I love plants! I have plants in my living room, kitchen, bedroom…everywhere! All that greenery in the house makes me feel good, and since I’m in recovery, I can take good care of them, too. Before, all my plants were dying. I just wasn’t able to give them what they needed, which isn’t surprising, considering I could barely keep myself alive.

Today I have many plants, and thanks to my recovery, I can give them what they need. I recently experienced something remarkable with one of my plants. Two months ago, my grandmother gave me some money to buy something nice, so of course I bought a new plant! I immediately knew where I wanted to put it: in my living room, on a plant stand that once belonged to my grandmother herself, about one and a half meters from the window. The perfect spot, if I may say so myself!

However, after barely a few weeks, the plant began to struggle. Its leaves started drooping limply (the proud upright leaves had suddenly disappeared). After a while, some of them even fell off. I stood there and looked at the plant, not knowing what was going on. After all, it had a good spot, enough light and water. I decided not to worry about it–it would turn out fine.

At the same time, I myself was going through the exact same phase in my SA recovery. Very odd. Just after I had bought this plant, about a week later, I realized that I had begun to have warm feelings for someone. I called it friendship. It is someone I have been seeing several times a week for the last few years, because we are in the same circles. I enjoy being with him, and always enjoy talking to him. I can also laugh with him, and I feel comfortable with him. I found it all very healthy, because we never saw each other one-on-one, but always in a group. We did realize that maybe we were giving each other a little too much attention, that maybe it was time to talk to other and spend less time chatting by WhatsApping. I hated it. I missed him, I cried tears for days, and wanted to hear him and be with him. I told my HP that this was the sacrifice I wanted to make for recovery, to be and stay sexually sober, because something in me said that being so focused on a man was not healthy.

A few days later he contacted me again, and we expressed to each other that we do care about each other, and that we are and will remain good friends. Yes! Finally, I could smile and be happy again! Meanwhile, I worked my program as I had for three years: daily meetings, service, etc. I was doing all the right things, but, without realizing it–or wanting to admit it–I was deteriorating. I was thinking about him constantly, 24/7. The obsession was huge. And because I was always thinking about him in a non-sexual way, just constantly wishing to be with him, I didn’t call it lust. Isn’t lust the desire for sex? That kind of lust is what got me into SA. That kind of lust I knew well! This was different; this was a constant feeling of “I want to be with you and laugh with you, and if I could I would also give you a big hug and never let you go.” Since it was not the kind lust that got me into SA, I called it love.

I did what I was supposed to do, what fit into my picture: I shared everything with my sponsor; I discussed my feelings at length with my therapist; I attended 1-2 meetings a day, and shared honestly there; I made my phone calls with my sisters and brought everything into the light there as well; I did service; called sponsees; and I stayed true to my prayer and meditation practices.

But I declined. Besides the obsession and emotional dependency (not hearing him for half a day and completely collapsing can’t exactly be called healthy), I felt depression creeping in, and I felt the light in my soul dim little by little. With my plant, meanwhile, I saw something similar happening: even though its living conditions were theoretically fine -it has enough light there 1.5 meters from the window after all-, it was quietly dying. Just like me: even though I did my meetings and followed the advice of my sponsor and therapist, I was quietly dying.

Yet I persisted, both with the plant and with myself. Because what I felt for him was real. This is real love, more real than anything I have ever felt for a man. And love always wins, so it can’t be bad.

And then lust attacked me. So hard, it screamed that I had to have sex with myself. I was in total despair. To act out is to die, in my case. I can’t afford a relapse, I won’t recover from it. I prayed and I cried. To the point of despair. For days and weeks, because lust kept attacking me. The addiction kept shouting that I had to act out. The fears were too great. The fear of abandonment, and at the same time, the fear of commitment. The fear of not being good enough, the fear of making mistakes that he would find insurmountable. It was destroying me, little by little.

Until someone was straightforward enough to tell me that this was not love, but lust, I wasn’t convinced. However, I was convinced that I couldn’t keep up my behavior because I knew it was going to kill me. I have to do more than work the program the way I want to; I must surrender. That is something very different from doing meetings and service. I have to recognize who I really am: a love cripple. I am—and I didn’t know it—as addicted to relationships as I am to sex. Without intending to, I make men my Higher Power. And I can pray all I want, I don’t seem to be able to do otherwise. Not even with the support of the program. I am too sick to love men.

It was time to be honest with myself…and with my plant, too.

Let’s start with the plant: after all the leaves hung limp and about five had already died, I moved it to the windowsill. Not my preferred spot, believe me. It’s a big plant in a big flower pot on a narrow windowsill. It doesn’t look very nice there, but I knew I had to go to any lengths to save it, and it is noticeably brighter there than in its previous spot.

I have taken similar actions with my life, actions I didn’t want to take that seemed to break my heart, but which I knew deep inside myself would “give me light.” I ended my friendship with this man. We still see each other in our community, but we keep our distance from each other, and no longer talk to each other. The first week I found this terribly difficult. At least once a day I got an irrepressible urge to cry, because my heart felt broken. At the same time, I also felt how right it was. As the White Book says on p.78: “We simply knew it.”

I had to admit that lust is much more than sexual acting out. For me, lust is also losing myself in another, being sickly dependent on the other person, resulting in depression, anxiety, and the urge to act out.

Now, just a few weeks later, I feel myself recovering. I am feeling more “Nathalie” again, happy, joyous and free. I feel the Light in my soul again, I feel the strength and energy I seemed to have lost for a few months, and now I really surrender any temptation (in the form of friendship, romance, whatever) to my Higher Power. I am coming back to life, and translate that energy now by doing a lot of service. It feels right and good, and I am (almost) grateful again to be a sexaholic!

I am, under the guidance of my sponsor, rewriting my entire First Step, this time focusing on dependency relationships. I’ve found firsthand that the program only works when I acknowledge who I really am, a love cripple, and surrender everything to my HP. Working a program “in theory” doesn’t work. It is not ticking off a checklist, but constant surrender, in all areas of my life.

Wondering how my plant is doing? Well, after three weeks on the windowsill, it is shining again as ever! Its leaves are no longer hanging limply, but are standing proud and upright showing off. For both of us, it appears that the closer we are to the light, the closer we are to what we really need—and not what I think we need—the more life there is in us then. It is time to grow and flourish again!