Dear Jana,

One of my oldest and dearest friends from high school is getting married in a few months’ time. I was overjoyed until I found out who she was marrying.

It turns out her fiancé is someone I dated for about six months in my twenties. She knows about our past – but what she doesn’t know is that he still messages me.

It’s nothing outrageous – just the occasional ‘how are you?’ or the odd flirty emoji.

I have always ignored it, but now that I’ll be watching them on their wedding day, I feel like I’m keeping a secret. Should I come clean to her before the wedding, or stay silent and hope he never crosses the line?

Torn.

Dear Torn,

Girl, you are turning a situation that is a five (at best) into a 10. Let’s be clear: you haven’t done anything wrong – and he hasn’t crossed a line either… not really.

You’re not sneaking around with him, you’re not sending nudes. You’ve simply been on the receiving end of his ‘hey, stranger’ texts. That’s on him.

So, the million-dollar question: do you tell your bestie? No. Not unless it gets spicier.

Weddings are stressful enough without adding ‘oh, by the way, your fiancé sometimes texts me’ into the mix.

Right now, all you’ve got are a few emojis and some (probably) harmless messages – hardly enough to wreck a friendship, let alone a wedding.

Here’s what you should do: keep ignoring him, but keep screenshots, and keep your distance.

If he ever crosses the line (say, with a late-night ‘what are you wearing?’ text), that’s when you march straight to your friend.

Until then, zip it. Let her have her day.

Don’t set fire to the house… but have a fire extinguisher ready just in case.

Dear Jana,

I’m devastated. My husband recently stumbled across an old amends letter I wrote nine years ago as part of my recovery program.

In it, I apologised to an ex for the reckless things I did while I was addicted to cocaine and alcohol – including cheating on him multiple times.

My husband knew I’d struggled with addiction before we met, but he had no idea about me being unfaithful to my ex.

Now he says he looks at me differently. He still lives with me, but he no longer touches me the same way or tells me that he loves me.

I feel like I’ve destroyed our marriage with a letter that wasn’t even meant for him. I honestly don’t know what to do next. I can’t change my past.

Heartbroken.

Dear Heartbroken,

First of all, you did nothing wrong here.

Anyone who has worked a 12-step program knows writing amends letters is an important part of recovery – it’s not a saucy diary entry you left lying around for fun.

You were doing the work. The fact that your husband picked it up and read it is the bigger breach of trust, if we’re being honest. Snooping rarely ends well, and he’s now sitting with information he wasn’t prepared for.

But let’s not forget you are also not the person who wrote that letter anymore. That was a younger, more chaotic version of you who was surviving the only way she knew how while in the grips of addiction.

You’ve worked the steps of recovery (bravo!), which is hard, messy and requires extraordinary courage. That matters far more than the mistakes you made in the past.

So before you spiral, take a breath and remember how brilliant you are for getting to a point of recovery.

But, yes, your husband has just had his world turned upside down. He must feel terrible. He married you with an understanding of your past, but not the details.

And those details – sexual, shameful details – can feel like grenades when they explode in a marriage without warning. Of course he feels differently about you now.

The question now is: can he separate the woman you were from the woman you are today? Can he love the sober, grounded you enough to integrate your history into the story of your life together, rather than let it define you both?

That isn’t something you can fix alone. It requires honesty and space for him to grieve the version of you he thought he knew, and probably therapy – individually and together.

What you can do is remind him – gently – that love isn’t about perfect histories; it’s about showing up as who you are today. You’ve already done the hardest part: you changed. If he can’t accept that people are complex and contradictory, but also capable of growth, then it may be time to make difficult decisions.

You’ve done the hard work. Now it’s his turn.

Dear Jana,

My boyfriend and I have a great sex life, or at least I thought we did.

We live together and sleep together three to four times a week, but I recently discovered he still watches porn every day, sometimes right after we’ve had sex.

He says it’s ‘just a habit’ he’s had since he was a teenager, but it makes me feel like I’m not enough.

I don’t want to be the nagging girlfriend who tells him what he can and can’t do, but I can’t shake this pit in my stomach that it’s a bad sign. Is daily porn consumption normal in relationships, or am I right to be worried?

Confused.

Dear Confused,

I’ll get straight to the point: watching porn every day is too much, and watching porn after you’ve had sex is weird.

Sure, a bit of porn here and there is fine – most people dip in and out of it. But if you’ve just given him the real thing and he’s still racing to Pornhub for a second go, that’s a problem.

Genuine question: is the man not able to climax with you? Porn isn’t inherently bad, but it suggests he’s prioritising fantasy over intimacy.

You’re not crazy for feeling a pit in your stomach. Women are told to be the ‘cool girlfriend’ who doesn’t care if her man watches porn. But when it’s every day – and after sex – it stops being ‘just a habit’ and starts looking like an addiction. And like all addictions, that’s something he’s going to have to come to terms with himself.

So, what do you do? Don’t nag, don’t shame him, but be upfront: ‘When you go straight to porn after sex, it makes me feel like I’m not enough.’ If he gets defensive, that’s a bigger concern than the porn itself.

You’re not the first woman to worry about her boyfriend’s porn consumption – but at least you’re in the position where you are still having sex and his digital life hasn’t eclipsed real intimacy altogether. Sadly, that happens all too often.

Tell him how you feel. If he acknowledges he has a problem, that could be the first step to healing. Alternatively, you could suggest watching porn together – so long as you’re comfortable with it – or explore porn-inspired fantasies together safely.

The bottom line is, you are right to trust your gut. If his screen time is overshadowing your bedroom time, it’s not you being needy. It’s him being lazy.