What is Sex Addiction?
- It requires a partner—willing or unwilling.
- It is using another individual or group of individuals to perform some sexual activity.
- It may involve pornography to “get in the mood.”
- It has the goal of having an orgasm or ejaculation.
- It is interacting with others to create a feeling of sexual excitement.
- It involves specific rituals, which vary with the individual.
- It involves shame, guilt, and secrecy and is heightened by the feeling of the danger of exposure.
- It is not about sex. It is not about love.
- It is about lust. It is about control. It is about self-gratification.
- It may involve a spouse. Marriage does NOT prevent sex addiction.
- It is divided into three stages:
- Stage 1: Masturbation, pornography, prostitution, consensual relations
- Stage 2: Exhibitionism, voyeurism, BDSM (a variety of erotic practices involving dominance and submission)
- Stage 3: Non-consensual relations such as rape, incest, molestation
- It will often escalate through the stages.
- It is usually about the fantasy of what will happen rather than the experience of what happens.