IN-TO-ME-YOU-SEE
Sex addiction, love addiction and relationship addiction are complex issues requiring specialized treatment. Patrick Carnes, a pioneer in the field of treatment of sex addiction defines sex addiction as a pathological relationship with a mind and mood altering experience.
Unlike other addictions where abstinence is the safest course, with sex addiction abstinence from sex is not the solution. There are certain ways sex addicts act out based on their arousal template usually formed when they were very young. Understanding this is vital to recovery from sex addiction.
The Cycle of an acting out episode usually follow this sequence:
- Preoccupation – with sexual thoughts.
- Ritualization – certain behavioral patterns that are part of the build up to sexual complusivity. e.g. “Cruising “ driving through the red light district view Sex worker.
- Sexual Complusivity – the actual acting out behavior which may vary from person to person. This usually carries on longer than initially planned.
- Despair – Strong feelings of self-loathing. To distract or to sooth the despair , pre-occupation starts again the the cycle continues.
Sex addiction has similar characteristic like other addictions.
- Tolerance – Where more intensity is needed to experience the same high. Often more risk produce more intensity. Sometime emotions like fear and anger during the sexual acting out intensifies the experience.
- Progression – Due to the pursuit of more intensity due to an increase of tolerance, the adverse consequences become worse. These may include financial, health, legal and interpersonal.
- Impaired control – Often in the despair phase, sex addicts swear that will not act out again, however this intention is short lived. This suggested that they are acting out against their own will.
Sex addicts are often hugely ashamed of their behavior, and are fearful of being judge by others as perverts, resulting in secrecy. They tend to have a relationship with an experience, rather than the person they are acting out with. They tend to objectify others, thus making it difficult to form intimate relationships with other. Patrick Carnes refers to sex addiction as an intimacy disorder. Recovery from sex addiction is, then, not about being abstinent from sex. It is about integrating healthy sexual behaviors into one’s life and finding the capacity to hold truly intimate relationships.
When in a relationship, understandably partners feel betrayed due to the acting out of the sex addict. Couples counselling is a vital part of the treatment process of sex addiction.
Recovery from sex addiction is possible, but will take time and hard work. I have a lot of experience in working with sex addiction and follow the very effective Carnes model for treating it.
SHARING IS CARING
