137. The Addiction People Are Too Scared To Talk About (Part 1) Ft. Patrick Eilers

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello everyone and welcome back to the A Word to
the Wise podcast, a space wherewe curate conversations around
mind, body, spirit and personaldevelopment.
I'm your host, shumi Moses.
Before we get into today's show, I want to take this moment to
let you know that this episodeis not suitable for minors
because we'll be touching onsensitive topics.

(00:20):
So if you're listening to thisepisode on speaker, if you're in
a car driving and a minor ispresent, please make sure that
you take this episode offspeaker or listen to it at a
different time when the minor isnot present.
Okay, so on the show today isPatrick Eilers.
Patrick is a master's levelcondition, receiving his degree
from Moody Theological Seminary,michigan.

(00:42):
He works at the intersection ofpsychology therapy and theology
.
He's also a licensedprofessional counselor in the
state of Michigan and has beenworking in the field of
psychology since 2016 and as aspecialist in the field of
sexual addiction since 2020.
He is a member of the AmericanCounseling Association.
Patrick also has a professionallife code certification.

(01:04):
He is also a Green Cross memberof Traumatology.
He is part of the MichiganCounselors Association and the
American Association ofChristian Counselors.
So today's conversation is partone of a two part series where
we dive into porn and sexaddiction.
This addiction is a prettycommon addiction but yet nobody

(01:25):
really talks about it, mainlybecause there's a lot of shame
around this addiction and a lotof people are not forthcoming
about it because a lot of peoplemight shun them or think that
they're weird.
According to psychology, todayage 13, on average, is when most
people watch porn for the firsttime.
For most boys and an increasingnumber of girls, it's the

(01:46):
beginning of a lifelong habit.
Around 80% of men and 30% ofwomen consume porn weekly.
So again, this is a very commonaddiction that most people deal
with, but nobody's reallytalking about it and nobody's
really talking about theresources out there for people
who are struggling with it.
That's why I thought it wasvery important to have a

(02:07):
specialist come on the show whospecializes in porn and sex
addiction, to talk more aboutthe addiction, how it affects
people, how it affectsrelationships, and to also offer
guidance and resources on howto overcome this addiction if
you find yourself strugglingwith it.
So in my conversation withPatrick, we discuss what causes

(02:28):
porn addiction, how to tell ifyou're a sex addict and or a
porn addict, how social mediaaffects or promotes porn
addiction, how therapy can helpwith recovery, how emotions and
mental health correlate tocompulsive sexual behaviors, how
porn addiction affects romanticrelationships and how faith and
religion play a role inrecovery, and much more.

(02:49):
This was a very insightfulconversation with Patrick.
I hope that you learned fromthis conversation and, if you
are struggling with thisaddiction, I hope that this
conversation offers you guidanceand you can find some resources
to help you move through thisaddiction.
Here's my conversation withPatrick.
Patrick, welcome to A Word tothe Wise.

(03:25):
It's really nice to have you onthe show.
You're a licensed professionalcounselor and a lot of your work
is at the intersection ofpsychology therapy and theology.
I was very fascinated by thetheology aspect because I
haven't come across a lot ofmental health professionals who
add that as an element to theirwork or therapeutic approach.

(03:49):
I'm curious to know why addingtheology as part of your
approach towards mental healthservices is important to you.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
Absolutely.
Thank you, jimmy, for having metoday.
That's a great question andit's something that is
absolutely part of my a littlebit, mostly the educational
background I went to.
I graduated from MoodyTheological Seminary in Michigan
, which is associated with MoodyTheological in Chicago.
The background of our programis really about trying to bring

(04:22):
yes, there's a mental healthcomponent to things, but also
bring the spiritual componentinto that and emerging those.
I found with me that it's alittle bit more of my
perspective on how to helppeople or how we get to certain
or arrive to certain things inmental health.
I think the other side of thattoo is that, also as an
extension to what I do forclients coming in who are

(04:43):
interested in exploring thataspect of more about their life
or about their relationship withGod and those kind of things, I
think that's really where youcan add that as an extension, as
far as helping people makesense of not only their physical
place and some things we knowfrom science, but also then
going back to the theologicalcomponent, is that ultimately
all comes back to where we putour faith and where does our

(05:04):
faith stand within our life andthose kind of things.
It is nice to have thatperspective, but again, it's
kind of something really it'sclient to client, because I
usually try to let that be inthe client's hands as far as how
far they would like to go withthat.
So, but certainly part of mybackground of education.

Speaker 1 (05:23):
That makes sense, that you'd kind of put it in the
client's hand and see ifthey're comfortable with that
aspect of your work.
So why specialize in sex andporn addiction recovery
Something that a lot of peopleare struggling with but it's not
a space where I see a lot ofmental health professionals kind
of specialize in.

(05:43):
So what led you to specializingin that form of addiction
recovery?

Speaker 2 (05:49):
Absolutely.
Yeah, the biggest thing youknow, kind of going back to, you
got to go back in time a littlebit here to 2020, and during
the pandemic I was working at astartup clinic and so I was kind
of more of a generalpractitioner.
I've been a generalpractitioner most of my career
until I came here to North Point, and when I had an opportunity
to come here, the way I saw itwas that, you know, there was a

(06:11):
lot of different.
There's a big need for thisparticular type of help for
folks.
Right, this is, you know,beyond just the church.
There's a lot of part of thisin the culture.
That's absolutely been.
A lot of people are sufferingwith it.
They don't even know it or theyalso maybe even I'm sure how to
necessarily get help in thatway.
So there's a very there's alsovery few therapists, like you
mentioned, who are specializingin.

(06:32):
So I felt like this is anopportunity.
I see a need.
Let me see if I can meet thatneed and see kind of how that's
gone.
So that was almost four yearsago, so now I have an
opportunity.
Since then that I've really beenlearning a lot about.
You know how to help people,not only with the addiction
piece, but then also in theirown life, kind of what is
healthy, what's unhealthy,sexuality and that kind of idea.
And I know for even from my ownexperience, like what it really

(06:53):
does that look like throughoutmy life growing up and there was
a period in my life wherecertainly adolescents and early,
early, you know, youngadulthood, I struggled with porn
too.
So I was in that same kind ofboat.
I kind of know what people havegone through with that aspect.
So I did have some relationalconnection in that way my own
story.
But then also just to knowing,seeing this is a need and
knowing, you know, hey, likewhen there's a need, if I can
meet that need, let me use theskills that God gave me.

(07:14):
Maybe I'll do that.
So that's kind of where I waswanting to step into that space
as far as you know, being ableto specialize in it.

Speaker 1 (07:22):
Do you have a number in terms of the amount of men
that suffer from sex and pornaddiction and or not number, but
I should say statistic on thenumber of men that suffer with
porn addiction versus women,because when I hear of sex or
porn addiction it's usually menthat comes to mind with who

(07:48):
struggle with that type ofaddiction, but I presume women
are also affected by this.

Speaker 2 (07:53):
Oh, absolutely and there's, there's more, it's
growing that there's more womenthat are starting to suffer with
it Absolutely and thereprobably has always been to some
degree.
It's just usually in the pastit was more what they called
love addiction or morerelational addiction rather than
necessarily the porn piece ormaybe even, like you know,
multiple, you know relationships, that kind of thing.

(08:14):
Majority of the people I workwith are men, for number one
because I'm a man, so a lot ofmen feels comfortable talking
with men.
So our man, so that's themajority of why I have mostly
men and then and then I know,but other colleagues here that
work they do have in thepractice.
They are a lot of.
Some are female colleagues andthey work with other women, so
we do have women that do come in.

(08:34):
It's not as predominantly, likeyou said, mostly known for
being kind of a man's particular, you know, concern, but they're
also women who are strugglingwith it too.
Statistic wise, I mean I'vekind of looked at some different
things that I don't have anypersonal like immediate
statistics I can tell you thatmost of the majority of all my
clients are that I work with aremen.

(08:54):
But I've found in the MayoClinic about in 2019, their
research was about 68% of thepopulation.
In the United States, about 24million people are considered to
be sex addicts.
Now, whether or not thatactually means that they're
diagnosably addictive, that'sone that's here and there,
because ultimately it's probablymore than 24 million people are
struggling with some type ofcompulsive sexual behavior.

(09:17):
So, again, going back to either, whatever your masturbation,
pornography use, whatever thecase might be, so there we also
don't know a lot of this.
Also from the perspective ofthere's a lot of people who
don't report, so we also.
There's a perspective of peoplethat the 68% seems a little low
to me just because there's alot of people that don't report.
So there's probably much higherthan that.
But there are sort ofstatistics for based on anybody

(09:38):
who is watching pornography 11plus hours a week, and it can
vary, you know, depends onpeople's stories, but certainly
that aspect of usually being aweekly or daily use user of
pornography or unhealthy sexualbehavior of any kind is pretty
common.
So from that perspective, tohave that number be 68% seems a
little bit low, and it's also2019.

(09:59):
So the stats are not superrecent, but the most recent I
could find.

Speaker 1 (10:05):
That makes a lot of sense where you said a lot of
people are not reporting theiraddiction to pornography or sex
because there's a lot of shamethat goes, or there's a lot of
shame that comes with it, andthat maybe a lot of people are
not even aware that it's anaddiction, and I want to talk
about that a little bit later.
But I want to know the sexaddiction and porn addiction.

(10:28):
Do they go hand in hand?
I'm sure some people have pornand sex addiction, but are they
categorized differently?
Are they the same thing or arethey?
Do they have two differentcharacteristics?

Speaker 2 (10:45):
I wouldn't say they have different characteristics.
I think the one way I wouldlook at it is that I always
think a compulsive sexualbehavior is am I using sex in a
way that is to their cope withsomething that's going on with
my life, deal with unhealthy ormaybe uncomfortable emotions in
my life?
Using sex in a way that'sself-serving would be another

(11:07):
way of kind of put that in thatsense.
So basically I'm using sex askind of the vessel, similarly to
you might see with alcohol ordrugs or something like that,
where you're still getting awayfrom that particular, your
particular emotions you'retrying to avoid.
So there's that aspect of thatthat's certainly at play.
The one difference between kindof porn and sex addiction a

(11:29):
little bit is that porn canescalate.
People's behavior doesn'tnecessarily mean it's going to,
but sometimes it does so.
Sometimes what you'll see ispeople will start watching porn.
Eventually they'll turn in,translate into other unhealthy
sexual behavior.
Sometimes it's the other wayaround.
Sometimes you have the set.
The sex addiction is alsoanother way people act out with
porn.
So I wouldn't say theycorrelate, but it may be a maybe

(11:51):
a sort of a spectrum if youthink about in that way.
So on one side.
You kind of have fantasy sexand then all the way down to
what they call exploitative sex.
You kind of a large range ofbehaviors, and so certainly porn
fit, falls into that category.
That that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (12:05):
Yes, what you said makes a lot of sense and, as you
were talking, I couldn't helpbut think about what triggers
potential sex or porn addictionwithin people, and I know that
you mostly work with men.
So what are some of the reasonsthat you're seeing them develop
these addictions?
Is it related to self esteem?

(12:27):
Is it some sort of trauma thatthey had to endure?
What are some common threatsthat you've noticed as to what
could be trigger points forpeople who develop these sex
important addictions?

Speaker 2 (12:41):
Yeah, absolutely so.
There are probably about 10things 10 you want to call them
symptoms we would typically lookfor.
What I will say is I want totouch on a few of those because
they're very there.
Some are kind of common forfolks and some are not so common
folks, depending on their story.
I think when I matter of it'smen or women.
There's the first part of it isyou know, how early was your

(13:02):
exposure to sex, meaning, howearly did you start to
experience either porn orviewing some type of material,
eroticism, erotic, like eroticstories, those kind of things?
A lot of folks nowadays,especially with the way the
Internet is and the way we havea lot of these connections with
with the Internet, is that thiscan be starting.
For some folks that is reallyis five and six years old.

(13:23):
When you have an exposure, itdoesn't mean that you're going
to be clinically diagnosable asbeing an addict at five years
old, but it means that you'regoing to be starting to have an
exposure at that age.
That that's something that'scommon for people.
So we do see a lot of this,this early exposure for folks,
that something.
Again, it could be that you ranacross pornography accidentally
, could be that youintentionally with that, but the

(13:43):
reality is you have some typeof early exposure that tends to
make a like a thumb.
If you think a thumb print in apaper, right, that's when you
put ink on your thumb and youpress against that paper, that's
a pretty good thing and theearlier ages, the earlier ages
have that imprint that's goingto stick with us.
So that's a.
Really that's a pretty bigimpact.
That first impact we've had.
Nothing that we look for is,again, you mentioned abuse

(14:05):
scenarios and sometimes that ispart of people's story and
fortunately people have some hadsome type of an abuse in their
story.
Doesn't necessarily mean that,again, that that's for everybody
or everybody's story, butcertainly part of some people's
experiences.
And our thing we might look foris that they come from a
background that it's very rigid,very the structure of the
family is very rigid and so sexis something that's not talked
about.
So it's almost.

(14:26):
On one side of the extreme isthat you're kept, it's kept
under wraps so much that there'sa there's a curiosity to that,
there's a wanting to know moreabout it, and so that kind of
leads them into this behavior.
On the other side of pointing atpeople who were overexposed to
have.
People on the other side werevery early on Porn's accepted
porn's normalized, just like theperson who may be struggling
with alcohol is the same kind ofthing.
If the home life is theiralcohol is normalized, they're
gonna probably be prettycomfortable on alcohol, just

(14:46):
like they would be a brown pornif that's part of their
experience.
So those are a few things youmight look for it.
The other one that I would alsosay is that they've had some
type of so in that earlyexposure aspect there are, you
know what has been some ratherrelational things that are going
on, especially when you talkabout, you know, unhealthy
sexual behavior.
You know as far as masturbationgoes, it's sex with yourself.

(15:08):
So you know how sex is definedvery early for folks is a big
part of also kind of thatdevelopment of how you see it,
what it looks like for you, howyou know what that is, those
kind of things.
So that's that's an.
Our part of it, I would say, isa.
It's kind of in that, in thatsame range of things that we
typically look for.
You also believe that a lot ofpeople are not aware of sexual
behavior.

Speaker 1 (15:29):
You also believe that a lot of people who struggle
with this type of addiction, doyou think it's also related to
self esteem issues?
I know we talked a lot aboutearly exposure and potentially
growing up in a very rigidhousehold.
I know some people who grow upin a very rigid household,

(15:50):
really, especially a very rigidreligious household, and they're
basically told that any sort ofsexual thought or impulse is
really wrong.
So they have to kind of holdthat within themselves.
But I mean, they end up findingit, they end up using point as
an outlet to express that.
But do you also find thatpeople who develop this

(16:13):
addiction have issues in termsof relating to other people, in
terms of romantic interest, orpotentially have self esteem
issues?
So it's just easier for them toturn to something on the
computer rather than actuallyinteract with a regular person?
Absolutely, yeah.

Speaker 2 (16:31):
So belief system is huge.
So belief system of in regardsto what do I think about myself?
How do I think about you?
Know where do I fall if you'retalking about kind of a
religious aspect or theologicalaspect.
You know where do I fall within.
How does God see me?
You know what some of thosekind of things I think
absolutely from the perspectiveof you.
Know, if my, if I don't thinkI'm worthy that's the one that
comes up quite a bit Right, I'mnot worthy, if I don't feel like

(16:55):
I'm worthy and probably notgoing to do the things are going
to be healthy for me because mythought life is going to be
affected by that.
I tell people all the time thatyour thought life has really got
a lot to do with what yourbehavior is going to be, and so
there's two parts to working onthings.
One is what am I thinking about?
And then how's that translatinginto what I'm doing?
And so, ultimately, my thoughtlife is a big part of why I
might be acting out.
If I think a lot verynegatively about myself, or I

(17:15):
really earlier you mentioned theshame, if I will shame about
myself, I'm going to be focusedon that particular thought and
I'm probably going to morelikely do unhealthy things in
that way.
I think the other thing youmentioned as well is really,
really I see this is more of ayounger folks but certainly the
idea that why would I want torisk having a relationship with
somebody who could hurt me, whenI could just go over here and

(17:36):
get my needs met.
You know whether or not that'sin hookup culture or if that's
in pornography, because I don'tknow what I'm going to do, or if
that's in pornography, becauseI don't need to have a
relationship with anybody.
So I close myself off to that.
Intimacy is really about beingall like completely known by
somebody else, and so theexample I give is the old show
home improvement that Tim Allen,his neighbor, had this really

(17:56):
high fence and part of thecomedy was that you can only see
the guy's eyes.
So it was like this, and that'sa reflection of, to some degree
, a person doesn't want to beintimate, right?
They don't really want anyoneto know what's going on in their
yard and they don't want tokeep completely isolated by
themselves.
So typically what happens iswhen people want to be that way,
they tend to sort of try tofind the way they're going to

(18:17):
meet their needs, because we allhave needs in that sense, to be
relational beings that's evercreated to be so.
When we're not getting thatneed, that ends up creating a
lot of isolation, loneliness.
That you said, self esteemconcerns beliefs that I'm not
worthy again, kind of going backto that and so what we see for
a lot of folks is that that is adriving force for people why
they might choose to act out,because, again, to risk being

(18:38):
with somebody else is a risk,and a lot of people feel that
pornography is this safe spacefor them to be able to express
what they're feeling with theirthinking.
And look how let that out, butall that really does is it
alters your mind to thinkingthat sex is now about you, right
?
Sex is completely aboutyourself rather than being about
a relationship, and so you'reunfulfilled.
And you continue to beunfulfilled as you as the

(18:59):
further you go down that trail.

Speaker 1 (19:01):
So the nature of the world that we currently live in
definitely promotes a lot of.
It creates a lot of opportunityfor people to turn to
pornography or addiction Ratherthan actually work hard to make
those connections.

(19:21):
I saw a recent statistic thatsaid that porn use skyrocketed
during COVID 2019 or COVID 19,when everybody was at home and
under a lot of stress and notreally getting a lot of those
social interactions.
So that makes a lot of senseand, as you were talking, I kind
of want to dive deeper intowhat are some traits.

(19:44):
If I was listening to thisepisode and I'm trying to figure
out, am I just randomly hookingup with people because I think
it's fun, versus is thisactually a problem?
And I have some sort ofaddiction, whether it's watching
too much pornography or hookingup with tons of different
people?
How can I tell the differencebetween exploring sex or

(20:09):
sexuality versus oh, this isactually a problem?

Speaker 2 (20:14):
And I get this question a lot and it's it's
somewhat tough to kind of putinto into sort of a you know.
Here's the things you look foras far as because a lot of times
for a lot of people, especiallyif they really truly are
struggling, they're usually in alot of denial, they're usually
very minimizing the behavior,they tend to sort of think it's
not affecting anybody.
You know, even if it isaffecting anybody, it's only
affecting me, like we talkedabout earlier.

(20:35):
If I don't have a lot of selfesteem or a lot of belief that
I'm worthy, I'm probably goingto try to avoid again.
It's not going to affect mewhether or not I'm doing this
for five hours or for, you know,five days.
So I would say is back to kindof the hookup ideas.
Yes, there is an aspect forpeople you know certainly want
to explore the relationships andunderstand that and I think the
part of it where I would goback to is that, yes, are my

(20:55):
just getting together for thesex or am I really legitimately
trying to find a way to connectwith somebody?
So, going back to that riskidea, how much am I willing to
risk in these relationships oram I just sort of putting myself
in a position where this girlor this guy is really hot and so
I really want to get to getwith them sexually, feel good
and kind of move on.
And so I think there iscertainly a cultural trap of

(21:16):
that where the idea is thatright like dating is not like.
There's.
No, there's not a lot ofcourtship and dating anymore.
People don't try to pursuerelationships for connection.
They pursue, hey, this person'sattractive, I feel good around
them, and that's pretty much thedepth of what that looks like.
So part of it is, I think youknow what, what, what really,
ultimately, is your, your goalof dating or your goal of going
out and looking for arelationship?

(21:37):
Are you looking to findsomebody to really connect with
and be more vulnerable with?
Are you being more vulnerable?
In that processes you get toknow more people.
I think the other part of thatis I was going to go back to
thought life.
You know how much am I thinkingabout sex, how much am I
thinking about that porn that Iwatch, how much am I
objectifying the people aroundme.
I hear all the time peoplereported on a regular basis that

(21:58):
preoccupation, which is thosethoughts that we cannot break
from those same fantasies thatare rolling in our head.
You know, the person we seejogging down the road, or the
person we see at the grocerystore, or the person that's the
coworker, whatever those peopleare, just they keep playing.
You know, to use a use, aphrase the kids use, right?
So let's live it in my head,rent free, right?

(22:20):
So it's keep keeps just playingaround in my mind.
And so, because I'm not able tobreak from that, that's where
I'm gonna probably be much morewilling to fantasize about stuff
that I'm gonna look for online.
So that's going to probablydrive me more into pornography
or pornographic material.
Again, social media plays a rolein that as well, because a lot
of stuff that's on social mediawhich is not meant to be sexual

(22:41):
is sexualized.
I mean, I can.
I mean you go Instagram, youlook up anything about hiking.
Most of those hiking things,even though they're not meant to
be sexual, have a sexualizedmaterial in them to some degree,
whether it be the clothes,whether it be the pop poses,
whatever might be.
So one of the things I think weneed to consider in that as
well as that.
Okay, so if, if I've said Idon't want to do this behavior
anymore, but I continue tocompulsively do it.

(23:03):
I feel sad, I feel anxious, Ifeel whatever, and then I'm
going to respond by going andacting out, using porn or
finding someone to fill thatvoid.
That's an ever, never endingpit that I cannot fill up and so
, no matter how many times I dothat, I'm never going to be able
to be satisfied.
If you're going to talk aboutearlier and so those would be
maybe some things if you'retalking about kind of signposts

(23:24):
of you know there's apossibility that this is
something that's going down apath that's going to end up
being unhealthy for you in thelong run and then ultimately,
you know, kind of going back to,like the relational piece.
Do I see relationships, as youknow, self-serving or do I see
them, as you know, opportunitiesfor vulnerability and
connection?
I think that's where you talkabout in that aspect.
Like you said, unhealthy sexualbehavior almost always is

(23:47):
self-serving.

Speaker 1 (23:50):
It's interesting that you said that a lot of what we
see online now is so sexualized,and I could not agree more.
I mean, even things that are notsupposed to be sexy are super
sexy and you know, I thinkhaving this critique sometimes
could come off as if you'retrying to be super conservative

(24:14):
with your ideas, because we'redefinitely living in an era of
soul liberation, people beingable to express themselves.
But I do think that it's done alittle bit too much and I think,
as a young person on socialmedia, I could not imagine

(24:35):
certain images or being exposedto certain things as a teenager
or an adolescent, right, and Ithink a lot of young people, a
lot of kids, a lot of teenagersjust really exposed to
hyper-sexualized content,whether it's covertly or

(24:58):
explicitly, just in your face.
So I do think that plays a hugerole and you know to your point
in terms of characteristics ofpeople, kind of using sex or
porn as a way to avoid intimaterelationships, as kind of like a
guidepost of okay, thispotentially could be a problem.
It also makes me think aboutpeople who are in relationships

(25:20):
with people who struggle withsex addiction and porn addiction
, and I kind of want to talk alittle bit more about.
How does this type of addictionaffect relationships?

Speaker 2 (25:33):
Yeah, and this is something where you know.
So I'm going to speak to what Iknow from my experience on the
one side of it.
I mean, I'm not a partnertrauma specialist, but that
would be the terminology wewould use right?
So when you're a partner who'sbeen betrayed whether or not it
be a physical relationship orit's, you know, pornography a
lot of the same results happenfor the partner.
So one of the things thathappens for partners typically

(25:55):
is they will start to experiencevery similar to PTSD or
actually diagnosable PTSDsymptomology.
So I'll give you some examples.
So the one thing is what theycall hypervigilance.
Hypervigilance is just a fancyterm for detective work or kind
of sort of focusing on thedetails or trying to find out
where the person catch theperson in a lie, almost in some
ways, right.

(26:15):
So if I am betraying my partner, my partner is going to come
very hyper focused on what am Ilying about?
What am I not lying about?
That's one aspect of it.
In some ways, the partneractually becomes almost obsessed
with the behavior themselvesand they become hyper focused on
people around them as well,right, so they're looking for
all the danger you know sort ofpeople around them that can
potentially.
You know their partner that hasjust betrayed them is focusing

(26:39):
on.
So you see a lot of these typeof play out.
They play off one another, onethat went in a really negative
way.
The examples I give I give thereare two examples I think about.
The first one is you knowrelationships at fish tank.
So we've got a bunch of livingorganisms in the fish tank and
if you put water in the fishtank, that's what's going to
keep everything alive.
When you introduce a betrayal,you just drop the couple drops

(27:01):
of red food coloring in thewater.
The water now is red.
This relationship, in order forit to move forward, continue in
a healthier, regardless way, ifit's going to continue, you
have to learn how to adapt withthe red water, and so a lot of
times, what people look happensis partners will say to their
partner who's betrayed them.
Hey, you go talk to Patrick andyou work out your stuff.
I'm not interested in doing anytherapy.

(27:22):
I'm not interested in doinganything.
This isn't my problem.
In some ways they're correctabout that, but in other ways
they've been affected bysomething that they may not even
be aware of, and so one of thethings for partners is that
we're always very encouragingthat this is something that's
now relational.
It's not just the person who'sstruggling with the addiction,
this is something that is nowaffecting the partner most
likely, and in order for therelation to move forward, they

(27:44):
have to come together and workon that together.
The other thing I think aboutthe analogy I used for partner
trauma is you know a person whogoes through some type of PTSD.
You know they don't know wheretheir mind is going to take them
.
So I think about if you'restanding on top of the Hoover
Dam and the Hoover Dam bursts,you're going to go, the river is
going to take you someplace.
You had no idea where you weregoing to go, and so that's

(28:06):
what's like kind of to somedegree in your mind to go down
this river, that you have noidea where it's going to take
you, and so all you're doing istrying to grab onto something to
get to some solid ground.
And that's what a lot ofpartners are trying to do.
They're trying to grab ontosome level of reality, because
they don't really know whatreality is, because for some
people they may have been, youknow, betraying them for years.
It could be you know five, 10,12, 15 years that this is

(28:28):
happening and they're justtrying to get some level of
reality.
So this really is somethingthat's all encompassing in the
relationship, and it's very rarethat we see a partner not be
affected in some to some degreeby some type of betrayal whether
or not be some pornography orextramarital fair or extra fair
outside the primary relationship.

Speaker 1 (28:49):
Right, so it sounds like what you're saying.
In order for them to kind ofmove forward, they have to work
through the addiction together.
The partner who does not havethe addiction, if they want to
stay in a relationship, has tosupport the partner who's
struggling with that in orderfor them to move forward but

(29:11):
also potentially recognize theirPTSD or how they're suffering
from this new reality of theirpartner Having this addiction.

Speaker 2 (29:20):
Yeah, so I wouldn't.
I don't know if I'd use theword support the addiction.
I think so.
I know what you're saying.
I think they have.
There has to be a recognitionand an acceptance that this is
something that now is in ourrelationship.
But as a partner, are youwilling, are you willing,
against the question I ask allthe time Are you willing to then
go and learn about you and howthis has affected you?

(29:41):
It's not fair, it's not, it'snot right, it's not correct.
We understand it.
There's a lot of things thereand not to minimize it, but as a
partner, now, what can youlearn about how you're being
affected by this behavior?
Once that process is, onceyou're starting to do that
process and your partner iswilling to do recovery or
willing to do some type of workon themselves, there comes a

(30:03):
point where typically what weand again I'm not part of these,
but we do hit them here at thepractice is what they call
disclosure process, and sothat's really an opportunity to
for the addict, so to speak, orthe betrayer, to lay all that
out there, and again, it's donevery therapeutically, it's done
in a way that is very respectfulfor both the partner and for

(30:24):
the addict, and so, again,that's something to help again
build reality.
You need evidence, as the personwho's been lying, that you are
now telling the truth, and sohow are you going to do that?
And so there's a process tothat in some degree.
So one of the things is that wewant the relationship to be
healed, but the relationshipcannot necessarily be healed
right after betrayal by justgoing to a couple's counselor

(30:46):
and saying, hey, we got someissues we got to work out A lot
of times.
And again, this is no knock onour therapist, but if you're not
trained in understandingpartner trauma, you're going to
work and I say this also work,have a work with couples.
You're going to be looking forstuff that is not going to
necessarily be the right toolsto help.
And so it's really importantfor both the person who's
struggling with addiction and aperson who's betrayed to look

(31:09):
for therapists that are going tobe able to help address those
specific behaviors, becauseother therapists you know, when
I was a general practitioner,same kind of thing I wouldn't
have been able to mostadequately help a person in that
sense.

Speaker 1 (31:23):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
I've also heard aboutsituations where people who are
dating people struggling withsuch addictions they end up
suffering with severeself-esteem issues because the
partner, who has either sex orporn addiction, is kind of
projecting this image ofimperfection with how their

(31:45):
partner looks.
Because they're looking at youknow images or they're probably
hooking up with people whoappear to have the perfect body
or have certain characteristics.
All of a sudden they'reprojecting that onto their
actual partner and the partnerin the situation starts to feel
really bad about themselves andfeeling really unloved and

(32:07):
unwanted and I think throughtherapy some might discover that
it's not about them, it's aboutthe addiction.

Speaker 2 (32:17):
And just to speak to that too, there's sometimes that
you know again why people areacting out.
I think a lot of times becausethe way the brain changes,
you're become very self-focused.
You can't see how it'saffecting other people.
Part of that's the denial wewere talking about earlier, and
so one of the things I thinkthat comes up sometimes for
folks is that a partner or evenan addict might feel like well,
it's, you know, I'm just aselfish person, I can't really

(32:40):
think about our people, I can'tbe empathetic.
When, when a lot of times it'sabout either learning some of
those we talked about theintimacy piece.
If you don't have a lot ofpractice with that, you're not
gonna know how to have thatskill or you know the empathy is
a skill, so you can learn howto do that, you know as you work
through therapy.
But part of what I think comesup a lot of times is people feel
that they're just selfish andagain back for a partner, like

(33:01):
Again that you said thecomparison is huge, right?
So now the comparison I'm notgood enough, and so now you have
two people who are strugglingwith some type of worthiness and
self-esteem in the relationship.
So it definitely snowballs andit's something I think that you
know.
People I I would say a lot ofpeople don't really realize how
much it impacts both parties.

Speaker 1 (33:17):
For sure, Is talk therapy Effective when it comes
to helping people get over thisaddiction?

Speaker 2 (33:24):
I Think in the right context.
So again we what we have at ourpractice on part of an
outpatient recovery program.
So what that means is that wekind of a three-pronged approach
it's.
It's based on a programdeveloped by a man named Dr
Patrick Carnes and he is a kindof the world-renowned, he's kind
of the original guy who did alot of research when it came to

(33:48):
sex addiction.
His research started in the 80sand so he's developed a lot of
programs around sex addiction.
So our program really is the.
His program has threeapproaches to it.
So you have the individual work,which is, you know, working
one-on-one with the therapist.
You have a group that's part ofthat, a recovery group, what
they call a process group, andthat group is a little bit

(34:08):
different than like a fellowship, like a 12-step it's.
It's therapist led and it'sworking through some of the
material together as a group.
And so you're starting to buildthose interpersonal
relationships with this group.
And then also usually asponsors include an ass sponsors
, somebody who's gonna kind ofmentor the person one-on-one in
the program.
So you have kind of therapist,they'll end of it.
You have the group.
Then you have kind ofpracticing the relationship

(34:29):
aspect to me too.
So there is some talk involvedin that there.
Obviously, as you knowconversations we're having and
you know we're trying to get toa deeper root there.
But it's not the traditionaltype of talk therapy from the
perspective of the person comesin and we go okay, what's our
roadmap?
And kind of the program is sortof our roadmap, right, so
there's gonna be certain tasks.
We're gonna.
We're gonna be working on.

(34:49):
Dr Kern's program is what theycall a 30-task model, meaning
that 12-step program is 12 steps, the 30 tasks is 30 tasks.
It's 30 steps basically.
So you have a much deeperProgram so it's much longer.
Usually is it's gonna involvemuch deeper work in that sense.
So that's kind of you know itdoes, it is effective, but it's

(35:09):
effective in the right context.
I think if you just go to, youknow and again all respect to
all our therapists, I've workedwith our people out there you
know if you go to see theaverage therapist, general
practitioner, they're probablynot gonna recommend that type of
route and they're probably justgonna kind of work on the
typical type talk, talk, therapytype thing.
So you might not be able tohave the same amount of effect

(35:29):
as you would be if you'reworking with a specialist.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
That means a lot of things.
I spoke with another therapistout of New Zealand, dr Luke
Smuski, and we briefly touchedon it.
He's a somatic therapist and heactually works with a lot of
meant struggle with Cornedictionas well, and he, his approach,
is more on the somatic side oftherapy, which is body based

(35:56):
therapy, if I'm describing thatcorrectly.
So that's part of the reason Iasked and I also, you know,
wanted to know do you considerthis type of addiction a disease
?
Because I hear people talk inGeneral, I've heard the term
that or I've heard the sayingthat addiction is a disease,
once an addict, always an addict.

(36:17):
I Find I struggle with thatbecause I think that kind of
labels Someone and doesn't givepeople much hope.
But I just wanted to hear fromyour perspective, do you think
this type of addiction is adisease?

Speaker 2 (36:32):
I Also struggle with that same idea that you know,
once you're an actor, always anact I will say it like this is
that Diseases, when we have aphysical disease in our body,
some diseases alter what ourbody Genetically is part of
right, so we there's a change inthat, and so I Can't think of a

(36:56):
great one on top of my head.
But if, let's say, if I have acold changed me for the rest of
my life, meaning that mygenetics changed for having a
cold, would I truly be a per?
Would I always have a cold forus in my life?
Probably not, right?
I wouldn't have thesymptomology, for it's similar.
In the same idea, when we'retalking about how the brain is
altered and so there's a lot ofdifferent things out there, and

(37:16):
the way I use my, my analogy Ithink about, is that you know,
we have the way the braincommunicates with itself and the
way it interacts with thedifferent things in the world is
like we have a Bunch of littlefreeways in our brain, so we
have a bunch of like.
You know you go from point A topoint B.
You think about Google Maps.
You know if you look up youwant to go traveling across the
country.
You know, from New York to LAYou're going to have three
different routes.

(37:36):
Typically that's gonna take you.
You know it's gonna be afastest route, you know, maybe a
scenic route and then a routethat is going to be, you know,
somewhere in the middle.
No kind of deal.
If we think about the brain,the same context is that the
things we do over and over again, our brain loves to streamline.
So what ends up happening isthere's things that our habits,
that everybody has, that feelvery organic and feel very like

(37:57):
I'm flipping the switch on.
I just get to go and do themand they don't have to think a
lot about it.
All right, those are the,probably the pathways in our
life that are very muchentrenched.
Those are the eight lanefreeways, where there's a lot of
traffic.
It's very easy for us to godown there, it doesn't take a
lot of effort, right?
We just automatically kind ofgo down that place.
Pornography and other types ofaddictive behavior I would.

(38:18):
I would tend to lean moretoward the, what they call the
process addiction, so more sothe food addictions in the, in
the sex side of it, rather thanthe substances, because the
substances I can remove and Thenyou know again, I probably can.
I hit the reset and I kind ofreheal from that and that's
about trying to stay away fromthat, that substance, because
food and sex are both part ofwho we are as people.

(38:39):
Those pathways, particularlythat, are in our brain.
They're and just like anythingthat was in our brain, though,
those pathways remain there,they remain, they're always
going to be in our brain.
Now, when we choose to do adifferent behavior, our brain
actually has to build a newfreeway now in order for it to
do that, it has to start out asa walking path and it becomes a
bike path, then it becomes atwo-lane road and then a

(39:01):
four-lane road, etc.
So eventually that becomes theway we're eventually gonna.
Our intention turns that, turnsthat into a new pathway.
But the old freeways alwaysremain.
Those don't go away.
They become dormant or theybecome kind of unused.
You know, I live in Michigan soa lot of the freeways around
here have giant holes and cracksin them and everything else.
They're really unmaintained.
So that's kind of like whathappens when we don't use those

(39:22):
other pathways.
But it doesn't take much for usto go back to the old pathway
and when we do that it smoothsout really quickly because the
breath of the brains veryefficient, likes to get rid of
stuff.
They holds it up from that kindof efficiency.
So there's a video out there ofa guy they made this backwards
bike.
So basically when you turn left, the bike goes right and
vice-versus, and took him eightmonths to learn how to ride the

(39:44):
backwards bike but it took him20 minutes to learn how to ride
there.
Work the bike the right though,the normal way, correct way,
and that's just an illustrationof how quickly it takes for us
to jump back on that old pathwayand how our brain can remember
that very quickly.
So what I always say when you'retalking about Overcoming
consistent compulsive behavioris what are your intention?
Because intentionality takes alot of practice and also takes a

(40:08):
lot of hard work to do when thethings that feel organic or
natural are really usually kindof flip the switch and it's
automatic.
So when I want to changecertain behaviors, I want to you
know, again back to kind ofquestion about is this a disease
?
I think if we're talking aboutit being, has it altered my
brain to the point that that'ssomething I'm always going to
have to be aware of, then yes,it's a disease.
If I feel like, is it alwaysgoing to be the symptomologies

(40:31):
always going to be there, doesthat make it a disease?
I'd say that there's hope, thatthat there's hope in recovery
and in the process of change,that would say that it's not a
disease.
So it depends on how you definedisease.
Do you find disease as Longterm this is how my brain's been
affected for the rest of mylife Then yes, then I can see
where you've been saying.
I can see where you didn't sayit is a disease.
If you're saying it'ssymptomology, then I would say

(40:53):
no, it's not a disease becausethe symptomologies can change
and the symptomologies peopleare very.
We've discovered over in thelast probably 30 years or so
that the brain is very malleable.
It's very plastic.
It has a ability to be.
There's really nothinghardwired in our brain other
than our genetics, and so ourbrain really has the ability to
be able to be flexible andmalleable.
So if that's the case, thenreally we can work on changing

(41:16):
anything we want about ourselvespersonal or our personality but
it will take a period of timeand it will take intentional
work to do that.

Speaker 1 (41:23):
I'm curious to know Do you know much about neuro
linguistic programming?

Speaker 2 (41:29):
I think that's might be the first time I've ever
heard of it.

Speaker 1 (41:32):
It's really okay.
So I'll let that go, because Iactually spoke with um, a woman
who actually works with men toovercome porn addiction.
She was a sex addict herselfand kind of healed through that
and now she, you know, iscertified in a few different

(41:54):
areas, but one of the areas thatshe's certified in is this
concept of neuro linguisticprogramming, and part of the
reason I asked that as well,it's because I was thinking
about um Rational recovery.
I don't know if you've everHeard of that book.
I think it's for alcoholics,people who struggle with alcohol
Addiction, and I also read thisbook called brain over binge

(42:17):
and essentially, and which wasrelated to food right.
So to your point about theirdifferent types of addiction.
Some are substance based andthen their other ones like food.
We can't get away from food.
We need food to survive and andsex is part of that relational
aspect of what it means to be ahuman being.
But you know, in brain overbinge, which was focused on food

(42:40):
, she picked up some insightsfrom rational recovery, which
talked about the fact that A lotof addictions and when it comes
to talk therapy, she foundherself going in circles because
they were telling her that heraddiction Was because of how she
felt about herself on theinside, while that might have

(43:02):
triggered a lot of why she didwhat she did.
The author of the book basicallysaid that she was able to
recover from her eating orderafter having it for about six to
seven years, when she realizedthat she did not have to relate
with her thoughts, becausetriggers are always going to be
a part of life.
There's always going to besomething that will trigger A

(43:26):
response she talked about.
She ate when she was happy.
She ate when she was sad.
She ate when she was anxious.
So if she's eating foreverything, then the issue is
not necessarily the emotions,because those are there.
It's about how her brain iswired, like what you were
talking about, because the moreyou do something, the more your

(43:46):
brain.
We're kind of like machines.
We kind of go into autopilot.
So that's why I asked that andI just kind of wonder in your
approach, do you center a lot ofthe recovery based on the
person's Emotions and whatthey're going through in life,
or do you kind of talk about whytheir brain is responding to

(44:07):
external stuff Rather than theiremotions?
I don't know if that's makingsense.
Yeah yeah, that's what I'mtrying to say.

Speaker 2 (44:13):
Yeah, and I think you bring up a really good point.
So there there's an aspect ofthis behavior and across the
board I think what you made, thepoint you made about the idea
that what's our relationshipwith our emotions I think about
emotions on a railroad trackthat's simultaneous with our
thoughts.
A lot of people will be veryuncomfortable if those don't

(44:33):
align, because sometimes it'lljust go way off track and then
this will keep going straightand it doesn't make sense.
So there is a little bitabsolutely about the
relationship that we have withour thoughts and with our
emotions, and do those correlate?
There's a lot of times theydon't, but are we willing to
sort of investigate that?
A little more to what you'resaying, to your point, I think
that it depends.
If you're someone who hasexperienced a lot of trauma,

(44:56):
then you can go more along, andI'm not.
I don't have a huge traumabackground, so I can't really
speak too much to this, but Iknow from my experience with
working with addiction is thatthere are periods of there are
some people who have had a lotof trauma in their life and so
what ends up happening is thatthat's where you can really work
more with the body.
There's a book out there by aguy named Bessel Vander Cook.
It's called the Body Keeps aScore.

(45:17):
It's a relatively new book andthey really kind of have a whole
new look on trauma and reallythat's more where you can look
at kind of the body physicallyreacting to certain things, and
so that was much more.
There's a different perspectiveyou have to have with that than
if you have with someone who maynot have as much trauma but
certainly has, like you said,more of the background, of the
worthiness and kind of thoseinternalized dialogue with

(45:37):
themselves.
And then also it kind of bringsus back to some shame pieces,
because how we respond to shameis a big part of how people will
react to different things.
Whether it be food, sex,whatever it might be that people
are, there's a lot of shamepeople experience and so again,
that's some of that internalizeddialogue.
But there can be shame that'sassociated with trauma, and so
the trauma perspective is alittle bit different than maybe

(45:59):
somebody who might be looking atit from a more of an
internalized perspective.
And that's a little more of mybackground as far as kind of
just in my, just my ownworldview of that of like
helping people kind ofunderstand their own, their own
internalized dialogue and theirown emotions and those kinds of
things.
But I think you bring up agreat point is that there's
probably, as we move forward, aswe continue to learn more about
the body, the brain, there'sgonna be different ways people

(46:20):
are gonna be approaching thisbehavior and how to help people
with this particular concern.

Speaker 1 (46:25):
Yes, I agree with that, and if you are working
with them, they're doing well,but then they leave your office
and see a billboard with someonein a bathing suit, right?
What are some techniques thatyou offer to people struggling

(46:47):
with this addiction on how tomanage all these different
sexual images?
I know some people.
They are no longer on socialmedia, for example, because
they're constantly seeing that.
So is the suggestion that theycompletely get rid of their
social media?
Or, you know, how can theymanage their reactions to living

(47:08):
in such a hyper sexual society?

Speaker 2 (47:12):
Great question.
So, yeah, so some peopleprobably should seriously
consider going on maybe a socialmedia hiatus for a while, right
, At least to give yourself achance to kind of reset from it
yourself.
Personally, Couple things thatI talk about as far as helping
people break thought right, Goback to thought life.
My thought life is really gonnabe depending on what I'm

(47:35):
thinking about, what I'mprocessing.
We're all gonna have, we'redefinitely gonna have, trigger,
triggers or you like to use theword stimuli, because there's a
lot your trigger is overusedword but basically stimuli that
we're gonna have on the world,whether it be social media or in
public or whatever.
One thing you can use thatpeople tend to find some success
with is this idea, what theycall ABC awareness break
compassion.

(47:55):
So basically the idea is I madeawareness of the person or the
image that's concerned for me.
I'm breaking from it, I'mredirecting my mind to something
else that I that you know again, brings peace, brings calm, I
can think about, and then I havecompassion toward myself or
toward the other person.
Sometimes that looks likeself-talk.
You know, I'm not this type ofman anymore, I'm not this type
of woman anymore.
I'm gonna be somebody who'sdedicated to living in a healthy

(48:16):
sexual way.
So that'd be kind of an exampleof compassion.
One that sometimes people havesuccess with is what they call
fantasy contamination, and thisis kind of similar to the drug.
I don't know the drugspecifically, but if you drink
alcohol you'll get sick andvomit.
So eventually there'sassociation with that.
Fancy contamination is verysimilar, Bringing something that
you find that's gross, that'sabnormal, that doesn't make a

(48:38):
lot of sense for that particularimage.
I always think of somethinggoofy, like you know there's a
giant Twinkie or something inthe you know holding hands with
the jogger or whatever you know,something that just throws it
off, so that I don't have tokeep associating down that
fantasy, Because the more Ifantasize about that, the more
likely that I'm gonna be drawnto going to act out some more or
continuing to fantasize.
But what I've also found to bekind of that I personally, if

(48:59):
I've found to be successful atleast some of the time for folks
is to create lists of thingsthat they know a lot about.
Because as you make listsyou're breaking that loop and it
seems like fantasy kind ofloops, very similar to anxiety
does, and so it's a similar kindof way that you break that.
You kind of put a bend in thetrack a little bit so that it
doesn't keep going.
I always like using NFL teamsbecause they're really easy to
remember.

(49:19):
In divisions they're all infour groupings.
So, like I'm in Detroit, soit's Detroit, Chicago, Minnesota
and Green Bay.
Those are our four teams in theNorth.
So, and then you can keep goingthrough that.
Now, that's just one for guys.
Sometimes that can be an easyone, but you could use the stuff
that you know because you canremember it easier and you can
kind of pull it up.
So I've used sports teams.

(49:39):
It could be baseball, it couldbe soccer, it could be
basketball, anything like that,Music, cars, stuff that helps
you to have that list.
That can kind of help breaksome of those thoughts.
So you're not focusing on whatthe stimuli might be.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
I respect a lot of people who struggle with these
thoughts.
These hypersexual thoughtscould also potentially have
mental issues related to OCD.

Speaker 2 (50:08):
I don't see much of a in my personal experience.
I don't see a lot ofcorrelation with OCD.
Most of the time thecorrelation we see, the biggest
one, is ADHD or ADD, some typeof a tension.
Because the number one thingthat drowns out a lot of those
kind of difficult, the constantflow of those thoughts is
pornography.

(50:28):
When we focus on pornography orsomething sexual our brain kind
of just zooms right there andbecause it holds that much
attention it tends to sort ofdrown out a lot of other stuff.
So people with ADHD or ADD tendto sort of find that very
soothing way to kind of approachthat, so you can feel less numb
, less of the thoughts in yourhead in that way.
So ADHD and ADD are usuallycommon ones.

(50:50):
Sometimes ASD is one of them.
So autism spectrum is one thatwe see a little bit occasionally
.
I haven't seen as much of thoseCD though, mostly those of
there to ASD and ADHD ADD.

Speaker 1 (51:01):
Okay, so is there hope for full recovery?
Have you worked with patientswho have fully recovered and
they're doing well?
I mean, triggers are side butthey're not acting on triggers.
Do you have you worked withpatients who've been able to
fully recover?

Speaker 2 (51:19):
So I'm in a process because of what I started.
Our program is anywhere betweenthree to five years long, so I
mean year four.
So I haven't seen anybody, fromstart to finish, go all the way
through.
But I am working with people atdifferent stages in the process
and so there are people whodefinitely, at the end of this
process, are able to heal fromthat.
But I think we really need tolook at what does it mean to be
healed from this?
A lot of times people willreport to me very early in the

(51:42):
process and they'll say I wannabe totally free from this, I
never wanna have another thoughtabout this, I don't want this
to come up for me and those kindof things, and so they're a
little bit unrealistic in that.
Is it gonna be something that'sgonna control your life?
You can recover from thatabsolutely 100%.
Is it gonna be something thatyou're gonna not be able to be
aware of the rest of your life?
100% inaccurate.
You have to always be aware ofit because it's something that

(52:03):
you're gonna always have to beaware of.
These things that come around.
So like just give you anexample, one of the things that
happens with people with thephone a lot of times that people
take the phone.
The bedroom and the bathroomthose are two of the places
where people most commonly actout, at least in my experience.
So even just creating thoseboundaries around the phone and

(52:24):
the bedroom and the bathroom ifI don't take my phone in those
things at least I'm eliminatingopportunity to act out.
So one of the things that downthe road does that mean that,
okay, when I fully recover, Ican start taking my phone in the
bathroom and the bedroom again?
No, because I'm still settingmyself up for the possibility of
it happening, even if I think Ihave the strength of it.
One of the things about denialsdenials always about minimum.

(52:45):
Well, like one of the biggestdenials I see all the time is
minimization.
It wants us to believe thatwe're stronger than we actually
are, and it does that.
You know our own mind tells usthat, hey, we can overcome this.
Now I'm not saying that peoplecan't be confident in their
recovery.
They ever say can be.
But if they're confident intheir recovery, they also know
how to respect what their addictor their addiction has been.

(53:07):
And so you can't lose that sideof that respect, cause if you
do, it's gonna.
It's gonna pull you in theposition where you're gonna be
weak and you're gonna just likea city with a wall around you.
You're gonna.
There's some part of your wall.
It's gonna have a hole in it Ifyou're not.
But where are that?
So can you recover from theperspective of it never being a
problem for you again?
I think that's unrealistic.
But can you get to a pointwhere the behavior is not what

(53:29):
you compulsively do?
I think that's 100% realistic.

Speaker 1 (53:33):
I have to ask, just because of your work and your
self work specifically, and yourtraining, how, for patients who
are open to the theology side,how does faith play a role in
helping people move throughshame and work towards recovery
for those who are interested inincluding that into their

(53:57):
recovery?

Speaker 2 (53:59):
Yeah, and I think so.
A lot of times we use theverbage the addict.
I would replace that with thesin nature.
If you're talking abouttheology, our sin nature is
always, at every given moment ofour life, waging war against us
.
It wants us to just bedestroyed.
It's not going to look, it'snot going to want us to be
successful in any way.

(54:20):
Part of shame is one of thebiggest lies that I think we
believe we take on those liesand again, if you are subscribed
to being a Christian, you'regoing to this is the perspective
I'm coming from and that spendswe're going to believe those
lies and those lies are going todefine who we are.
And so one of the thingsbiblically that we see over and
over again throughout the Bibleis that the reason that one of

(54:42):
the reasons that God came tosave us and to die on the cross
for our sins was to us to give anew identity and to have a new
heart.
And so shame is a continuouslie of the enemy.
So we're willing to allow thatthe lie to continue our lives.
And if we don't, why are webelieving that?
If we are lying, that lie tocontinue.
Why are we believing it?
Because we have a freedom inChrist to be able to live out

(55:03):
the way he wants to live andbasically live in the freedom of
how his image.
So I think a lot of times whenyou're talking about shame,
believing that lie and thenconsistently going back to that
type of behavior, it doesn'tmean that you yourself are
something wrong, but it meansthat are you where?
Are you still working onunderstanding and believing and

(55:23):
holding to the truth that youare subscribing to in your faith
?
A lot of times I think thatthere is the science part of it,
which we talked a lot abouttoday, but the other side of it,
from the theologicalperspective, is do I really
believe that that's the personthat I am, or do I believe that
I'm the person that God says Iam?
And so if I hold that truth,those are the truths I have to
hold to as far as moving forwardand allowing that other part of

(55:45):
who I am to die, because that'swhat it has to do.
There's a part Paul talks aboutthe idea that we have to work
out our salvation in faith andtrembling, and so that means
that's a process, and sosanctification, which is the
process of becoming more likeChrist, is a process of every
single day working toward, justlike the process of walking away
from something that's anaddiction, and so these things

(56:06):
when we talked about earlier, Imentioned the idea that we want
these things to be organic inour lives.
But they are not organic, theyhave to be intentional.
My relationship with my faithor my relationship with Christ
is all intention, as much asit's the same as intention to be
away from pornography.
So how intentional am I willingto be in my life?
Or do I want the organic?
Do I want to flip the switchand just go along the easy route

(56:29):
?
Nothing that's easy ever ends upbeing rewarding.
So the direction we want to gois about how intentional are we
going to be in working towardbecoming the people we want or
the people that God wants us tobe.
So there is that aspect of that.
When you talk about faith, theintention still goes the same.
They're going in that direction.
That's the process.

Speaker 1 (56:51):
Thank you for sharing that.
I love the line that you saidand I hope I don't butcher it Do
we want to believe what theenemy is telling us about
ourselves, or do we want tobelieve what God tells us about
ourselves?
I think that's what you said.
I love that line.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
Well, because it's a choice, right Every day we have
a choice to decide.
Okay, today I woke up and I'mgoing to believe what I believe.
My faith is, which again takesfaith.
It's not going to be somethingthat's going to be just like
that.
But it also takes the same insome ways also the same off
faith to believe that I'm whatthe devil tells me.
I am too right, so I have to beintentional in what I'm going
to choose to believe.

(57:26):
If I continue to allow the lieto be my truth, even when it's
not, I'm not going to probablysee a lot of changes there.
I'm probably going to continuethe same path.

Speaker 1 (57:37):
Yes, exactly, and I could even even using different
language in, for people whomight not even be Christian is
just the idea is am I going tofeed into these negative
thoughts that I'm having andgive my power to those negative
thoughts, or am I going toconnect with the true essence of
who I am as a person?

Speaker 2 (57:59):
Yeah, I'm going to believe who I am as created,
created to be, or am I going tobelieve that I'm the person that
doesn't believe the lie thatthe addiction tells me that I am
?

Speaker 1 (58:07):
Right, exactly, Patrick.
This has been a greatconversation.
I usually like to end out eachepisode with asking every guest
for final words of wisdom.
You've shared so many insights,but any words of wisdom, it
could be related to what we'vebeen talking about or something
completely random that you kindof keep in your back pocket as

(58:28):
you go through life.

Speaker 2 (58:32):
Yeah, it's hard to always pick just one thing that
we could specifically focus on,but I've just had a real heart.
I've had a real feel like areal revelation in my own life
the last few months about theidea that my my intention is
what I need to.
That's my my intention is whatis going to get me toward the
direction I want to go.
And there's nothing that'sdifficult, there's nothing easy

(58:55):
about intention.
And so there's a part of me inmy life and my personal story
that I feel like I've alwayswanted to get to, that organic
that I was talking about earlier.
I wanted to be flip a switch.
I want to be easy.
I think everybody is humanbeing does to some degree.
But just like when you're, ifyou're, ever had a personal
trainer, they're going to makeyou do two things they're going
to make you change what you'reeating If you don't eat right,

(59:16):
and they're going to make youwork out.
Both of those things are reallyhard, but you'll get the
results that you want to have.
And that's the same way withmental health.
I mean, there's, there's.
There might not be a wholebunch of stuff you have to do,
but there has to be some kind ofchange.
One of the things that my myboss likes to talk about as far
as the program goes is thatnothing changes if nothing
changes.
And that is very true.
But I think it nothing changesif intention is not there.

(59:39):
Because I can't just, you know,in my mind, fantasize again,
like we talked about earlier,fantasize about change.
A lot of people, I think, think, that the change that they see
is the change they see here.
They don't see the change outhere, and that's because they're
not willing to make from thispart to out here, which is the
hard part.
So I think a big part of thatis, you know, continuing to make
your intentions.

(59:59):
Be what you, not only what yousay you want, you want, but also
be what you're doing and thatgoes in line with your faith, or
recovering from something, orchanging any type of behavior
you want.
You have to, you have to seethe execution of it you played
out.
It can't just be in your head.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
I love that.
I love that.
It kind of reminds me ofsomething I heard earlier today,
which said that in order foryou to create a new reality or
to achieve something, you haveto become the person that has
that thing or is living in thisnew said reality or life or
vision that you have foryourself.
So I appreciate you for sharingthat.

(01:00:37):
Where can people find you ifthey want to connect with you or
learn more about your work?

Speaker 2 (01:00:42):
Absolutely so.
Our practice website isnorthpoint-counselingcom.
We are located in Novi,michigan.
We are one of Michigan'slargest resources for sexual
addiction and partner betrayaltrauma.
So if you're interested inworking with any of us or you
know again in the part of apiece of the world, learn more
about that.
Definitely check us out on thewebsite.
We are actually starting ourown podcast here.

(01:01:04):
It just got launched, I think,earlier this month, but we're
going to start trying to do aweekly podcast.
I'm going to be included inthat.
My boss is going to be includedin that Multiple part of my.
Many of my colleagues are apart of that, so we're going to
hopefully have some guests aswell, but we're open to have
that success as well and be ourresource for folks.
Another thing to look into ismy boss wrote a book a couple of
years ago.

(01:01:24):
It's called the Partners Guideto Truth and Healing.
That is a great resource forfolks who are looking for any
type of partner trauma type ofunderstanding, kind of what that
process looks like we weregoing to talk about earlier.
You can reach me at my personalInstagram.
It's read underscore PGE.
I also have a threads accountattached to that as well.
I also have a LinkedIn.
It's Patrick Gailers and yousaw my kind of credentials right

(01:01:46):
there.
That's my LinkedIn account.
So there are a couple of ourPatrick Gailers out there, but I
don't know if they'retherapists or not.
But so those are some things.
You can look for me there and Ican give those to you, if you'd
like, in the email or anything.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Yes, that'd be great, so I can link it in the show
notes.
Thank you so much, patrick, forstopping by.
A word to the wise.

Speaker 2 (01:02:06):
Thank you so much for having me, Jimmy.
I really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
A big shout out to Patrick Gailers for stopping by
the show.
If you are interested inlearning more about Patrick,
please check out the show notesfor a link to his social media
podcast and website.
And please make sure that youtune back in for part two of the
series, which is focused onporn and sex addiction, where I
speak with a woman who struggledwith sex addiction and dated a

(01:02:30):
man who struggled with pornaddiction, and we discussed how
she was able to recover from sexaddiction and what it was like
dating someone with pornaddiction and how that affected
her, and so much more.
It was a very good episode aswell, so please make sure you
tune into part two of this shortseries.
Again, thank you so much fortuning in.

(01:02:52):
You can follow A Word to theWise on Instagram and TikTok at
A Word to the Wise pod.
We're also on YouTube at A Wordto the Wise podcast.
Please be sure to subscribe Ifyou are enjoying the show.
Please rate, leave a review,share and subscribe wherever you
listen to podcasts.
Till next time.
Peace and love, always, always,always.

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