Latest / The Trauma Therapist / Episode 816: Sex Addiction & The Journey of Healing with Allan J. Katz

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Episode 816: Sex Addiction & The Journey of Healing with Allan J. Katz · The Trauma Therapist

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  Trauma Therapist Podcast. Plus listeners can listen to episodes early and ad free right
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  now. Become a Plus listener by going to Apple Podcasts searching for the Trauma
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  Therapist Podcast and signing up today. All right, welcome back to the Trauma
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  Thepist podcast. My name is Gamiferson. My mission is to help trauma therapist
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  be their incredible selves, to be human, to be real, not just
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  a clinician. I'm a big believer in who we are is more important than
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  what we know, and this requires cultivating authenticity, genuineness, and vulnerability,
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  and that requires intention. Can learn more about my courses and workshops by going
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  to the Trauma Therapist project dot com. That's the Trauma Therapist Project dot com.
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  Let's get started, all right, So five or three, two and
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  one are folkscome back to the podcast. Very excited to have my guest today,
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  alan Ja katz Allen. Welcome, Thank you, thanks for having me.
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  You're welcome. So Alan is the Healthy Intimacy Coach, licensed professional counselor,
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  and certified sex addiction therapist in the Mid South. Has counseled over one
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  thousand clients with the relationship and intimacy issues out of control of sexual behavior and
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  Trauma. Alan is the co author of the book Ambushed by Betrayal, The
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  Survival Guide for betrayed partners on the hero's Journey to healthy intimacy. Alan fascinating
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  topic, I mean and specialization. We'll get to that before we do.
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  Welcome to the podcast. Share with the listeners. Where you're from originally and
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  where you are currently. Well, I was born in Memphis and I'm still
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  in Memphis, so I've been here seventy two years. Wow. All right,
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  So look, Ip, I spent four years in New York and at
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  school. But okay, but I've always been here. Okay, How did
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  you get into this field? The specialization? Okay, so I was.
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  I was a marketing executive for about twenty years. My parents originally wanted me
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  to be an accountant, and I was an accountant. Then I owned a
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  restaurant and I sold Yellow Pages, and I never really wanted I didn't feel
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  it was creative enough to be an accountant, So I got into marketing and
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  I was a That's where that coach thing comes in, the loyalty coach.
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  I just I switched it now to the intimacy coach. But it used to
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  be the loyalty coach and I would help small businesses with their marketing and then
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  we sold our business. And I just wasn't getting wasn't feeling like I was
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  getting a lot of self worth, you know, from doing this. I
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  didn't feel like, you know, I kept comparing myself to other people.
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  This person was more wealthy, this person was more well known, and I
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  just didn't feel I was making a difference. And so I have a problem.
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  I've had a problem with porn addiction in my past, and so I
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  started going to twelve step groups and I also started a hotline for a Jewish
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  people who were suffering from sex and love addiction. There's a website called guard
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  your Eyes dot com. And I started a hotline for them about twelve years
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  ago. And I started the first online groups for them also, And now
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  it's become just a whole, you know, a major course, and it's
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  really helped a lot of people. But because I started getting really good results
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  with them, my therapist told me, she says, well, why don't
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  you become a therapist. And I said, well, I'm fifty eight years
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  old. I can't go back to school now and get a master's degree.
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  That would be ridiculous, you know, but she said, well, you're
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  going to be sixty anyway, you might as well go do it. So
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  that's what I did. I took off two years and my wife was working
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  so the money wasn't a big issue, and went back to school at fifty
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  eight, and who got my master's age? You got my license, And
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  I've been practicing. I went spent six years in an alcohol and drug treatment
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  center doing groups and individual and then I've been in private practice for four or
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  five years now. So that's a long story. But no, no,
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  that's but that's what this is about. Wow, very impressive. So you
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  did I hear you correctly? The main impetus for this specialization was your own
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  porn addiction. Correct And when we hear worn addiction, I think people think
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  a lot of things. What is it? How does it occur? Why
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  does it happen? I know, and I know it happens differently for different
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  people, But talk more about that, right, Okay, Well, so
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  like any addiction, you know, somebody can drink one drink and they're and
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  they're fine, right, or they can gamble a little bit, but once
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  it becomes compulsive and obsessive, you know, then one drink can become twenty
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  drinks, and then you know you're in bad shape. You're an alcoholic.
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  But with porn addiction, like the same thing. You can look for a
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  few minutes and maybe every week or every month, but when it becomes obsessive
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  where you're spending hours and hours online or talking and chatting with people, or
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  videos and things like that, then it becomes it becomes obsessive. I mean,
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  it's the pornographers know very well that it's very addictive, and so that's
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  why they have so many varieties of different forms of pornography, different shapes,
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  different sizes, different ethnic things. I don't want to get into all the
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  details, but you know, so they know how to keep you on there
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  for longer and longer. And the longer you stay on there, it starts
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  to you start to develop certain chemicals in your brain where you almost feel numb,
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  and you don't think about eating, you don't think about sleeping. You're
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  you're in there. You're addicted, and it's very hard to get out of
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  that. And like with with many addictions, and some would say all addictions,
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  there oftentimes is an underlying trauma. Correct, Okay, And that was
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  that the case with you, right, So so what we There was no
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  major trauma, but there was what we call little TA trauma, which I'm
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  sure you've heard. So with little T trauma. I grew up with parents
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  who did not have any self esteem, and so they couldn't give me any
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  self esteem. I was constantly yelled at. I never I became national president
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  at eighteen of a youth organization with eighteen thousand members, And when I called
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  my parents, you know, to tell them that I won the election,
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  it was just like, you know, like big deal. Like so I
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  just never got a lot of accolades or you know, self worth, self
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  esteem, and I just grew up very and people used to come over to
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  me and say, you look so sad. What's wrong, you know?
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  And I would say, well, nothing, this is just this is just
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  the way I am, and this is me. This is me. I'm
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  an introvert. You know, what do you you know, what do you
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  want? But really I was, I was. I was probably depressed.
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  And I look back at some of my pictures, like you know, in
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  my in the school yearbooks, you know, in like seventh grade, I'm
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  just sitting there like you know, like not smiling and so I don't know,
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  I don't have a little blurry with my younger age, you know.
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  And I think for a lot of people, I wouldn't say when I was
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  growing up that I was addicted to porn. You know, we would everybody.
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  We would look at magazine, you know, Playboy, but you know
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  it was you had to go to a convenience store and you feel embarrassed because
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  it was a woman behind the counter. You were asking for a Playboy or
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  whatever, hustler, you know something. But you know, now with the
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  Internet, I think a lot of people that were not addicted have become addicted
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  because it's so addictive. Just the movement and the color and the sound and
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  all that video together. It just makes it a lot more intense. How
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  did you begin to seek out healing for this? Well, so I was
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  in Where was I in? I was in Las Vegas once doing and when
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  I was in the marketing business, I was doing a trade show. Are
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  you are you married at this time? Oh yeah, I've been married fifty
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  one years to the same person. So I was already going to twelve step
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  groups. But I went to Las Vegas for this trade show, and I
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  wasn't doing really well, I wasn't doing well at all, Like people weren't
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  buying anything, they weren't coming over to my booth and just and I found
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  myself going out to like strip clubs and that was that was the main thing.
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  But I realized after that that this was crazy, like there's really something
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  wrong and I have to get some more up high level of care, let's
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  put it that way. And so when I went back to my twelve step
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  group. When I got home, I asked, someone, do you know
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  a cesat? Do you know someone who you know really is into this?
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  Because my therapist before was not certified in sex addiction. So they gave me.
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  They told me about this woman in Memphis who basically saved my life,
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  and she was the one. She was the one that you know, told
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  me that you have to go to a I went to a seven day intensive
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  in Nashville, and you know, I went to all kinds. I went
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  to two years of group therapy every Monday morning from ten to twelve, doing
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  experiential psychodrum things like that, and that really I joke around and say that
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  I did more in those two years mental health than I did in twenty five
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  years of talk therapy if I may thank you for sharing this, by the
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  way, and I realized, you know, we don't have a lot all
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  the time in the world, and these are difficult questions to synthesize. But
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  you talk a little bit about why that treatment was so uh earth shattering for
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  you, Why was it so helpful? What about it? Okay, So,
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  and it's a it's very very apropos for trauma treatment. Also, by
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  the way, since you know, the reason psychodrama is so amazing to me
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  is that instead of instead of telling you what my problem is, I show
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  you what my problem is. Instead of telling you that you know, dad
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  or mom did this to me, I show you what they did. And
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  so I if I'm in a group, for example, and I'm upset with
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  my mother or father, I'm going to have somebody in the group playing mom
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  or dad, and I'm going to say what I may not have been able
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  to say to them to their face directly, or they've passed away, and
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  I'm still holding on to grudges, I'm still holding on to resentments. And
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  so after about two minutes of doing this, that person who is not your
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  mom or dad starts to feel like your mom and dad's I can. It's
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  hard to explain why that happens, but it becomes very real, very quickly,
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  and you're able to literally take those the stuff, the trauma that you've
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  been storing in your brain because you haven't been able to say it's all of
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  a sudden, now it's coming out, and literally it's leaving your body so
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  you can start to heal and so or even something as simple as so we
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  used to do this every Monday morning. But something as simple as I'm afraid
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  that if people touch me or I'm afraid of getting too close, and so
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  all the people in the group you lay down on the floor and all the
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  people in the group were ask you where they can touch you appropriately, And
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  all of a sudden, you've got all these people just touching you, and
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  you feel like, you know, just calm again. It just affects your
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  body. You feel like, you know, like like you were being hugged
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  six people or something. There's a lot of different a lot of different ways.
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  And then there's this thing called role reversal, which is now that I've
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  talked to Dad, I'm gonna I'm going to turn around, I'm going to
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  be Dad and answer me. That makes sense, Yeah, yeah. Yeah,
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  We've had a lot of episodes on here about psychodrama. It's it's really
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  fascinating. Wow. So I was I was able to get my find my
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  voice basically is what it was. I never you know, and I never
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  thought I was not very assertive at all, and so working on my assertiveness
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  was something that I needed psychodrama for to be able to have a voice and
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  be able to express myself. And so even in my as a therapist,
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  now, that was one of my original struggles was to be able to be
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  more assertive in in session with the client, you know, telling a client
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  that he's that he's full of it, or you know that that's that's not
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  right, you know, to do that or something. So that was a
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  real challenge and I've worked through a lot of that. And what's funny is
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  that about a month ago I went back to my therapist that I originally was
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  at UH just to talk about some you know, therapy things, and I
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  told her some of these stories and she said, well, that that is
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  assertive. So I really was happy that I finally you know, got there
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  that you know, I work on the assertiveness and yeah, I can do
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  it now. So so was that experience before you enrolled in your master's program
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  and got license as a as a counselor the group the group process. Yeah
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  yeah, okay, so talk to us about your decision to specifically want to
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  help people regarding UH sex addiction or porn addiction or so forth. Okay,
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  it was It was because because it was the first time in my life that
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  I felt a sense of purpose and a sense of I'm making a difference finally
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  in somebody's life instead of trying to work on myself. But that gave me
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  just a sense of purpose, you know. And what's really interesting about it
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  is that I always have these negative voices, you know, negative beliefs,
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  irrational beliefs coming in to my own self when I was in marketing, always
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  questioning myself because it's difficult because you know, people, advertisers expect a certain
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  amount of results, and if you don't give them those results, you know
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  you're not there. So now I was getting good results with helping people,
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  and it just made me feel good about myself and all that negativity just went
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  away. I just just not come into my head. I can't explain it,
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  but it's just, you know, am I doing that? You know?
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  So somebody criticizes me, I'll say, okay, well, you know,
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  that's that's okay. But before, before I would you know, the
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  heart, I would be upset for a week or two because you know,
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  one person said they didn't like what I was saying or doing, you know.
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  But now I just kind of chalk it up to, you know,
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  there's other people in the world that can help. What I find so inspiring
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  about you and your story, Allen, is is your journey, and it's
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  not too dissimilar from my own. I mean, you know, you excuse
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  me. You went through a lot of different experiences and it took a lot
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  for you to find a context and a situation where you where you shined,
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  you know, And that's really I think a lot of us, a lot
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  of people out there can relate to that, because it's not easy to deal
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  with those voices in our heads, to manage those and to you know,
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  break free in a sense, and to go back to school at the fifties.
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  I mean, Jesus Christ, I went back to school at thirty six.
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  I thought I was doing something. But that's that's amazing. So when
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  you when you're working with people and do you have a particular special pop population
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  quote unquote that you like to work with. Do you like to work with
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  men or mostly work with men who are sex and love addicts. I do
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  have a few partners that I work with and I have do you have some
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  Im starting to get more females who are just having like relationship issues. And
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  I work a little bit with couples that are going through infidelity or just communication
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  problems, things like that. And obviously we've heard some about your your background
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  and experience, but what do you feel you bring to the relationship when you're
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  working with these let's say men, Well, first of all, I've been
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  there, so I when I say I understand, I understand. Okay,
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  you know, and and that counts for a lot. I think therapeutical.
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  I mean, I'm older, and I'm older, and I have a lot
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  more experience and just life experience, because I think a lot about like these
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  younger therapists that are just right out of school and you're getting a really interesting
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  you know, you're getting a really complicated case about infidelity, and you know,
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  some counselors will say, well, just divorce the guy, you know,
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  but but we're we know that we can hopefully help them, you know,
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  through experience and so uh and I've you know, I've been I've been
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  that through that with my wife too, where she's she was very upset with
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  things that I was doing and we worked through it, and so I can
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  help other clients work through it. That's amazing. I was gonna ask you
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  about that. I mean, that's very amazing. I think admirable too that
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  you were able to work through that with your your wife. I mean,
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  I'm assuming for a while she didn't know about this, right, yeah,
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  yeah, yeah? And did you have to tell her? Did she find
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  out what happened there? Trying to I'm trying to remember. I think I
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  think one day I just told her. She didn't find out. But one
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  day I just told her that because I had to go to that meeting on
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  a Tuesday night, I had to go to the first SLAA meeting on Tuesday
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  night, I had to tell her where I was going, and so,
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  you know, I just told her that I had this problem and I to
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  explore it and see see whether that was something. And in my first meeting,
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  they said your insides never matched what you saw on the outsides of others.
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  And when I heard that line, I said, this is for me,
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  this is I've never heard of that before, but that's my life,
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  you know. And just from that one one sentence, your insides never matched
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  what you saw on the outsides of others. In other words, I'm always
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  comparing myself to somebody outside of me that they're they're better, they're wealthier,
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  they're happier, whatever, And that's what it was. You know, audience
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  can relate to that. So let's let's talk about the book Ambushed by Betrayal,
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  the Survival Guide for Brigade partners on the shial Journey to Healthy Intimacy.
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  Talk to us about the book. Who's it for? Why'd you write it?
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  Okay? So I wrote it with a woman named Michelle Saphir who's a
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  marriage and family therapist and also a sea set and she knew that I'd written
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  some other books, so she asked me to co write this book with her,
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  and so I gave more of the atticts side of this and she gave
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  more of the partner side. So basically, this book is for partners of
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  sex and love addicts or porn addicts, who want to go, who want
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  to make things right, who want to understand what's happening to them, that
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  this is normal, what's happening to them is normal because they've been betrayed.
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  It's betrayal trauma is what it is. They've been betrayed, and we have
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  a specific process that we work them through to get all the way to forgiveness
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  and then to self actualization. So the the spouse who's been betrayed has is
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  going through, has gone through a trauma themselves. Yeah, betrayal, but
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  it's a betrayal trauma. That's what we call it. Yeah, just just
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  go ahead. Nope, go ahead, go ahead. Okay, So briefly,
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  how do you approach that treatment? What is what is? What does
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  that look like? Well, basically, it's it's a lot, it's a
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  lot of questions, but it's allowing the the spouse to write down her feelings
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  because a lot of us we intellectualize what we're feeling, but we don't talk
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  about it or we don't write it down. And when you write it down,
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  it becomes very real. And so if you can get out your your
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  own story or you're as the betrayed partner, you can get out your feelings
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  and emotions. So we we interviewed hundreds of betrayed partners, and we got
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  their quotes, which are a lot of them around the book, and we
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  found out what, you know, what, what they were feeling, and
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  so we crafted questions and the workbook toward dealing with some of those emotions so
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  that other women would realize women or men would realize that, you know,
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  this is this is normal for you to feel this way. But then now
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  there's that there's a path to get out of that with with worn addiction and
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  sex addiction is it? And I guess, uh again, I'm sure it's
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  different for a lot of people. But are is it mostly about the sex
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  or is it about something else? Great question? So it's it's not about
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  sex. It's a that sounds strange to say, but it's more it's what
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  it is is about power. It's about the need power, the need to
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  control. So think about it. If if a guy is looking at porn
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  right, he has the power finally to say I don't want to look at
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  this one now, I'm going to switch to this video, or I'm going
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  to do something else, or I'm going to pay somebody for sex online or
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  offline, and I have the power to tell that person what what? What?
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  I want them to do right. Finally, I have the power and
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  control that I did not have growing up because I didn't I was abandoned or
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  neglected or you know, just never got affirmation from someone else. And so
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  that's what I'm craving, and so I'm gonna now I've got the opportunity to
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  do that. So it's that's what it's about. It's it's also about shame,
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  the shame cycle. The addict doesn't know. Once they feel shame of
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  acting out, they feel shame and guilt. The only way they know to
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  get rid of the shame and guilt is to do it again, and so
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  it becomes a vicious cycle over and over again. So shame is the motivator
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  or the cycle engine, so to speak. So yeah, Alan again,
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  the book is called Ambush by Betrayal, The Survival Guide for Portrayed Partners on
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  their hero journey to healthy Intimacy. We'll have that linked up here at the
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  show notes page at the Trauma therapistpodcast dot com. Alan, how can people
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  learn more about you? Perhaps get the book as well, that's the best
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  way, But they can get to My website is Alanjcatz dot com. It's
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  a L L a. N jay E k A t z dot com.
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  Okay, And I also have a section in there on my website called Creative
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  Tools for Therapists. So these are tools that trauma therapists can use to help
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  their clients experientially with exercises and also if they ever think about doing an intensive
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  or something, there's a there's a very comprehensive three day intensive program oh that
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  I offer there. Okay, such a thing. Okay, so you can
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  get in touch with me. Do you want me to give the phone number
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  or no? I think that's sufficient. Here and again I'll have the both
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  those links your website and the tools up here at the at the shown this
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  page. Alan, Wow, thank you for just being open and vulnerable and
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  sharing your experience. I mean, this is this is an intense topic definitely,
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  but you are one inspiring individual. I appreciate you being on here.
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  Well, thank you all right then, all right, take care, all
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  right, thank you,