Eddie Capparucci is a licensed therapist and certified in the treatment of sex and porn addiction. He runs a private practice with his wife in Marietta, GA and works with men struggling with sex/porn addiction, as well as their wives who are dealing with betrayal. Eddie recently wrote the book, Going Deeper: How the Inner Child Impacts Your Sexual Addiction and talks with Dr. Rob on how men can build their emotional IQ and reconnect emotionally with their families. 

TAKEAWAYS:

[4:30] Eddie believed he was a broken and perverted person when he struggled with his own porn addiction. 

[6:20] If you want to work on your addiction, you need to be able to sit with discomfort. 

[9:45] When you’re by yourself after the wife and kids are gone, do you experience anxiety and discomfort? 

[11:10] How does Seeking Integrity work with trauma? 

[14:05] Eddie wants you to move away from shame or thinking that God hates you. 

[15:10] Men, you don’t have to be absent in your family’s lives because you’ve worked long hours! 

[16:40] A lot of men that walk into Eddie’s practice have a low emotional IQ. 

[19:00] Despite living through a chaotic childhood, you don’t need to distance yourself from your current family. 

[21:45] Men get a lot more satisfaction in their work lives than they do in their home lives and that might be because men don’t know how to seek satisfaction in their home lives. 

[24:05] Your partners are asking you for memorable moments. Whatever is on the computer or TV is just not as important. 

[25:15] What you’re about to do, is it good for the relationship? 

[26:35] Eddie and Dr. Rob are not just talking about sex or porn addiction, they’re talking about all addiction. 

[29:05] What’s wrong with watching porn? It’s not hurting anyone! 

[32:50] Who should read Eddie’s book, Going Deeper? 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Abundantlifecounselingga.com

Innerchild-sexaddiction.com

Going Deeper: How the Inner Child Impacts Your Sexual Addiction by Eddie Capparucci

Email: [email protected]

QUOTES:

• “We can’t sit with our emotional pain so we learned to distract and escape.”

Porn is not only a guy’s issue. Women struggle with porn addiction, but you never hear about it. In fact, one in three visitors to adult websites is women! So why is there such silence for women looking for recovery resources? Alice Taylor overcame her addiction to porn by finding healthier, non-sexual, ways to have her needs met. She is the author of Restored: A Woman’s Guide to Overcoming Pornography. On this week’s episode, she shares her journey of recovery and the shame that surrounded her about sexuality and porn. 

TAKEAWAYS:

[2:00] What are the cultural differences between the U.S. and Australia?  

[5:20] Alice grew up in a household that absolutely didn’t talk about sex or sexuality. Why is this a problem? 

[6:50] Alice was 12. She was horny and she found porn on the internet. 

[8:50] The best way to talk about pornography online is by having a healthy conversation about it with your children, even when they’re 4 or 7, or 14. 

[10:35] When did Alice realize her porn addiction was a problem? 

[12:35] Alice entered into an abusive relationship because she was a vulnerable mess desperate for intimacy. 

[16:40] Alice is very thankful for therapy. She saw her therapist every two weeks for five years and it helped her process all her feelings and emotions. 

[20:55] How does Alice’s husband feel about Alice’s sexually disconnected past? 

[23:20] Before therapy, Alice was always afraid. 

[24:00] Boys and girls get caught up in porn often for different reasons. 

[27:30] Why did Alice write the book, Restored? 

[30:20] If you don’t heal your deeper issues, the porn addiction will come back. 

[33:30] Before Alice dated her husband, her previous sexual experiences were all bad. It was disconnected and unhealthy and Alice didn’t want to be there anymore. 

[35:20] Alice wants to help other women experiencing the same thing she did realize their power and overcome any shame they might have. 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Thegracespot.com

Email Alice: [email protected]

Restored: A Woman's Guide to Overcoming Pornography Book by Alice Taylor

QUOTES:

• “The bible says no. Sex is for marriage. Think about it when you’re married.”

Dr. Larry Hedges is a psychologist, a psychoanalyst, owns a private practice in Orange County, California and specializes in the training of psychotherapists and psychoanalysts. He is also the Director of the Listening Perspective Center and the Founding Director of the Newport Psychoanalytic Institute in Tustin, California, where he is a supervising and training psychoanalyst. Dr. Larry is the author of numerous papers and books and through his contribution to psychoanalysis over the years, was awarded honorary membership in the American Psychoanalytic Association. 

TAKEAWAYS:

[3:05] Where do our thoughts of suicide come from? 

[4:20] All therapists are required to take a 6-hour course in suicide prevention.

[6:50] Nobody truly knows why people are driven to commit suicide. 

[9:40] Suicidologists determined that the first two years of life will determine whether someone becomes extremely suicidal or not. 

[12:15] It all stems down to trauma and deep attachment issues.

[16:35] Should you let your child cry or should you comfort them? 

[21:20] Between 4 to 24 months, the mother and baby have a set of attachment scenarios they go through. 

[27:55] If the needs of the baby are warped by a depressed, narcissistic or broken mom, the baby becomes stuck in how they become comforted during distress.

[30:30] Suicide manipulation doesn’t aim to kill oneself but to get the attention of others. 

[33:10] What happens if you have an adult daughter or son trying to kill themselves? What can a parent or loved one do? 

[36:15] Dr. Rob and Dr. Larry discuss medical treatments available now to help someone going through suicidal thoughts. 

[39:10] Dr. Larry’s book The Call of Darkness is available on Kindle for free! 

[41:45] What should you do if you know someone who is suicidal? 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Listeningperspectives.com

The Call of Darkness: A Relational Listening Approach to Suicide Intervention (Listening Perspectives in Psychotherapy) by Lawrence E. Hedges Ph.D

QUOTES:

• “Our ability to predict and treat suicide is less than chance. We still don’t know what suicide is about.”

Dr. Tian Dayton is a Senior Fellow at The Meadows and she has also authored 15 books on the subject of recovery, trauma, addiction, and more. Dr. Tian is the director of the New York Psychodrama Training Institute and served on the faculty at NYU for eight years as a psychodrama teacher. In Dr. Tian’s latest book, The Soulful Journey of Recovery, she says that “All of us who have been touched, directly or indirectly, by chemical or behavioral addictions and related mental health disorders can benefit from this continuing journey of self-awareness and recovery.”

TAKEAWAYS:

[2:25] What is sociometry and how does it help patients? 

[4:15] Who should read Dr. Tian’s book, The Soulful Journey of Recovery?

[6:35] Finally, people are finally realizing that trauma is a medical problem! 

[7:30] Dr. Rob shares an example of how childhood trauma carries over into adult life. 

[11:20] When we run into the ability to have our needs met, we also run into all of our fears. 

[12:30] Dr. Tian wants to tell couples not to worry about years of unrest. It’s to be expected! 

[15:35] Children are unable to psychologically see their parents failing. They blame themselves and this is where a lot of shame and low self-esteem come from. 

[16:55] Do you keep picking unavailable people? 

[18:55] Dr. Tian recommends to use the book but to also go into a 12-step program. They’re free! 

[19:25] As a therapist, Dr. Tian believes 52% of the work has already been done the moment you walk through the door. 

[23:25] Our biggest challenge we’re facing today is our lack of community. 

[30:45] Isolation is how you punish people. When it happens in your home, it becomes incredibly hard to detect where the true trauma happens. 

[31:00] How can couples overcome their childhood traumas? 

[33:30] Sense of self can get lost in the relationship as you get closer, but if you let go of that fear, you end up having a stronger self. 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Tiandayton.com

The Soulful Journey of Recovery by Dr. Tian Dayton

Healthy.kaiserpermanente.org

Elizabeth Smart

QUOTES:

• “What increases doctor visits? And they did not expect to find that what increases doctor’s visits are traumatic experiences.”

BONUS Episode: Today's episode was pulled from Dr. David Fawcett's podcast "Sex, Love, and Addiction: Healing Conversations for Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Men". Dr. Fawcett had the one and only Dr. Rob on to discuss sex addiction and chem sex in men. Dr. Rob dives into why we shouldn’t separate the relationship with drugs and sex in therapy because it’s often combined and needs to be addressed together. He also believes there’s a lot of benefit for hosting gay and straight group therapies together because the commonality of being men can open up a big dialogue and he believes that for most people in therapy, the biggest thing we are seeking is a real and meaningful connection. 

TAKEAWAYS: 

[2:40] Dr. Rob didn’t realize in the very beginning how drug addiction is so closely linked with sex addiction. We have to look at both, not either/or. 

[3:55] How does Dr. Rob see the effect of trauma play into these addictions later in life? 

[6:50] Gay, transexual, and transgender people struggle a lot with their relationship to sex, and culturally we still haven’t gotten to openly talk about these issues. 

[9:35] Dr. David has seen two worlds collide in a beautiful way. Gay men had their reservations/thoughts about straight men and vice versa. By sharing group therapy sessions together, a real dialogue has begun to open up between them where it’s just men sharing their experiences and trauma. 

[11:55] Dr. Rob shares a story about a man who hated what turned him on, but when he did drugs, he was able to indulge in these sexual interests. The work Dr. Rob does has a lot to do with helping people come to peace with their sexual desires.

[12:40] Seeking Integrity gets a lot of clients that have a misunderstanding that treatment and addiction are about ‘curing’ themselves, but it’s about self-acceptance. 

[16:50] Dr. David breaks down why alcohol is a drug. 

[21:25] So many people that Dr. David and Dr. Rob treat are looking for a connection and use drugs to fill it, but in reality, it creates more emptiness. 

[25:45] There’s so much more to you than your bodies. As you get older, you’re just not going to get noticed that much and it can be very hurtful to the ego or identify about yourself. 

RESOURCES: 

Seekingintegrity.com

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men by Dr. Robert Weiss

Sexandrelationshiphealing.com

Email Rob: [email protected]

QUOTES: 

• “People are what grounds us, not substances or behaviors.” 

Lacy A. Bentley is the Founder and CEO of Women United Recovery Coalition, an organization dedicated to raising awareness of female pornography addiction. She is the author of Addicted to Love, an international bestseller, and is currently collaborating with Dr. Rob on a book about sex addiction. Lacy shares some of her thoughts on why so many women feel like they have to hide in shame because of this addiction and how this addiction gets developed in the first place.  

TAKEAWAYS:

[2:25] How did Lacy get into this line of work?

[4:05] What does it mean that women ‘don’t have’ porn issues? We are ignoring a huge population here! 

[5:15] Female security is changing. Women are becoming much more visual. The porn industry has been marketing to women since at least the early 90s. 

[7:45] For some women, porn addiction is very real. They become compulsive with it. 

[13:00] Women suffering from porn addiction experience a deeper level of shame compared to their male counterparts. 

[14:15] When you say addiction doesn’t exist, you make people who are experiencing very real feelings feel invalided and shamed. It takes away their hope. 

[15:45] Every woman is different. Why they get addicted to porn it is often for very different and varied circumstances. 

[22:00] There is an important distinction between determining whether porn addiction is real or whether the person just has some guilty feelings come up from watching porn. How does Lacy help her clients realize it’s an addiction vs. not? 

[25:25] Why do some women struggle with porn and others don’t?

[28:15] Feel free to reach out to Lacy if you have any questions!  

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Email Lacy: [email protected]

Addicted to Love: Recovery, Empowerment and Finding Your True Self by Lacy Alajna Bentley

Lacy on LinkedIn

Women United Recovery Coalition on Facebook

Women, Sex, and Addiction: A Search for Love and Power by Charlotte S. Kasl 

QUOTES:

• “I go up and talk to a Ph.D., who is the head of a big recovery program, and I say to him, ‘Why do you not address female porn?’ and he says to me, ‘Women don’t have those problems.’ You just double shamed and invalided many women.”

Jason Swilling is the Program Manager at Seeking Integrity and works alongside addicts at the treatment center. He is on the ground working one-on-one with individuals seeking recovery from sex addiction and shares his experiences with Dr. Rob on today’s episode. How is a treatment center different than a support group? Does drug addiction differ from sex addiction? All these questions answered and more! 

TAKEAWAYS:

[2:35] Jason has worked with addicts in some form for over 20 years. 

[3:35] Is there a difference between patients who are recovering from sex addiction vs. drug addiction?

[4:55] Older patients take recovery much more seriously than a 25-year-old in recovery because they have established a stable home life and they are completely scared to lose everything. 

[7:15] What’s the difference between going through a treatment center vs. a support group? 

[11:55] Jason explains the differences between people who experience guilt vs. self-hatred for their actions.

[15:15] There’s something magical about treatment where everyone develops a very strong bond within a short amount of time. 

[16:35] The body will heal if you put it in the right circumstances. 

[18:30] In this therapeutic environment, the first thing people learn is how to be intimate in this safe environment.  

[21:05] When people go through treatment, their hearts begin to open up for the very first time. 

[23:20] How does spiritual work help with recovery? 

[27:15] By hearing each other’s stories, people going through recovery are able to grieve and really reflect on their own journeys and decisions that they’ve made. 

[31:35] Jason shares a story of a man feeling comfortable enough to reveal a trauma that he has held on to (and never told anyone) for 50 years. 

[33:25] The goal at Seeking Integrity is to develop healthy lives without shame or guilt.  

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

QUOTES:

• “The opposite of addiction is connection.”

Charlene Benson is a Licensed Professional Counselor, Certified Sex Addiction Therapist, and fluent in American Sign Language. She is out with a new book, Unstuck: Move From Powerless to Empowered in Your Relationships, which details the ways you can get out of a relationship (romantic or non-romantic) ditch. When we are experiencing conflict in our relationships, we tend to want a complete 180 change from that person. However, it’s important to realize that it takes time to develop good habits and it takes time to overcome past development experiences that have consciously or unconsciously shaped who we are. 

TAKEAWAYS:

[3:45] What inspired Charlene to write her book?

[6:15] Charlene’s book, Unstuck, is for every relationship, whether it be romantic, work-related, or platonic. 

[9:40] Our deepest fear is abandonment and rejection. A ‘me’ focused person tries to protect themselves from feeling abandoned. The ‘others’ focused person tries to protect themselves from rejection. 

[13:55] The first thing towards getting unstuck is to develop awareness and the second is to set realistic expectations for yourself; huge change comes from tiny steps. 

[14:55] Sometimes you have to take two steps back to take one step forward. Your brain takes time to adjust to new changes. 

[17:35] Name your fears out loud when you start to feel like you’re being abandoned or rejected. Where are these feelings coming from? 

[24:30] Why is it that therapists constantly look at the past/childhood development when dealing with trauma? 

[28:15] When we understand what our natural default behaviors are, we can change them and become more empowered. 

[31:55] Running away from our fears to protect ourselves can actually be the very thing that makes your fear come true! 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Bensontherapist.com

Email Charlene: [email protected]

Charlene on LinkedIn

Unstuck: Move from Powerless to Empowered in Your Relationships by Charlene Benson

QUOTES:

• “When we don’t know how to balance what I want and what you want at the same time, we will default to our pre-programmed pattern of either giving up what I want or being the one that leads the way.”

Michelle Mays is the Founder and Clinical Director of the Center for Relational Recovery with offices both in Leesburg, VA, and Washington, DC., where she and her team deliver treatment to addicts and betrayed partners. Today’s topic covers how couples can overcome betrayal after infidelity and why it’s perfectly normal to have an attachment ambivalence pattern towards the person who has hurt you. Michelle dives in on some of the challenges couples face as they build the trust back up again and underlines why the hurt partner needs a support group to help them through this chaotic time in their life. 

TAKEAWAYS:

[3:35] If a partner cheats on you, how do you define love after that? 

[8:00] Dealing with cheating is difficult because it presents itself as a unique type of trauma. You begin to experience an ‘I love you today’ and ‘I hate you tomorrow’ attitude. 

[9:35] Our brains give us two contradicting messages at the same time. One is to repair the damage so you can find safety again in your partner and the other is to run away. 

[16:55] Things might seem like everything is back on track in therapy, but it takes time for the hurt partner to not be reminded by the pain. Sometimes it gets worse before it gets better. 

[19:15] Love becomes a big question mark after infidelity. It is not a given. 

[20:25] If you’re going to cheat, tell your partner first. Do it in real-time, not after the fact. 

[23:20] Michelle explains the benefits of getting the betrayed partner into a support group. 

[29:20] The partner recovering from betrayal is left with a massive hole for which they can get their support. You need a safe base in this chaotic time in your life. 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

Partner Hope 

Center for Relational Recovery 

[email protected]

Dr. Barbara Steffens

QUOTES:

• “The person you usually turn to for safety is now the person that has hurt you.”

Rob wanted to take some time to express some of the challenges he is facing in communicating the importance of his work on this week’s episode. Rob recently attended a conference in Australia that was a bit frustrating to experience. Facts matter in the therapy world and it seems that people prefer to listen to the loudest of voices instead of the experts who have dedicated their lives and education to addiction and therapy. Everyone wants you to take a side or to think in absolutes, but therapists don’t take sides. Therapists guide you in choosing what’s right for you.  

TAKEAWAYS:

[2:05] We don’t really have all the research about porn addiction yet. 

[3:50] Porn can be bad for some people, but it doesn’t mean that it’s bad for everyone. 

[4:35] When Rob spoke at a conference in Australia about his neutral beliefs about porn and porn addiction, people were disappointed. When attending scientific conferences, it’s important to present facts; not opinions. 

[5:55] Unfortunately, people who are anti-porn hold very strong beliefs about it, but they might not necessarily have the clinical knowledge on how addiction really works. A lot of speakers were not citing statistics or facts in their talks.  

[7:45] It’s a catch 22. Anti-porn people do not want to talk about the positives of porn and sexual health professionals don’t want to talk about the negatives of porn and sex addiction. What you need is a balance and you can’t have that if you are very biased towards one belief or the other.  

[8:15] Rob makes the connection about how people feel about porn addiction to how people felt about prohibition back in the day. It was deeply rooted in moral, religious beliefs, with conservative overtones. 

[9:15] Fear sells. All you have to do is pick a side and think in absolutes, and you will be very popular. Rob doesn’t believe this is the best approach. 

[12:55] Rob and some of his fellow colleagues, who hold PhDs on the subject, were turned down to speak because event organizers preferred the speaker who had more media contacts, who were ‘marketable’, or even paid more for a booth. It’s a sad state when fame is preferred over expert knowledge at scientific conferences!  

[17:20] How can you do mental health treatment without asking about human sexuality? It sets Rob’s hair on fire when there is such a big disconnect in this area. 

[22:05] When you use the word ‘addiction’, you are not shaming yourself. You are embracing your vulnerabilities. You have limits and you learned what they are. That’s a good thing. 

[24:55] You can never debate facts to people who have very strong emotional beliefs or opinions. You will always lose. 

[26:15] Rob doesn’t understand why the sexual world is so split on certain issues when we all use the same methods and techniques to treat patients. Life would be so much better if we can just come together and work together. 

RESOURCES: 

The Porn Panic: Is Porn a ‘Public Health Crisis’?

Sex and Relationship Healing

@RobWeissMSW

Sex Addiction 101 

Seeking Integrity

Cruise Control: Understanding Sex Addiction in Gay Men 

Prodependence: Moving Beyond Codependency

[email protected]

Dr. Gail Dines

Dr. David Ley

Prohibition: A Film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick

QUOTES:

• “I don’t really decide for you or for anyone else whether porn is good or porn is bad because I think I would be a bad therapist.”