One morning this past winter, during a depression, I was meditating downstairs in my bedroom while my wife was eating breakfast upstairs in the kitchen. She sneezed, and my initial reaction was annoyance (not the most spiritual reaction, but human enough).
I’m Dave, a grateful recovering sexaholic, sober by God’s grace since January 2004. My wife has been active in recovery working both Al-Anon and S-Anon for many years. We share “the Real Connection” because we each work our own programs.
At our Monday evening group, we had an instance of a male SA being inappropriate with a female SA to the point where we had to ask for guidance. What an eye-opener to find out that there were no suggestions, no guidelines, no experience, strength, or hope that anyone I contacted had to share.
I know I am powerless over lust because of my inability to stop acting out despite knowing the outcomes and consequences. The ways I am powerless are many: I’ve continued to act out alone despite knowing that practicing the compulsion is directly opposed to becoming sober and maintaining sobriety.
About five years ago, my sponsor in another fellowship talked with me about Step Eleven. This was before I found SA, and I was busy imposing my self-will on the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. I was the epitome of “half measures availed us nothing”—nothing except for maybe a check mark on Steps One through Ten, indicating I had completed them.
For me, lust is an attitude. It begins with a desire to covet. It is a desire to take (even if only mentally) something that is not mine to take. My acting out always begins with lust. Why? Because I am powerless over lust. I do not have the ability to control it.
I’m the type of sexaholic who likes to do everything by myself. I started my own business, did my own accounting, and wrote my own contracts. When I play music, I only want to play my music. I don’t want or need any help because I can do it all by myself!
Recently, I have begun to recognize a change over time in the nature and quality of my own desire for sexual sobriety and recovery.
I’ve always had a large ego, which never allowed me to acknowledge that I needed God. I looked down on people of faith, thinking they were foolish or weak, and that they used the notion of God as a crutch.
When I first got into SA recovery, I had been attempting for a month to recover—on my own—using a popular Twelve Step study guide, but I was slipping constantly. I happened upon an online SA meeting and posted my complaints about the triggers that were overwhelming me.
