I was a lady and ladies just aren’t sex addicts. So I told myself when I thought of joining SA. No, I didn’t have that problem; it was my ex-boyfriend’s problem. The sexual behaviors that we argued about doing were not the problem. He just needed to stop taking care of his ex-wife.

Once in recovery I began to learn that my acting out was a perverted attempt to be appreciated, valued, loved. I didn’t believe I was lovable, so, instead, I sought to be lusted after. Acting out was about feeling powerful and satisfying my desire for revenge.

The core of my sexual addiction is relationship addiction. I was 12th-stepped into SA at the first Twelve Step meeting I attended (Adult Children of Alcoholics). I went to SA the next week looking for help for my ex-boyfriend. I could not see my own problem until one and one-half years later when I returned for myself.

Growing up in an alcoholic home with parents who were embroiled in their own struggles, meant that I often felt alone or needed to be in charge of myself or my younger brothers. Dad was not only angry and short-tempered, he threatened me if I didn’t go to the local grocery store and buy his two quarters of ale.

It felt as though everyone I met in the store and on the way home knew that I had a drunk for a father. I felt so much shame. At school I believed I was the only poor kid. After all, Dad was the last man hired and the first one fired either because of his drinking and temper or because of his artificial leg.

By the time I was 14, I went to one of the priests in my church and said I wanted help in believing in God. He spent a year trying to help me. When I went to college, I made sure it was a religious one so I could learn the answers to my need for God. I had no idea what it was about or why I so desperately needed to know or feel God’s presence. I was sure everyone else believed and was secure and comforted by this faith.

The summer before my senior year I met the man I would marry. On our first date, we declared our disgust with our parents’ marital relationships and admitted we had no idea how to have a fulfilling marriage relationship. A year and a half later we began duplicating a mixture of their relationships.

After seven years of marriage, I saw my husband touch a woman in our therapy group with tender affection. He told me he could only touch me sexually. Within a week I acted out with another man. I went home and told my husband. I wanted him to be upset, jealous, something. He just said, “I guess we have an open marriage.”

I didn’t know how I seduced someone else, I didn’t know why I did it, and it didn’t make me feel any better. In fact, I felt confused and dirty and ashamed — that old familiar feeling. After that, the men who were friends to us all seemed to know I was available sexually. My denial was so cunning that I couldn’t understand how and I couldn’t say, “No.”

In two years I was divorced and determined to overcome my prudishness. After a few years of acting and feeling worse, I remarked to a girlfriend that I wanted to stop having sex with men that I just met. She told me that I would stop when I got sick of it. I was sick of it and I could not stop. I didn’t know then that I was addicted and addicted after the first time.

When I first attended meetings, I knew that I had a problem getting too involved too quickly with men. I lost my identity and my life when I was in a relationship. After a while I decided that the way to avoid getting hooked by one man was to date several simultaneously. The problem was that I just couldn’t go a year without dating. If I could just do that I’d be okay and could marry again. Besides, the men who were interested in marrying me had problems I could not accept (addictions).

I continued in ACA and a women’s therapy group. I lost months of sobriety twice. I acted out with a man I met at a business meeting. I couldn’t lie to myself anymore. My therapist said it was SA or inpatient treatment.

For the first year or two in SA an ex-partner attended meetings. Because I felt so unsafe with this man who had no sobriety, my sponsor allowed me to invite several other members to meet before the meeting for my First Step. Her comment was that she didn’t hear a lot about powerlessness and unmanageability, but about my being the victim.

My Fourth Step in another program helped release me of the illusion of being a victim, so I could be more forthright for my Fourth Step in SA. It was wonderful to burn the “evidence” against me and begin the road to forgiving myself.

Therapy gave me awareness of how I was hurting others and myself, but I could not make myself stop. After 15 years of insanity, I was free in SA.

Old boyfriends would call during that first year and even later, and I could say, “No, thank you.” I even went to dinner with one and God did for me what I was never able to do. Of course, I called my sponsor after the fact. Was I lucky that time!

God granted my prayer to get out of sales jobs that were really a big source of triggers and partners. I started at a greatly reduced salary in a whole new area. Eventually, I was able to return to school and complete a master’s degree while on this job.

Four years into sobriety my self-reliance was strong and my God-reliance was tenuous. As usual, I did not know this until later. I had 5 sponsees and had done service work on the group, Intergroup and regional levels. I spent too much time helping others and not enough time keeping my house in order with prayer, meditation, journaling, and calling my sponsor. So, I relapsed with another person.

I called my sponsor that day and worked out how to protect my sobriety. What I didn’t tell her was that I got high earlier that day when he merely held my hand. I was drunk on lust. I gave it away as I had done so many times in the past. I got nothing but physical pain and this devastating fear that I made an unthinkable mistake.

I couldn’t decide if I lost my sobriety. When my sponsor told me that I had, I was furious! How could she tell me that while I was at work? I had to shut my door because I cried uncontrollably for two hours. One brother in SA assured me that I needed to make that decision on my own. Well, once my sponsor told me her opinion, I knew I had to surrender that decision. I knew I lied to myself and couldn’t trust myself. I had to accept the loss and go on or I’d be lost. My sponsees were angry with me for not calling them. I had too much shame.

It was two weeks before the International Conference in Vancouver, BC and I had a plane ticket. I decided to go and give my First Step there. What I gained from giving my shame away so quickly was the most beautiful First Step imaginable. As God would have it, the room was packed with 20–25 people. There were unfamiliar faces, but there were also about a dozen folks from my town. Never have I felt closer to the bunch than after receiving their feedback and hugs that night. The next day someone who did not come to my First Step remarked that I looked so much better than the day before. WOW, you could actually see a physical difference from working a Step.

Today, I have surrendered the right to seek a relationship with a man. If that is in my highest good, then the God of my understanding will send that to me. I am simply to thank my God for every experience and look for the lesson.

I work my program in a variety of ways. Meetings locally, regionally and internationally is one way. Doing service work from the group level to the international with only one position at a time is another way. Finally, my newest joy of connecting is by telephone with other women in other locations.

Things in my life have changed. I’ve been given free trips, a new car, a much nicer home, help in moving and repairing, a fulfilling career, help after three major surgeries, and other things too numerous to mention.

The intangible gifts are: a warm relationship with my only child; gratitude and serenity instead of self-pity and fear; the ability to allow others to say no; the ability to appreciate and learn from others, rather than the need to teach them and have them appreciate me; the ability to give without always expecting something in return.

One of the “benefits” of my addiction was excitement. I was so afraid of being bored. Now my life is quieter, but I do have adventure without sacrificing my peace of mind … the only goal I ever want to seek.