# How to address an addict in a positive manner?



## Machjo (Feb 2, 2018)

It appears to me that the spouse of an addict or a struggling addict has started most of the threads in this forum, so I figured that it might be useful to others for recovered or at least semi-recovered addicts like me to start a thread too.

Since befriending, courting, or marrying an addict or as an addict presents unique challenges that one might not face in other relationships, I'd like to invite others who have navigated such relationships successfully or at least semi-successfully to share their stories in this thread too.

Since each person and family is different, I can't prescribe anything. Instead, I'll just narrate my experiences and let you extrapolate from them whatever might apply to your particular circumstances.

I suffer alcoholism, internet addiction, and sex addiction. My sex addiction used to manifest itself mostly in the combined form of compulsive sexual avoidance and compulsive masturbation. Before meeting my wife for the first time, I'd dealt with each of these in different ways. I'd joined a circle of teetotaler friends and abstained from alcohol. I installed a screen-blocking app and a filtered browser on my smart phone. I personally use Screentime and Mobicip together, though plenty of other options exist too.

My sex addiction involved more complex mental-health problems that I dealt with in different ways. I participated in Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA). If SAA doesn't operate in your local area, you can try Sexaholics Anonymous and other twelve-step groups too. I also played a mental game with my sexual abstinence through chastity play with myself with the help of a device I'd bought from Mature Metal, though again plenty of other manufacturers produce such devices too. Though one can play such a mental game without such a device, the device helped to ritualized my sexual abstinence which helped to reinforce the mind games that I played with it.

I'd met my wife-to-be while she was visiting her cousin from abroad for three months. Once my friendship with my wife-to-be progressed to a courtship, I started to panic on a number of fronts. Firstly, I didn't want to live a lie with her: if we were to court one another, then I felt it necessary for me to open my true self to her. Secondly, due to past trauma, I feared making myself emotionally or sexually vulnerable to her in any way. Thirdly, since for me, sex deeply affected my emotional health, I needed to protect my boundaries for my own sake. Fourthly, past abuse had shattered my sense of boundaries and so made me more vulnerable to sexual, emotional, and domestic coercion and other abuse, and I very well knew it.

Not knowing how to express these concerns to her orally (mainly out of a fear that she would reject me for defending my boundaries), I decided to type up a courtship contract for her to sign. That way, I could calmly type it in the comfort of my privacy and then just present it to her for her to read and sign it. I'd presented her with a written courtship contract. The preamble revealed my past trauma (while withholding all of the details), my addictions, my emotional and sexual vulnerabilities and weaknesses (again without the details), my fear that she might try to coerce me into violating or reject me for defending my boundaries, my desire that she reject me rather than violate or try to coerce me into violating my boundaries, my recognition that I still needed to learn to defend my boundaries, and that neither of us had any obligation towards the other until we married. It then specified that I was not to fornicate with anyone and that she was not to fornicate with me (which I'll explain below), that we were to abstain from any physical touching between one another other than by taking hands when the other consents to it, that we were never to share a bedroom before marriage, that we were not to engage in any flirting or sexual conversation with one another, that we were not to marry before a specified date more than one year into the future, that we were not to marry without the express consent of our parents, and that we were not to announce our marriage more than ninety-five days before the wedding. The contract ended with an understanding that her rejecting the terms of the contract would end the courtship but not necessarily our friendship.

She found it odd that the contract explicitly banned me but not her from fornicating with anyone else and she asked me about it. I explained that if she did, though it could end our courtship, it would not necessarily end our friendship as long as she'd respected my own boundaries. I elaborated that, if she absolutely needed sex before I was ready, I'd rather she seek it from someone else than that she seek it from me with the risk of traumatizing me later. She found my use of the word to seem strong, so I revealed the basics of my past trauma (again while withholding the details) to emphasize my emotional and sexual vulnerability towards her and that for my own well being, I'd rather she walk away than violate my boundaries.

She also found it strange that I insisted on our parents' consent. I explained that I couldn't handle the stress of conflict between us and our parents.

She found it strange but to my delight, she agreed to sign the contract. Happily for me, she also had to return home shortly after signing the contract, and so this allowed us to develop an online courtship. Honestly, we both thought that the courtship and maybe even the friendship would die out from the distance. Though I shared a common language with her and her parents, she did not share a common language with my parents.

During the course of our courtship, I discussed additional rules with her. She was to respect my freedom to choose to not consume alcohol, to use screen-blocking apps and filtered browsers on my smart phone, and to engage in chastity play between myself and the chastity device. That last one she found particularly bizarre and it needed considerable explanation. I explained how I used chastity play as a mind game to manage my sexual abstinence and the device to ritualize it. That worried her and she asked if I'd cheat on her without that. I explained that I probably wouldn't but that since I'd been using chastity play to manage my abstinence for so long, that one could say that I'd developed an addiction to the chastity play itself; but that I found any compulsive use of chastity play to not harm me in any way.

She later revealed that she too suffered from past trauma and asked me to understand her if she should ever snap at me.

To both of our surprises, the courtship flourished online until I'd eventually visited her and her parents in her home country and she returned to visit mine and we married over three years ago now.

In the last three years, she has truly supported me and I her. She's sometimes snapped at me but has been quick to apologize and, as promised, I always responded to it with understanding. She never did it often to begin with but now does it even less. Since our marriage, I've learnt that she kicks me in her sleep sometimes too, though that too has become ever rarer over time.

I think what has helped us has been a combination of my doing whatever I've had to do to manage my addictions and my wife lovingly understanding and respecting my freedom to do so.


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## WilliamM (Mar 14, 2017)

Impressive.

Stay well.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

What I see in your post is the thing that matters the most.. YOU, the addict, are the one who decided it was time for you to deal with your demons and you did it.

That's the only way it works. I give you a lot of credit for what you've done.


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