In actuality, the addiction to sex or pornography has taken over their thoughts and the first thought they have, as automatic as it is, is 100% wrong. The first thought, when we break it down, is usually something like, “Porn would make me feel good right now.” The problem is that this thought is often so quick and the addicted person is unaware that it happened – it’s become habitual.

If you or someone you love is struggling with addiction to sex or pornography, keep this in mind – The first thought you have is probably wrong.

That’s right.  I said you’re thinking is wrong. Will porn or sex make you feel better? Yes, but only in the short term, then your problems come back and you have the guilt or shame or burden of your secret in addition to the other struggles in your life.

You have to practice this concept, but you will eventually be able to recognize your first thought, note that it is not a healthy option, and begin to find new options to deal with the stress and other uncomfortable emotions in life.

Sex and pornography will make you feel good – in the short term. In the long term, they will continue to create problems, ruin relationships, isolate you from those who love you, and steal your chance for real intimacy.  Don’t let an addiction to sex or pornography rob you of this one precious life.  Realize “first thought wrong”, and seek new options.

The model of addiction that many clients find helpful to conceptualize what is happening to them goes like this:

Imagine the scales of justice.  On one side of the scale are the uncomfortable things and feelings that happen in everyday life.  These include stress, depression, loneliness, tiredness, anger, frustration, embarrassment, deceit, rejection, disrespect, and much more.

When one side of the scale feels that heavy, it’s natural to place something on the other side to put life back in balance. Some people learn that what works to balance their life is alcohol. Others find drugs help to create balance. Still others find pornography or sexual behaviors create a sense of balance.

Notice we’re not addressing the etiology, or cause, of the addiction.  We’re not talking about WHY someone reaches for sex or pornography to balance their life, only that they do.  And many people do – estimates are that 6% of the population struggle with sexual addiction.  That’s approximately 18 million Americans, and the 6% number is a bit dated.

There is obviously much more to understanding addiction, but the “scales” model is a start. The root of the addiction may lie somewhere in the uncomfortable things and feelings that are on “the other side” of the scale creating a heaviness in your life or the life of someone you love.

Tired.  What are you feeling when you’re Tired?  Low energy? Ambivalence? Don’t Care? Wiped out? Like you just a need a little “pick me up?”

When battling a sex or pornography addiction, any of those things make relapse easier. When you have a plan to avoid your addiction, it’s easier to forget the plan when you’re tired. It’s easier to forget the plan when you just need a pick me up or when you don’t feel like fighting your thoughts or feelings.

Have you ever relapsed when you were Tired?  If so, think about what was going on in your mind.  That “sleepy fog”, the feeling of taking the easy way.  Relapse is the easy way – in the short term.

Tired is a time of “high risk” for relapse. Being aware of this will make it easier for you to do a number of things:

1) Take care of yourself.  Physically, mentally, emotionally. Avoid letting yourself get Tired. Do regular workouts to build stamina. Turn the TV off at a decent hour and go to sleep. Unplug from the internet and the hectic pace of the world. Meditate, relax, chill.

2) Set good boundaries. Don’t allow people into your world that you don’t want in. Avoid the unnecessary stress.  Don’t over extend yourself at work or with your personal schedule.

3) Be AWARE.  If you do find yourself Tired, recognize this is a time of higher risk for relapse. Take precaution – tell a family member, remove yourself from danger (internet, computer, tablet PC, chat rooms, etc.).  Leave the bar and head home – don’t allow yourself to get pulled in because “this is the last time.”

4) When you’re Tired you make poor decisions.  Don’t make a major life decision when you’re tired. This is a major life decision. If you’re aware of being Tired, take yourself out of the position to make a good or bad decision about your sex or pornography addiction.

In individual and group sessions clients tell of being Lonely or bored and turning to sexual thoughts or pornography as a way to “feel good”, “break up the monotony”, “have something to do” and many other avoid Loneliness reasons.

This seems especially dangerous for the pornography addict who needs alone time to surf the web, hit favorite sites, enter into a chat with someone, etc. Loneliness is a HUGE trigger for pornography addicts.

Loneliness – why is it such a trigger? I’ve found that boredom and Loneliness bring up feelings of being unwanted, being abandoned, being left out, forgotten, and other emotions of rejection. Some of my clients can be alone for a few minutes and begin to feel these feelings. For some their ritual use of pornography starts when they leave work and are thinking of the 15 minutes they have when they get home before the spouse and kids show up.  Loneliness is a significant challenge for sex and pornography addiction.

Recognizing this is the first step. Taking action to avoid being alone is a good stop-gap.  Build your schedule around being with other people. Avoid alone time unless you have activities scheduled – working out, going for a run, etc.  Leave work 20 minutes later so you arrive to a houseful of your family. Go to work a 1/2 hour early so you’re not at home alone in the morning (just you and the computer, tablet, smart phone, magazines, etc.)

There are other options, too.  Seek a counselor that you relate to and talk about your sex or pornography addiction.  Find out why loneliness is such a big trigger. Break the cycle and the hold it has on your life. Uncovering the reasons behind your addiction will allow you to live a life free of pornography and compulsive sexual acts. A life where YOU’RE in control, not your addiction.

Anger is a powerful emotion. I’ve had clients tell me that running to pornography or masturbation is the only way they know to relax. When they get angry, their “automatic thoughts” or first thoughts are to use their addiction to cope with the anger.

If you struggle with a sex or pornography addiction, consider the last time you fell victim to your addiction. Was anger involved? Were you in an argument or did something happen to make you angry? Think about the last time you got angry – how did you cope with those feelings?

If you find yourself thinking that anger is a predecessor to your addictive behaviors, you’ve found one of your triggers. Now that you understand at least part of the addictive sequence, it’s time to find other, better, more healthy coping skills to your anger. This might seem tough, since it’s foreign to you. Make a list of everything you could do to blow off steam when you’re angry. The list should have no fewer than 10 items. Once you have the list, consider the pros and cons of your options and make one of the good choices next time.

Let’s start this investigation by looking at the last time you felt Hurt. What happened? Where were you? Who were you with when the Hurt feelings surfaced? How did you deal with the uncomfortable feelings of being Hurt? Did you go online to view pornography? Did you masturbate? Did you go to your favorite strip club or hook up with a mistress or one night stand? Did you do the behavior that you know is part of your pornography or sex addiction and robs you of honesty and intimacy with people who love you?

Now that you know Hurt may be a trigger, you have options. One is to really look at the feeling. What’s behind the Hurt? Is it guilt or shame? Is is disrespect or dishonesty? What happened in the moment that created the feelings of Hurt? (Be careful here not to blame the other person. Own your feelings of Hurt without making it about them. They are your feelings. They are trying to tell you something important. Figure this out and you’re on a great new path. Ignore it and blame the other person and you’ll stay stuck in your addiction.)

Answer this question: What else could I do when I feel Hurt? Make a list of as many things as you can think of. You could speak your feelings. You could yell and scream. You could hit a heavy bag or punch a pillow. You could go for a run or other exercise. You could do just about anything – you could even act out sexually, but this has other negative consequences that you’re trying to avoid.

When you have other options listed, pick a couple and imagine what would be differently if you’d taken a different action. Try one of these the next time you feel Hurt.

We’ll take a look at a similar process with the other feelings – Anger, Loneliness, Tiredness – in subsequent posts.

Your addiction to pornography or sex may be triggered by “typical” things or events: seeing an attractive woman, seeing your laptop or computer (and thinking about going online to your favorite pornography sites), or maybe it’s something else like checking up on a former sex partner on Facebook.

Often the triggers that spur an addict’s addictive behaviors are not directly related. When you understand your triggers, you increase your awareness and begin to fight back the addict within and take back your life.

To identify the triggers, start with the acronym, HALT. Hurt, Angry, Lonely, Tired. The situations that you enter into in life that create these feelings are quite possibly keeping your sex or pornography addiction alive.

In subsequent posts we’ll look at each of these and discuss what clients have shared with me about each of these. Hopefully you can learn to manage your sex or pornography addiction by recognizing these situations, being aware of them as they occur and taking steps to do something different.

Through consistent use of pornography, or even sexual addiction and the thoughts of conquest of the woman with the big breasts or the good looking guy at the bar, pornography and sex addicts learn to objectify members of the opposite sex. Objectification is when you no longer see the person for anything more than something to be “had” or “conquered”.  If you’ve ever seen a woman at the grocery store or at work, then fantasized about her later when masturbating, this is objectifying her. If you’ve slept with someone and had little or no meaningful conversation – it was just about sex – you’ve objectified them.

Most people want meaningful relationships. They truly want more than just sex. If you’re addicted to pornography or sex, take some time and look deep within yourself. What my clients find, and what you’ll find is that you want more than just sex – you want a friend, a partner, someone who “has your back”, you want a relationship that is safe and honest.  None of these come from a quick hit sexual act.  And the use of pornography and secrets in your relationship, even if you’re married, prevent you from being open and honest with your spouse.

Objectifying the opposite sex is a learned behavior for pornography and sex addicts and, in many ways, it feeds your addiction.  When you begin to see others as human beings – not sexual objects – you begin to break the cycle of addiction and move towards more incredible relationships – and better sex!

When you have cravings to view pornography or engage in addictive sexual behaviors it is important to recognize that the “pull” to do these things, the “voice” that tells you all those lies (it doesn’t hurt anyone, one more time and then I’m done, no one will know so it doesn’t matter, etc.) isn’t you – it’s your addiction.  It’s the monster within.

In group we began to look at and discuss the monster in many ways.

When you “feed the monster”, like anything else, it gets stronger and lives on.  Some people feed their sexual addiction every day.  Their addiction – their monster – tends to be very strong because it eats regularly.  Some people who only feed their addiction on occasion, have less of a pull to pornography or sex – their monster isn’t as strong because it doesn’t get fed.

Consider this – when you DON’T feed the monster it becomes angry.  It starts growling and grumbling.  These are the cravings that you experience with withdrawal.  Agitation, nervousness, depression, anxiety, frustration – recognize these for what they are: withdrawal symptoms.  Or, as one guy said, “It’s my monster trying to get fed!”

If you ignore those cravings, they go away.  Try it next time.  The struggle most addicts have is that they hear the monster grumble, they know how to shut it up (feed it) so they relapse.  If you don’t feed it, it will grumble and growl, then it will slowly die. This takes awareness, time and a plan. (See a previous blog post on relapse prevention planning.)

If you struggle with sexual addiction or pornography addiction – any addiction really – you have a monster inside that wants to be fed. If you continue to feed your monster, it grows. If you refuse to feed it, the monster causes discomfort.  But then it dies.

Recognize that voice for what it is – the monster within.

Relapse to sexual addiction is tough to avoid. It is possible, but rarely have I found clients who avoid relapse through sheer “force of will”.  Instead, working a process is the best way to avoid relapse.

The process is multi-fold and different for each addict. The basics though, include learning your triggers, being able to recognize them, having other options when your triggers occur, and having the open and honest support of someone you can reach out to when triggers and cravings occur – which they most likely will.

It’s not a difficult process to understand, but it does take focus and attention.  Start by thinking about what was going on in your life the last time you relapsed. Figure out what emotions were going through your mind just before you started the process of relapsing. What caused those emotions?

Now, begin to recognize those emotions as soon as they surface and have a different, more healthy escape.

Your addiction to sex or pornography is probably an escape from something – an unhealthy escape. When you realize this, and find more healthy coping skills and tools, your relapse is much less likely.