Welcome!

Beginning Your Journey

Welcome

Welcome to Breaking Free from Porn and Sex Addiction. My name is Tim Barber. I am a licensed professional clinical counselor and co-owner of Counseling Alliance, located in Cincinnati, Ohio. I am also a co-owner of Salvare Learning. I have been a mental health worker for over two decades, helping individuals with depression, anxiety, various forms of trauma, as well as marriage and relationship problems. Since the beginning of my career, I have worked with individuals and led groups for those who struggle with unwanted and out-of-control sexual behaviors. For many of those individuals, their primary way of acting out sexually was through porn and masturbation. For others, their behavior was marked by sexual encounters outside of their primary relationship through affairs or hook-ups with others. I was trained by the International Institute for Trauma and Addiction Professionals, founded by Dr. Patrick Carnes, and I am a Certified Sexual Addiction Therapist.

If you found your way to this course, there is a good possibility that you have been looking for support in managing unwanted sexual behaviors in your life. If that is true, I would like to begin by encouraging you as you fight what can be a very lonely battle. Whatever the reason you are here, welcome to a place where you will not be judged, shamed, or scolded for what you have done or continue to do. Welcome to a place of hope and healing.

Why People Seek Help

When I begin working with a new client, one of the first questions I ask is, "What is going on in your life that led you to call and make an appointment with me?" The answers vary from person to person, but common themes emerge.

One theme is the negative consequences that have accumulated. Strained relationships, legal issues, financial problems, declining physical and mental health -- these can be a powerful motivation for seeking support. As Dr. Carnes has said on several occasions, "Follow the pain." The accumulation of negative consequences is often what leads a person to say, "Enough is enough."

A second theme is repeated failed efforts to change. In acknowledging that they cannot overcome their addiction on their own, individuals seek the guidance and support of professionals. This is an essential step for many, and a good example of Step 1 in any 12-step program. As Sex Addicts Anonymous puts it: "We admitted we were powerless over addictive sexual behavior -- that our lives had become unmanageable." In the decades of my work in this area, I have found it exceedingly rare that a person establishes lasting sexual sobriety by themselves. We really do need others in this battle. We need people who understand the power and the pull of sexual addiction -- wise individuals who have been engaged in their own battle to hold us accountable, give us encouragement, and speak wisdom into our lives. While there is not much opportunity to engage with others enrolled in this course, I would encourage you to find a support group such as Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA) or Sexaholics Anonymous (SA). If there is not a group meeting in your area, there are online groups you can participate in. Information about these groups and others can be found in the Free Resources section of the course.

Another theme is the fear of losing family, job, friends, or other important parts of life. And a fourth is the shame experienced as a result of behaviors that are in conflict with one's values or faith.

Course Overview

This course relies heavily on the book Facing the Shadow, 3rd Edition, by Dr. Patrick Carnes. The work we will do together is based on a 12-Step Model, particularly Steps 1, 2, and 3. Dr. Carnes has expanded the 12 Steps to include 30 separate Tasks, listed on page 8 of Facing the Shadow. He believes that to truly accomplish the goals of the 12 Steps, these tasks are essential. They bring the 12 Steps to life for many people. The workbook and this course will guide you through the first seven of those tasks, with reading material and exercises accompanying each one. The primary goal of the book, and this course, is to help you establish sexual sobriety and begin living your life in recovery from sex and porn addiction.

Chapter 1 of Facing the Shadow is about breaking through denial. Denial can show up in many ways -- for example, a failure to understand the impact of your sexual behavior on your life and the life of those who care about you. This may look like minimizing the pain caused by your behavior, or justifying it with statements like "Everybody looks at porn" or "It's only porn, I'm not having an affair." Many, if not all, of those living in denial also live in self-delusion and lack self-awareness. To establish sobriety, a person must identify the roles denial and self-delusion are playing in their life.

Beginning Your Journey to Healthy Sexuality

There are multiple names people use to describe sexual addiction. Does it matter what we call this unwelcome part of our lives? Labels are not helpful for some people, while others find them useful. The key point is that even if you adopt a label such as sex addiction, that is only a description of what is happening in your life -- it is not who you are. If you catch the flu, you do not label yourself as "Flu." That is the way it is with sex or porn addiction. Statements like "You are just an addict" only increase shame.

On the other hand, conceptualizing what you are dealing with as an addiction can be very helpful. It describes the nature of the condition and helps clarify what is needed to find recovery. So we will use addiction language and follow the addiction model throughout this course. Remember: this is a disease, not an identity.

The Bottom Line: Do I Have an Addiction?

Has your use of porn or your sexual behavior caused problems for you in your life? PATHOS is a quick six-question quiz to assess for the potential of sex addiction. Answer these questions with a simple "Yes" or "No." Be honest with yourself. Do not let denial or self-delusion minimize your behaviors.

• Do you often find yourself preoccupied with sexual thoughts?
• Do you hide some of your sexual behavior from others?
• Have you ever sought help for sexual behavior you did not like?
• Has anyone been hurt emotionally because of your sexual behavior?
• Do you feel controlled by your sexual desire?
• When you have sex, do you feel depressed afterwards?

If you answered three or more of these questions with a "Yes," sex addiction is likely. If that is the case, do not be discouraged. Instead, think carefully about the items you said yes to and ask yourself, "What are the consequences of those behaviors?" This reflection can help you understand more clearly which behaviors are most problematic and increase your motivation to make significant changes in your life.

What About Therapy?

A good question to consider is whether to have your own therapist. Here is my recommendation: this course should supplement therapy, not replace it.

If you are working with a therapist who is not a Certified Sex Addiction Therapist (CSAT), you will gain valuable information from this course about how to fight the fight more effectively. CSAT therapists can be very helpful in the healing process. Many -- or I should say most -- individuals struggling with unwanted or harmful sexual behaviors have a history of some trauma in their life. CSAT therapists can help a person heal from the wounds of trauma and clarify how struggles with sex and porn are connected to that trauma history.

If you are already working with a CSAT, this course can supplement your work with that therapist, allowing you and your CSAT to address everyday issues that come up in your life and relationships and to move into deeper, root issues earlier in the counseling process. I also recommend reading the article "How to Use This Course in Conjunction with Therapy," found in the Free Resources section.

Access to the Course

To help you get a feel for how the course works, the first five lessons are offered free of charge. After signup, you will have access to the remainder of the course as well as multiple mini-courses. Here is what those first five lessons cover:

This lesson provides an introduction and overview. Lesson 2 focuses on recognizing self-delusion -- it helps clarify what self-delusion is and how it may be more a part of your life than you realize. In Lesson 3, we begin to face the reality of addiction by identifying the excuses commonly used to justify problematic behaviors. Lesson 4, Recognizing Denial, digs deeper into the nature of denial in your life. And in the fifth lesson, Understanding Addictive Behavior, Dr. Carnes begins to describe a model for addiction. Understanding the processes of addiction and how they work together is essential to fighting the fight effectively.

Timing of the Course

There are 36 separate lessons in the course. The slide presentations are short, with most lessons running about 15 to 20 minutes in length. However, there are reading assignments and exercises to complete in each lesson as we work our way through Facing the Shadow. Two lessons will drop each week, on Mondays and Thursdays. This pace is intentional -- you can work at a slower pace, but you cannot move more quickly than two lessons a week.

I ask you to trust me on this. Speeding through the material is admirable in the sense that you want to create change quickly and are eager to master the content. However, creating this kind of change in a person's life is not like completing a small project around the house. We are retraining the brain to live free of addiction -- the very addiction that has likely been part of your life for years. There is a strategic reason for daily work: the brain learns by repetition. Doing something every day will help keep the material on the forefront of your thinking. As you learn and continue to think about recovery, new neural pathways that are recovery-oriented will be established and strengthened by repeatedly bringing your attention back to recovery-related thoughts and behaviors.

Photo by Tim Barber

Needed Resources

To get the most out of this course, you will need a few items.

First, you will need a copy of Facing the Shadow, 3rd Edition. If you do not already have a copy, you can purchase one on Amazon by following the link provided in the course resources.

Second, a notebook for note-taking. It does not need to be fancy -- a cheap spiral-bound notebook from a grocery store or office supply store is fine. The important thing is to have a place to make notes about insights that stand out to you and action steps to follow through on.

Third, a journal. Journaling is one of the best things you can do to foster personal growth. Check your local office supply store or purchase one from Amazon. There is an example of the kind of journal I recommend if you click the link "Journal" in the course resources. I will sometimes refer to this as your "Breaking Free Journal."

Finally, privacy. Partners can at times be insistent about knowing what you are doing in your recovery work. However, Facing the Shadow includes exercises that ask questions helpful to your recovery but potentially harmful to your partner and to your relationship. Find a way to protect your work. This is not about secret-keeping -- it is about protecting your partner and your recovery. If you are working with a therapist, especially a CSAT or one with experience working with couples, that therapist can work with you so that you have a safe way to share your story with your partner when the time is right. Having your partner read your recovery work in Facing the Shadow or in your journal is one of the worst ways for your partner to find out about your sexual history.