Porn or sex addiction ?

[dave]

Thought I would open the door for another kick at this question.
After being P and MB free for 94 days I still struggle with urges to M.
Ideally my wife would want sex every day or so but I love her and realize that at age 56 it is not going to happen. We have sex about once a week and some mutual M activity at mid week - yet I can't seem to settle with this pattern.After 3 months I still walk around with sex on my mind quite often - daily anyway. Usually it is a physical / horny sensation as well
Enduring the current pattern of marital sex or returning to solo M (non P) seem the only sex options. Yet I am afraid solo M may lead back to P.
Surprisingly I have had little temptation to look at P. A few scenes involving nudity and sex have shown up in movies but I didn't get very aroused by them.
So this leads me to think the my problem is not so much PA (although it did become a big compulsion in recent years) but a compulsion for sex.
So perhaps sex addiction more accurately describes my challenge.
I am really afraid of doing a stretch without any sex - perhaps my fear of total celibacy is another clue to my situation.
Any insight out there?

[bodget1974]

i don't really have advice..only i like to MB.. i personally don't think there is anything wrong with it, and obviously sex is great, my problem was using the P to MB when really i should of been with my wife..i think the thing with me was i hated it when i was horney , and my wife wasn't, because i'd get all turned on and with my wife thats quite easy to do, but we both horney at different times of day, i'm more a night person, my wife is more a morning person..and the thing with P is it never says no or i'm to tired...
but i realise now that then is when i should of been better at communicating...and also not be week.

sorry i've just rambled on there, very random sorry.

[FoolishMind]

Interesting that, I used to use that excuse, and blame my wife for my P usage because she wasnt in the mood. I always used to remember the times she would reject me, yet I was oblivious to the many more times i actually rejected her, because i was so drained from P & MB. Sick Sick Sick. Yes and I was more of a morning time person, and she was more night. But because I dont drain myself like i used to, our intamcy improved ten fold. Still room for improvement but the great things is ive got the rest our lives to do it, whereas should I have not changed my ways in Jan, I would have lost her for ever.

[brokensoul]

reading these post it sounds like me story
me morning her night person
the only thing that was different is she started to have pain if we had s$X
I STARTED TO FEEL BAD ABOUT THIS
she wouldn't just brush me away she did try to keep our s$x life going
i just got to the piont where i couldn't make her happy and didn't won't to prees her even thought she was fine with it
i put my head in the sand i could not deal with our issues
so i find a way out
and in my mind it was ok
but now i see that it wasn't ok just to try to get around
this
i have messed up and really crushed my wife

[Coyote Toast]

I think we're talking about sex addiction, Dave. The P is only the medium for the addiction. The drug addict can choose to use heroin, cocaine, oxycontin, whatever, but it's all still drug addiction. So taking away the P may not be getting to the underlying issues. You might benefit from trying to explore what purpose sex serves in your emotional life. Is it a release from stress and tension? Is it an escape from anxiety or pressure? Is it something you use for calming or soothing? If so, then your investigation could dig into why you have chosen sex as a way to regulate your emotional life. I highly recommend working with a good therapist to attempt this kind of archaeology of the self.

And it's possible that it really isn't about those things, in which case you need to find out what it really is about. If I understand you correctly, it isn't just about sharing pleasure with your mate. Something else is going on.

However, it's good to remember that sex is a healthy part of life. Sex addict specialist Patrick Carnes does NOT recommend celibacy as a treatment strategy for sex addicts. He feels it's too unbalanced and doesn't really resolve the underlying problem. That said, it is imperative to stop the addictive behaviors. But most sexual behavior is not addicted behavior. Carnes offers some guidelines to assess whether a sexual behavior is addictive or not. You can find that in his book OUT OF THE SHADOWS. Anyway, best of luck to you.