The concept of sex without an emotional connection may sound impossible to many, but to the millions of people who are living with sex addiction, it’s part of the destruction and the pain of the complex addiction.
Sexual addiction is a serious problem that afflicts many people. Although not all experts in the mental health profession consider it a true addiction like alcoholism, sex addiction is very real. Whether you call it sex addiction, sexual compulsion, or a sexual behavior disorder, it describes someone who obsesses over acts, behaviors, and other things sexual.
Carolee and Sayda met in an online community called Experience Project. Carolee had been searching for stories related to female sexual addiction (she suspected she might be experiencing the problem herself), and after reading several such stories on the website, she gathered the courage to post her own. When Sayda read Carolee’s story, she related so completely that she realized she might be suffering from sex addiction, too. She was stunned. The two young women began to communicate via the site’s messaging service and eventually began to email and talk by phone. They poured out their stories and their hearts to one another.
Sex addiction is a complicated thing. Many experts would even refrain from using the term addiction, as they believe it applies to substance abuse only. However, all experts would agree that it is possible to become obsessive about sexual behaviors and to have a strong and destructive compulsion to seek out sexual activities. Some professionals prefer to call this hypersexual disorder.
By now, media is saturated with reports of accusations against David Tutera, celebrity wedding and event planner, designer, public speaker, author, and host of WE TV’s My Fair Wedding. The accusations were brought by Tutera’s husband of ten years, Ryan Jurica, who filed court documents claiming the demise of the relationship was due to Tutera’s problems with “sex addiction,” further stating that Tutera had “engaged in a pattern of hiring sex escorts and prostitutes to support his addiction.”
It is from somewhere near the ceiling that I witness myself and the scene I have somehow chosen. I am naked on a stranger’s bed – a four poster of heavy carved mahogany. I am tied with intricate knots binding my wrists to my ankles behind me. There is the deafening sound of metal music, which vibrates the bed beneath me. There is scented candlelight diffusing the room, creating a density of sickening sweetness. A man is standing near the bed speaking menacingly to me about his selection of tools, a cane. He is preparing to cane the bottom of my tender, bare feet. When he begins, I seem to fall into the center of the nearest candle.
One of the difficulties that nearly every sex addict who opts for recovery encounters, usually sooner rather than later, is telling the people in his or her life what’s going on. The simple fact is most people have little to no understanding of what sex addiction actually is. In fact, a lot of folks think it sounds like fun. You, of course, know that it isn’t. In fact, it’s as devastatingly un-fun as full-blown alcoholism or drug addiction, with consequences that are every bit as severe. So what do you tell your spouse, your best pal, your boss, your parents, or whoever it is that needs to know that: a) you’re making some major changes; and b) why you’re doing it?
Sex addiction is a very touchy subject. Admitting to an addiction of any type is tough to do, but when it involves sex, the odds of facing up to it are even lower. A sex addiction, also known as hypersexual disorder or compulsive sexual behavior, is an obsession with feelings, thoughts, or behaviors that are sexual in nature and which negatively affect aspects of your life. A sex addiction can be very destructive and can lead to damaged relationships, lowered self-esteem, lost careers, and more devastating effects.
