Today, I checked out of curiousity whether my job would help with sexual addiction treatment as they do for alcoholism, depression, etc. However, the summary plan description (the SPD) states that services or treatments that are “experimental, investigational, mainly for research or not in keeping with national standards of practice as determined by” our EAP vendor, “for example, treatment of sexual addiction, codependency or any other behavior that does not have a psychiatric diagnosis.”

Too bad!

Feelings are important however fleeting they may be, however uncontrollable they may seem, and however minor they are. Sometimes they are all over the place and sometimes they are “no where” and sometimes they just are. So sometimes us addicts love to answer the question, “How are you doing?” with “Fine.” We do this because we either cannot put our finger on what we are feeling, we cannot articulate what we are feeling, or we just don’t feel like talking about our feelings. I don’t remember where I first heard this, but I love what the acronym for FINE is:

Freaked out
Insecure
Neurotic
Emotional

If only more people cared to dig past “FINE,” but I completely understand one’s hesitancy to do so because I don’t dig myself though sometimes I wonder what I would find if I did…

In college, I had a roommate that defined FINE and OK his own way, so whenever someone asked, he could simply say FINE or OK, which usually meant something bad or that he was in a bad place. However, he and I both knew that we simply could not be “honest” with people because they simply didn’t care. “Hello, how are you doing?” is only a welcome greeting idiom or euphamism in the South, especially where we were at school. What do you say when someone asks you a question like, “How are you doing?” when you don’t want to talk?

Despite my attempts at getting a sponsor, I am still sponsorless in my new city. Having gotten the phone number of a guy in my city who has had 13 years of sobriety, I visited his group, talked with him, and began a temporary sponsorship with him. Over the course of two weeks, we got to know each other (barely); however, I did inform him that I was going to see a Therapist as well. As soon as he heard, he said to me, “I cannot be your sponsor if you cannot commit to the program 100%.” Then I replied that I could easily commit to the program and maintain the advice and help of a therapist. However, he would not have anything to do with mounting his “massive experience.” So we departed from one another. So then I sought out another temporary sponsor, and we talk a few times, and then nothing… I called him for a week straight, and he never returned my phone calls. So I dropped him as a sponsor. Now I am trying a third guy as a sponsor, and hopefully it will work out. While I didn’t get a chance to talk with him today, I will try again tomorrow to see how it will work.In the past, I would have said, “See I tried!” However, that simply isn’t enough. I must get a sponsor and begin working through the steps. So I will try for a third sponsor, and if I have to I will try everyone who has more than a year of sobriety. Hopefully, this guy will call me back and hopefully, he isn’t anti-therapist.Should getting a sponsor be this difficult?

What is a slip? While I define a slip a little more broadly (or, a little more specific including some recovery behaviors) than this, a slip at minimum is any viewing of pornography, any sexual act outside the confines of marriage (between a man and a woman), and masturbation (see tomorrow’s post). At minimum, it is breaking one’s sobriety.

I really like what Mark Brower over at sexualsanity.com says:

In the work I do with Dr. Mark Laaser at Faithful and True Ministies, we advocate a three-fold definition of sobriety using the acronym MAP: sexual sobriety means abstaining from:

• Masturbation (sex with oneself)
• Adultery (sex with anyone other than the spouse)
• Pornography (intentional viewing of erotic media)

I believe that this forms a great basis or bottom line for sexual sobriety. However, I would like to clarify this definition a little more.

Masturbation

Some people I know advocate having a more loose sobriety definition so that it is more “attainable” and so that someone could gain sobriety and eventually add to this definition as time moves forward. This very SAA approach to sobriety is extremely vague and insecure providing a false sense of pride and progress. For any sex addict, masturbation must be part of the sobriety definition. Because of the nature of masturbation, the secrecy, the shame, and the guilt, without including masturbation in one’s sobriety definition, a fall or relapse is almost inevitable in my opinion (though I am sure that there may be some who allot for masturbation and who have not relapsed in other areas).

Adultery

Once I heard a guy tell me that having sex with other single people was not adultery because neither party was married. He would even admit that adultery was wrong. While this may be true technically, I believe his rationalization (or rational lies) misses the point biblically speaking. And I am sure that Mark Laaser and Mark Brower don’t hold that position as they define Adultery as “sex with anyone other than the spouse.” Simply speaking, Laaser and Brower are technically marrying adultery and fornication, which is perfectly fine with me.

Pornography

To me this is one of the most important parts of the sobriety definition or in defining a slip. Note that Laaser and Brower define this as “intentional viewing of erotic material.” I love the vagueness and the all-inclusivity of this definition. First, they mark the intent of one’s heart as part of the definition, which is so important. If my intent is to find erotic material (whatever that may be), then I am viewing pornography and I am slipping.

Second, it is erotic material, but what is erotic material? Does it include things like Sports Illustrated Swimsuit or catalogs or whatever? I define pornography as “any material (either pictures or words or video or multimedia, etc.) that is sexually explicit [in any way] that is designed in any way (whether primarily or even secondarily or tertiary or even accidentally) to produce sexual arousal [or excitement] in viewers, or any non-sexually explicit material that can be used to produce sexual arousal (but not necessarily at the fault of the creator)” by the viewer (and their intent at viewing the material). So that billboard that I see driving along the highway may be “pornographic” to me but not the next guy. Furthermore, though the billboard is “pornographic” my viewing of it initially is accidental; however, if I view it longer than 3 seconds (suggested by SA’s White Book), then it is pornographic.

A while back I became eligible for a new phone, then about amonth ago, my MotoQ Smartphone died. Since my screen no longer worked and Icould not tell why my phone was buzzing. I didn’t know if it was a textmessage, a phone call, or anything. So I desperately needed a new phone. So Iwent and got a Blackberry Torch, a dream phone for me. It could do anything Iwanted: Twitter, Facebook, HootSuite, Email, Internet (without Flash),WordPress/Blogging, Games, etc. etc. Simply, “There’s an app for that!”However, in the past, the phone was a source of contention with my wife. I haveused my phone for pleasure, and not just the simple pleasures. I was using itto access pornography (reminiscent of porn on a dial-up). One time, I wasaccessing porn in the house near the kids while my wife slept! And then I wasBUSTED! My wife came out of the bedroom and saw me and immediately inquired. Inthe past, she has always made “boundaries” which I always took as demands orher dictating my recovery to me.

However, a couple of weeks ago, my wife asked me to considergiving up my phone. WOW! What a change! She was asking me to consider and tothink about it. It was my decision, and I knew what I should have done immediately.However, I wanted to keep my phone. It was…“My precious!” Having thought aboutit and talked with a couple recovery buddies, I had not come to a conclusion.Really, I was wrestling with sacrifice, selfishness, and my will. One weekpassed. Two weeks passed. Then she came to me demanding that I just give up thephone, which I failed to respond appropriately. So I went to my recoverybuddies, which one of my recovering buddies (@porntopurity, Jeff Fisher atporntopurity.com) told me, “Brother, man up! And get rid of the phone.” Sohaving come to the conclusion that I needed to get rid of the phone at thebeginning, and now deciding that I wantedto get rid of the phone, I was ready.

Then I had an epiphany after a few more talks with somerecovery buddies and a couples counseling appointment (though my counselor didnot say these things to me). My wife was simply trying to place a boundary(though her boundary failed because of a lack of time frame placed on it), notdictating my recovery. My wife was simply asking me to give up my phone for thesake of our relationship, not for my recovery (though I know she thinks it willbenefit my recovery).

So, yesterday, I went and traded phones. To the shock of theAT&T associate, I was downgrading from the Torch! to what!? Two hourslater, I got my new Dumbphone, a new Jawbone, and my restock fee waived with apartial financial refund (probably because I was switching from a top-notchSmartphone to a pathetic Dumbphone). My new Dumbphone can text, call, and…??? Well,that’s it! No blogging. No internet. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Zero. Nil. Naught.Null. Simply, my phone is but a cipher or a bagatelle (two new words that Ilearned today that mean something of little value or of no importance).