A reader looking for answers wanted to know about the connection between sexual addiction and swinging. Like many relationship issues, the opinions of the ‘experts’ vary widely.
Some mental health ‘experts’ don’t even acknowledge sexual addiction as a disorder.
Those within the swinger community view their activity as healthy, normal and freeing. They consider swinging something that has has improved their marriage and made their relationships stronger.
(Let me add, I also know that those abusing alcohol also view their consumption as ‘normal’ as well.)
There’s something about when you’re in the middle of extreme or addictive behavior, you don’t see it that way. You want to see what you’re doing as ‘normal’.
This is one of the traits of addiction. Addiction puts blinders on you regarding the danger of the addiction. (BTW, the only place you find ‘normal’ is as a setting on a washing machine).
My views regarding sexual addictions were influenced by the psychologist Patrick Carnes, who’s been working with sexual addictions for decades. Within that framework, swinging is definitely on the continuum of sexual addiction.
Does this mean that all swingers have sexual addictions? Given the nature of swinging and how it occurs, not everyone caught up in the lifestyle have sexual addictions.
Let me repeat that, NOT all swingers have sexual addictions.
It does mean that some sexual addicts use swinging in hiding their sexual addictions. They use the network of couples as a way of engaging in their addiction. The secretive nature of the swinging lifestyle network gives them a world to operate in without being questioned.
Some in the swinging community put up ads for sexual partners as if conducting a garage sale. They merchandise themselves or their spouses. When not offering people, they offer movies or photographs of them and their spouses.
There are some well financed swingers who use their monies and influence in taking advantage of other couples. They use their leverage in gently seducing other couples into being exploited by them. Money and sex are powerful seducing and control agents.
As an outsider, such practices come across as soft human trafficking. To them, it’s part of the world they’re caught up in. It makes a huge statement about how deep they’ve gotten into the lifestyle.
The swinger lifestyle only provides cover for someone with a sexual addiction.
When your marriage relationship is filled with secret activities and merchandising, it’s moved from functional to dysfunctional. At those times, you have to consider the question of whether or not there’s a sexual addiction going on.
If you’re caught up in the swinger lifestyle and are looking for help, consider downloading the video “Relationship Trauma for Swingers”. In it you’ll find ways of overcoming the traumas that come with being caught up in that world.
Click and download your copy today.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
