Multiple Addictions Fueling Porn - (Systems of Addiction)

Hi Everybody,

I've been reading "Out From The Shadows" (Understanding Porn Addition) by Patrick Carnes PHD and wanted to bring a crucial topic to everyone attention of how multiple addictions tend to co-exist and fuel our sex/porn addictions. Its likely that there are multiple addictions at play forming a self sustaining system and I want to share with you my own personal account to hopefully provide some food for thought for the rest of the community here. In addition I want to highlight how a sex addiction, much of the time, also has a much larger footprint/pattern than just porn consumption. I want to make all of these variables known so we can all maximize our potential for a full recovery.

Two Areas to Discuss:
1.) Levels of Addiction
2.) Types of Addiction

At the risk of oversimplification I'm going to distill a summary of what these levels of addiction represent so you can gauge for yourself an overall footprint of where you are at within these levels and how to get the support needed to break the chains of this addiction. In addition to escalating porn fetishes and morphing sexual tastes that most people are highly aware of, there is also a more insidious element at play which is the escalation of behaviors over time (This was a blind spot for me). The below overview is to provide you with context so you can further understand my person sexual addiction footprint and how it has escalated over time.

#1 Levels of Sexual Addiction:

• Level 1 = Socially tolerable & justifiable forms of behavior. (The illusion that you are in control)
• Level 2 = Potential for social repercussions & minor legal consequences. (Voyeurism, Exhibitionism, Prostitutes ect...)
• Level 3 = Major social & legal consequences (Incest, Rape & Other Violent Acts)

Now that a general baseline has been established I'd like to share my sexual addiction pattern to hopefully prompt some self reflection within yourselves of what your pattern looks like and truly how out of our control things can get if we are not properly aware and taking the right actions to get help.

My Sexual Addiction Footprint:
Over the years of my porn habit, I went from a low Level 1 to straddling the line of Level 1 & 2. Things started off innocent enough (With masterbation) but as time went on and my fetishes morphed & escalated, so did my behaviors.

My Level 1 Behaviors:

• Pornography and Masterbation = This is where it started and there was a pattern of escalation here of needing more and more hardcore material.
• Strip Clubs = I began wanting to go to strip clubs because the energy output was extremely low to getting sexual attention and the reward was moderate to high. I was able to find women who were also into or willing to entertain my strange warped fetishes and in a few cases would actually bring them home and live them out. (I was concerned of STDs but still felt I needed to go through with satisfying this urge)
• Kink Apps, Sexting & Emails = My particular morphed fetish surrounded Femdom so in the absence of a real life partner to indulge my fantasies I took to Kink Apps & Websites. I got the point of sending risky photos and almost sending risky videos to people I did not even know (It could have been anybody on the other side of the phone. They could have potentially used those photos or videos as blackmail against me)
• Visiting Local Kink Meetups = With a craving for a real life partner to engage in fantasies I went to sketchy meet up places in my city that made me feel physically unsafe.

***A common element I'd like to outline here throughout all of these behaviors is I always thought I was in control yet in most if not all of these circumstances I was concerned physically for my safety or socially embarrassed by my behavior but still felt it was something I had to do***

My Level 2 Behaviors:

• Massage Parlors = I started feeling trapped with my current lack of sexual gratification so I considered going to massage parlors as a surrogate to intimacy (The legal ramifications were too much of a concern of mine should the place get busted so this was not something I regularly entertained)
• Professional Dominatrix Session (With a Porn Star) = I remember having the most embarrassing talk with a Lawyer because I wanted to see if paying for dominatrix is legal. It is, however, my detailed explanation to this man of what I wanted to do was completely humiliated (And now in hindsight I find hilarious. That guy had no idea what he was getting himself into during that discussion with me, his reactions to the acts I wanted to engage in were hysterical - I'm laughing as I write this. But all joking aside looking back on this conversation I can see how powerless I really was within this addiction).

***For those of you interested in hearing about my story with this Porn Star and the insights I gained from it you can find my post under "Problematic Sex Behaviors" titled My Experience With a Porn Star - (The Truth About ED & Fetishes).***

Although nothing here is explicitly criminal or illegal and my level 2 behaviors were very conservative you can clearly see how I began escalating over time and began to straddle that line of what may potentially have legal & personal health ramifications if this continued.

Its clear that my sexual addiction footprint & patterns extended far beyond just pornography as time went on. I'd love to read in the comments how your addictions might have also taken a similar path of escalation and what other behaviors you guys/girls engage in aside from just porn.


***Next lets take a quick look at other existing addictions that helped fuel this primary sex addiction and how it's all connected***


Types of Addiction:

1. Porn = My main addiction
2. Work = Working 14 hour days plus weekends to numb my pain
3. Social Media = Numbingly searching for digital social connection
4. Sugar & Caffeine = Drinking excessive coffee & comfort eating

I want to call out this section because most of us believe that our porn addiction happens in a vacuum when in reality there tends to be a system of addictions at play all fueling each other. Its also important to note that these addiction are formed usually as a result of unaddressed Core Fears and Issues that date back to childhood. Speaking from my own experience the roots of these addictions reach back to my family dynamic & upbringing but that would require a separate post to get into in detail. Although the wounds were not my fault, they are my responsibility to own and heal.

Below is a typical day in my life from 2 & 3 years ago.

My Systems of Addiction:

• Go to work at 6:00AM drink multiple cups of coffee to power through the day
• Work until 6:00PM to 7:00PM then head to the gym
• Get home and masterbate to porn as a stress reliever
• Browse Social Media to hopefully get some sort of social attention
• On weekends would work and deny my friends requests to hangout with them and go to bars

A Viscous Self Sustaining System at Work:
***You can reasonably begin to connect the dots and see how each addiction supported the other. My long hours of work would leave me stressed out and isolated from meeting any girls. Because I was stressed out and isolated from meeting any girls it was justification for me to masterbate to pornography as a stress reliever. Because I masterbated to pornography as a stress reliever every night I had no motivation to try and go meet girls in real life. Because of this lack of motivation and feeling shitty about myself I'd go on social media & dating apps to try and get some attention. The continued isolation created ongoing pain that I would numb through long hours at work. And the cycle would then repeat itself day after day, year after year increasing in intensity each time the cycle was completed.***

You can see how each addiction and each component supported the other creating this ruthless cycle and pattern of impaired thinking. In addition to this self sustaining cycle, every time I would complete this process my porn fetishes would escalate (As my dopamine tolerance increased) requiring something a little more hardcore each time to give me that sustainable high. Understanding now what was happening to me its very clear to see how I was digging my own grave.

Below is a quote from "Out From The Shadows" by Patrick Carnes that captures the crux of this cycle beautifully.

"Completion of each cycle confirms that faulty belief system and the impaired thinking. Out of the validation of the beliefs a new stronger cycle is born. The behavior then gets intensified in Level 1 and then may escalate to levels 2 & 3."


Putting It All Together:
I think its so important that all of us in recovery recognize both the Levels of Addiction and Types of Addiction at play to get a comprehensive understanding of the interwoven landscape that forms a self sustaining system. In order to break the chains of this addiction its essential that we know where we are starting from and where we are looking to go. To adopt a new, healthier way of thinking we need to reverse engineer these different components to interrupt the cycle. Once we have a comprehensive understanding of our toxic sexual patterns and impaired thinking we can then begin to change these patterns and emotionally embody lasting change. The goal is not to just be fap free for 90 days but to make a lasting lifestyle change and replace these self-defeating, self-sustaining systems with healthy self-improvement, self-sustaining systems.

I hope that highlighting my own sexually compulsive landscape and addictions and demonstrating how they all work together to support each other is helpful insight to help guide those of you who are interested and on your own self journey to awakening. I'd love to read in the comments any stories of how multiple addictions and increasing escalation has played out in your life.

I highly recommend Patrick Carnes book Out From The Shadows if you liked this post. I'm not finished with it yet but its been very illuminating so far on the nature of sex addiction.