Wow Patria I can totally relate, and I woudl love an answer to that question myself as I just found out and i am really strugglin to believe this is something real. Please if anyone can answer this I would greatly appreciate it.

First, I have not forgiven my h. I am not to that point at all but am willing to make the decision to work toward forgiveness. I elected to start recovery for my benefit because so much of what I read said that my recovery and healing would move faster if I did it with my spouse whether we stayed married or not. I had to give it a shot for my family and myself. Not for my h. I have asked your very questions and sometimes I still get a fleeting hint that it is an excuse to be a SA but when I list all of the other neurologic changes that I observed, personality changes etc...I believe it is an addiction in the purest definition and in our society with internet etc...I believe it will be an epidemic. Look at Wiener, Schwartzenigger, Woods, Clinton, Halle Berry's h, Sandra Bullocks h and on and on. An addict lies to keep the addiction and that is against their values so they feel crappier about themselves so they use the addiction to try to stop that awful feeling and so the cycle begins. It is not about the sex. They can get sex at home. It is about the high they get with the risky behavior. Wouldn't be risky without having a partner so I don't think it would be as much of a high. But it is a progressive illness and the sooner you can stop it the less damage and wreckage to put back together. Mine started with mags, strip clubs, porn now and then with me and probably without, private rooms at strip clubs, massage parlors, sex trade workers or hookers. It progressed along with the alcoholism over our 30 year marriage. The frequency increased as well. what started out as a couple of times a year ended up weekly almost. I hope this helps.

Hi PatriaC,

I was going to give a stab at answering your questions. I hope it isn't too inflammatory, as the path my H is taking in recovery is different from some/most.
1st question: sociopaths and pathalogical liars are fairly easy to discern from sex addicts. They don't get better in recovery, and they truly don't have a conscious. They would not feel bad at all about what they are doing. They generally can not stay in/fake a relationship at all. Most sex addicts are using sex to meet an emotional need and are very much consumed with the guilt/shame cycle and know that while they love as best that they can (their partners and family) every thing gets filtered through a very immature, unrational mind. They truly believe that if you don't know about it, it doesn't count. Very sick, and so childlike. I would highly recommend you look at recoverynation.com at the partners forum. It will helpyou get a better grip on the making/characteristics of a sex addict.
That being said, there are generally two camps in the SA world. Diseased based recovery, and health based recovery. 12 step would be an example of the former, recovery nation and value based cognitive tools training the latter. Diseased based recovery programs do believe that addiction is a lifetime disease and that it is truly a fight everyday. Health based recovery believes that sex addiction can be overcome, and after a period of recovery, the person is in remission (like cancer instead of a chronic disease) and needs to do monthly value monitoring, but does not have to look forward to the daily fight for the rest of his/her life. My H is doing recoverynation.com (Health based) as well as a program created for sex addicts by a MD that is face to face and also health based.
That being said, I would encourage your H to check both methods out. The HBR definitely takes the excuses away after a certain point in time -- but still each addict walks their own road and owns what is most meaningful for him. Both methods work, but HBR resonated more with myself and my H than the disease based model.
Oh and forgiveness...thats a tough thing. I sometimes wonder if it isn't an ongoing thing. Some say it is an emotion that comes and you have no control...others say that it is a choice like love. I think maybe a combination of these? I felt forgiveness, but then another day I choose to remind myself I felt or give forgiveness...another day I'm mad and don't want to forgive. I am six months in and it is no longer a day by day thing...but sometimes I get blindsided by a past hurt/trigger and the old feelings come up again and I do remind myself that that was forgiven...don't ruminate. Its hard ya know? I also have an almost 3 year old and a 1 year old.