Tag: Addiction

Getting to Powerless-ness

Hi, I’m Jacob, a grateful, recovering sex addict. I recently passed six months sober. I’m working on admitting that I’m powerless.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Step One of the Twelve Steps is:

We admitted we were powerless over sex and love addiction – that our lives had become unmanageable.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t much like the word “powerless”. It sounds wimpy and weak. It sounds a bit whiny. In some ways, it sounds like a cop-out, as in “Yeah, I’m addicted to sex, but I’m powerless against it, so I’ll keep doing whatever I want because I’m powerless.”

I like to think that I’m powerful enough to manage my own affairs. I’ve never been a “power freak” by any means, but just powerful enough to take care of myself. On the flip side, to admit to be powerless sounds a lot like failure to me.

Maybe that makes me a control freak. I do like to be in control and drive the bus. I think I’ve done a pretty good job, thank you. I have a great family. I have a great job. I’ve been successful.

Except for the fact that I’m sex addict. And have been for decades. And while trying to not be an addict, I keep going right back to the same behaviors.

  • I get angry, I act out.
  • I get sad, I act out.
  • I get lonely, I act out.
  • I get scared, I act out.
  • I get euphoric, I act out.

Looking at that, it appears that when most anything happens in my life, I act out. Maybe that is powerless after all.

And then there’s the baggage I carry around from a long time ago.

I’ve been working with Hank (not his real name), my counselor, on identifying past traumas. Things that I didn’t really identify as trauma at the time because I was a kid. But as an adult looking back on them, they were traumatic because adults treated a kid that way.

In the exercise we’ve been working on, I went through all my past traumatic experiences and identified: 1) the roles I played in my family of origin, and 2) the unwritten rules that existed in our family. Then, reflecting on those, I was to write the mission statement of our family as I must have understood it.

Here are some highlights:

  • Keep Mom happy
  • Don’t express negative emotions
  • Love is conditional
  • Protect the family name
  • Be perfect
  • Work hard
  • You must out-success your Father
  • You are a bad judge of character
  • You may not act independently of Mom

I don’t have time for the backstory here, but all of those are spoken in my Mom’s voice. She was larger than life. She was in control. She was nurturing and explosive at the same time. Crossing her was dangerous.

She’s been dead for a while but I’ve still been living in her shadow. I’m seeing that as it is for the first time in my life. But it’s hard to deal with.

So how do you break the addictive cycle I started out with above, PLUS deal with all the baggage I carry around from my childhood? I think I’m coming up on the answer.

Here it is: You Don’t

You want to know why? Because I am powerless to change any of those things by myself. And that’s not a cop-out. That’s an absolute fact.

So, maybe I’m coming up on Step One. Maybe I am powerless after all. I do know that my life has become unmanageable. And I’m ready for things to change.

I’ll be sharing all of what I’ve shared here with my Sponsor, Dan (not his real name), and see what he thinks. Maybe I’m ready to start “working the steps”.

I pray that someone out there reads this and finds hope. That’s the only reason I’m baring my own soul here.

Blessings,

Jacob the Addict (jacobtheaddict@gmail.com)

Brokenness

Hi, I’m Jacob, a grateful, recovering sex addict. My sobriety date is unchanged since my last post.

If you know anything about 12-Step programs and the steps themselves, then you probably know that Step One reads like this (modified for sex addiction):

“We admitted we were powerless over sex addiction— that our lives had become unmanageable.”

That may seem like a pretty simple thing to do – admit that one is powerless over one’s addiction. But it’s not.

Human nature says that I can beat this if I just try harder. Never mind the fact that I’ve tried for decades to overcome this by myself, without success.

I’ve read self-help books on overcoming pornography and I’ve implemented their recommendations. Then I’ve white-knuckled through several years of not acting out, only to relapse.

I’ve had accountability partners that I’ve promised to check in with. And I’ve forgotten about them or misled them into thinking I was OK when I wasn’t – and relapsed.

Nothing has worked for more than one or two years. Eventually, the stress or the pain or the anger or the whatever gets bad enough that I return to my drug of choice.

You can probably read what I just wrote and say: “That sounds like ‘powerless’ to me.” But for me, saying I’m “powerless” feels like a cop-out. It feels like I’m looking for (or claiming) an excuse.

Part of my problem is that I was “raised in church”. I’ve gone to church since I was born. When I responded to the “invitation” or the “altar call” when I was 12, it was out of fear, rather than surrender.

For many years, I’ve tried to work my way into God’s favor. And most days, I felt like I was carrying about 60% of the load and just needed Jesus to “top me off” with the other 40%. That attitude is a long, long way from surrender.

I hate to say it, but my church upbringing actually stands in the way of my surrender in Step One. You see, I’m a pretty good person, all in all, and God is pretty lucky to have me on His team. Again, that is a very long way from surrender.

Thankfully, the work toward Step One requires serious reflection on all the things I’ve done, all the places I’ve been, all the times I’ve tried to stop my addictive behavior and all the times I, like the dog in Proverbs, have returned to the vomit.

Looking at the many situations I’ve written about in my step work, it becomes very obvious that there’s a dysfunctional pattern. And the weight of evidence seems to indicate that I’m unable to stop my acting out.

With that said, I’m getting closer to surrender every day. It’s a scary thought to finally yield my will to God’s, approach Him with empty hands and bowed head, and say “Lord, I got nothin’.” But as one of my readings said recently, its time for me to get out of God’s way and let Him lead me where He wants me. After all, He made me and knows how I’m wired.

When I get there, it will be the first time in my life I’ve truly surrendered my will to God’s. Its high time I stopped trying to control everything. After all, its quite easy to see what a fine job I’ve done in screwing things up til now.

May God grant me the humility to yield my will to His.

Best, Jacob the Addict (jacobtheaddict@gmail.com)