r/slaa

That's how i felt coming into the fellowship many years ago when my sponsor told me to go to 90 meetings in 90 days and start working the steps, while fully withdrawing from any unnecessary socialization with women for that period.

I went from being the life of the party, social butterfly, flirtatious cool guy -- to not even making eye contact with women i was passing in the streets or buying groceries from -- for months, I did the most "extreme" things i possibly could to stay sober, because i was so done with acting out. Maybe some people thought i was weird and many didn't hear from me for up to a year...

But today, I'm ever grateful for being that "extreme" - because:

Putting my marriage, kids, career, health and mental health ALL AT RISK to get a hit of sex and love for over a decade -- is actually the most extreme thing i could have been doing. It's ludicrous.

This program works for me because it leaves no space for me to go back to living a life that was, by all definitions, insane.

Protecting my sobriety and sanity sometimes requires extreme measures.

I don't know about you all, but i personally think SLAA fellows give some of the best feedback - i've experienced it in outreach and i wish there was more of an opportunity to spotlight or give feedback to someone that's really in a pickle. Of course, if they ask for it -- but most meetings don't even make it an option because of the crosstalk statement in meetings.

There's one meeting i found called Healing Late Night Cravings that allows crosstalk/feedback to shares in their parking lot. People are kind, understanding.

Those meetings are quite late though for me as i like to get in 1-2 meetings per day during work hours (US/CAN)

Anyone else know of any other feedback-crosstalk meetings i could check out?

Hi, I am 29f dating a 29m. Back story we are in a VERY long distance relationship (me CA, BF EU), we are very in love, see each other about every 1.5-2 months, talking long term future etc. However, are biggest fights have come about from my jealousies and anxieties due to his sex and love as a coping mechanism. He goes to therapy for it, but it definitely still comes up. About a year into dating I caught him lying about texting another women from his past. And he admitted he was having fantasies about his exes. He also shared he felt hypersexual but not toward me at that time. He also was watching a lot of porn at the time. I felt the distance which is why all of this came to surface after a few weeks. I just couldn't handle the lying, and then emotionally cheating. I love him so much and know he is working on this and wants to get help and be better but it just feels like I can feel when when its starting to go that direction again. I want kids, I want to build something with him, but frankly I don't know if one day he will cheat on me, and I do worry about moving forward until I know he is "recovered" or sober if thats possible. I am really torn, because I know he adores me and wants me as his future partner and wife but I am afraid of marrying someone and then getting heartbroken because of his SLAA.

He is currently 2 years sober of alcohol, he said he hasn't watched p in a couple months, and also recently gave up weed. He is a hard worker and a good looking man.

Last night I had sex with someone I met in the rooms. They were likewise acting out and after it was over they cried and said I should have known better than to reach out to someone I met at a meeting. My soul felt like it had been slashed with a knife and I knew I had fucked up. Needless to say I’ll never contact that person again (especially since they won’t be living anywhere near here fairly soon). I’ve got so many feelings flying in so many directions and I feel so ashamed.

So someone I talk to on a weekly basis told me about this term and it blew my mind because I related so much to the checklist and have struggled with real intimacy in friendships and relationships my entire life.

I’ve been to a few meetings and they are all really different.

Would love to hear how people overcame their social anorexia. I’m great at talking over the phone and really good about calling people in programs. But when it comes to in person, I can’t seem to bring myself to make those connections.

And deeply connected because of a void or unmeet need in you?and only to realize after years that you couldn’t be with this heavenly person that came into your life and made you feel all the good things because you cant accept her past. Sexual past.You would reject her or not make her a girlfriend but you were already attached to her when you find out and after that you just tried to keep holding onto her. You didn’t want to be out but you couldn’t stay either.And the strangest things is when all this dopaminergic feelings moves aside,you are left with these radical thoughts but still you were deeply attached and in love all this time.

31f

I'm so disgusted and embarrassed about this. I don't know if addicted is the correct term, but I watch p*rn and mast--bate a few times a week. I don't find it normal and instead feel gross about it. I don't want to go in that direction. But I think it comes from this deep deep Void of never receiving love as a child, especially from my father, and instead being neglected and abused as a child that I genuinely don't know what love actually looks like and my brain equates the physical act of making love to actual love. Because its logic is "do whatever it takes to experience being loved". The need is so desperate. It hurts like a pain in chest.

I feel scared my mind may be getting weaker because how is dominating me with turning to p*rn. I struggle to speak up where it's actually needed, like asking back for my change at the grocery store.

I don't even like or appreciate the concept of p*rn but I feel I've just never felt safe with anyone so I'm so afraid of true intimacy with a real person. I'm working on my childhood issues in ACA and recently joined slaa (in the first 6 meetings) I resonate with the love Anorexia and fantasy description. In retrospect, I feel this addiction is just a subconscious urge to find love and experience being loved.

I don't know what the hell to do about this. I promised myself that I won't go back to p*rn as it was my rock bottom that brought me to slaa but it just pulls me back into itself even if for a few minutes and I end up wasting hours in self loathing and disgust.

I want to come out of this. Can someone please help and tell me if there is a way out of this? What the hell am I going through.. like a compulsive need to find and receive live at any cost, even if it feels disgusting after!

I feel afraid to speak up at meetings about this. Especially more so because I'm a woman. Women aren't supposed to talk about sexuality. But this is screwing me over hence asking for help here. Thanks.

(Please be gentle and non-judgemental in feedback.)

(I'm sorry if this is too explicit for this sub, mod can delete.)

Hi all. I am new to SLA but have been sober from alcohol for four years. A recent event has made clear that I need help. I am currently with my partner but I have not disclosed my transgressions. I am certain that this would cause more harm to my partner and our small community. I want to find a sponsor and work the steps but I’m curious if making amends in the ninth step requires disclosure.

Help

This was not always me. I had healed this character defect at some point but over the winter I’ve been really isolated and regressed a lot.

I noticed I assume I’m going to be rejected but I’m just rejecting myself before anyone else can.

I live in Miami and people here are very image conscious and almost all the women have fillers or are shaped like barbies. I have struggled with an eating disorder since I was 15 and I catch myself just staring at peoples body parts and hating my own body bc it will never be that perfect. I am a nanny and usually show up to meetings looking like an exhausted mother or coming from a workout class and am all sweaty.

I just struggle to believe anyone will actually really like me and not just be putting “principles before personalities” and talking to me to be kind.

I have been sober in AA 10 years, worked the SLAA steps in my first year and am in a healthy loving marriage, did ACA and AlAnon thought I was good.

I’ve been in therapy on and off my whole adult life but got into negative maternal transference with a couple of older women therapists that I couldn’t get out of.

My dad died suddenly two years ago and I decided to try working with a male therapist. Terrible idea. I picked someone off Psychology Today who was my age and attractive. I told myself I wasn’t attracted to him but he was my type and in retrospect I was into him from the moment I did my intake.

The first year and a half were ok because I was so deep in grief I wasn’t thinking about sex but the minute I started recovering from the grief I developed the most brutal romantic and erotic transference with him. We were doing psychodynamic/gestalt therapy where the relationship with your therapist *is* the work so he encouraged me to disclose the romantic feelings so we could process.

Unfortunately for me he had bad boundaries and unmanaged counter transference. He clocked all of my behaviors pretty well but he fed the dynamic.

He described me as ‘siren like’ and said that his mind ‘went places’ with me. I told him I resented not being able to sleep with other people because I was married and he said he felt the same way. It was like my ultimate dream, the unavailable/forbidden person finally picking me and wanting me. I described it to him as feeling like pure heroin. I was obsessed with him, thinking about him every day and fantasizing about him. Then he freaked out and pulled way back, got really cold and distant with me. I ended up terminating over email because I was so freaked out.

It’s been a month now and I am working with a new female therapist, specifically on the transference , finally starting to think about him less but the first week it felt like physical withdrawal, I couldn’t eat or sleep and my poor husband was comforting me while I was crying over this guy like a teenager. We are good now, but mainly because he doesn’t know how obsessed I was. Even consciously knowing that my therapist was unethical I still want him. My new therapist is asking me if I want to file an ethics complaint and I don’t. I am still fantasizing about reaching out to him.

I never thought I was. Even though I’ve cheated emotionally and or physically in all long term relationships bar one (current)…

So that would be from the time I was 19 to 33: 3 long term relationships messed up and what I would call tail chasing sprees in between.

I have been accused (?) of being one in the past, but I didn’t feel like I was truly addicted to sex. And I might not be.

The truth is, I love the attention of women. I deeply want to know I’m wanted. Desired.

And for me, nothing hits that spot like attention and / or sex with a woman who is physically and emotionally interested in me.

And now I’m married to an amazing, beautiful woman. And she’s pregnant with our first child.

(I did text some exes early on [of course] she called me out and I got my head right).

I love my wife - I’ve never been happier than when I am with her. I have a good job, a great relationship, a few good friends.

And I do not want to fuck this up.

I guess it’s worth mentioning I am an adult child of an alcoholic. And a survivor of CSA (not family). I’m sure that all plays a part.

I’ve been in therapy on and off and have found it very very helpful. I am a better man and have better relationships with everyone in my life as a result.

But I’ve been looking at some of the comments and threads here and I am seeing some of myself in them. Chasing exes. Workplace flings. Misconstrued ideas. Validation seeking.

Sometimes I feel like I would be okay to throw everything away for another spree of chasing tail. And sometimes in the past it has felt like it’s almost another person acting on my behalf - like I’m observing myself.

Just locking eyes with the girl a few offices down who holds eye contact longer than other women … boy oh boy: What a rush.

Is she into me? I have no idea. But in my head she wants me and that feels good.

And to be fair, that’s a learned behaviour on my part. I feel like I know that look because I’ve seen it before and I’ve acted on it and it’s played off “in my favour”.

I’m not going to act on it. But the feelings are there and sometimes feel like they take up more space in my head than I would like. The itch hangs around.

Until now I’ve wondered if it’s actually my self-esteem issues driving my behaviour and desire for validation.

Is this post just validation seeking? Probably. I don’t know.

If you read this far, thanks.

I guess I want to know what other people who know more about this than me think about what I’ve shared.

Is it possible to live a “normal”, happy life if you have this bug? Is there a risk this bug can turn into other addictions?

i know i am a love addict. i think i always knew subconsciously but i simply blamed it on adhd. i have moved abroad for university five years ago. right before that i was in an abusive relationship with someone i was obsessed with my entire childhood. it left me traumatised, struggling with attachment and repeating the same pattern of sexual withdrawal after even the slightest pressure. in those five years, following an 8 month long break from dating (in which i was still obsessing over another, unavailable person), i have been in four back-to-back long distance relationships. all quite questionable, all following the same pattern of: experiencing burnout in old relationship - breakup - obsession over the new person - jumping into a committed relationship very soon - burning out after a couple months and withdrawing sexually - soon withdrawing emotionally and looking for next person. and i am repeating this pattern again. except this time i was already almost sure i would leave my partner. i missed out on my life abroad and i don’t want to do this again. and being together in person for six months last year was disappointing. we are also not in the same place. and when i was making the decision i suddenly met and connected with a new person. he knows my story and openly told me that even though he’s interested, he really thinks that i need the space to learn to be alone. which is also something i want. we are at the same university and won’t be seeing each other for three months this summer. i really like him and i feel very connected to him. how do i navigate this? i don’t want to ruin something that might be right. is it okay to take the space and not talk over summer with the intention to see where we stand when we see each other again? or should i end this definitely in order to be able to recover? i think he will understand me and accept it but im also scared that i will be struggling and obsessing over him even more because i know i get emotionally invested even during no contact.

SLAA was my first and then I got into ACA since it seems being an adult child is at the root, at least for me, of my acting out behaviour.

Curious to know who came from another fellowship into SLAA or if you've turned elsewhere after being in SLAA - please share.

This might be the wrong place for this, but what do you think is a trigger that more average people have that makes them think about sex or porn? Is it normal to have all the triggers an addict does but just act differently on them? I appreciate any input and thoughts about how to mitigate the process from tigger to acting out

I have been working with my current sponsor for 2 years

Just fresh in a relapse where I was having casual sex with random one night stands and multiple partners

I also decided to get sober from drugs and alcohol and one month sober in AA

Both my AA sponsor and slaa sponsor want me to stop having sex and go no contact with Qualifiers and stop pursuing men

I DONT WANT TO. Its making me want to quit program entirely even AA and go back out

I have stopped acting out with multiple partners I have one sexual partner right now like a fwb that's going okay for me and I feel okay

I hate wrestling with my desire to stop and be in this program

I hate it. Should I just stop slaa and focus on AA?