It's Cheating

Two separate studies were recently completed on the effects of childhood trauma and how it can affect intimate relationships later on in life. Childhood emotional maltreatment, or CEM, includes physical and sexual abuse, neglect and emotional mistreatment.

Studies suggest that a rough childhood can affect romantic relationships in destructive ways later on in life. Researchers found that that study participants had extremely strong tendencies toward self-criticisms which interfered with their relationships and basically derailed them. (more…)

The next time you’re in Apple’s App Store you may be seeing an app designed to protect people from sexting. The app is discussed in a recent news article on USA Today.

Snapchat gives the smart phone users the ability to take a picture, send it to whomever they choose and then control the message and how long it is visible for. Yes, that’s right, the message ultimately self destructs usually between one to 10 seconds after it is received. (more…)

Two important and surprising things happen when you meet someone you’re really fond of. One, your brain creates certain chemicals that allow contact with this person to feel really good, and two, you crave more and more of this contact as a more solid bond forms. (more…)

A surprising and violent twist has entered the social media scene, involving women and pornography. Groupon — the popular savings and deal-offering website that features discounts on everything from theater to salons to restaurants — is now offering a promotion to purchase a deal on an experience with Kink.com, a creator of pornography associated with bondage and violence toward women. (more…)

Robert Weiss LCSW, CSAT-S, replies to this blog,  ”What a terrific summary of the “partner’s dilemma” that we in the sexual and romantic addiction treatment field hear virtually every day. As you wonderfully point out, with sexual addiction it’s not the cheating itself or any specific sexual act that causes the deepest pain to a betrayed spouse or partner, it’s the betrayal of relationship trust caused by consistent lying that causes intimacy to crack wide open. The decision of whether to stick it out or remain together is always difficult, and unfortunately there is no way to ever make it easy.”

In David J. Ley’s recently published book, The Myth of Sex Addiction, Dr. Ley argues that the concept of sexual addiction is based on questionable research and subjective moral judgments. He believes that labeling problematic sexual behavior as addiction undermines the individual’s personal responsibility for that behavior. He also believes that the sexual addiction treatment “industry” is driven by economic greed. Sadly, sexual addiction is not a myth and the treatment “industry” is barely in its infancy. Read why sex addiction expert Robert Weiss disagrees with Dr. Ley.

It can be difficult to know from within a media swirl of headlines related to celebrities and sex addiction what the facts and realities are of this powerful, consuming addiction. Sex addiction is believed to affect at least three to five percent of the U.S. adult population.

Although public perception may vary, professional addiction experts offer a list of signs that could indicate the addiction is present.

Signs you, or a partner, may have a sexual addiction: (more…)

Relapse is generally associated with people going through recovery from drug or alcohol addiction, but the term also applies to people recovering from sex or pornography addiction. (more…)

We’ve all heard the stories – secret service agents guarding the door while their boss engages in a bit of “extramarital fun.” Lately, though, it seems it’s the agents who are misbehaving – an indication that the “boys will be boys” mentality fostered in our military and certain other governmental service agencies is alive and well despite numerous scandals and public efforts to curb such sexual misconduct. (more…)