Sharing the wisdom of David M. to help us let go, grow, and remember.
Maynardism: The opposite of love is indifference. When one is angry or critical of another, that is not indifference. That is an expression of caring. Learning to accept caring in the form of judgment is important, though rarely pleasant.

The January 29 reflection from The Real Connection has had a profound impact on my recovery.

Cesar’s videos can be viewed on the ESSAY website on the Videos Page on https://essay.sa.org/videos/.

I didn’t know what grief was or what it felt like before recovery. Lust numbed all my emotions, positive and negative. I rarely had feelings when pets passed away. It felt like it was just part of life.

As this headline suggests, I have lived through the deaths of my large childhood extended family, where I lived and thrived. Then, in midlife, my beloved husband died tragically. My circle shrank to my parents and grandmother, but in 2020, my cherished father and grandmother both died in lockdown, with all the severe trauma that involved at the time. Even my former acting-out partner will be dead by now.

“Have you worked the Steps on this issue?” Sylvia asked me that question regularly when she was my sponsor. The question stays in my head, and it comes to the surface when my Higher Power knows I need help. Seven women received many wise suggestions from Sylvia as our sponsor or as our friend. We united in our grief to have an online memorial, a memorial on Zoom, and a memorial published in the June ESSAY magazine. Sylvia passed away in October 2024. One of the women interviewed me and Sylvia’s former sponsees and friends to paint a picture of her gifts of experience, strength, and hope.

I have a lifetime of tears that are trapped like an ocean, deep within the inside of me,
The pain and the fears, and a lingering notion that one day they’ll all be set free.
But for now, as new tears are gathered and added deep behind an impenetrable wall,
The pressure increases as the stability decreases, awaiting the eventual fall.

I remember what my life was like when I was living wholly in my addiction. It was as though I were in a cave, deep inside, where the light was far off, and surrounding me were damp, cold walls of stone. Gratefully and finally, I moved toward the light and found fellowship in SA. That damp, dark place was my lust addiction. I was isolated even though I was surrounded by people. In my lust, I saw people as objects, and I was alone.

I wept nearly every day in my first year in recovery. What a contrast with the previous 25 years, when I acted out sexually whenever I felt sad. In doing so, I had stuffed so much grief inside me that when the dam broke, I thought the flood would never end. There was a lot of pain down there. All those losses that I had never grieved: the death of my father when I was a teenager; many lost loves; two broken marriages; separation from my children; two failed careers; hard-won fame and fortune gone. There was a world of sadness here that I had never expressed naturally. I had just “moved on” to the next career or relationship, until one day I was 12th-stepped.

My name is Kathie S., of the Exeter, Devon, England, SA group. The next county to Devon is Cornwall, including one of the smallest SA groups in the country: the Truro group. This dedicated group has hosted again this year one of the most awesome events on my calendar: the Truro Recovery Day (which was in early April 2025). Truro is a Cathedral city, accessible by railway and by main roads.

It never seems to get old, even though I’ve been driving to these regional conferences now for over a quarter century. I’m just appreciating these special times all the more since they were interrupted for a couple of years by the pandemic.

A few years after the Flemish IG began, Luc brought up the idea of organizing a larger workshop or convention. We also looked to SA in the Netherlands for collaboration. This happened several times during workshops with old-timers. A few years ago, a tradition emerged: an annual Dutch-language convention, alternately organized by the Dutch and the Flemish IG.

I am very lucky to have an experienced therapist who is a man my age and who has also personally worked the 12 Steps for his own addiction issues; he thoroughly supports 12 Step programs. I have found this kind of outside professional help to be a very positive complement to my recovery in SA.

A Legacy of Recovery through the Eyes of Those She Helped

I started this 12 Step program from the bottom after committing adultery. What was left was me saying, “I know a solution. I’m going to commit suicide, and then I’ll blame everybody else. That it’s all their fault.”

Flirting Was a Real High for Me
by Sylvia J. (at six years SA sober) with the original 1989 title
Reprinted in Member Stories 2007, pages 120-123 with the title “The Only Way I Knew”

In my memory, the expression “good grief” was a common expletive of the cartoon characters in Peanuts. For much of my life, I used “good grief” to express astonishment, dismay, and frustration, never considering the deeper truth hidden within the euphemism. Before I entered the SA program (10/21/1998), I lived with an accumulation of frozen grief. Only after a couple of journeys through the steps did I begin to understand and embrace the benefits of grieving. I realized that journeying through grief was healing and good for me.

Sylvia participated in the early history of Sexaholics Anonymous (SA) and was a primary figure in the development of SA’s current service structure.

כניעה אמיתית אינה רק לבקש עזרה – זה להציע את עצמנו לתוכנית של אלוהים.
בתוכנית, בניתי את השריר של לבקש את עזרתו של אלוהים. עזור לי להישאר נקי! עזור לי להתרחק מהתאווה! עזור לי להיכנע! עזור לי! עזור לי! עזור לי! ככל שאני מחזק את השריר הזה – שלעיתים דורש פעולה של התמסרות מלאה – אני גם מסיט את התפיסה שלי לגישה עדינה יותר.

לתת לאלוהים לנצח את התאווה. אומץ אינו להילחם בתאווה – אלא למסור אותה לאלוהים.
שמי סטיב, ואני מכור לתאווה בהחלמה. בחסדי אלוהים, ספונסר והתוכנית, אני נקי מאז 20 באוגוסט 2013. לא קיימתי יחסי מין עם עצמי או עם מישהו אחר מלבד רעיתי למעלה מ-11 שנים. חוויתי גם ניצחון הולך וגובר על התאווה.