Sex addicts use sex in the same way an alcoholic uses alcohol.  Sex or lust is used to numb feelings and escape from the painful parts of their lives.  The sexual experience becomes mood altering and in time becomes central to the sex addict’s life.

 

The fact that the addict has no control over their behavior is a difficult concept for non-addicts to grasp.  This is particularly with regards to sex addiction and in aftermath of the many damaged relationships, ruined marriages, parentless children, and even worse, victims of sexual misconduct or crimes. There is little neutral response to sexual improprieties.

 

It is important to understand that addiction is a “solution” to pain, past trauma, and anxiety - addiction literally becomes a coping mechanism.  If somebody starts doing something to cope, and if they do it long enough, the body adjusts to the point that it needs that level of activity just in order to feel balanced.

 

Sexual addiction comes in many different forms. There is no single type of behavior or even amount of behavior that will indicate you are a sexual addict. The problem is much more complex than can be explained in a few words and if you have been living the life of a sex addict, you know how difficult it is to describe what you are experiencing. Three basic things to consider when you define sexual addiction are:

1. Do I have a sense that I have lost control over whether or not I engage in my specific out-of-control sexual behavior?
2. Am I experiencing significant consequences because of my specific out-of-control sexual behavior?
3. Do I feel like I am constantly thinking about my specific out-of-control sexual behavior, even when I don't want to?

 

Typically what happens is that an addict responds to stress by using sex, alcohol, food, drugs, etc. and when the stress goes away the behavior is reinforced.  In the above drawing, addiction really isn’t about alcohol, drugs, gambling or sex – it’s about a solution to pain.  It is a maladaptive response that has become part of the system and has reached the point where it has become pathological. The addict will use whatever works to take away the pain.

 

The addictive behaviors produce guilt, shame self-hatred, remorse, emptiness, and more pain in the addict and he is driven to more isolation, ever inward, away from reality, away from relationship with others, lost to a world of loneliness.  The compulsive behaviors make true intimacy impossible for the addict.  True union with another becomes impossible because addicts become addicted to the unreal.

 

“Addiction is an illness of escape.  Its goal is to obliterate, medicate, or ignore reality.  It is an alternative to letting oneself feel hurt, betrayal, worry, and—most painful of all—loneliness.” (Carnes, 2001)

 

The sex addict has removed himself out of the whole context of what is right or wrong.  He has lost control, no longer has the power of choice, and is not free to stop.”  (SA, p.3).  The sex addict’s situation has become like that of the alcoholic who can no longer tolerate alcohol and must stop drinking altogether but is hooked and cannot stop.  The addiction eventually takes priority over everything else and it now brings more pain than pleasure into our lives.

 

A person who is addicted to sex is living in an imaginary, self-created world that avoids the possibility of experiencing rejection or the risk of pain that a real relationship can offer.  It is a person’s attempt to avoid the pain often caused by real intimacy.  The sex addict is essentially creating a pseudo-relationship with someone/something that can be controlled and manipulated; such as a picture, a video, or a prostitute. 

 

The main issue of sexual addiction is not the need for more sex, rather, it is to control and avoid relational pain.  This is similar to how an alcoholic or drug addict uses alcohol or drugs to avoid their pain. 

 

Belief System/Impaired Thinking

 

The addiction cycle is rooted in a larger addictive system which starts with a belief system.  The belief system is a collection of convictions, myths, and values that affect the decisions we make.

 

At the core of this belief system are ideas the sex addict hold to be true of self and are:

 

• “I am basically a bad, unworthy person.”
• “No one would love me as I am.”
• “No one will take care of my needs but me.”
• “Sex meets my need.”
• “Sexual activity becomes all about me and my survival.”
• “Selfish ‘me’ sex leaves me empty and feeling shame…therefore.”

 

There is an internal logic that flows like this:

 

“Because I am unworthy, no one would love me if they really knew what I was like on the inside.  Consequently, my needs are never going to be met if I have to tell the truth about who I am.  Given that sex is my most important need, I will never be able to depend on another person who really knows me to get it.”

 

Out of this situation flow all kinds of delusional thinking which allows the addictive cycle to flourish.  It essentially distorts reality or even blocks the awareness of what is going on around the addict.  The addictive cycle becomes the driving force in the addict’s life.  Bad things and consequences begin to happen.  What the 12-steps call “unmanageability”.  Lies, covering up, and inventing ways to keep losses at bay do not stop the accumulation.    Sooner or later, their life becomes a mess.  Addicts find themselves despairing about how complex, stressful, or awful their lives have become.  The feelings of despair confirm their dysfunctional beliefs about being an unlovable person.  Thus the system only strengthens and repeats and repeats.

 

Cycle of Sex Addiction

 

 

Sex addicts get caught into a repetitive cycle called “The Sex Addiction Cycle".  It starts off with:

 

Family Wounds that begin in childhood/adolescents. These wounds can be many forms of abuse including divorced parents, physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, over mothered & under fathered, disconnected family relationships, abandonment, parents with addictions, etc. These family wounds create a self-shame in the child/adolescent that produce a low self-worth: "There is something wrong with me" or "I am bad and unworthy." The family wounds and shame brings pain to the child/adolescent and he/she tries to escape or medicate the pain.

 

Preoccupation or Dissatisfaction involves obsessing about being sexual or romantic.  Fantasy becomes an obsession that serves in some way to avoid life.  The addict’s thoughts become focused on reaching a mood-altering high without actually acting-out sexually.  He thinks about sex to produce a trance-like state of arousal in order to fully eliminate feelings of the current pain of reality.  Thinking about sex and planning out how to reach orgasm can continue for minutes or hours before moving into the next stage of the cycle.

 

These obsessions are intensified through the use of ritualization or pattern of getting aroused.  A sex addict first cruises and then goes to a strip show to heighten his arousal until he is beyond the point of saying no.  Ritualization helps to put distance between reality and sexual obsession.  Rituals are a way to induce trance and further separate oneself from reality.  Once the addict has begun his ritual, the chances of stopping that cycle diminish greatly.  He is giving into the pull of the compelling sex act. 

 

The next phase of the cycle is Acting Out or “sex act”.  The tensions that the addict feels are reduced by acting on their sexual feelings.  They feel better for the moment, thanks to the release that occurs.  Compulsivity simply means that addicts regularly get to the point where sex becomes inevitable, no matter what the circumstances or the consequences.  The compulsive act, which normally ends in orgasm, is perhaps the starkest reminder of the degradation involved in the addiction as the person realizes that he has become nothing more than a slave to the addiction.

 

Almost immediately reality sets in and the Addict begins to feel ashamed.  Like a dog, he has returned to his vomit.  This point of the cycle is a painful place where the Addict has been many, many times.  The last time the Addict was at this low point, they probably promised to never do it again.  Yet once again, they act out and that leads to despair and more shame.  He has betrayed God, possibly a wife, and his own sense of integrity.  At a superficial level, the addict hopes that this will be the last battle. 

 

For many addicts, this dark emotion brings on depression and feelings of hopelessness.  One easy way to cure feelings of despair is to start obsessing all over again.  The cycle then perpetuates itself.

 

How do counselors know when addiction is present?

 

There are ten of these criteria and at least three of the following criteria must be met to show addiction may be present:

 

1. Loss of Control – recurrent failure (pattern) to resist impulses to engage in specific sexual behavior.
2. COMPULSIVE BEHAVIOR - a pattern of out of control behavior over time, a pattern of loss of control. 
3. EFFORTS TO STOP: repeated, specific efforts to stop the behavior, which fail.  Repeated violation of their own value system, yet unable to stop.
4. LOSS OF TIME: Significant amounts of time spent in obtaining sex, being sexual, or recovering from sexual experience.
5. PREOCCUPATION: obsessing about the behavior or preparatory activities.  Preoccupation becomes a means of escape
6. INABILITY TO FULLFILL OBLIGATIONS: the behavior interferes with work, school, family and friends.
7. CONTINUENCE: the failure to stop the behavior even though you are having problems because of it – these may be social, legal, financial, work. 
8. ESCALATION: the need to make the behavior more intense, more frequent and, often, more risky.
9. LOSSES - losing, limiting or sacrificing valued parts of life, such as relationships, work and family.
10. WITHDRAWAL: stopping behavior causes considerable distress, anxiety, restlessness, irritability and physical discomfort.  Often involves a high degree of restlessness, an inability to sleep, being very easily triggered into anger and a high degree of reacextivity.

 

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