Want to overcome addictive personality

Dear Wilma,

Tears came to my eyes as I read your account. Not because I was sorry for you, but because I felt humbled by your courage and invincible spirit. At least two-thirds of my clients report a history of severe abuse. I only wish more of them would cope as well as you have.

Wilma, I strongly doubt that you are a sex addict, or that you ever were: you write that you have been faithful to your husband for five years. The previous period of promiscuity was probably a means of working though your history of sexual abuse. People who have been neglected and made to feel insignificant in childhood often have an overwhelming need to 'buy' love. At some level, you had to learn that sex does not do this.

I hate labels like 'addictive personality'. They seem to describe a cause. 'I can't help having it off with every guy because I'm a sex addict'. Actually, they just summarize a pattern without explaining it. What is a sex addict? Someone who compulsively seeks out multiple sex partners. 'I seek out sex multiple partners because I seek out multiple sex partners' is not much of a statement, is it? In fact, such labels can be prisons. If I am an 'addictive personality', then I am stuck. How on earth can I change what I am?

If you were an addictive personality, then how did you give up a whole series of habits you wanted to do without? You have proved that you can break bad habits. You are even giving up smoking, which is harder to give up than heroin. The average heavy smoker needs at least 4 attempts to kick this nasty habit. Ten serious tries can fail, and the 11th succeed.

When you were a child, you thought like a child. You interpreted the actions and words of important people in your life in a child-like way. This led to certain conclusions, which are still with you and influence your thinking. If you now examined them with an adult understanding, you'd see them to be irrational. They were reasonable conclusions for a child, given the available evidence, but were false.

These beliefs are of the type: "If only I could be perfect, they'd love me." "No-one could possibly love me for my own sake, so I must achieve perfectly in order to be accepted." People who are 'workaholics' and 'perfectionists' usually have some such inner beliefs.

From your account, I think there are two current problems: you are eating more than you like, and you fight with your husband. Well, you have a wonderful, admirable record of conquering bad habits. I wish my record was as good! Everyone has bad habits. Don't think they are with you because of your dreadful history. They are with you because you are human! You don't need to be perfect. You just need to be you.

I suspect that once you stop thinking of yourself as faulty, you'll be less stressed out, more relaxed, and so fight less with your husband. Maybe you can ask him to do a deal with you: both of you do your best to let go of any past hurts. Start the new Millennium with a clean slate.

You ask if you should seek out more long-term therapy. As is clear by now, I think you have coped admirably with the scars of your past. What you have done so far has worked. Do more of the same. If something doesn't work, try something else. Help for emotional problems is like help for a bad back. You might go months without backache. You can do regular flexibility exercises to stay without pain. Then for some reason you get some twinges. When the pain builds up, you go to the chiropractor or physio. My work is similar. Seek help when you are stuck with a problem, and your own efforts can't beat it. You're probably stuck in a cycle where the attempted solution maintains the problem. Then you need an outsider to help you cut through the cycle.

Some books to read:

• 'Love is Never Enough: How Couples Can Overcome Misunderstandings, Resolve Conflicts, and Solve Relationship Problems Through Cognitive Therapy' by Aaron Beck
• 'Self-Esteem' by Matthew McKay & Patrick Fanning