Are you a sex addict?

You may already feel like you know the answer to the question. Many of us lean one way or the other. "Surely I'm not" or "Oh yes I am" are not unusual feelings when discovering about ourselves, but here, we'd like to aid you in understanding if you are, truly, addicted sexually. 

What is Addiction?

There are lots of ways to describe addiction. Some classics are "it takes you farther than you want to go" or "it will make you do what you don't want to do" or "it's that thing you just got to have". Notice what these are all saying? They are saying "I'm out of control". Truly, that is what an addiction is. 

An Addiction is identified when it is proven that under certain conditions a man or woman cannot say "no" to the autonomic processes of their brain, creating compulsion. 

Translation? You can't say "no" to yourself. Your body takes off without you, doing what it craves as though you have nothing to say about it. Can you relate?

The part of the brain that controls many of these autonomic processes is called the limbic system. The limbic system controls stuff you don't want to think about, including but not limited to your breathing, heartbeat, and the way you wave your hands when you really want to make a point. The limbic system grows with training, like the way my fingers find all the right spots on a keyboard when I am not consciously thinking about typing, or when someone is so in tune with a game they are playing that they get in the zone. Most actions are running on autopilot. 

You might like to know, however, that the limbic system is also the region that governs survival responses. If you are cooking and don't notice your hand getting too close to the heat, it is your limbic system that pulls your hand away before you can even think about it. When you are walking through a building and something shadowy scurries across the floor in front of you, it is your limbic system that stops you dead in your tracks and focuses in on trying to figure out the threat level of the situation. Or the most classic,  when you are walking through the woods and look down to see a snake by your feet, it is your limbic system that jumps you back and away from it. Moments later you realize that it is actually a garden hose. But the limbic system didn't know, it just tried to keep you alive. 

This is how addiction takes hold in someone. The limbic system of the brain is taken over by faulty programming, making the brain convinced that without the desired addiction, you are in danger. In the case of substance addiction, a person might train their brain to think that alcohol is required to be "safe". We might also call it coping. Coping is a way to make oneself feel safe. In the case of process addiction, a person may train their brain to think that gambling is the only way to cope. The thrill of the process (experience) makes them feel safe and in control. In short, if your brain attaches a substance or process to an innate feeling of being unsafe, then addiction is sure to rise. 

What is Sex Addiction?

Unfortunately, sexual addiction is far more complicated than that. Sexual addiction is when your brain learns to make you feel safe through the release of sexual chemical rewards. A sexual high becomes the answer to the times a person feels down or unsafe, and an addiction is born. And yet, it's more. As the person sexually acts out again and again, the threat of bad feelings grows. What starts as occasional porn use turns into regular or severe porn use, then grows into new and dangerous heights. It's not uncommon for someone to shift from relatively safe behaviors to risky behaviors. This is because sexual addiction is both a process and a substance addiction.

As you may recognize in your own life or in the lives of people you know who struggle, sexual addiction follows a process. Addicts walk out similar scenarios over and over again, repeating the sequences that make them feel safe. Once they do this, they then enter into a time of sexually acting out, where they receive the brain's highest compliment of bonding and pleasure rewards. This is called an orgasm. In orgasm, the individual bonds themselves chemically to that which they are viewing at the time of release. Substance addiction is in effect. 

It may be tempting to think that sexual addiction is just about trying to feel good. It's true, the chemical reward fr acting out does feel very good. But we can easily see the strangeness of this addiction when we realize that the people who are acting out in this way are not doing so in the context of healthy relationships, but rather unhealthy ones. Either in person or online or even in complete fantasy worlds. Their capacity for relationships is severely diminished, and this implies that something else is going on. It's not about feeling good, it's about medicating the pain that we feel.

How do I know?

Sexual addiction comes from a deep woundedness that is often planted in the soil of our lives early on. We call this woundedness "trauma". Trauma is the inability to emotionally adapt to an event or sequence of events leading to confusion in one's core beliefs. For some it can be an angry or abusive parent. For others, early sexual encounters. For still others, negligence or loneliness. However trauma presents itself, it becomes a key factor in developing a shame mindset.

A shame mindset is a belief in one's heart that says "I am bad".

Other ways to state a shame mindset may be, "I am worthless", "I can't do anything right", or "I don't deserve to live". While each addict's shame mindset can take on a style of its own, they all end up in the same place. They end up with a constant background noise of fear (read discomfort, aggravation, lack of safety) in every moment of their lives. it is this that they want so badly to medicate. They want to be able to live a few moments without the pain swinging around in their mind. 

Is this you?

 You may want to take it now and get your results. However, if you are seeing yourself in the words on this page and are interested in reaching out to someone who can help now, then click to schedule a discovery call now or submit an online discovery to see what the right next steps would be for you. We hope that you are blessed by our ministry and that God will continue to reveal to you Himself. 

Resources: 

One of the best actions you can take to begin your journey towards healing is to read quality resource material! Check out these books which contain powerful and transforming information.