When things go wrong, don’t go with them.
Many sex addicts new to the healing process openly wonder: “If sexual sobriety doesn’t require lasting sexual abstinence, what does it require?” Interestingly, there is no cut-and-dried answer to this question. Each of us arrives in recovery with a unique life history and set of problems, along with highly individualized goals for the future. Thus, each of us, with the help of our therapist or sponsor, must craft a personalized version of sexual sobriety. To do this, we must first delineate the sexual behaviors that do and do not compromise and/or destroy our values (fidelity, not hurting others, etc.), life circumstances (keeping a job, not getting arrested, etc.), and relationships. We then commit in a written sexual sobriety contract to only engage in sexual behaviors that are non-problematic (for us). As long as our sexual behavior does not violate these highly individualized boundaries, we are sexually sober.
Just for Today
If you do not yet have a sexual sobriety plan, create one. If you do have one, review it with your therapist and your sponsor.