Am I addicted to sex? Can you be addicted to sex though, seriously?
Those questions could be on your mind as you think about your sexual habits and history. The celebrated likes of James Bond, Casanova, Don Juan, and other mythical Lotharios may even make the idea of being addicted to sex appealing. In reality however, being addicted to sex is anything but good. It’s actually a debilitating addiction that can destroy your life. With that said, with the right help, you can overcome a sex addiction and learn to enjoy healthy sex—and a healthy life.
What It Means to Be Addicted to Sex
It’s important to clear this up from the start: sex itself is a good thing. It’s perfectly healthy and OK to have sex. But being addicted to sex is takes the good thing that sex is and twists it into something not.
Being addicted to sex means you feel compelled to have sex, so much that you can’t stop. You may even want to slow down your sexual escapades, but you keep discovering (to your frustration and detriment) that you can’t, no matter how hard you try. When you’re addicted to sex, you have what’s called hypersexual disorder. Being hypersexual means you constantly have uncontrollable sexual urges, fantasies, thoughts, and behaviors that are driving your life. As a type of compulsive sexual behavior, your hypersexuality will negatively get in the way of your daily functioning, hurting your personal life, work, school, and social obligations.
Being addicted to sex often looks like having physical sex with others (to state the obvious), but it can also take on other forms of hypersexuality, including:
- Porn addiction
- Arousal addiction
- Masturbation addiction
- Phone sex addiction
Common Sex Addiction Symptoms
At this point, it’s easy to wonder about how much sex is too much when considering sex addiction. But it’s not as simple as that. There isn’t a magic number. To answer the question Am I addicted to sex, you need to know the common sex addiction symptoms to look out for. If you can relate to the following warning signs, you may have hypersexual disorder:
- Hiding your sexual activities from others
- Feeling regret, shame, or guilt as a result of your sexual behavior
- Thinking about or planning sexual activities for the majority of your day
- Using sexual activities to cope with difficult feelings and emotions
- Taking on escalating or riskier sexual behaviors regardless of their consequences
- The inability to stop your sexual behaviors and activities
- Difficulty forming and keeping healthy relationships
- Having unprotected sex with strangers or sex with multiple partners
- Engaging in sexual activities (including porn and masturbation) in public places
- Spending excessive amounts of money on sexual activities
- Not fulfilling work or personal responsibilities in favor of sexual activities
Why Am I Addicted to Sex?
As you think about sex addiction’s symptoms and reflect upon your own sex life, you may question how you got to this crossroads. Being addicted to sex doesn’t just arise overnight. But how could it happen to someone like you?
Hypersexuality’s roots start in your brain as a result of past traumatic experiences, believe it or not. When you experience events such as a serious accident, emotional abuse, or financial troubles, the emotional response generated is called trauma, shares the American Psychological Association. And this trauma can leave a lasting negative impact. Even the effects of adverse childhood experiences like abuse, divorce, neglect, bullying, or the loss of a loved one can linger for decades into adulthood.
When new experiences that trigger this past trauma, as well as new traumatic events, negative feelings, or stress occur, it’s easy to seek out ways to self-medicate or cope with this discomfort. So where does sex enter the picture? Sexual experiences cause your brain to release large amounts of dopamine, the pleasure chemical that tells you that what you’re doing feels good. So when you’re dealing with unprocessed trauma, you naturally seek out what makes you feel good to find relief, which for some, can be sexual behavior.
While having sex, masturbating, or watching porn may provide some relief, your brain eventually develops a tolerance for the dopamine rush these activities provide. So you need to pursue this sexual behavior more often to achieve the same pleasing effects. Over time, your brain develops a chemical dependence on this regular dopamine rush. You’re compelled to do your sexual activity of choice to function, and you find yourself addicted to sex. And the effects of trauma still linger, so you continue to use your hypersexuality as a coping mechanism.
Long-Term Consequences of Hypersexuality
If you’re addicted to sex, you may think it’s something you can live with on your own. But over time, it only gets worse, causing major consequences in your own life and in those closest to you. Some of these consequences include:
- Engaging in infidelity
- Legal troubles resulting from criminally sexual behavior
- Anxiety, depression, and loneliness
- Feelings of self-hatred, helplessness, and suicide
- HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases
- Job loss and financial troubles
- Ruined careers, relationships, and marriages
Think You’re Addicted to Sex? Here’s What to Do
You may be wondering what to do if you think you’re addicted to sex. And the short answer is, you need to get help. You can’t overcome hypersexuality on your own. You’ve got to work with professionals like a CSAT therapist.
At Integrative Life Center in Nashville, TN, our holistic sex addiction treatment program is designed to address the root causes of your hypersexuality, heal your trauma, and empower you to stay healthy long-term. With our help, you can even learn to have healthy sex after sexual sobriety. Ready to move forward? Take our Sex Addiction Test as a first step or contact our team today to learn more.
The post Why Being Addicted to Sex is NOT a Good Thing appeared first on Integrative Life Center.
source https://integrativelifecenter.com/intimacy-disorders/why-being-addicted-to-sex-is-not-a-good-thing/
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