What to Expect

You have weathered the discovery that your spouse/partner is a sex addict/compulsive (SAC). Perhaps you are still discovering new behaviors or the extent of his acting out. What does that mean for you and the relationship? For your children if you have them? Feeling lost, without a compass is what each of us feel in addition to feeling betrayed, angry, hurt and devastated. This is where education is your best ally.

So from here, where? What should you do? How can you possibly know what is real? You have been lied to and misled. The betrayal is so deep you fear you will never trust anyone ever again. You may still be experiencing both betrayal and deception. This is tricky and there are no guarantees. The disease of sexual compulsion/addiction is complex and does not lend itself to simple answers or even simple questions.

The disease is progressive, yes. And, and the situation is dynamic. That means that addiction is a direction, a trajectory, and its force, speed and developments are dynamic, specific to the addict and his relationships, his traumas, his circumstances, his spirituality, his commitment to recovery (or not), events, consequences and the progression of the disease at the time the question is asked. Please note that we chose to use the masculine pronoun for the addict and the feminine for the partner/spouse for ease of reading. We are well aware that there are female sex addicts, so please just transpose the pronouns to suit your particular relationship.

Your decisions

Yet, you have many decisions to make, you want information, data, best practices even. You want to base your decisions on as many facts as can be ascertained. What's important for you to know is that the variable for all the data available is the addict. Addiction is a trajectory and there are many factors that affect the exact arc and speed.

If we could tell you what to expect, what specifically will happen in your case, we surely would.

Since we are not there to determine/assess the expression of his/her condition, what we would like to do is offer you some suggestions that worked for us.

Our suggestions for you

• Learn all you can about addiction, specifically sex/porn addiction. An active addict's primary relationship is with the addiction, not you or the family. To the addict, the addiction comes first. Upon his beginning recovery, if you are fortunate enough to have that happen, his primary relationship is a tug of war between the addiction and recovery. You are then relegated to third place on a good day. Addicts have brutally difficult priorities.
• But that does not mean you are alone in a wilderness, though it likely feels that way. In the thirty or so years since real research was done in this field, there is a wealth of research and information available to us today. Much of the research indicates that you can recover and heal regardless of whether the compulsive in your life decides to change or not. So take heart. At least you will escape this alive and hopefully, be well on your way to a real healing.
• Determine and reach out to your sources of emotional support other than the porn/sex addict. This can be close friends, therapy group members, 12-Step and other support group members. All of these offer and deepen your support to others while you reach out for support, as this is nothing to handle alone.
• Learn your own trauma issues/Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that allowed your boundaries to be so violated by your partner/spouse. Yes, even if he lived a secret "other" life and you just found out, you are affected deeply by this and will benefit from availing yourself of every resource possible. Here you will not be labeled a co-addict, (unless you are one of the rare few who helped him procure people or products with which to act out) but there are reasons that your psyche was not alerting you to this abuse (and all addiction is abusive to those around the addict) and other ongoing violations.

Because accessing and working with this material is usually highly charged and often very difficult work, you will need to access resources. This means individual therapy, group therapy, recovery meetings such as CoSA, S-Anon, Al-Anon and coaching for instance. If you can find or start a trauma survival group, you may benefit from that. Get a complete psychological work-up with a licensed therapist paying particular attention to the possibility of depression, PTSD, ADHD, abuse survival and covert childhood sexual abuse.

• Narcissistic Personality Disorder, or NPD is frequently co-morbid with porn/sex addiction. Narcissistic issues are very difficult to change because they are based on such a fundamental exposure to vulnerability that narcissists do not easily remain in treatment. Even when they do, treatment can be painstakingly slow. We hope that finding out that your SAC has a notoriously difficult to treat disorder would certainly affect your decision-making. Three excellent sites to help you identify behaviors and lend some clarity:

 http://tami-port.suite101.com/narcissistic-disorder-diagnosis-a30074  

 http://blog.thenarcissistinyourlife.com/ 

 http://thenarcissistinyourlife.com/

• Pay close attention to this stark truth: You are dealing with a sex addict/compulsive. Never, ever expect him to think like you do. He doesn't, he can't and he will not. You will set yourself up for heartbreak and disappointment if you think otherwise. This is not because they are a bad person, it is because they have been overtaken by the complex known as "addiction" or "compulsion". An addict lies, overpowers, manipulates, seduces, makes decisions on criteria that seems senseless to us, charms, promises anything and delivers little, if anything. This is so important we are going to say it again: An addict lies, overpowers, manipulates, seduces, makes decision on criteria that seem senseless to us, charms, promises anything and delivers little, if anything! In addition, SACs are often confused about why they do what they do, so don't expect straight answers to your many pressing questions about their behavior. Most likely you'll just get a blank stare or some attempt at a response back. Don't expect it to make sense; he's not lying when he says he's confused. This took me years to believe, especially as my SAC was otherwise very intelligent, so how could he not know his own logic/reasoning behind his own behavior?

Until the addict has three to five years of solid recovery, you are dealing with an addict. Expect that. Sounds harsh and hard line—unforgiving, even. Please, if you believe nothing else, believe that active addicts are dishonest and that their primary relationship is with the addiction—not you. Here is another point you might as well memorize and repeat daily: A SAC's primary relationship is with his addiction, not you! And if you in any way attempt to get between an addict and his source of supply, he will use any and all means to remove you from his path. Just ask those who live with an alcoholic what happens when they empty the alcoholic's bottles down the drain.

• Even though everything feels like it's going wrong right now, one thing going right is that you have decided to get information. Don't underestimate this step. We find it sad that many partners just shrug and say, "This is his problem, not mine" and then just react (usually negatively) to the addict in their life. Active addiction + uninformed partner = disaster for both! Stop and give yourself some credit for taking a first, very important step. You are getting yourself informed!

In closing

No one can say what your partner will progress towards. But progress he will. It is the nature of the beast called "addiction." His own history and personal psychology will affect the expression of the trajectory of his addiction.

We hope this overview has helped you 'zoom out' of your own situation enough to see the landscape ahead of you more clearly. There is much confusion and so many decisions to make, that most partners feel overwhelmed. Please know that you are NOT alone—many have traveled these same painful roads you now find yourself on. Remember to reach out. Terre and I have been here before. We are here for you now.

With great love and compassion for you on this journey of healing,
—Lili and Terre

We recommend:

Almost everything in our Resource Center! If you need very specific guidance and don't trust your intuition or are too traumatized right now to find a book for yourself, e-mail us and we can guide you to one.