When Practitioners Can't Bear "Bearing Witness"

It’s taken a lot to get you to this place. First, you had to get him to go to an appointment with this sex addiction treatment practitioner. That process took hours—searching for information and resources, learning vocabulary and approaches, finding practitioners nearby, and choosing which one seemed the best fit. Then began the bargaining, begging, threatening, and arguing needed to convince him to go to the appointment that you had to make on his behalf. After he went he told you how caring and understanding she was. And now it’s your turn to go. 

Settling into your chair in the therapist’s office, you are nervous but also anticipating the first scrap of caring and safety you will have received since this whole nightmare began.

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therapeutic abuse, self-careDiane Stricklandtherapeutic incompetence, misogynist therapy, bearing witness, telling the truth of your life, partners look after themselves, sex addicts manipulate, your strength
Recovery Down So Low You Can't Get Under It

Another week has passed. And it’s been another week of wives and partners broken, enraged, diseased, and frantic to learn what their best options are and find some relief from his abuse—abuse now amplified by the treatment model and its practitioners.

Some weeks I want to scream. But instead I’m going to tackle yet another topic on the buffet table of recovery bullshit. This week’s blog is about the imaginary “reasonable expectations and accountability” bar that you will spend your time and energy creating so that he and his team can beat you upside the head with it any time you bring it into the conversation. The first piece of the imaginary bar are your boundaries. 

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self-care, therapeutic abuse, expectations for recoveryDiane Stricklandlow expectations, boundaries, slips and lapses, recovery ploys, infantilizing sex addicts, misogynist therapy, low bar for recovery
"I Can't Do This Without You"

Most wives and partners of men called sex addicts have heard it at some point in the wake of discovery and his panic to put Humpty Dumpty back together again quickly and quietly. Just when his secret life is screaming he doesn’t give a shit about you (or your children, for that matter) he gets all serious, puts on his best “sincere” face, and makes his dramatic confession of need, “Babe, I can’t do this without you.”

 Meanwhile you sit there being destroyed from the inside out as you process each unimaginable truth that is taking shape.

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Diane Stricklandsex addicts manipulate, sex addicts feel sorry for themselves, sex addicts tricks, don't take his responsbility, sex addict regrets, partners who challenge sex addicts
Trying To Do The Right Thing

We are women of integrity and caring. We think about the wellbeing of others, even when those others have hurt us. Our high level core values are real. They inspire us, guide us and constrain us. We may rant and cry and swear about the cruelty visited upon us by the person we loved and their treatment gang, but when push comes to shove it’s very hard for us to make a decision without asking “What is the right thing to do here?”

 It’s ironic. This is the very question about which our men called sex addicts have no concerns and never ask as they overtly and covertly abuse us (and sometimes our children, too). The core values that would give this question voice are not values that hold their lives together and interpret what their lives mean.

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making decisions, self-careDiane Stricklanddoing the right thing, the right thing for you, core values, partner integrity, tell your story, partners look after themselves, telling the truth about him, telling the truth of your life, overcoming fear of truth