Sexual Addiction:Strength/Hope/Recovery

Carol the Coach believes that couples can get through partner betrayal  and find post traumatic growth. Today, she interviews authors Joanna and Matt Raabsmith who along with Dan Drake, wrote Building True Intimacy:Creating a Connection that Stands the Test of Time. In this book they describe about how couples can navigate some of the later stages of betrayal recovery as a team. Their roadmap helps a couple tackle issues like forgiveness and grieving, sexual reintegration, and building a thriving partnership. Using the skills and framework of the Intimacy Pyramid they will share how couples can work through some of the obstacles to full healing in their recovery journey. They have lived this journey and now they want you to find restoration too!

Today, Carol the Coach, Mary Kay Cocharo who wants to educate our listeners abou a new type of support and intervention.Encounter-Centered Couples Therapy is an integrative relational model at the intersection of philosophy, clinical theory, organizational methodology, and relational neurobiology. It aims at assisting couples to experience the most alive and joyful connection with each other while helping each other grow and develop their relational intelligence on the path to relational maturity. It inspires couples to become not just good couples but creative couples!  In the stage of Intimacy Building, EcCT will help you to learn an effective and powerful tool for better communication, to deepen emotional connection, resolve conflict, and create a shared vision for your relationship.The work is done in weekly couples counseling, in Private Intensives, and in Weekend Couples Retreats.  We know what disconnects us from our partner, EcCT will teach you what connects.

Today, Carol the Coach is talking to Hope Ray, the founder of the Betrayal Violence Institute. Hope has created new terminology and conceptionalization for professionals and couples when complex partner trauma and betrayal violence has been identified. She has created hope  for society to better understand betrayal violence starting with the experieences of women in relationship with men who betray and lie about the addiction. In this interview you will hear Hope discuss why she feels that a better understanding of betrayal violence will help protect and manage the relationship in a more clearly defined way. She hopes that it will develop an awareness of how to create more safety, boundaries and assertiveness.

Today, Carol the Coach interviews Sandra Shachar PhD, who has just released The Solution, Relationship Repair After ography Betrayal. In her book she realizes that can fracture a couples relationship. She writes, "It is likely that your relationship is in crisis following the discovery of hidden ography use. If you, as the discovering partner, accidentally learned about your mate’s ography habit, you may be in a state of shock and disbelief. Perhaps you did not know they were looking at at all. An additional shock may have been seeing the kind of ography they were viewing. You may be feeling hurt, angry, disgusted, confused, devastated, or all of these emotions at the same time. These feelings and reactions (and many more!) are all normal upon the discovery that your partner betrayed your trust with this secret behavior." In The Solution, Dr Shachar, helps you navigate the crisis, learn about betrayal trauma, and walk you through the steps to healthy living again! For the person whose behavior was discovered, when you were confronted you may have “come clean” immediately—admitting your use of ography, promising it would never happen again and begging for forgiveness. On the other hand, you may have tried to explain looking at as a result of the state of your relationship or because of something your partner did or did not do. Perhaps you feel they are overreacting and that “everyone does it, so it’s not a big deal.” You may have tried to reassure your partner that “it isn’t what you think.” Perhaps you feel angry and defensive when they barrage you with questions, guilt and shame for having hidden this from them, or all of these emotions at different times.She wants to help guide you through these normal feelings and come up with an action plan for to help set boundries for your own mental health!

The American Foundation for Addiction Research (AFAR) is a public non-profit that funded research into understanding and effectively treating addiction, with a special focus on sex addiction. Today Carol the Coach will be interviewing Tim Stein, a colleague who wants the putblic to be aware of the research behind sex addiction and the important co-morbity that occurs when people suffer from untreated sex addiction. We will explore some of the value information we have gained from past research, some exciting research that is currently being conducted, as well what research is coming in the near future. Most importantly, we’ll discuss why these research findings are helpful to addicts, partners, and the clinicians who treat them. This is important research for addicts and their loved ones!!

Today, Carol the Coach will be interviewing Ken Adams who has co-authored a groundbreaking book A Light in the Dark: The Hidden Legacy of Adult Children of Sex Addicts detailing the unique issues experienced by adult children who grew up with a sexually addicted parent, and offering a path to unburden their shameful legacy and embrace sexuality and intimacy without the intrusion or constraints from the past. Adult children who grew up with a parent who had a sexual addiction are left confused, ashamed, and mistrustful regarding the feelings and boundaries surrounding sex, love, and intimacy. Due to the inappropriate sexual behavior of one parent, and the subsequent impact of betrayal on the other parent, these adults carry sexual secrets, have divided loyalties, and are often caught in the middle of their parents’ struggles. Having witnessed (or known of) affairs, walked in on a parent masturbating or viewing ography, received extreme or shameful messages regarding sexuality or gender, experienced sexualized remarks about their bodies, been neglected as a result of the addiction, or were modeled extreme moral values (either too permissive or shaming), these adult children of sex addicts (ACSAs) struggle with their sexuality and longings for love.

Betrayed partners need immediate support to navigate the new terrain of their relationship. They need a clear articulation of betrayal trauma, a thorough education about their normal attachment-based reactions, and a proven path to healing.⁠ Today, Carol the Coach is interviewing Michelle Mays LPC, CSAT-S, who is an expert at helping partners work through sexual betrayal. An expert in the field, her new book clearly delineates how partners can heal and find their life again or perhaps for the very first time. ⁠ The Betrayal Bind: How to Heal When the Person You Love the Most Hurts You the Worst offers a new exploration into an an age-old problem. In addition to sharing her own personal experience with recovery and renewal after betrayal, her new book offers a well-grounded process for healing and restoration and a clear step-by-step path for moving forward. The Betrayal Bind is a must-read for the betrayed, the betrayer, and the therapists who treat them.

Today, Carol the Coach interviews a Male Partner who is in Post-Traumatic Growh. Listen as he tells you how he got there!

When a couple seeks therapy after discovering one of them have been living a secret and harmful life of betrayal.  The usual treatment plan will most likely focus on the betrayer becoming sober and learning to live a life of integrity, and the betrayed partner beginning a path of healing from the PTSD symptoms of betrayal trauma.  This is a well researched and proven approach. However, the addict is also traumatized by the discovery that turns their world upside down.  Dr. Crystal Hollenbeck and Carol the Coach will be discussing the trauma impact an addict experiences after discovery and some of the challenges the addicted spouse will face in the healing process. Today, Carol the Coach will be interviewing Dr. Crystal Hollenbeck who is a Relationship Expert, AASECT Certified Sex Therapist, and a Certified Clinical Trauma Specialist. In addition, she holds certifications in Sex Addiction and Betrayal Trauma and she helps couples on the healing journey when their lives have been devastated by the discovery of sexual betrayal.  She has offices in Orlando and Tampa, Florida and her Three Day Intensives are attended by people from the United States, Canada and Europe.  Visit her website www.CrystalHollenbeck.com or text her at 407.408.6521. We both understand how addicts get traumatized by the addiction and partner betrayal. We will be talking about how we can attend to the addicts needs while he is helping her heal!

Today, Carol the Coach will be interviewing Corinna Kaufman who is a partner who is in the middle of transformation. She is speaking, writing and sharing her message of self empowerment and change.