Okay i need some insight on what to do in my situation. I hope this is the correct place to post this.

I am 24, my fiance is 32. We have been together for almost 4 years. I have a 6 yr old son from a previous relationship and a 2 1/2 yr old daughter with my fiance. I have never been married. My fiance is divorced. We are planning on getting married this year.

Okay i have always thought Nymphomaniac was a word basically meaning someone that just likes to have a lot of sex. I guess thats just a loose definition.

I had seen something the other day that said a Nympho is someone that can't get enough sex from just one person. Maybe that plays into sex addiction as well.

At the age of 16, i was diagnosed with sex addiction. I was basically exploring myself and having fun. Therapists said i was looking for a "father" figure.

I'm very happy with my fiance. I want to marry him. I am very much in love with him. But i can't help having thoughts of being with other men. I dont want a relationship with any of these men, i just want to sex them.

In my mind, if you are in love with someone then thoughts of other men just wouldn't cross your mind. We have a great sex life. We show each other tons of affection every day. So its not like i am feeling deprived.

So now i'm wondering maybe i am a true nympho. Sometimes the thoughts get so overwhelming i get to a point where i doubt our relationship.

I feel like i have to keep this inside. I dont want to hurt my fiance by bringing this up to him. I know our relationship would be over if i started having sex with other men.

So i'm looking for opinions/thoughts/advice on this. And if anyone wants to add thier stories concerning this as well.

i do not know much about this topic, but sounds to me like maybe u need to be back in counseling to control these feelings? mlhb

What you are describing sounds like an addiction. When someone has a desire to do something that they consider wrong and they feel they cannot control that desire and that desire has serious consequences if acted upon, that would be an addiction.

The reason the therapist told you at 16 that you were seeking a "father figure" is that it is a common theme for many sex addicts. Many addictions originate in childhood due to traumas. A lot of sex addictions are often associated with missing or abusive fathers; dominate mother figures with weak fathers; or incest/molestations.

There is a lot I know about sexual addictions if you would like to ask questions. Also you can look at www.recoverynation.com which has some good information.

My basic question would have to be.. how do you overcome it? How do you get to a point that you aren't always sexually frustrated and sexually satisfied with the one person you are with?

I should also add that my partner is very tentative to me. I should not want to have the feeling of wanting more when he's done.

First when talk about addictions, you are medicating emotions. Choose any addiction, gambling, drugs, alcohol, shopping, sex, any one of those can create highs to medicate an emotion. The gambler gets locked into the high of trying to win until he will loose every dime he has. The shopper will spend hundrends of dollars on credit just to feel good about the clothes they are wearing or the things they have around them. Those who choose alcohol or drugs are altering their physical state of being to calm themselves physically. Those who choose sex create a temporary high as they build towards the climax and then they create a temporary release of stress with the orgasm, much like that of someone using cocaine.

So if you know that sex is about medicating emotions you have to determine what emotions you are medicating and why. For most people it's stress and then secondly depression. For some sex addicts ADD or OCD psychological problems also play a role. Attention Deffict Disorder or Obsessive Compulsive Disorder both play a role in stresses that cause a person to repeat sexual behaviors. So it's important to get tested for those to know if you might have them. But again knowing why you medicate your emotions is the most important so that you can stop when triggers occur. Triggers are those things that cause us to react. It's what spring the emotions into action. If we can catch the emotion at the trigger point we have more success at stopping the potential of acting out on the addiction.

Now I do want to bring up that there is one other disorder called Persistent Sexual Arousal Syndrome, but it's right debilitating. For women who have it they cannot stop the urge to find gratification by any means. Some antidepressants work for treatment, but not always. There have been about 400 known cases of this disorder.

I still think yours may be more emotionally related. And again, I'll be glad to answer questions and work with you on pointing you to help.

I'm starting to wonder if i'm confusing interest of friendship with interest of sex.

I have no personal friends. The only one i have lives almost 2 hours away and is very hard to get in touch with. And my fiance of course, is my best friend. But other than that, I dont have anyone that i can just call and talk to about whatever. I dont have anyone that i can just hang out with. I have very little family.

I went to one school from K-8th grade. After i hit puberty (which it started earlier than most that i went to school with) i gained quite a bit of weight. Probably went hand in hand with my depression over my parents divorce. But i was teased terribly. So i kept one friend close. She had it worse than i did, but we balanced each other out. I went to a much bigger school after i moved in with my dad in the 9th grade. I made a swarm of friends very fast. I was basically loving my "new" life. In 10th grade, i was considered a "trophy" date, as one guy put it. Seemed most girls were jealous. I started becoming friends with more guys than girls and i was eating up the attention.

I started having some problems. Becoming rebellious i guess. I think because i was outcasted in my original school, i wanted to start having some real fun with my new friends. My stepmom and dad couldn't deal with me anymore and i they told me i had to go back to my moms. So i went back to my original school for 3 days until i dropped out. Seeing all those people that treated me so terribly started a surge of emotions within me. The girl that i became friends with in kindergarten and protected each other through middle school- didn't seem to have the time of day for me anymore.

The friend that lives a couple hours from me, we met up in the 11th grade. We have been very close and have been there for each other through some sticky situations with men and have felt each others pain. Most of our friends have always been with men. She had told me one time that she wished guys were attracted to her like they were to me and wished they didn't treat her like she was thier sister.

I guess i have felt "stabbed in the back" with too many females that i rely on men and thier friendship. But that frienship usually has always led to sex. Looking back, i think i have honestly slept with every single male friend i have ever had except for the 3 or 4 that just weren't my type. Of course... the ones that weren't my type, were the ones that were the nice guys that treated me and my son like gold. Except for my fiance.... He just wouldn't let up! <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I put your last reply at top so I could refer back to it. There was good stuff in it. A sex addiction does have its confusion of friendship and sex mixed together. You are trying to meet multiple needs all at one time and because of that all the emotions get twisted up and you get where you really aren't sure what you are after. It's back to the medication of emotions. If you can medicate your emotions and sex is a part of the package, then you'll take the entire package. If medicating your emotions can be done without sex, then great those guys who were great to you probably filled the void in some way without the sex. They met an emotional need without the physical need of pleasure being given, which often translates to false love and caring.

Ah, the divorce card....it's a terrible one to be dealt. And you were dealt one at the wrong age. You were at a vulnerable age when your parents divorced and it tends to traumatically affect kids. Many kids believe in some ways they were somehow responsible, when they HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. Your depression is typical, but not healthy. Probably had a lot to do with your problem.

Next you go from no attention to finding attention. How did that define love for you? I'm sure it didn't give you a clear view.

Oh, and then your dad abandoning you. What kind of a signal did that send you about men? You went from a HIGH to a low. Your dad basically gave you up to go back to something you could not stand.

So when you are going to these men you are emotionally looking for something from them. This isn't about sex, but sex is a result that comes out of the emotions. Think of it as a cycle. You have an emotional core belief that is out of balance, you get triggered by something that upsets those core emotions, you start seeking out how to satisfy those emotions through rituals, then you act out through sexual desires, you feel the shame of what you have done, which returns you back to the state of the emotional core beliefs, which allow you to start the cycle over again. That is an addiction.

I can see exactly how this could have happened to you. Also the fact you say you have very few friends. Sex addicts tend to be isolated. They usually have only one friend they think they can count on. It's one reason we encourage them to be a part of a group so that they can expand their friendship and build closer relationships.

The problem can be overcome. I was a sex addict up until I was 46 and I have finally gotten a grip on it over the past 3 years. I was totally out of control. I had to have sex in any form or fashion, but now it's only with my wife. And our marriage is surviving because of the hard work I have put into counseling, accountability, research, and my own studies and faith. So the problem doesn't have to defeat you that is the good news.

this sounds like a complaint i have heard from many guys(in real life and books, movies, tv) in my life.....
"how can i ever be satisified w/ just 1 partner for the rest of my life??"
why is it that when women feel this way they are called nymphomaniacs and when men say it they are told...."you are normal......it's biology."
<img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif" alt="" />

does your fiance know you have this isuue? does he know about your past and the diagnoses of looking for a father figure?
it is really unfair to marry untill you have worked all this out.
deal w/ it before you get married. be honest w/ your finace.

I always thought a nymphomaniac was a hallucination dreamed up by some guy anyway. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

i sometimes wonder if there is much more SA (particularly when it comes to emotions and self medicating)in the world than we realize. men are able to get around dealing w/ it becuse it's "normal" for a man to feel that way....he's 'wired' that way.

we are all wired for sex.
it's normal for women to want sex too.
how many of us are taught to really understand our desires??

i fear that there will be a lot more SA diagnosed in women in the future.

Sometimes I enjoy making light of things to add a little humor to our lives. I don't like the label nyphomaniac, it's too stereotyped. I do believe there are women with SA problems or relationship addictions. I have known women who go from relationship to relationship, never really engaging the relationship, because they are addicted to the thrill of seeking out the relationship and then dropping it. It's a control thing. I have the control to obtain you and I have the control to let go of you. Those are the wicked ones. Of course I am sure there are some men out there just like that too. It's all about CONTROL.

Let me just say in reference to the quotes above, being a sex addict, I knew women who were sex addicts. And two sex addicts together don't solve the problem. You just have two people with problems having sex together. The sex is good, but they still have problems they each need to deal with. And some of the women I knew were way beyond me when it came to sex. They taught me things I didn't know. So yes, women can be sex addicts. I can verify that.

My fiance knows everything about my past. Sometimes he seems a bit turned on knowing the details...

I really thought i had overcome all this. I guess the thoughts and desires had slowly crept up until one day i really felt out of control.

Sometimes it seems that i am *wanting* to be destructive and to destroy the good things that i have. I say harsh words, make accusations, and do things that i know i shouldn't be doing.

A few months ago, i did ask my fiance " how is it someone can sleep with the same person for like 50 years?" He started asking me questions like- Do you want to be with someone else, etc. Of course, i wasn't honest with him. Probably not even honest with myself. He ended the conversation by telling me that i needed to do some soul searching. I just dont know how to do that.

I guess i'm going to have to be honest with him. soon.

Mich,
have you checked out the recoverynation site that askme mentioned above? there is some really great info there.


it sounds to me like you are dealing w/ some stress about getting married etc...SA's are vulnerable to falling back on old habits when they are stressed. be careful.

Askme,
i didn't mean to sound like a stick in the mud..i thought your remark was funny.

it's just a sore spot for me....men's sexuality as somehow being MORE than.....in so many ways.
stronger, more important, more acceptable.

it can be so confusing for a girl/woman who is trying to figure out her own sexuality and what it all means.
(particularly when it comes to relationships)

Nia-
I could well be subconsciously stressed about getting married, but this has been going on well before the proposal. I guess i didn't see that there was a problem until i realized i couldn't back out of my current relationship.

On one hand, i want to be "free" and get to know myself again. On the other, i feel very guilty because i have children and i dont want to disrupt their loving home.

I love my children very much. They are a big cause of stress for me though. Mainly my son. He's adhd. I'm learning to deal with him and having to deal with the ups and downs that he goes through everyday. I feel like i can't get a break, that i'm just stuck in this misery with him. He can't be pleased unless it costs money and that only lasts for a very short while.

Maybe i feel trapped and i just want out?

Maybe i'm just making excuses. I know making excuses are easier to do than admitting you have a problem.

Nia you're no stick in the mud...it's just me explaining everything like I usually do. I think it's one my deep core beliefs that makes me do that. If I see someone reference something I said then I start wondering "did I offend them or hurt their feelings?" so I go into reactionary mode and start trying to somehow apologize for what I said. I'm real sensitive to people's feelings and try not to hurt or offend someone on purpose. Well, let me take that back, maybe on a few occasions that hasn't been true. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I agree with you about the views on women. Maybe because I was raised by a single mom. And too I understand the struggle for men who deal with same sex issues, which is a very similar struggle. I have married friends who struggle with same sex desires because of childhood issues. What a man experiences for the same sex struggle is very similar to what a woman experience in her struggle to create a normal male relationship. It's why some women will end up turning to a same sex relationship or bi-relationship.

Childhood traumas that are created cause complicate issues in adult life. Most of us don't understand the impact. I have watched one unfold this week in someones life. It took 50 years for it to unfold and it all came from their childhood. And it will probably affect their adult child's children when they have children.

Dysfunction....a very important word to know.

Any possibility you are ADHD also?

Not that i know of. Never been diagnosed. I dont have hyperactivity problems or attention problems.

I just normally have racing thoughts going through my mind.

The only reason I asked was that ADD and ADHD are often associated with sexual addiction. Also, OCD is associated with sexual addiction. I have OCD anxiety and what would happen is I would reach high levels of anxiety and my mind would get locked onto sexual thoughts as an obsession. It then became sort of a fantasy world to retreat. The only problem was then my anxiety got really high and the obsessive thinking was no longer working and it became more of a compulsion.

If you want to take a test and see, there is an online test at Amen Brain Scan Test