Unofficial Couples Ü

Stage 4 - Addicted.

Stage 4 – Addicted.

“Romance, with or without sex, encourages personal growth as each new relationship forces new insights and self knowledge. The beginning stages of a potential love relationship can be intense and exciting. Most people easily relate to that "rush" of first love and romance; the stuff of songs, endless greeting cards and warm memories. Healthy intimacy, however, is characterized by more than romance, intensity and sex. Intimacy evolves over time. Loving relationships develop partially through utilizing those first exhilarating times to begin to build a bridge toward deeper, longer term closeness.

It can be difficult for anyone who is not a love or sex addict to understand how love or sexuality can be exploited or evolve into destructive patterns of addiction and compulsion. Yet for the Love and Sex Addict, romantic love, sexuality and the closeness they offer, are experiences most often filled with pitfalls, anxiety and pain. Living in a sometimes chaotic emotional world of desperation and despair, fearful of being alone or rejected, the Love Addict endlessly longs for that "special" relationship.”

“As the love and sex addict recovers, they begin to discover themselves in new and unexpected ways. Time formerly put into flirtation and 'the hunt', now may go into family involvement and work. Creativity formerly used to seduce or attract now goes into hobbies, self-care and healthy relationship exploration. This self-redefinition allows the love and sex addict to have a much clearer understanding of healthy partnerships. As the single person begins to really recover and their self esteem and understanding improves, so does their choice of dating and romantic partners. No longer willing to take anyone who might have them or give him or her away, they begin to develop clear criteria (often written down) of the type of partners they wish to engage. Recovery for the coupled person brings a deeper understanding of their emotional needs and wants in their partnership, encouraging them to take more intimacy risks in their relationships. As hope and honesty slowly replace despair and superficiality, the recovery process brings about a deepening maturity and sense of choice that the addict may have never previously known.”

 Excerpt from

Robert Weiss LCSW

Copyright 1998

By permission