Symptoms of Sexual Addiction: Our relationship with sex and love

Physical intimacy (sex) and emotional intimacy (love) are the bedrock of human connection; they are the roots of our relationships with ourselves and others. Sex and love feel good. They light up the reward center in our brain, just like eating something delicious, laughing with friends, and doing something you’re passionate about. It’s natural to desire and enjoy sex and love. Unfortunately, sometimes our need or desire for true intimacy can lead to maladaptive behaviors, such as compulsive sexual activities, obsessive romantic intrigue, or addiction to relationships. These behaviors were helpful at some point, but now they could be hurting us and our relationships. You’re noticing that your relationship with sex and love is stressful, exhausting, troublesome, difficult, or overwhelming. Here are a few signposts that you could have a maladaptive relationship with sex and love.

Feeling Out of Control  

Uncontrollability is trying to control or reduce your thoughts or behaviors and being unsuccessful. For instance, you might constantly feel the need to pursue or be in a relationship.  When you set goals, such as remaining single for a period of time, not having sex on first dates, or masturbating fewer times per week, does it feel impossible to succeed? Is the desire to date or have sex so strong that you feel unable to refuse the urge? 

Dysfunction and Impairment

Spending an exorbitant amount of time focused on sex and love, thinking and behaving in ways that interfere with other parts of your life (e.g., work, school, home, relationships, recreational activities, mental health), or choosing sex and love over physical and emotional safety are indicators that your relationship with sex and love may be having a negative impact on your life. Individuals with addictive relationships to sex and love frequently struggle to remain present in their lives, causing them to be late to planned events and skipping out on important commitments. Sometimes the behavior becomes so dysfunctional that individuals end up creating a secret life to create a layer of protection around their “real” lives. These second lives often result in physical, financial, or legal consequences.

Withdrawal and Tolerance

Withdrawal might include feeling awful when you can’t engage in particular behaviors, while tolerance means feeling like you need more and more of the behavior to survive. Perhaps someone cancels a date with you or you’ve lost phone service and cannot connect to your dating app. When that happens, does it feel disproportionately overwhelming and unpleasant? Have you caught yourself saying “I’ll never do that,” only to find yourself doing just that months later because the original behaviors were no longer cutting it? Other manifestations of withdrawal can include headaches, stomach aches, depressive feelings, and even thoughts of suicide. Tolerance can manifest as needing to have more frequent sex, watching more aggressive pornography, or needing to date more people to achieve the desired feeling.

If you have resonated with any of these themes, it may be helpful to have a safe place to process these barriers to true intimacy and how you can form more stable, fulfilling attachments around sex and love.  Schedule an appointment today.