What’s Sex Addiction? Obsession, Compulsion ≠ Addiction
Before we go deep into July’s 2021 theme, sex addiction, let’s first understand obsession and compulsion in relation to addiction.
SIMILARITIES
🔸 Obsession, compulsion and addiction are behaviors/thoughts you cannot control nor discontinue.
🔸 All three can interfere with normal, every-day life functioning.
DIFFERENCES
🔸 The path to compulsion might differ from the path to addiction. A compulsion can develop as a response to an obsession.
🔸 Compulsive behaviors are performed to get rid of the anxiety produced by an obsession.
🔸 A compulsion, as opposed to an addiction, will not feel pleasurable in itself. It will only provide a “temporary removal of anxiety.”
🔸 Addictions are about pleasurable experiences, more specifically about getting adrenaline and dopamine into your system.
Having this in mind, let’s talk terminology ⬇
Sex addiction is formally known as “compulsive sexual behavior disorder (CSBD) or hypersexuality.” CSBD “refers to a long-standing pattern of repetitive sexual behaviors, fantasies, and urges.”
🟠 What’s particular about these urges is not only that they are repetitive, but also that they may translate into difficulties in your relationships and daily tasks. “CSBD involves a variety of complex and intense unwanted sexual behaviors and fantasies that, at times, may become harmful to you and others.”
🟠 CSBD can make these urges the center of your life, potentially leading you into leaving other aspects of your life unattended.
Does everyone agree it’s a compulsive disorder? NOPE.
“It has been argued that, although sex addiction shares features of both an obsessive-compulsive and an impulse control disorder, it does not fit neatly into either category.”
Fun fact: the term “sex addiction” existed in the past in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), but around the 90’s it was taken out. Some argue it has not been incorporated again because of political and cultural reasons.
Some people are reluctant to pathologize sexual behavior between consenting adults, some others worry that sexual offenders could use such diagnosis to excuse their inappropriate behavior and avoid legal consequences.
Do you think “sex addiction” should be included again in the DSM?
Sources: Lorraine Cairns MBACP, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health and the APA Dictionary of Psychology, NHS, PsychCentral, Verywell Mind, and Robert Weiss LCSW.
