J’ai rompu avec ma dernière petite amie lorsque j’ai rejoint le programme, après deux ans de relation. La raison était mon aveu choquant de la vérité sur moi-même : je l’avais utilisée pour trouver une estime de moi-même à ses dépens, satisfaire mes désirs sexuels et ne pas me sentir seul. Cette prise de conscience était douloureuse, mais honnête et donc salutaire.

The author of the article “The Availability to Dive” brings to light how beneficial it can be to live single while recovering. While it can also be challenging, the single life can give us the time needed to learn how to live without our drug and relate to others. This prepares those who plan to sober date at some point.

This period in his life has given him time to grow.
Hi, I’m James D., and I’ve been incarcerated since January 28, 2022. I’ve been sexually sober since November 29, 2023—one year, ten months, and one day from the worst day of my life. That day, I experienced the first of many of the best days of my life: the day I entered sobriety.

Our next edition’s theme is “Surrendering Fear, Guilt, and Shame.” Coming into the Program, many of us experience fear of facing the guilt and shame that the addiction of sexaholism brings to those powerless over lust. The Fellowship helps us overcome this fear by walking with us through the process of finding a sponsor and working the Steps. In doing so, we discover that we are not the things the addiction said we were.

It can seem that being happy and single are two ideas that don’t fit together. What a great discovery to learn that our joy does not rely on a relationship or even marriage! It relies on following the will of God through working the Steps.

One of SA’s 18 committees that helps to carry the message and serve the fellowship is the Support for Institutions and Professionals Committee (SIP). Formerly, it was called the Hospitals and Institutions Committee. Our mission is still the same, to inform institutions and professionals as to how SA can help restore and maintain their clients’ mental, emotional, and spiritual health. This committee’s service is designed to take place at the intergroup and regional levels. Our International SIP Committee provides materials and guidance on how to reach local professionals and institutions. This article gives an example of how it can be done at the local level.

Greetings from India. I am Iris from India–grateful, recovering, and blessed lustaholic and sexaholic. My SA journey and sobriety began on May 25, 2021, one day at a time (ODaAT). I heard about ESSAY and its garden of recovery at the beginning of my SA journey. I was approached to be a part of ESSAY’s garden, and I blossomed through sharing 3–4 articles. ESSAY has been one of my very strong recovery tools. I am never sufficiently grateful for its birth in our SA world. I am grateful for the many articles of recovery and for ESSAY reaching many members virtually and in print.

She decided to give away what was freely given to her.
As I reflect on my journey in recovery, I’m filled with gratitude for the AA Big Book and those who have carried its message. Working the steps as they’re written in the Big Book has been the most transformative path to true freedom that I’ve experienced.

Participating in the Fellowship helped him to accept his disease and to laugh with those carrying the message to him.
Ontario’s SA Spring Retreat 2025, themed “Acceptance is the Answer”, took place from Friday, May 23rd–Sunday, May 25th, coordinated by the Peterborough SA group.

As a result of working the Program, this member likes the man he is growing into.
Before SA and recovery from chronic lusting and the acting out that followed, I was frequently lost in fantasy, on dating apps, or in an “intimate encounter.” The irony was, there was nothing intimate about it. This behavior eroded away my soul and made me feel deeply ashamed. It was also causing aggravation, fear, and intimidation–albeit unintentionally. Like any good ol’ sexaholic, I could not stop.

Detachment was the path that led him to a break from the unreal and to seek what was real.
Without a doubt, my program is one of progress, not perfection. It has taken me some years to understand how infatuation has kept me bound to lust. Infatuation, I believe, is a distortion of reality. What begins in me as a natural response, appreciating what is attractive in another person, slides out of reality and into the realm of fantasy.

Surrendering her life to God through the steps
I am single in SA. And I am content. How is that possible?
It is possible because I feel content each day as I surrender to my Higher Power’s care. I don’t look into the future about what that means. My focus is on today.

Hearing others share from their weakness helped him realize he was not alone.
Hi, I’m Justin, I’m a grateful recovering sexaholic. I came to SA in 2019 when a priest friend introduced me to the Fellowship. I had just started a new job and it was summertime. He invited me to a meeting, gave me the SA White Book, and encouraged me to attend. At that first meeting, I heard other men share openly about their struggles—not just with masturbation and pornography, but with lust itself. I immediately felt connected. For the first time, I realized I wasn’t alone.

Good service leadership at all levels is indispensable for our future functioning and safety.
I began service in SA to practice leadership based on the principles and values I am learning from our 12-Step program and to learn a new sober way of life and functioning in the world. SA service means I am too focused on helping sexaholics find the Program and affirming them in their recovery.

Having had a spiritual experience has allowed her to accept the plans God has for her personal life.
Sitting in the counselor’s office in early 2020, I voiced my biggest fear: that one day my sexual behavior would destroy a marriage.

Learning how to surrender and open up to healthy activities affirmed that he belonged.
My name is Ryan, and I am a child of my Higher Power. As a former SA sponsor once
humorously suggested, “You qualify to be in the program, you are one of us!”

Sobriety has helped him deal with the highs and lows of being single.
I am single. I am not always happy, joyous, and free. It can be lonely. Divorce is painful. I don’t feel happy, joyous, and free.

This period of being single has given him time to work a rigorous program.
For most of my life, I’ve been looking for someone to connect with me and make me whole. I felt “inadequate, unworthy, alone, and afraid” (SA 203), always comparing my insides to the outsides of others. I was terrified of people seeing me for fear that they’d reject me—which was why I never learned to date. It felt too risky.

Recovery radically changed how he celebrates Father’s Day.
I used to think Father’s Day was about waiting for my children to shower me with drawings, or words that would make me feel like a good father. I thought it was a day to sit back and receive—to be told that all my sacrifices were noticed, my sleepless nights appreciated, my worrying understood.

This tool helps him to release the past.
There are moments in life when the past will not let go. I’ve started the path of recovery, made amends where I could, committed to change, and yet — the memories remain. The images return. The shame lingers. While I’ve begun to move forward on the outside, my mind is still caught in the painful echoes of what I’ve done. This is where the Prayer of Divine Remembrance comes in.