SEX, A NEW RELIGION: A STRUGGLE WITH SEXUAL ADDICTION
I’ve come to the conclusion that there should be a new religion established in the world—sex. Everybody does it, usually during the same time, and mostly in the same places. The significance of sex in this present world is worship in its truest form. It’s what drives most of us. As men, it’s the reason we get a college degree, buy those Porsches/Hummers, and the reason we swallow the idea that the woman is always right. Sex sells everything, from water to a pair of sneakers. I’m surprised that the media hasn’t used it to sell diapers. It is also the reason why so many marriages are in a rut, AIDS is such an established disease, and why fifteen year olds are having children.
Speaking from a sexual addict’s point of view, I’ve worshiped this very thing for a matter of years. I’ve been exposed to it since I was 9 or 10 when my older brother showed me a dirty magazine that was hidden in a corner of his room. Then I was disgusted by it. I remember the pounding in my head once my innocent eyes were exposed to it. At the age of twelve I masturbated for the first time, looking at the scrambled Spice Channel on channel 99 of my parent’s television. Ever since then I was hooked to pornography. Now at the age of 22, ten years later I am still searching for a way out of my addiction in order for me to move on with my life and not get caught up and stuck in the mud in my distress, while life tramples by me leaving its dust for me to cough up. I never knew how much of an impact my addiction would have on me. I actually never considered it one, due to society’s experts saying how natural it is. If it’s so natural, then why am I and so many others so afraid to admit that they pleasure themselves in the darkness of rooms. Because it is not natural, it’s not normal, and once I realized that masturbation can actually be put up on the same shelf as homosexuality, that’s when I realized that I had a problem. I had a sexual disorder, not something I was born with, but a disorder that was influenced by the external cue theory, in which aspects of my environment create in me this sexual appetite.
Reasons why I am so fixed on this subject of sexual addiction is due to the way it has ruined my life. I never noticed until recently, but due to my sexual habits, I spoiled so many opportunities in my life. I failed out of college my freshman year at Temple because I chose to sit in front of the computer looking at pornography rather than looking at my books. I’ve made some poor choices in women in the past, based on my mind being on the pure physical rather than the overall aspect of the women. And now, I am on my way to being a father due to my failure in facing this problem head on. I’m talking about life-altering decisions here, due to an addiction. When I look at crack addicts and see the results of their habits, and then I take a look at mine, I realize, we are pretty much the same. The sexual addict and the crack addict have a life that is changed forever due to decisions based around their addiction. If you want to be religious or not, masturbation or even other sexual addictions are a selfish act. As I said before, many marriages suffer due to relationships built on sex. A man and woman are attracted to one another, keep the courting routine at a minimum without getting to know the individual, have sex, and if it’s great they say it’s love, if it’s not, they say, “Well, since it wasn’t out of this world, she’s not out of this world, thus our relationship will not be out of this world.” It’s purely ridiculous. And to think that you may have missed out on the person that you are meant to be with due to your poorly formed decision which was based on 15 minutes or sadly, three minutes of pleasure. If you want to have a happy marriage, get to know someone outside the bedroom.
There are essentially three reasons why I’m writing this. The first reason is to possibly help another individual, and I know one is out there, who is suffering through the same mental and physical trauma that I’m going through because of their sexual addiction. The second motive is to help myself, because writing this in itself is a means of me getting rid of this obsession. It’s a literal death of my old self being poured into this paper. Thirdly, it’s due to my conviction that sex has become of so much importance, that it has inspired such a lack of morals and dilemmas that no one quite comprehends. I don’t want anyone else to suffer as I did, because I didn’t comprehend it either.