Jokes are often made around sexual addiction, but when the problem exists, it is far from being a fun topic. For those who live this disease, it can become a real agony.
Sex addiction or hypersexuality is the inability to control sexual behavior. As a result, the person who suffer from it feels a lot of distress. It is not only based on excessive or intense sexual desire. This is a sexual behavior that affects several aspects in the victim’s life, causing problems in the affective, family, social or economic aspects.
Mauricio is a 46-year-old Costa Rican and he asked not to reveal his real name. He decided to tell his story. That was how he admitted that he started his sexual life when he was 14 years old and it definitely marked his way to see and live sex.
At that age, his first partner was a friend of his mother. He now knows that it was an abusive relationship, but at that time he was not aware of it:
That relationship started to give me the feeling of pleasure and that prize was a sexual intercourse. For someone like me who came from a dysfunctional family, with many weaknesses and fears, when I experienced the feeling of sexual reward, I felt protected.
As with any addiction, he said, there is a hoax and the addict thinks he can handle it, but it is not possible. and at that time he thought that he had everything under control. He started living the stage where the sexual addict feels that he needed more. It is called progressive dependency.
In fact, he realized that he was addicted when he started to feel empty and frustrated every time he had sex:
I started paying for sex when I was 17 years old and if I could not do it, I resorted to masturbation or pornography. I needed to have some kind of sexual experience.
He added that the problem was that sex started to become an obsession, a fixation. He used to masturbate 10 times and he felt very tired. Besides, he saw how other people had normal lives and that took him to deep limits.
Mauricio acknowledged that he did not take care of himself. He admitted that it is a miracle he is not spreading any disease. He spent 10 years of his life doing tests.
However, when he was 25 years old, he met a person who took him to a 12-step group and, according to him, it changed his life.
Mauricio recognized that he owes a lot to the 12-step groups and he is still there because it feels good and he knows there are people who go every week and he needs to be there. He now has a family, he works and he is a therapist.
Warning Signs:
-¿Do you sexualize every image or person that you see?
-¿Do you need intimate details from people you know?
-¿Do you feel discomfort caused by sexual anxiety?
-¿Do you have sexual thoughts that keep you aroused?
-Do you consume too much pornographic material?
-Do you often have “quick sex” in marginal places with strangers?
-Has you started to suffer from work, social and family deterioration?
-Do you spend more money than what you can pay for sex?
-Each time you have a relationship, does it start by being obsessive to become distructive?