My family and I took a vacation recently. In preparation I called motels and found one near our vacation area that was affordable.

Greetings from the Guam SA Group. We’re alive and well — three regular members, with perhaps a fourth.

Around 40 SAs and S-Anons from the U.K., Ireland, the USA, Austria and Luxembourg gathered at a retreat house atop London’s Mill Hill for “A New Beginning” over the weekend of March 21-23.

[The Oklahoma City Jan. ’97 SA Convention] was my second convention in the States — the first was of another S-fellowship. What impressed me about this one was the substantial number of members with five to ten years of solid sobriety. There was a very strong emphasis on the solution rather than the problem. It was also great to see so many people from different ethnic and religious groups. It was a great reminder that this disease is no respecter of persons.

Over the weekend of April 25-27, the third Australian SA Conference was held in Yackandandah, Victoria. With 24 members attending from various parts of Australia, this was the largest conference so far, and we are growing slowly in numbers and sobriety.

When I was a small boy of three or four years of age, I was the first to go to bed. I used to hide my head under the pillow and dream about women of beaming beauty. There wasn’t anything explicitly sexual, but I fused with them. I remember at that age walking with a two-year-old girl and immediately getting a weird feeling of being “connected” to nature and the whole universe — and being afraid of that small creature.

The following information comes from the meetings of the SA Board of Trustees, the General Delegate Assembly, and the SA Business Meeting (called “SA Today” at the conference; audio tape of the same name available from Glenn K Audio Tapes):

Invariably I find Essay to be a very helpful series of personal sharings. In the last issue [Dec. 96], the article, “How I Deal with Romantic Lust” was one that helped me considerably. J.R., who wrote it, made an excellent contribution to the basic understanding of our deadly disease.

Many of our members tell us that it was several months before they became aware of the Essay. Once a person finds the Essay’s inspirational articles and heartwarming stories of recovery, that person is likely to subscribe and become a regular reader.

I have been concerned about a policy of our international conferences and feel a need to address this in a forum permitting the greatest participation possible. That issue is the prohibition of children from any official gathering at the conferences, a policy that has been in place for the past two years.

At the most recent Convention in Oklahoma City, the SA General Delegate Assembly elected four non-sexaholic professionals to the SA Board of Trustees. Each of the four nominations was approved unanimously by the General Delegate Assembly and the Board of Trustees. They will serve staggered terms as the historic first non-sexaholic trustees and are eligible for re-election. Following is some biographical data on the new trustees and written responses to the Board’s questions.

I never knew I was a sexaholic. In the six weeks between the time I heard of Sexaholics Anonymous and my first meeting, I did a lot of honest soul-searching. I was working the program in AA and considered myself safe from the dangers of other addictions. I wavered between ignorance of my sexaholism and denial of what I did know. Denial was my first reaction to everything.

I am completely powerless over pornography of all kinds on the Internet. This includes pictures and words. Something inside of me cries out against making this admission, even now. I don’t want to give up my independence. I want to believe that I can control and enjoy it. I want to believe that I can get on the Internet and not go to the wrong sites. I want to believe that I can have the Internet on my computer and not use it to go to the pornographic sites, but it is not true.

My addiction had reared its ugly head in many ways over a long period of time. Before sobriety I could look back on over 40 years of living the addict’s secret. The only bottom line I would dare claim is what I did not do in acting out. Moments of honesty about my addiction make me ask why I did not do what was left undone. Fear of being seen created a pseudo bottom line.

Greetings from the Guam SA group. We’re only two strong, but we’ve been meeting weekly for nearly a year. And God has richly blessed us. I always leave the meetings uplifted. We’ve had several others join us from time to time, but the two of us are the original members.

In a member’s family beach house, 14 hopefuls, newcomers, and old-timers travelled over thousands of miles to be together. Bonded in our need for recovery from addiction to lust, from lifestyles so varied, so alike.

Frequently my head and my heart think and feel that I am alone. This is especially difficult while being the secretary for an SA meeting of one, here in Fort Bragg, Calif. One Thursday night my Higher Power gave me a gift. It is a tool for revealing loneliness as the deception it is. I use it frequently. I call it the Gratitude Attendance Check.

Recently, I was a participant at a business meeting of our regular SA meeting. Having been in SA for four-and-a-half years and coming up on my fourth anniversary, I have attended my fair share of business meetings. However, this group conscience meeting was a test for everything that I’ve learned and read in the past four-and-a-half years. All I can say is that I left the meeting feeling as if I needed another meeting. The anger and resentment that it brought up in me was carried within for too long a time.

Terms of office were set for the first Delegate Assembly so that only half of the Assembly would be elected at any one time. Lots were drawn to decide whose term would be two years and whose term three years.

In order to be more effective in the task of the Twelfth Step and First Tradition of carrying the message to the suffering sexaholic, the fellowship appointed the General Service Board committee in July 1991, during the Chicago International Conference Business Meeting, to recommend a service structure appropriate for Sexaholic Anonymous.