What You Should Know About Porn Addiction and Treatment

Treatment programs for behavioral addictions such as porn or masturbation addiction are designed to help the addict overcome compulsions that are very similar to substance addictions (alcohol or drugs). But behavioral addictions are treated a bit differently because they involve processes that are normal for humans to participate in. Sex addictions, for example, are based on the normal human act of sexual intercourse. The addiction arises when the person develops a compulsion to repeat the act until it inhibits his life, work and social interactions. Treating such an addiction requires a slightly different approach than substance addiction recovery.

What is Porn Addiction?

Porn addiction is a sex addiction that is more solitary. It is the compulsion to view pornographic material and to masturbate to it with little regard to financial, social and other obligations. Like a true addiction, the pornography takes over. Addicts spend hours viewing and masturbating to porn. The stimulation provides a pleasure that is akin to the high that substance addicts feel from their respective drugs. Porn addicts are driven to the compulsive behavior in an effort to obtain that pleasure over and over again. However, each time, the pleasure becomes harder to achieve, making more masturbation and porn exploration necessary to achieve the pleasure that the addict seeks. This is a similar process to that substance addicts endure. This similarity also makes that addiction to porn easier to understand and treat.

Porn Addiction Treatment

There is usually an underlying psychological illness or complication that drives the porn addiction. Many of the addicts are survivors of childhood abuses, depression sufferers or another condition. Most porn addicts seek treatment as a part of marital counseling or in conjunction with treatment for a substance addiction. The porn addiction isn't the primary issue. Thus, treatments for the addiction must address these issues before the porn addiction can be overcome.

Treatment for porn addiction begins with psychotherapy to determine the underlying conditions driving the addiction. These sessions may take quite some time to complete. Drug therapy in the form of antidepressants may be prescribed to treat the depression that often accompanies the addiction. Marital and family counseling is often ordered to help mend relationships. Whether the addict is hospitalized or treated as an outpatient, the mental health portion of porn addiction recovery is the most important and cannot be duplicated without the help of a professional.

Other treatments include group therapy sessions and 12-step programs. These work like the substance addiction programs in providing support for the addict to help aid in recovery. This type of treatment is especially helpful to the porn addict, as it reverses the solitary nature of that addiction. The compulsion to view porn and masturbate is a private, solo act. In group treatment, the act is no longer personal. This helps tremendously in healing.

The goal of any treatment is to teach the addict to survive in a world where sex is a normal function, without having the addict fall back into the addictive behaviors. This means learning control over the addiction through lifestyle changes, alternatives and distractions to help the addict stay on the road to recovery.

Signs You are Addicted to Pornography

Porn addicts spend an extraordinary amount of time masturbating and viewing porn, often hours at a time. The acts are performed in secret, a secrecy that the addict will strive to keep hidden. Addicts may experience lost time while viewing porn, escalating intensity in the types of porn viewed (stranger acts) and a decrease in the amount of sex performed with a partner. Lying, depression, lonely feelings and shame follow each act, but you can't seem to stop on your own.

Help for Porn Addicts

Fortunately, you can find the help and support you need to overcome your porn and masturbation addiction. Contact your family physician, religious leader or contact an addiction rehabilitation facility directly for help.

Self-Help: Overcoming Pornography Addiction; University of Texas at Dallas.

John Leland; Church Counsels Women Addicted to Pornography; The New York Times.

Keith Morrison; BattlingSexual Addiction; Dateline NBC.

Donald L.Hilton Jr. and Clark Watts; Pornography Addiction: A Neurological Perspective; Surgical Neurology International