Do You Believe in Sexual Addiction?(N...

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-18-2004
Do You Believe in Sexual Addiction?(N...
9
Sun, 08-29-2004 - 8:52pm

Do You Believe in Sexual Addiction?(Not Porn)



  • Yes
  • Yes, but only in rare circumstances
  • No


You will not be able to change your vote.


iVillage Member
Registered: 05-18-2004
Sun, 08-29-2004 - 8:55pm
I voted No. I was flipping through channels and saw some woman who's DH claimed sexual addiction for his constant cheating. I do belive people can become addicted to porn, but I think that is different than someone who is addicted to sex. Do you think it is possible to become addicted to sex?

Leticia

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-18-2001
Sun, 08-29-2004 - 11:05pm
I think it's possible in very, very rare circumstances. I believe that the term is tossed around far too frequently these days to explain all manner of plain bad behaviour.
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-30-2004
Sun, 08-29-2004 - 11:30pm
I went to a boarding school throughout highschool, and there was another student there who used to masturbate all the time. Like I mean, ALL THE TIME. We'd catch him doing it at the urinal, in the stalls, and he took looong showers. He got teased a lot. He got "spoken to" by the staff. He got roughed up a few times too. Each of those things must have been torture but it didn't make him stop. Finally a sister (sort of an anglican nun) took him under her wing. She had been in crisis zones around the world and seen the worst things I would care to think about, so I guess a kid that masturbated like a bored lab monkey was not a big deal to her. Somehow she got him to stop. I figure he just couldn't face a nun about it so he was shamed into stopping. It still makes me shiver just to think about it. I saw him again a few years later, apparently he is still known as the "Autobator". Rumour has it there is a tongue in cheek instructional video featuring him that floats around the internet. Poor guy. Anyway, yes I believe in sexual addictions, although I think it is way overused as an excuse.
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-18-2004
Mon, 08-30-2004 - 3:07pm
Guess I am in the minority LOL

Leticia

Avatar for sugarbeat
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Mon, 08-30-2004 - 3:39pm
i think it is quite prevelant and often goes unnoticed because men are stereotyped to be dogs always out for some p-ssy. since arousal and sex cause our body to emit natural chemicals, i would think it is just as likely, if not more so, to form an addiction to those chemicals as to any other drug. i think it is harder to keep it in check than a drug or alcohol addiction because people still need to partake in it and not just cut it out completely.

i was watching halle berry on oprah the other day, and she was talking about her previous partner having a sex addiction and she overlooked it for a long time.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-01-2003
Mon, 08-30-2004 - 7:07pm
Yes I do. We had a poster here a few years ago (female, no longer on the board) who I also became friends with off the board. She was married for 20 years, pretty happily, and then got to chatting online with some guy. She met him, had sex with him, started another fling and then another. Her marriage eventually crumbled when it all came out, although I believe in the beginning her DH was willing to work through it all with her.

I truly believe she became addicted to the sex, to the thrill of a new conquest, the 'passion' and fun of a new partner instead of the same one year after year. I don't think it was that she was that unhappy at first and looking for something new, but once started it gained speed until it was out of control. We all know those hours of making out with someone new, the hours of foreplay and titillating, tantalizing conversation, as opposed to just climbing into bed with your partner of years. I think she became addicted to it, to the sex, to knowing just how appealing she could be to someone new. I haven't talked to her in awhile and I hope things are going well. She was at the point of realizing just how destructive her behavior had been and the board wasn't necessarily a good place for her. But I think I've witnessed sexual addiction in her. It was sad.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-22-2004
Tue, 08-31-2004 - 11:07am
I'm not sure if you're talking about in regards to when people cheat or just sex alone. Regardless, I voted yes.

When it comes to cheating, especially constant cheating, there are people who love the attention as well as the pleasure of sex.

Also, there are people out there who aren't even sexually active with a partner at all who enjoy it occasion, in other words, a lot more often than what would be construed as normal. I believe the message board called Solo Sex may be a good place for a question like this as well.

Many "addicts" if you will have reported that the pleasure is as intoxicating as alcohol and gambling and drugs and you name it. Same excuse that rapists use the power to control. In fact, many couples still suffer clashing libidos because of excessive or out of control sexual urges.

YES, I do believe there is such an addiction in sex that keeps one from controlling him/herself when it comes to sex and what it can lead to.

Just my two cents. :)

C h a r a c t e r


above all else


Mr. Para

 

C  H  A  R  A  C  T  E  R

iVillage Member
Registered: 11-15-2003
Tue, 08-31-2004 - 11:31am
Hi all,

I too voted 'yes'. I believe that people can become addicted to anything that pulls them from reality. However, having said that, I believe things about addiction that are a little different. I believe those that become addicted to sex (maybe drugs too) are searching for love. During sex (as most of us know) our hearts open greatly, we become vulnerable and we allow love to flow through us from the inside out and from the outside in. Even masturbation has that aspect (although in my opinion somewhat less). Those that become addicted to sex are looking for the expereience of love because they don't realize that the most profound love that we can experience comes from within ourselves. If we realize that, than we have no "need" for another...rather, we choose to share our love with another because there is so much inside. If both partners experience this, they are deep in the rapture of Divine love. They are together by choice and not forced to be together because the "need" enslaves them.

I think all addiction on some level is this same thing and to heal addiction you must deeply love and accept yourself and that includes loving the addiction. You must see yourself completely loving and loved. When that happens sex becomes a physical union of the two Universal creating forces and becomes a pathway to God and that driving desire to recreate this feeling over and over is completely satisfied.

Peace.

Scott.

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-23-2004
Tue, 08-31-2004 - 12:16pm
I voted "Yes, but in rare circumstances".

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