Couples Dynamics in Sexual Addiction Recovery

¶ … Sex Addiction Counseling The Story Jim (50) and Mary (48) have been in a relationship for 27 years. They are married with four children. Jim was a victim of childhood sexual abuse at age 13, and, after that, began significant involvement with pornography and regular masturbation. His sexual experience prior to marriage included a single failed experience, but since being married he has continued to use pornography and has used escorts and prostitutes.

He has made full disclosure of his activities to Mary after she discovered his activity, and they began counseling 6 months after recovery. Mary is also the victim of childhood abuse, including sexual abuse for which she never received treatment or counseling, and reports disgust at Jim's behavior. Jim is no longer sleeping in the marital bed. Jim has been committed to recovery, is involved in a 12-step group, and has invested significant time money into a recovery materials.

The couple attended a sexual addiction recovery workshop, though Mary identifies Jim as the one with the problem and is furious with him. Jim currently reports not having any sexual desire, and rejected Mary's sexual advances shortly following the discovery of his affairs. Jim believes that his rejection of Mary is fueling her anger. Summary The counseling approach selected is based upon the Iceberg Model. The model begins by looking at coping strategies, examining feelings, looking at the decisions one makes about feelings, internal messaging, expectations, yearnings, and reclaiming.

This model will be used as the background for considering the relevant articles. Furthermore, rather than focusing primarly on Jim and his compulsive sexual behavior, the approach will focus on Jim as an individual, Mary as an individual, and the two as a couple. According to Steffens and Rennie, a spouse's disclosure of sexual addiction can be a very traumatic period for wives (2006).

Some prior research describe the wives as behaving in co-addictive behavior, including compulsive checking on their husbands, but this research explores that behavior within the context of trauma and finds similarities with the symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). This response may be exacerbated by the fact that many wives of sexual abusers bring past relationship difficulties, including abuse, with them into their marriages (Steffens & Rennie, 2006). Furthermore wife-discovered disclosure often has a suddenness element that exacerbates the trauma.

Zitzman and Butler focus on the abuse of pornographic material by husbands (2005). They look at how couple's therapy can be used to help couples recover from a husband's addiction to pornography. They begin with an examination of the negative impacts of pornography consumption, which can impact not only sexual relations but also home and work productivity (Zitzman & Butler, p.312). They suggested that conjoint couples therapy can be used, not only to help deal with the primary sexually compulsive behavior, but also to help with the relationship, primarily in trust-building.

Zitzman and Butler also examined the deception that co-occurs with sexually compulsive behavior and how that impacts relationships (2009). Through interviews with wives of men who abused pornography, they discovered a three-part model of attachment-destructive reactions by the wives. It begins with the perceived infidelity by the pornography-viewing partner, proceeds to a greater distance between the couple as a result of this initial fault, and results in wives feeling emotionally unsafe in their relationships (Zitzman & Butler, 2009).

Husbands were not only viewed as being unfaithful sexually, but also as failing to fulfill marital promises of emotional intimacy (Zitzman & Bulter, 2009). Assessment Mary's behavior matches the symptoms described in the literature and may be accurately described as similar to PTSD. Furthermore, her connection to her perceptions of perfection for her current life have led her to unrealistic characterizations of Jim's infidelity as worse than childhood sexual abuse.

While Jim seems committed to his recovery, it is critical to realize that his current sexual behavior, while controlled and not-compulsive, is also far from normal sexual behavior for a married adult male. Moreover, although he acknowledges that his rejection of Mary is probably largely responsible for her angry response to him, he does not seem to have a desire to change that behavior, which is simply another variant of compulsive sexual behavior. Treatment Individual therapy with Mary should focus, primarily, on her role as a childhood sexual abuse survivor.

It is well established that victims are more likely to be married to sexual addicts than non-victims, and it may be critical to Mary's recovery to uncover why she would choose someone who engaged in sexually compulsive behavior. In addition, rather than treating her rage response to Jim's addiction and concomitant deceit as abnormal, individual therapy should focus on those emotional responses as normal responses to trauma and then go beyond that to explore her feelings.

The primary question for Mary to address in her individual therapy is why she has perceived Jim's infidelity as a greater betrayal than her childhood sexual abuse. Individual therapy with Jim needs to focus on outlining and achieving normal sexual behavior.

Although he has found tremendous support in his 12-step program, a 12-step support group may not be the best place for Jim to find models for normal sexual behavior, since 12-step programs are, ultimately, based on abstinence models that may prove useful for alcohol or drug addiction, but are not realistic models for adult sexual behavior. His individual therapy also needs to examine the other impacts of compulsive behavior on his life and his relationship. Couples therapy needs to focus on trust-building exercises. At this point, Mary does not trust.