A Progressive Illness - Sex Addiction - Cut Out The Porn!

(Here's the quiz if you're in a hurry)

SAA - Sex Addicts Anonymous Self Assessment Tool

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Although a general public rarely talks about sex addiction, or may actually joke about sex addiction, it is a serious issue and should be treated as if it is a 'real issue.'

It is a REAL ISSUE!

Watching Porn is only part of the problem and watching too much porn is definitely a sign of bigger, more overwhelming problems.

* A cocaine addict will mismanage money, time, employment relations, family and friendship relationships, and will break the law. (Cocaine is definitely illegal, so the very use of it or possession of the drug means that the addict breaks the law to obtain and use the drug in the first place).

* A sex addict will mismanage money, time, employment relations, family and friendship relationships, and may even break the law.

* An alcoholic will mismanage money, time, employment relations, family and friendship relationship, and may break the law.

As with ANY addiction, the substance (cocaine, alcohol, narcotics, inhalants, etc) or habit (video gaming, shopping, sex, gambling) is used to cover up something that a person is not emotionally able to deal with in life. The substance or habit 'feels good' for a while and starts to perform as a 'coping tool' to allow the addict to 'manage situations' or to 'escape situations' better. In a very short time, the addict becomes unable to manage or cope WITHOUT the substance or habit of choice.

Addicts actually 'teach themselves' to cope, in general, through the use of substances or habits. They repeat the same actions and behaviors over and over again until they are EXPERTS at dealing with life and situations through a lens affected by or with substances or habit. They teach themselves so well that they require help to find alternative coping skills for whatever situations and life issues are present in their environment.

Addicts aren't terrible people. They're people who have intensely focused upon substances or a habit which ends up hurting them very drastically, sometimes permanently. They need HELP, not criticism. They need EXPLANATIONS, even about the things they have done, because most addicts - underneath the addiction - are simply scared, hurt, confused people who never learned effective coping skills.

The good news!

Addicts can LEARN NEW SKILLS!

When addicts gain some help to cut off their substance or habit supply and turn their efforts toward recovery, we're talkin' about some people who DO KNOW HOW TO FOCUS!

Any recovering cocaine addict or recovering alcoholic can tell you that when the money runs out...INTENSE FOCUS BEGINS on figuring out very intricate and usually complicated ways to find money or find drugs and alcohol even when THERE SEEMS TO BE NO HOPE of accomplishing this...

Well - if that same intensity is applied to recovery - something that most addicts feel there is NO HOPE FOR - then the addict can definitely heal and kick their addiction, no matter what substance or habit they are addicted to.

Here's the link again - for a quiz you can take to see if you're prone to or show signs of sex addiction:

Sex Addicts Anonymous - Recovery - 12 Questions To Ask

Here's a website that deals with Sex Addiction:

All About Life's Challenges - Sexual Addiction - Relationship Breakdown

And here is the Sex Addicts Anonymous site link, Mainpage:

Sex Addicts Anonymous Website

Sex addiction is tricky to deal with because it can exist in your life long before you realize you have a problem. There are no empty beer cans, 'rigging' and needles, no nosebleeds physically apparent to alert you to the dangers right away.

Sex addiction is COMPLICATED...but don't let the word 'complicated' scare you off. It just means that if you're looking for ONE SINGLE answer or cause about why you've become a sex addict, you won't find one single answer.

Sexual abuse during childhood years, abandonment, physical abuse, the introduction of porn during early childhood years, can all be factors in making up part of the answer to 'Why am I a sex addict?' These are just a few elements, and getting down to the main problems of 'why' will probably involve a combination of factors, so once you do decide to seek help, do so with the understanding that you'll deal with more than one or two issues along your recovery way.

If you'd like a more scientific approach to the problem, visit the AllPsych site:

AllPsych Journal - Sexual Addiction

* Note...

If you visit these sites and seem to encounter information at one site but not another, just realize that these are 3 very different sites that take a look at sex addiction from different specialties and perspectives. I thought it best to direct readers to varied information so that nobody feels pushed toward only one source of information.

One site is very much in 'layman's terms,' for a general audience, one is a 12-step approach, and one is a scientific-psychological approach, so naturally, there will be some slightly differing perspectives throughout the sites.

If you think or have recently come to realize that you have an addiction, please visit the sites, gain as much information as you can - and remember...you're NOT awful, weird, terrible...

If you have an addiction - you have behavioral problems that can be sorted out. You'll have chemical imbalances, too, from the substance or habit (habits create body/chemical responses that make even natural chemicals in the body behave differently and appear in irregular amounts). Chemical imbalances will sort out once the substance or habit is taken away. If some chemical imbalances remain after a certain 'clean time' then these can still be sorted out through doctors and professionals.

If you are an addict - you have 'perception' problems...this is both the worst and THE BEST PART...these perceptions will change with some clean time. Your general off-kilter perception of life and the world can be sorted out and improved upon. The reason I say this is the best part is - you will truly be amazed at your different view of the world once you decide to 'go clean.'

Perception will only be the 'worst' part of your life if you choose to do nothing and choose to keep engaging in addictive activities and behaviors.