What Is Problematic Sexual Behavior?

Leave the Shame and Darkness Behind

Although other forms of addiction seem to be losing their stigma, sex addiction and problematic sexual behavior still tends to sit in the shadows.


Anything confined to the shadows is bound to be shackled by embarrassment and cloaked in shame.


You don’t have to live in shame and shadows.

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Bring Your Struggles into the Light

If you keep returning again and again to destructive, compulsive, and sometimes dangerous behaviors that don’t align with your values—despite your best and sincere efforts to stop—you might be struggling with problematic sexual behavior (PSB).


When you can name the monster in the shadows, it returns some of its power back to you.

Understanding Sexual Addiction

Sexual compulsivity refers to uncontrollable and excessive sexual thoughts, desires, urges, or behaviors. These behaviors can cause distress and harm to your relationships, your finances, your career, and other aspects of your life.


Sex addiction is also known as hypersexuality, compulsive sexual behavior, and sexual compulsivity, among other names. It affects people regardless of education, race, economic status, religion, or occupation.


Sexual addiction is not based on the types of activities that take place in your relationship. Sex addiction is when your sexual thoughts and activities consume your life, contradict your personal values, and conflict with your commitments. The same out-of-control feelings and cravings someone has who is addicted to drugs or alcohol are also experienced by those with a sex addiction.

AM I ADDICTED TO SEX?

Facts about Sex Addiction

  • Sex addiction affects approximately 6-8% of the population of the United States.
  • Up to 24 million people in the U.S. may struggle with some form of compulsive sexual behavior.
  • There are as many people struggling with compulsive sexual behavior in the U.S. as there are people in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Boston combined!
  • For every three men who struggle with sex addiction, there is one woman.


The good news is, You are not alone, and there is help.

How Does Someone Become Sexually Addicted?

  • A history of abuse, especially of a sexual nature

  • An early sexual experience

  • Experiencing significant life stressors such as challenges on the job or in relationships

  • Other members of immediate or extended family who also struggle with addictions

  • Having been raised in a family with "rigid" boundaries or a family that is "disengaged"

  • The presence of depression or other mood disorder

  • The presence of some other addiction(s)

There is frequently a history of abuse (sexual, emotional or physical) for people struggling with problematic sexual behaviors. As children, if these men or women didn’t have their needs met consistently – or at all – the result, as adults, was to form conclusions in behavior as a way to get those needs met.


Childhood trauma, though, doesn't adequately explain the origin of sex addiction for everyone. Some people haven’t experienced any childhood abuse or abandonment. Some researchers believe that some people with sexual addiction would never have gotten addicted if it were not for the powerful draw of the Internet.


Regardless of the cause, sex addiction can threaten relationships, occupation, and health. It can be a life-threatening condition.

Could I Be Addicted to Sex?

If you are unsure whether this term describes your condition, this self-assessment can help you sort through your past experiences and present behaviors to find clarity.

TAKE THE QUIZ

Support Your Recovery with Hope & Freedom

Hope & Freedom offers many resources to start and maintain your journey to recovery. Our 3-Day Intensives can give you a jumpstart to recovery that packs the equivalent of six months of therapy into just three days. 


You don’t have to stay in the shadows. There is hope, and there is freedom.

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