Porn Addiction? Contact SHC for help Now!

Porn Addiction?! Doesn’t Everyone Look at a Little Porn?

Porn addiction today is one of the most common forms of sexual acting out behaviors. With the advent of the Internet, pornography has become vastly more available and vastly more anonymous in its use. It is what some have called the,

“Crack Cocaine of Sex Addiction”

Are you a pornography addict? Apply the same criteria outlined in “The Symptoms” page of this site or take one of the online inventories (currently under construction) to see where you stand. The signs may look familiar:

1. Can't seem to quit thinking about the next time you can be alone to view pornographic images, videos, or engage in sexual chat? Do you manage your day or week so that you have this kind of time available to you with your computer?

2. Do you spend more time viewing porn than planned or go there more and more frequently? Do you view porn at work? Do you take unnecessary Risks?

3. Has the material that you seek out escalated in intensity over time?

4. Have you been discovered in your behaviors, promised to stop, and yet returned to viewing porn again and again with even greater secrecy? Have you tried to stop and failed?

In a new book called “The Porn Trap”, the authors argue that the use of pornography on the Internet is something similar to the gambler who keeps feeding the slot machines waiting for his number to come up. With porn addiction, the sex addict does the same thing – he or she keeps searching for that “one” picture, video, chat, or fantasy that gets them where they think they want to go.

The porn addict is absorbed in a “high” state of arousal - searching and searching – like a junky chasing a fix. The viral nature of Internet pornography means that our “porn junky” is exposed to ever more provocative and disturbing images. Images they probably never intended to or wanted to see.

One day they stumble into some area of their “arousal template” that causes tremendous intensity of arousal. The arousal is like grabbing hold of an electric current. They can’t seem to let go or get the troubling new images out of their head… They can’t seem to get free from what they’ve seen and they feel incredible shame about the arousal they felt - But they can't seem to let go!

The individual's porn addiction is connected with sexual exposure, abuse, or trauma from childhood that was not their fault and which they did not ask for, but for which they are now responsible.

I’ll say it again …

What you are aroused by today is connected to your early sexual development and sexual experiences that you were not responsible for creating – you didn’t ask for them – but now they are unfortunately yours and You are responsible for your behavior!

All of the above is amplified by our abuse of the Internet. The days of having to go to the adult bookstore and risk the shame of discovery to buy a magazine with limited content are over. Internet Pornography offers:

Anonymity – It’s just the person alone with their computer and an unlimited amount of pornography.

Accessibility – All it takes is a computer, a locked door (or not), and some unstructured and unaccountable time.

Even more frightening is that our children are exposed to these same intensities of sexual content at extremely young ages with very little information (if any) available to them to explain what they have seen. They are wired naturally to have a response to what they’ve seen and they are unlikely to ever forget it – did you?

Today – More people are affected…

… At younger ages

… To a greater degree

… With less healthy and consistent guidance

Here’s a bold statement to the sex addict with a porn addiction – Give yourself the gift of recovery, live a life of integrity - starting NOW, and then make the living amends of maintaining sobriety and being a light of hope to a generation of young people now being raised with Internet pornography!

You need you. Your family needs you. Our culture and our children need you. Porn Addiction or not, who are you not to shine?

“If not you, then who?”

You’ll need help. As they say in AA, you “stand at the turning point.” If your brain says go right, then this time, GO LEFT! We’ll be here to help when you’re ready – and you are worth saving!

Porn Addiction - Ready for treatment that Works?