are aroused by things and not be afraid of that. Actually face it and realize that’s how God made me. I get aroused by things. God got aroused. It says his anger got aroused, our arousal is just a stirring inside of us. What do we do with that stirring, right? It’s not a, let me just avoid all things. I can’t go to the beach because it’s a temptation.

What does that even mean? When people go to the beach, they usually feel insecure about themselves. That’s why there’s temptation. You’re not tempted because a woman’s in a bikini. You’re tempted because you’re insecure about yourself and you are wondering what she thinks about you. There’s so much freedom when we begin to see below the surface and become curious about our stories and also compassionate towards the traumas that we have been through.

Andrew Marcus:

Amazing. So what are some practical things, of course, staying close to God, abiding in Him, but are there practical things that we can leave our listeners and viewers with to just maybe start this process for them? Maybe give us a little sample of what coaching with Shawn looks like?

Shawn Bonneteau:

Yeah, a hundred percent. A couple things that I wanted to share about that I think are very easily missed by, I’m just going to say the church just simply because pastors aren’t educated on addictions. They’re not educated on psychology. They’re really good at one area and they’re part of the body. But unfortunately, I think pastors have been put into a position where they have to be a lot of parts of the body and has just naturally done a disservice to the flock. So one of the things why I say that is because when we look at how faith and science go together, I really believe they’re super congruent. We can see that God made our brains and minds a certain way, and when we actually look at how healing happens through that element, we can realize that, man, this is even be a greater way for us to know Jesus better.

So one of the first things I love helping guys understand is what is called our nervous system, very practically speaking, is our fight, flight, freeze response. Almost everyone has heard of that before. What this really comes down to is understanding that the reason why go pray more, go read your Bible more. The reason why that doesn’t work very well and it’s good. There’s nothing… Like you said, they’re good things. We need to do those.

Andrew Marcus:

Yeah, a hundred percent.

Shawn Bonneteau:

But when we go into a fight, flight, freeze response, which is a fear response, which happens when we perceive danger or experience real danger, you can imagine how many things we perceive as dangerous. We’re almost always in fight, flight, freeze without knowing it. When that happens, the part of our brain that registers logic and detail and makes good decisions literally shuts off. So when you tell somebody to do something that’s more logical and detailed and making a good decision in that moment of temptation, they’re actually not able to.

So what we need to do in moments like that is we need to deep breathe. We need to go for a quick walk. We need to put on a song that relaxes our nervous system. We need to find somebody to tell about what we’re feeling or experiencing. Then when we do that, it brings us into a place of feeling safe and feeling grounded, and then our brain is reactivated. Then we can pray. Then we can read scripture, then we can journal. And that’s powerful to understand. That’s not to discredit prayer and journaling and reading the Bible, and it’s just to say, the brain works this way. We have a creator who made it this way. Let’s just look at how it’s made, how it runs, and use it in that way. When we get into these fear modes of fight, flight, freeze, we’re not able to make good decisions.

So what we need to do is actually have a predetermined plan that we walk out when we get into these places. So it’s not, I’m going to read the Bible because that’s then making you make a decision of what to read in the Bible, it’s Psalm 34 is what I read when I am really in fight mode. Philippians four is what I read when I’m in flight mode, and we actually specifically say, this song is the song that calms me down when I am aggravated. I’m going to listen to that song every time. And we’re already predetermining a plan so that we don’t have to make hard choices when we’re tempted or triggered. We just follow a predetermined plan. So that is really helpful, and the whole idea of that is helping people come back to a place of safety and connection and groundedness, just like you’re saying, Andrew, calming down, grounding yourself, and then reciting scripture from a place of peace, not anxiety.

Andrew Marcus:

Amazing. Bro, I appreciate you so much. Thank you for your time and all the best to you and your ministry and your family, bro.

Shawn Bonneteau:

Thanks, Andrew.

Andrew Marcus:

Hey, thanks so much for joining us today. For more great content, check out the INDOUBT show on YouTube, Spotify, apple Music, or wherever you stream your podcast. We hope you enjoyed it today. Feel free to check out indoubt.ca, we have some great resources available to you. Have an awesome day