Handling a s/exual addiction in one session

By Leonard Thornton, PhD

Hi Gary,

Just had a very powerful session with a new client dealing with self-abandonment and an intimacy disorder, which essentially cleared in one session.

Dirk came to me about a problem that he had had nearly all his life at the urging of his new girl-friend, Carrie. (The names have been changed.) I had known Carrie socially and as a client for about a year. We had a number of sessions using EFT, guided healing and meditation, along with energy healing with great success.

The last time Carrie came to me she was very upset about what she had just discovered about her new man, Dirk. An email had been circulated by a former close associate of Dirk's claiming that Dirk had a sexual addiction and wasn't fit to do the work he was doing, which was conducting apparently very powerful and successful workshops across North America helping others to awaken their hearts. This was a new relationship for Carrie who felt that spiritually and every way this was her true soul mate.

A major trust issue had come up for her as apparently Dirk had had a number of liaisons since meeting her only a few short weeks ago.

I was successful in calming Carrie, using EFT and a guided meditation to help her put the whole thing in perspective. I suggested that she might want to trust her initial feelings and the connection she felt with Dirk and not "throw the baby out with the wash."

Carrie said that when she confronted Dirk he did admit to having a problem and had worked hard at solving it for many years, using all his knowledge and skill and those of the associates around him, with no success. I suggested he might want to try EFT and I would be glad to help him. We made an appointment for Dirk the following day as Carrie indicated she had already encouraged him to come and that he was very eager to overcome the problem.

As we started the session Dirk said he wanted to read me some things, among them the letter circulated to about 300 individuals via email positing the sexual addiction. He also read a letter from a former female contact advising him that he should inform Carrie of all the liaisons he had had since he first met her. Dirk also read something interesting from a book entitled "The Four-fold Way" about the Visionary (which he seemed to identify with). One of the aspects of the Visionary was self-abandonment, whereby the self was abandoned in order to get love, approval, etc. Dirk started to become very emotional (This was a large six foot 5 inch man, weight probably 250 pounds).

I said that I thought we had something to work with here and briefly explained what EFT was and how it worked to release the energy disruptions stored in the energy field. As an important note our job with EFT was made much easier because of all the "homework" Dirk had done. He had come to the realization about the importance of abandonment through his own efforts and that of the other ministers in his organization in the last few weeks. He just didn't know what to do with it.

We started on the setup:

"Even though I have abandoned myself since childhood, I still deeply and completely love and accept myself, and I am willing to give myself forgiveness." Dirk started rubbing the sore spots but was unable to complete the statement before completely breaking down emotionally and sobbing uncontrollably. He seemed ashamed and I encouraged him to let it all come out and that it was really a good thing. At one point I went over and rubbed him gently on the shoulders and back as he sat hunched over and sobbing. I felt he needed the contact. Finally after a good three minutes, Dirk regained control and sat back up. We started the same setup and he was able to complete it three times.

We then started tapping on the top of the head point with the reminder phrase, "Self-abandonment." I suggested he tap and then hold the point to allow all the energies, feelings, pictures, and memories that came up to process.

We both held the point for several minutes. I encouraged him to breathe deeply to help release the energy. Dirk was very calm but I could see he was releasing a lot of energy. When we finally put our arms down on our laps I felt to have Dirk connect energetically to the Mother Earth, feeling the energy from his feet go through the floor and deep into the heart of the earth. I then suggested he feel the warm, loving, powerful energy of the Mother Earth come up in through and around him, allowing him to feel safe, loved and protected. It became apparent why this was important later in the session.

We then proceeded with same reminder phrase through the eye points, again tapping, holding and breathing as he processed. I have found in the past that this tap, hold and breathe procedure works very well and enables client to come to awareness of many things associated with the problem on their own. It also saves having to do many separate rounds as most issues, even difficult ones like Dirk's, can be resolved in one or two rounds.

We did the same thing on the remaining points down to the armpit.

I then asked Dirk how he felt and he said much calmer. "Suppose then," I said, "that when we started you were at a 10 on a scale from 0-10, where would you be now?" He said a five.

We then went to the karate chop point with the reminder, " Even though I have this remaining feeling of self-abandonment, I still love and accept myself completely and I am willing to forgive myself and let it go!" Dirk repeated this vigorously 3 times and we then went to the top of the head with "This remaining feeling...", followed by under the eye, chin, collarbone and under the arm, tapping and holding, but for a shorter period of time. I closed by having him taping his wrists together, rub them together, then hold, repeating the phrase: "I love and accept myself and I forgive myself for all that the abandoned self created." Dirk repeated this himself ten more times most emphatically! He then smiled at me for the first time and I asked him how he felt and where he was on the ten-point scale. He said he felt very calm and connected to himself and that it was probably a 0.

An hour had gone by and I asked him if he wanted to continue. He said he did and so we went to the original presenting issue, sexual addiction.

I asked Dirk to make the statement, "I have this sexual addiction." He corrected me, saying it was not an addiction, but an intimacy disorder. Making this corrected statement was about an 8 for him.
After the setup, "Even though I have this intimacy disorder....." we started tapping on the top of the head.

While Dirk was tapping the top of the head, I felt intuitively to ask him if this had to do with his mother. He said yes, that was where it started, and I could see that he was feeling strong emotion. We added his mother to the reminder phrase and Dirk again broke down emotionally, crying out vehemently with his head in his hands, "Mother, how could you do this do me! I was just an innocent boy! You.......me up for life!"

After this subsided, Dirk explained that when he was around four years old, he had started to go to his mother's bed, because he felt lonely and scared. His mother was in menopause and apparently very estranged from his father, a big man who always scared Dirk with his booming voice. His mother always went to her own separate room early, and did not stay up late or sleep with her husband.

Dirk said it was very innocent for him. His mother was always naked and he had his pajamas on. I asked what his mother did and he said she would hold him and he would touch her breasts but there was no genital contact. This went on every night for many years, until finally at the ripe old age of 12 Dirk himself decided he shouldn't be doing this anymore and stopped going to his mother's room.

He further explained that now, after an emotionally exhausting day conducting a workshop, he would feel the need for comfort and loving contact, and that since he had married women who were in menopause (unbeknownst to himself) and were sexually cold, (this doesn't mean all women in menopause are necessarily this way!) he ended up having sexual encounters with others.

I sensed PR so we went to the sore spot with; " Even though I have this intimacy disorder that began with my mother when I was very young, I still deeply and completely love and accept myself and I am willing to forgive it and let it go!" As we tapped the sequence down from the top of the head, I encouraged Dirk to breathe deeply and allow all the feelings to surface and release. The first round down to the under the arm points reduced the intensity to a 5.

At one point Dirk asked me if I was doing something as he felt something bad had just been lifted out of him. I said I was connected energetically but that I gave full credit to the healing angels I always invoked for sessions.

We than tapped on the KC point, "Even though my mother was sexually inappropriate with me, I still love and accept myself completely and I am willing to forgive her and myself, and let the whole thing go!"

Dirk repeated this emphatically three times. We then tapped on the top of the head, under the eyes, chin, CB and under the arm. I then had him tap his wrists together saying, "I love and accept myself even though my mother robbed me of my innocence and was sexually inappropriate with me!" Dirk did this many times with strong feeling.

He then looked at me and smiled, his face beaming. I asked him how he felt and if he thought this was clear. He said he had not felt this good with "...myself and my energy in ten years...actually my whole life!"

An hour and a half had gone by and I explained that although these two areas appeared to have been cleared there might be other aspects and nuances that might come up. He said he wanted to see me again and so we set up another appointment for the following week.

I saw Dirk again 5 days later. He looked very relaxed, even happy. I asked how he had been doing and he said great. He explained that he had tried to get in touch with the old feelings and energy that we had cleared but just couldn't feel it. "I almost don't believe it! It's just not there!"

We then talked about related issues, in particular his need to seek comfort outside of relationship and the pattern he said existed in his family of always trying to do the "right" thing even when it went against his heart feeling, which was presumably why he had married the women in his life.

We did a powerful round using the set up, "Even though I have this tendency to seek comfort through sexual activity outside of relationship, I still deeply and completely love and accept myself, and I am willing to forgive myself, my mother and anyone else who had anything to do with it!"

We closed the round tapping the wrists with the affirmations: "I love and accept myself and no longer need to seek comfort through sexual activity outside of relationship. I can give myself all the comfort I need. I can be faithful and true to myself and my partner."

Dirk said this issue was now completely clear.

We then dealt with what he felt was a very deep problem, not following his heart, but trying to do the right thing, the correct thing even if it meant being unhappy and miserable.

We used the setup, "even though I have this pattern of not following my heart and doing the "right" thing, even if it kills me, I deeply and completely love and accept myself and I am willing to forgive it, my family, and everyone else and let it go!" Tapping first on the top of the head with the reminder phrase, "doing the right thing" I had Dirk tap, then hold and breathe deeply seeing, feeling his whole life around this issue. We added phrases like, "hang in there no matter what...do the right thing even if it kills me, stay in my head, ignore my heart..."

We finished the round tapping the wrists, holding and breathing deeply as I had Dirk say, "I am now willing to follow my heart, no matter what. I am willing to be faithful and true to myself and my own heart's knowing. I will follow my heart even when it seems hard. I follow my heart wherever it leads me."

Dirk said he felt very clear now and that this was done.

We then discussed EFT and Dirk asked if it was hard to learn and I, of course, said it wasn't and would be glad to teach him, and that there were many good materials available on it.

Dirk explained that he did many workshops in prisons and in other venues and was very good at helping big groups of people open up and be ready to clear deeply emotional issues but he'd always felt something was missing. I agreed that he probably needed something like EFT and he asked me if I would be willing to work with him in groups and I thought,, wow, we can get EFT into the prisons!

We left it that Dirk would contact me again. He wanted to come for more sessions saying how impressed he was with how it worked.

Leonard Thornton, Ph.D

More articles on Addictions and Substance Abuse