by @purifyinggrace on September 2, 2010
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I was recently at a workshop where they were giving a ton of statistics. While I wasn’t able to write them all down and everything, I got the emphasis of the statistics. According to Patrick Carnes’s research, someone basically has a 90%1 chance of a full, long-lasting recovery if the following elements are in place:
- A minimum of three 12 step meetings (S.A., S.A.A., S.L.A.A., R.C.A., S.C.A., S.R.A.) with Celebrate Recovery that has a purity group (or Samson Society, or Pure Desire Group or Faithful & True Groups) being a 4th meeting for a minimum of 2 years. However, mere attendance does not count. For this to count, the person must be meeting with a sponsor weekly (sometimes contacting them daily) with daily phone calls to others in the group. If in Celebrate Recovery this would mean doing a Step Study Group on top of the weekly meetings.
- Weekly meetings with a CSAT or some other certified addictions therapist for a minimum of 2 years. Typically this means digging into your own life further from insights gained from (1) group therapy, (2) group therapy assignments, (3) going through the 12 steps (including the 12 step meetings), and (4) life as it happens while on the journey of recovery. Find a therapist here.
- Weekly group therapy meetings for a minimum of 2 years. This typically combined with the weekly therapy group as it is usually a bad idea to have two therapists (one for therapy and one for individual), and typically the group will go through a book either Laaser’s L.I.F.E. workbook or Carnes’s Facing the Shadow workbook (there are others out there but these are the two Sexual Addiction leaders).
So, typically, this means about 10 hours of work per week that needs to be done, and I am discovering this is the bare minimum. As I am creating my recovery plan, I notice that for men there are other elements that must be included such as exercise/working out (30 minutes a day), spiritual disciplines (30-60 minutes/day), and adequate sleeping patterns (7-8 hours/day). So in essence it is a complete life change and transition. My wife and I were chatting about this the other day, and she said to me (referring to something that her therapist said when her therapist equated much of their recovery plan with the spiritual disciplines) that if we observe people we admire, we will notice that those who are healthy already do much of the 12 steps in the form of spiritual disciplines.
So, when a therapist or counselor repeats what Patrick Carnes says about sexual addiction recovery that it is “a 3-5 year process,” don’t be surprised and don’t change therapists as you may be tempted to do. Seriously, they are not looking to make a long term financial making plan with us. Instead, this type of honesty is essential and if they wanted to make money with us addicts they wouldn’t tell us. Then this would create repeat customers (per se) for a much longer period of time.
While at Bethesda Workshops, I heard two really profound yet simple stories. One was in response to a question similar to “Why does it take so long?” The therapist simply said, “How long did it take for you to get where you are?” And then he continued, “Recovery won’t take as long as it should or as long as it took for you to get where you are, but it will be longer than you expect.” The second one is also just as profound in our microwave, quick fix it society. The guy went into see his CSAT therapist regarding his sex addiction. He sat down and began to tell how his sex addiction began. Then the therapist asked, “Tell me about your dad.” The addict confused yet persistent replied with more of his sex addiction beginnings. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict frustrated continued to discuss his sex addiction in present times. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict becoming angry and thinking that he is wasting his time began describing his current consequences. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Then the addict extremely frustrated and angry demanded that they talk about his sex addiction. And the therapist said, “We are. What is it that you want?” Then the addict began describing his despair in such sorrow. Then the therapist having listened, asked, “Tell me about your dad.” Finally in exasperation, the addict said angrily, “No! I am here to talk about my sex addiction—not my dad!” The therapist said, “What do you think I am trying to do? You want to talk about the behavior, and I am trying to talk about your addiction.” Full sex addiction therapy will investigate family of origin issues, trauma/impactful life events, and one’s belief system and thinking—not just the behavior.
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1. I am still trying to validate this statistic. However, I was able to validate something of the reverse. Carnes unofficially reported that people that went through treatment at the meadows and who were successfully following their aftercare plan, relapse rate was only 3 percent!
by @purifyinggrace on May 1, 2010
This was originally written as a guest post for PorntoPurity.com.
Denial. No! What is it, really? I hear it thrown around constantly, and you probably do too. If you are anything like me, when you hear something like the first step that says, “We admitted we were powerless over our addictions and compulsive behaviors, that our lives had become unmanageable,” we think, “Duh! I’m here aren’t I!? Why else would I be here?” And we think, “I have already got this first step done!” When I first really entered recovery, my sponsor would constantly tell me that I was still in denial, and like any good addict, I denied it! I denied it because I had no idea what he was talking about. And frankly, he couldn’t articulate why he thought I was in denial. He would simply say, “It just sounds like you are still in denial.” And I would ask, “Well, what makes you say that?” And he could never answer me…well, at least to my satisfaction because I was intellectualizing the conversation. So I brushed it off.
However, when I began therapy with my counselor, he walked me through Patrick Carnes’s 14 Types of Denial asking me which ones that I did. Then I realized, yes, in some cases, probably more than I’d like to admit, I was in denial. And immediately I wanted to deny it! And the thing about the 12 steps is that it is not once and done. It is a process that is continuous, and I must continually choose to step out of denial in my thinking and definitely any time I do something wrong.
So I wanted to share these 14 with you guys. While some of these may overlap with one another, it helps to have these 14 categories to really know what denial really is. While most of us don’t use all twelve, try to pick out your top 3-4. The twelve taken from Facing the Shadow (adapted by me) are:
- Global Thinking: This is attempting to justify something with absolute terms like “always” or “never” or “whatsoever.” It also can be something along the lines of “every guy does this.”
- Rationalization: This is justifying unacceptable behavior saying things like “I don’t have a problem, I’m just sexually liberated,” or “You’re crazy,” or “I can go months without this, so I don’t have a problem.” As Rick Warren states, “Rationalize is telling yourself Rational Lies” (Twitter).
- Minimizing: This is trying to make behavior or consequences seem smaller or less important than they are saying things like “only a little,” or “only once in a while,” or “it’s no big deal,” or simply telling the story in a better light than it really should be.
- Comparison: This is shifting focus to someone else to justify behaviors such as “I’m not as bad as…”
- Uniqueness: This is thinking you are different or special saying things like “My situation is different,” or “I was hurt more,” or “That’s fine for you, but I’m too busy.” This one can also be considered Entitlement.
- Distraction (Carnes, Avoiding by creating an uproar or distraction): This is being a clown and getting everyone laughing, having angry outbursts meant to frighten or intimidate others, threats and posturing, and doing shocking behavior that may even be sexual. This can be when we simply blow up upon being confronted hoping that our explosion will draw attention rather than the actual issue.
- Avoiding by Omission: This is trying to change the subject, ignore the subject, or manipulate the conversation to avoid talking about something. It is also leaving out important bits of information like the fact that the lover is underage, or the person is a close friend of your spouse, or revealing enough information while keeping back the most “dangerous” information that will get you in more trouble.
- Blaming: This is when you shift blame and responsibility from yourself to another person, and many times this is done unconsciously since in the depth of our being we really don’t want to be held responsible for something. I call this the Adam Syndrome as this is what Adam did in the Garden (Genesis 3) by wrongly blaming Eve for his rebellion. This includes, “Well, you would cruise all night, too, if you had my job,” or “If my spouse weren’t so cold…” or “I can’t help it, the baby cries day and night and makes me nervous.”
- Intellectualizing: This is avoiding feelings and responsibility by thinking or by asking why. This person tries to explain everything getting lost in detail, rabbit trails, and/or storytelling. This often includes pretending superior intellect and using intelligence as a weapon. If you watch the TV Show Bones, Dr. Temprance Brennan does this often.
- Victim Mentality (Carnes, Hopelessness/Helplessness): This is where a person says, “I’m a victim,” or “I can’t help it,” or “There is nothing I can do to get better,” or “I’m the worst.”
- Manipulative Behavior: This usually involves some distortion of reality including the use of power, lies, secrets, or guilt to exploit others.
- Compartmentalizing: This is something that almost every addict does (I actually want to say EVERY but will hold back). This is separating your life into compartments in which you do things that you keep separate from other parts of your life. This is like a Jackel and Hyde or a separation of Public and Private life to the point where it is unhealthy driven by thoughts of “If they only knew, then…”
- Crazymaking: This occurs when we are confronted by others who DO have a correct perception…we simply tell them that they are totally wrong. We act indignantly toward them attempting to make them feel crazy by simply positing that they cannot trust their own perceptions.
- Seduction: This is the use of charm, humor, good looks, or helpfulness to gain sexual access and cover up insincerity.
For me, while I struggle with many of these denial types (rationalizing, minimizing, uniqueness, distraction, omission, blaming, intellectualizing, compartmentalizing) and probably have done them all at one point or another, my Big Three are Minimizing, Omission, and Intellectualizing. Well, at least that’s what I think they are. It is a good practice to take this list and mark the ones that you think you do, and confirming it with your spouse and/or your sponsor and/or someone close to you that knows most of the story and has lived through things with you. The goal is to identify which ones we tend towards so when we are facing our secrets and/or our problems, we can identify some of these behaviors in order to face the truth at all costs and comfort and live out the Stockdale Paradox.
What are yours?
by @purifyinggrace on April 16, 2010
Ted Roberts, in Pure Desire, refers to The Addictive Cycle as the Addictive Noose.
The Noose of Sexual Addiction consists of four issues:
Click for a Larger Image
- The Addictive Root
- The Addictive Mindset
- The Addictive Lifestyle
- The Addictive Cloak
So the addiction is not just about the person’s behavior/lifestyle, but about a wide variety of other issues. As Ted Roberts says, “It is about his past, the way he thinks and the defense mechanisms he has developed to keep from being exposed. Sexual Addiction isn’t ultimately about sex; it is about the way the person deals with life!” (Pure Desire, 49). And as many therapist say, “A sex addict knows nothing about sex because they know nothing about intimacy.”
Addiction has three interlocking elements:
- The problem has become unmanageable. The person has repeatedly and unsuccessfully tried to stop the behavior in a number of ways. Many take a binge/purge approach where they binge for a day, week, or even a month, and then they purge and that is also cyclical.
- Their behavior is destructive to them in some form. The first consequence is numbness, emotional numbness. SA is medicating against some sort of pain or emotional reality in his life.
- There is increased intensity of the activity over a period of time. The sexual high of the past isn’t enough so the “dosage” has to increase thus altering the brain chemistry.
The Addictive Mindset consists of a variety of destructive core concepts or also known as Core Beliefs (Patrick Carnes) including thoughts or worthlessness, unlovability, loneliness, and pleasure centric thoughts.
- “I am basically a bad, unworthy person.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here.
- “No one would love me as I am.” (Similar to “If they knew me, then they wouldn’t like me.”) Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here
- “My needs are never going to be met if I have to depend on others.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here
- “Sex is my most important need.” Jeff Fisher at PorntoPurity.com has a great post on this here
The Addictive Lifestyle consists of a cycle that begins with Fantasy which leads to ritual, which leads to secrecy, which leads to further shame and guilt.
The Addictive Cloak is in denial, delusion and blame.
The Addictive Root has three basic drivers: (1) Family Dysfunction; (2) Personal Trauma; and (3) Addictive Society. And this root is a complex root system, and for people with multiple issues or even addictions this root system is overlapped with another complex root system that must carefully be revealed, studied, and eventually dug-up, repaired or even replaced.
