Defining Sexual Addiction

Question

I am a very sexual person. I like sex a lot with men and women and I have worked as an escort and exotic dancer at different times and I even enjoyed that. I crave sex daily and am always looking for new partners and fantasizing about men I see all around me, to the point where it's hard to focus on getting any work done! This has never been a problem for me. I always thought the idea of sex addiction was hilarious and ridiculous and that I was just free from societies expectations and doing what I wanted to do to have a lot of fun in my life. But now I am trying to stay in a monogamous relationship with a person I really care about and do not want to hurt and I have cheated on him 4 times already in the past 3 months and in addition to this I am doing sex chats on Fb and other sites pretty much every day. I don't know if that is cheating or not but I am sure he would be hurt if he found out. I do not want to cheat but it keeps happening. Am I just a person not built for monogamy or is it possible that there is something wrong with me that make me act like this?

Dr. Lani Chin · Accepted Answer

It sounds like you are really trying to understand yourself. Good for you for being curious about your behaviors and wanting to better understand yourself.

First of all, throughout your question, you keep stating that you have "always been a sexual person," so I'm trying to understand why you might want to change this now. It's important to understand why you want to change this about yourself to better understand your behavior. Are you wanting to be monogamous for yourself? Are you wanting to be monogamous for your partner? Do you think this is what you "should" be doing? Do you think this is part of "growing up"? It's imperative that you make sure you're doing this for yourself otherwise no matter what you do, you will be living up to someone else's expectations.

Secondly, I would encourage you to talk to your partner about what is ok and what isn't in your relationship. You seem to be asking me if it's ok to engage in sex chats on FB and on other sites. For some couples this is considered cheating, but if you and your partner do not consider this cheating then that's between you two. Many couples find different ways to express themselves sexually so I encourage you to talk to your partner about the "rules" in your relationship and respect them. Some couples even have open relationships...it all depends on what both what from the partnership.

I encourage you to also talk to an individual therapist about the role of sex in your life. You seem to be in an exploratory phase and individual therapy could definitely help you sort this out. If you are in the Los Angeles area, I'd be happy to help you: www.drlanichin.com. Good luck.

About the Expert