On Tuesday December 5th, veteran SA member Dave (27 years sober) arrived in Colombia to share with us his experience, strength and hope. On December 6th he accompanied us to the noon and afternoon meetings, where there was a combined attendance of close to 15 members. On the next day we went to a drug-addiction treatment center, where Dave shared his experience with 9 psychologists and close to 20 addicts.
“Must be nice to go to all those places and have them pay.” I do hear that said from time to time. First, let me say that I get more out of speaking places than anyone else. I love the chance to share my Experience, Strength, and Hope with others.
For sexaholics one of the most difficult parts of recovery is that our program is so simple. We have the Steps suggested as a program of recovery and we are told to ask God’s protection and care with complete abandon. Our recovery goal is equally simple: we have a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps.
Once every week an SA member calls to read to me the First, Second and Third Steps as a kind of surrender prayer. When I listen to him it brings me back to the basics of the program in these Steps. It could be changed depending on the person giving these Steps. Here is what he reads to me when he calls:
On July 3rd, 2004, I left a family holiday party early to go to my first meeting. I even changed from shorts to long pants as I knew shorts were not supposed to be worn at meetings. My family assumed I was going to a church meeting, and I did nothing to correct them.
My name is Peter and I am a sexaholic, addicted to lust. I am so grateful for technology, I thank God regularly for allowing me to be lust free when using it. In my disease I used the computer and telephone to enhance my acting out. It allowed me to live in a fantasy world.
Geek Camp’s Purpose “To carry the message to the still suffering lust addict by the appropriate use of information technology.”
Does SA really work? The clear answer from my own life is yes. I know it works, because it has worked for me.
When I first came to SA I was three years divorced from a twelve-year marriage and had two kids. I always say that I was a sexaholic before I married my ex-wife, a sexaholic while married, and still a sexaholic after divorce. I knew that something was wrong with my behavior—I just couldn’t stop, even though I did not want to continue.
The life I had been living was definitely insane, and my Step One inventory made that very clear. My way had failed, and I had to find a new solution outside my own thinking and willpower. Stories of recovery, and hearing recovery speakers share the depths of their addiction and how their lives were restored, gave me some small hope.
