The Importance of Female Friendships for Female Sex Addicts
Maybe you’ve just read the title and you’ve made the assumption that treatment professionals want to encourage you, a woman with sex addiction, to stop focusing on your male friendships because they may be unhealthy for you. Let’s get this out of the way by saying, no. That’s not the intention of this article—unless, of course, your addiction is causing you to turn your friendships into acting-out spaces (i.e., you find yourself having sex or attempting to be sexual with men who were only ever meant to be your friends). If that is the case, it’s important to acknowledge that this is an area in which you will need more insight and healing, but the primary purpose of this article is to point to the foundational benefit of bringing women into your life and nurturing your relationships with them. It turns out to be more important to women’s recovery than anyone may have thought.
The Partners of Sex Addicts and Their Need for Recovery
In a relationship in which one of the partners is a sex addict, naturally the attention and focus is directed to the addict and the problems and upheavals that the condition creates in the relationship. In the midst of dealing with the pain and challenge of being in a relationship with a sex addict, the needs of the non-addict spouse are often minimized or neglected.
Another tendency arises: because the addict and his or her behavior presents the more urgent and pressing challenge and conflict, the emotional issues and dysfunctional patterns that the non-addict spouse contributes may seem insignificant by comparison. But in a relationship between two people, even though only one may be the diagnosable addict, illness surrounds both partners. If reconciliation and healing are to occur, both must be willing to seek and follow through with recovery.
Gay Men and Sexual Addiction
Carlos had heard the term “sex addiction” before and summarily dismissed it. It must have been created by people, probably by corporations, who wanted to deny individuals’ their sexual freedoms. Anyone who looked down on others’ sexual rights was anathema to him; he dismissed them outright. He’d already had enough of his family’s conservative religious attitudes and their beliefs about his sexual orientation—he had no more chosen to be gay than he had chosen to be Floridian. Their repeated rejection had all been incredibly painful for him, so when Carlos finally left home in order to pursue his own life, he promised himself never again to compromise his own values. He would be out and he would be proud.
Sexual Addiction: (Not) A Love Story
Picture this: Two people, a man and a woman, on separate sides of a relatively large city, staring into their computer screens. He runs his fingers through the scruff growing on his chin and smiles. She tilts her head slightly to the left, curls her lip in that little way she does when she feels happy and nods. A pop up window opens, “Do you wanna chat?” It’s all very “You’ve Got Mail.”
Except that this is not a love story. Yet.
