I was born in 1989 in Kurdistan, Iran, in a family with 3 older brothers and no sisters. The concept of women and girls was always a mystery to me. The only female that I had a real connection with was my mother. That was not my only challenge though.

As far as I can remember, I was living a double life. There was a whole world inside my head, and another world outside me. And I was constantly trying not to let the outside world know what is going on inside my head. I must have started lusting much younger, but the first lust memories that I remember are from the age of five or six, when I was obsessing and fantasizing about being cuddled and adored by our female relatives.

As I grew older, I continued to develop this double life. And my inside world was pouring out into the real world, making my life more and more unmanageable. I was progressing at my lusting career and I was adding more features to it; masturbation, pornography, sex with self, with same sex, with opposite sex, with other species, prostitution, adultery, and so on. By this time, I was around 16 years old and I had already started taking drugs as well, since lust alone was not medicating enough. I had reached that point where I could not or would not resist any ideas that my head was bringing to table. Actually, the situation was one of “I am thinking of it, therefore I have to do it.” This ordeal went on for another 10 years, and I lost almost everything that had any value; emotionally, socially, spiritually, and materially.

With the help of AA and another fellowship, I got clean from my drug addiction when I was 26. Although I was working a rigorous program in the other fellowships, my lusting issue was not solved. I was hoping that once I am past Steps 6 and 7 in AA, then I would get a reprieve from lusting, but I was wrong. There were some short periods that I would stop acting out, yet they were always followed by another lust binge.

Now I realize that what I was doing back then was merely stopping the physical acting out while I was still lusting in my head. Had there been a solution, it had to be one that would deal with lust and sobriety from lust on a physical, emotional, and spiritual level, and guess what, there was a program who was particularly designed for the same purpose: SA.

I went to SA for the first time in 2015, and I stayed sober for a couple of months without having an SA sponsor or working the steps in SA. Not surprisingly, I relapsed. I finally joined SA on 21st of June 2016, when I was 27, and I have stayed sober since. This time round I was serious about my recovery. I had an SA sponsor, I was working the Steps, I was sponsoring other sexaholics, I was going to meetings and I was doing service. Most importantly, I had decided not to willfully entertain lust in any form, one day at a time.

I sobered up in Iran where there is an abundance of SA meetings, and was there for the first 6 months of my sobriety. Then I moved to Greece and have been here in Greece ever since. When I came to Greece, there were no established SA meetings. I was basically a loner. But, against the odds, the program did not fail me. I was in touch with my sponsor, was working the Steps with sponsees remotely and I was surrendering every lust thought, being sure that once I consent to enjoying lust in my head, I will not be able to stop.

After a couple of months in Greece, I started searching to see if there were other members in the country. I found a couple of members and we started meeting in parks and public places. Unfortunately, our meetings never took off and my fellow SA buddies did not manage to get a substantial amount of sobriety. Recently, we have started an online meeting for Greek members, and we are meeting once a week on Zoom. We are around 6 or 7 members now.

Today, I practice my SA program on a daily basis. I wake up, pray, meditate, and go to work. During the day, whenever lust thoughts come up, and they do come up, I start praying and surrendering them. If a specific thought or fantasy lingers even after praying, I call a member to share with them. However, most of the time, praying does the job. Also, if I feel disturbed with negative emotions, I start writing an inventory on the spot and share it with someone as soon as possible.

At night before going to bed, I ask myself if I have been selfish, dishonest, fearful, or resentful during the day. If the answer is yes, I ask God to forgive me and to help me be and do better the next day. I also check to see if I still have any lust thoughts or images in my system that I have not surrendered. Once spotted, I surrender the thoughts and pray for the person(s) involved. Then I ask God to keep me sober during the night while I am asleep.

Staying sober in my twenties has its own challenges. The thought that “Am I really a sexaholic?” is almost a constant. It comes and goes all the time. Also, peer pressure can be dangerous at times. I have friends who can lust like gentlemen and they sometimes try to convince me, with a good will maybe, that I am being too strict, and I am missing out big time. The solution that has worked for me is not to try to convince people about my SA sobriety. I almost never talk about it with people who are not in SA. However, sometimes I brag about being celibate when I talk with my friends.

A lot has changed during these five years. I live a life beyond my wildest dreams. I have a relationship with the God of my understanding. I feel alright inside my own skin and enjoy life. I also went back to school and got a graduate degree. I have a job and I am financially independent. I have lost my fear of people and financial insecurity. Please do not get me wrong. It is not that I am full of joy and happiness all the time. There are many times that I feel unpleasant feelings. The difference is that now I can coexist with these feelings without having to act out on them, knowing that God will take care of me so long as I turn over my life and my will over to His care.