Addiction can be a very dangerous problem, especially if the individual is addicted to harmful content such as drugs and substance abuse. Based on this, there is a need to develop treatment procedures that will help the individual suffering from addiction to successful recovery. Sex addiction has a similar impact just like drug addiction, and therefore, a recovery program is needed to help the victims. Based on this, various theorists have taken a leading role in the development of treatment therapy on sex addiction. One such theorist includes Dr. Patrick Carnes, who is credited for igniting the Sex Addiction movement. Carnes defines sex addiction in his 1983 book, “The Sexual Addiction,” and also outlines the proposed methods that can be used in the treatment of sex addiction. The theorist uses the addictive system to model the phases of addiction, which plays a crucial role in helping the audience in understanding issues related to sex addiction. The various phases include; belief systems, impaired thinking, the addiction cycle, and unmanageability.
According to Carnes, addiction begins with the addict’s core beliefs, which at most times are not grounded in reality. Carnes believes that addicts do not perceive themselves as worthwhile individuals, and nor do they believe that other people would be empathetic with them, caring for them, or meeting their needs if everything regarding them, including addiction, was known. To the addicts, sex is one of the most important needs, and this is what makes isolation bearable. Based on this, sex addicts live under a distorted reality, blaming other people for their addiction problems. Based on this, Carnes uses the addiction cycle to help model the addictive experiences of sex addicts, which are divided into four categories that include preoccupation, ritualization, compulsive sexual behavior, and despair.
According to Carnes, preoccupation refers to the addicts’ mental condition, which is responsible for fueling the obsessive search for sex. The second phase is followed by the ritualistic and patterned behavior, which results in sexual habits, which, after addiction, prove hard to control or even stop the sexual addictive behavior due to its compulsive quality. Despair regarding the sexually addictive behavior among the addicts, as well as their powerlessness to control the behavior, makes the finals phase of the addiction cycle. Each of the phases in the cycle requires more and more energy such as anxiety, stress, depression, and fear to help manage the addictive behaviors as well as the resultant consequences such as pregnancy, ruptured relationships, venereal diseases as well as other problems. With each cycle requiring greater energy than the other, the addict becomes overwhelmed, reaching to an unmanageable level that further results in hopelessness as well as the entrenchment in the addictive system.
Carnes also defines the assessment and the symptoms that are associated with sex addiction. The symptoms play a crucial role in informing health providers on how to manage and treat sexual addiction. There are ten symptoms identified by Carnes as indicators of sexual addiction. The symptoms include a pattern of out of control behavior, severe consequences resulting from the compulsive sexual behaviors, the inability to stop sexual addiction behaviors, persistent pursuit of self-destructive behavior, and the ongoing desire to limit sexual behavior. Other symptoms include Sexual obsession and fantasy as one of the primary ways of coping with the addiction, and increasing amounts of sexual experience since the current levels are not sufficient.
Also, sexual addiction manifests with severe mood changes around sexual activity and inordinate amounts of time spent in obtaining sex, being sexual as well as recovering sexual experience from sexual addiction. Finally, a sexual addiction also manifests through neglect of important social, occupational as well as recreational activities in favor of sexual behavior. Despite highlighting the symptoms associated with sexual addiction, it is not always possible to differentiate between individuals suffering from sexual addiction from those with non-addictive behaviors. Based on this, Carnes developed the Sex Addiction Screening Test (SAST), which helps in indicating the presence of sex addiction, and this has been helpful in helping sex addicts from refraining from their awful behaviors.
In addition to the description of the symptoms associated with sexual addiction, Carnes also provided a treatment procedure in sex therapy to help the sex addicts in rehabilitating. The treatment therapy is based on the twelve steps and twelve traditions of alcoholics anonymous, which can be fundamentally significant in disrupting and altering the addictive sexual system, and also responsible for the restoration of the addict’s capacity for meaningful relationships through the development of new beliefs in them, and to which are essential in helping replace dysfunctional or faulty assumptions. Based on Carnes’s description, it postulates that a sex addict can easily transform by attending to the twelve steps program that is attended by the alcoholics. Therefore, the development of such programs as sexaholics anonymous, sex and love addicts, and sex addicts anonymous through the support of a sponsor to facilitate the progression of the twelve steps can be an effective therapy in treating sex addiction.
Article overview
Tays, T. M., Earle, R. H., Wells, K., Murray, M., & Garrett, B. (1999). Treating sex offenders using the sex addiction model. Sexual Addiction & Compulsivity: The Journal of Treatment and Prevention, 6(4), 281-288.
Summary
The article regards the treatment of sex offenders through the sex addiction model. However, it notes that not all sex offenders are sex addicts. Furthermore, it states that much sexual behavior is addictive and offensive, and the need for greater amounts of sexual experience may result in increasingly greater risks of crossing the legal boundary. Based on this, the treatment of sexual behaviors becomes necessary, and this is where the sex addiction model comes into practice. Improving the patient’s understanding of themselves as well as the etiology of the disorder can help in fostering long-term relapse.
Sample demographics: Sex offenders from multicultural, multiracial backgrounds. Include both males and females whose ages range from adolescents to the elderly. The sample is representative of all socioeconomic levels.
Purpose of the study: To treat sex offenders and sex addicts and prevent long-term relapse
Data collection method: No specific data collection method as it depended on regular attendance of the twelve-step program in regard to sexual therapy
Hypothesis: The sex addiction model effectively rehabilitates sex offenders and sexual addicts and prevents legal breaching.
Results: The addiction model is useful for conceptualization, diagnostic purposes, intervention, and the prevention of sexual relapse sex offenders and addicts.
Effectiveness of the treatment method: A combination of the addiction model along with other modes of therapy can provide the necessary tools as well as the profound emotional and cognitive change to prevent them from breaching the legal boundaries of sexually offensive behavior.