Hey everyone, you can call me Ace.
So I have come to recent realization that I'm struggling with some form of sex addiction and it has evolved in the last two years.
Let's start from the beginning. I have always had an unhealthy relationship with sex, I lost my virginity around the age of 11 and it wasn't vanilla. I then got access to explicit material at 13 and have been abusing it since. I also had sex with my friends Stepmom while I was 16. My struggles were mostly connected to my lack of impulse control when it came to explicit material untill 2 years ago. I got a my first job and bought myself a VR to treat myself. This introduced me to a community on there where sexual content and acts were common. I was fine at first but once I dipped my toe in it progressively got worse. It started with just sending pictures then after a break up I started erotically roleplaying and from that point I was showing interest in others based on sexual interests. I was messing around out of relationships untill my ex. I cheated on her with multiple women towards the end. I had asked her if she was open for threesomes and used that as an excuse to flirt and mess around with other women. The relationship did not end well. My sexual pursuits we're not the main reasons and I believe I used the other issues to explain the downfall and not address my betrayal and disloyalty. After that relationship it was one casual thing after the other. No emotion's just lust and situationships. During this time I met my current girlfriend and the love of my life. We'll call her Madison. Madison was the only women during this time that I actually tried to pursue past just casual and wanted something serious. It was going well and we even set up boundaries. The problem is I broke them. I was talking sexual with another women the same week and it shattered her. I felt disgusted, ashamed and hurt that I was capable of hurting and betraying someone that I truly cared for. We went our separate ways after this and I continued my flings and casual relationships that felt hollow and only existed to quench my sexual urges. I at some point went on a trip to ohio for my uncle's wedding and I also visited my biological dad's grave for the first time. He passed just before I was born sadly. This trip really impacted me positively and I wanted to turn a new leaf and get back on track with what I really wanted out of a relationship and that's a future, a family, and a forever partner. I'm completely uninterested in anything besides being Monogamous. So I approached Madison again in hope of retrying with serious intent. It was going well but I fell right back into entertaining the sexual thoughts with other women. I was sending explicit pictures and even reached out to an ex. The only difference this time was that Madison didn't know. I hid it from her, we put boundaries up again and I broke them in two occasions but she still wasn't aware. I asked her out and at this point I was so riddled with guilt that it snapped me out of my quenching my urges with other women. And we have been together for 2 months now and I am staying strong and loyal but now the problems were the lies. I hid everything that I did before the relationship with her out of shame, disgust in myself and fear that it'll hurt her again. She found out. I was sharing my screen and we ended up going through my messages and everything slowly started to unravel. She was hurt, betrayed and questioned if anything we had was real. It was real to me. I deeply care for her and am frustrated and ashamed of my self for my lack of impulse control in the past. Luckily she's a very understanding individual and was willing to keep trying because I have betrayed her during the relationship. We decided to move forward with complete honesty and I was for it. I wanted things to work more than i have ever wanted something before. It was well untill I had those urges and use explicit material to satisfy these urges. The explicit material wasn't the problem, but the fact that I was lying about it even after we had our talk. I hid it out of shame. We delved more into my past, urges, patterns, and childhood and we discovered that I fall into 8/12 of behaviors that qualify you as a sex addict. This realization hit me hard. It explained so much of not just recent behavior but a long pattern of behaviors. Even though she was lied to she expressed that she truly did love me and can see that I'm struggling and decided to stay by me and support me. She has become my whole world We then went to my messages and looked through them and the amount of explicit pictures I have sent and the amount of women I got involved with were immense. More than I ever realized. I had forgotten about half these women and seeing everything just from the last two years laid out in front of me made me physically ill. My stomach twisted, My head throbbed, I cried for hours, threw up multiple times. And Madison was going through these same emotions but 5 times worse This was last night. We both felt suicidal. I felt intense shame, guilt and the biggest one was disgust. I had an abusive stepdad growing up who emotionally and physically abused both my mother and me. I from a very young age resented him and vowed to never become someone like him. That all fell apart last night and when I realized I was far closer to being that man then I thought I would ever allow I'm falling into self hatred and resentment. I feel empty and depressed at work atm. I am setting up insurance for therapy but untill then I would truly appreciate it if anyone has advice or any suggestions that would not only be helpful for me but also my partner until I can get proper help. Thank you