Sex Addiction Therapy Training, Module 2 and the Magic of Dr Stefanie Carnes

This March the International Institute of Trauma and Addiction Professionals came back to town hosted by South Pacific Private, for the certified Sex Addiction Therapy Training. Presenting was Dr Stefanie Carnes, the President of the organisation herself and bestselling author of Mending a Shattered Heart, and Facing Heartbreak. Resources that assist partners of Sex Addicts work through the shock and overwhelming life change that happens when you become aware of the addiction in your life, which is usually through the painful awakening that someone you love has had a secret life. Bringing the world as you knew it to a sharp and shocking end.

Sex Addiction is still a hotly debated topic, especially in the Psychiatric world, while therapists have been building expertise at the coalface. Patrick Carnes took bold steps to introduce into the therapy bookshelves his text Out of the Shadows in the 80’s, addressing sexual acting out under the criteria of addiction. He was targeted and abused, ridiculed and even received death threats.  Sex, Politics and Religion, we are warned about raising them at dinner parties for a reason. They bring for contesting views.
Sex Addicts though now have several 12 step fellowships they can attend and a wealth of literature that is world class. Writers such as Robert Weiss and Alexandra Katehakis have firmly taken the baton and run with it I  educating and introducing to Addicts, families and professionals skills on how to deal with this addiction. Partners though, had been a causality of this awful family destroying disease (yes, I said it, it’s a disease), of the reward system of the brain, and it will be in the DSM6, it is simply a matter of time. To give you a reference point, Gambling has only made it into the last edition and we have been calling that an addiction for years.
Well the Module Two’s focus is the partners, and how to help them, either as an individual, or as part of a family system process and deal with the trauma and impact of the addiction. It was noticed early on  within this field, that there was a benefit to treating partners of other addictions by getting them curious and explorative regarding their own histories and possible Co-dependencies. How ever it was quickly noted by Stefanie Carnes and others that specialised with partners, that the Trauma Model was a much better starting point in treating partners and their children and broader family and friends. This was due to the secretive nature of this addiction, the powerful impact it has on the addict’s rewards system, and the compartmentalized nature of the disease that can create in partners Post Traumatic Stress Reactions. The realisation of this fact was so confronting for Stefanie that the second edition which leant towards the Co-dependency Model was revised to include and use the Trauma Model and the feedback has been highly complementary.

5 days of training was an amazing opportunity to be able to learn how to help the whole family. Addiction rarely only effects the addict. The whole system suffers, and when the addiction gets exposed it can have devastating effects on wives and Husbands, Children and the adult children, as well as parents and extended family.
If you can think back it was that long ago that the Alcoholic was seen as a morally weak person, and should just pull their socks up, try harder and put the drink down. Sex Addiction is commonly misunderstood. People either joke about if you’re going to have an addiction, that’s the one to have, or ridicule sex addicts as stigmatised perverts or sluts. I heard on a talk show once from Britain, a famous personality was commenting on an addict that was famous and caught acting out to say  “That’s what they all say when they get caught!” (That they are Sex Addicts)
 Alexandra Katehakis points out in her book Sex Addiction and Affect Regulation, that it’s not really a common thing that people want to identify as a sex addict. It’s the last of the addictions that is highly stigmatised. Now if the addict feels this way, then put yourself in the shoes of the family member, especially children. The shame, humiliation, and devastation is tenfold. It is common for addict’s family members especially partners to say, this is your addiction, go sort yourself out. The shame  and pain gets internalised, turns into resentment and then depression, anxiety and PTSD get a hold. The addict can even get help and change their life and move on, but the family still stays in pain and shame sickness.
Like all the Gentle Path Press literature, Mending the Shattered Heart and  Facing Heartbreak are extraordinary in their meticulous breakdown and understanding of the issue. Not just informing you about the addiction and how to work through getting a full disclosure and getting to share and impact statement. Its more the deep understanding of how to improve communication, intimacy and head toward the goal of establishing trust and intimacy, including a healthy sexuality.
So often I hear horror stories of clients, and their families, going to therapist that simply do not understand Sex Addiction and its impact on the family system. This is a life-threatening disease, that is generational in its progression, and will continue to progress until it is properly arrested.
Carnes was captivating with her expertise and knowledge on the subject, the presentation reflected the book resources, practical, engaging, real and honest and full of hope. She knows the subject intimately and brings the passion of the saved to the quest, to educate and inspire Therapists around the world to be able to really arrest this addiction, and heal ,truly heal.
Please look at the resources online, and purchase them as a resource and look up International Institute of Trauma and Addiction Professionals and CSAT training the at www.recoveryzone.com . It’s the world premier sex addiction and general addiction treatment program, and the books are my all-time favourites. Stefanie is also a co-author of Facing Addiction for general addiction and I have simply not found a better book to take addictions with clients.
Partners do not have to suffer in isolation and silence any longer. Please if you are reading this and your are a partner, reach out for the help you deserve.

Cruise Control:Robert Weiss-Book Review

Robert Weiss is a prolific voice in the global education on Sex Addiction, its perils and the pathways out of hell. 

Cruise Control speaks both to addicts, and is essential for practitioners. It's focus is the unique challenges that Gay men can find in the addictive process , and the treatment pathways. 

When I first started in my career as a therapist, I knew that you had to have more than just your own experience. Roberts book is a clear example of this. Some clients find their landscape so challenging that if you do not know the personal aspects to their experience not only will therapy be ineffective but potentially harmful. 

Robert explains clearly the different nature of relationships, sexual expression and co-occurring addictions within this community that would help addicts identify and inform therapists deeply.

The book covers the impact of cultural changes and depending on the generation and age of the client you are treating, a radically different inner world will need to be empathised with. 

An example of this was some of the testimonies shared by men from the beginning of the HIV epidemic, pre- modern treatment and preventions advances. The incredible

loss of peers and loved ones brings a depth of grief that if you were not aware as a clinician, you would be doing your clients a disservice.

Cruise Control will leave your more confident as a health professional, whether you are a doctor identifying the addiction in a health check up , an inpatient service needing to make sure you  program caters for GLBTG communities authentic and individual treatment needs or a Psychologist offering  therapeutic interventions.

June Lake. Listen to the Music. Group Process Facilitation and Leadership

Well I just spent a week with one of Australia master Psychotherapists, Supervisors and unashamed Yalom devotee’s , June Lake, whom facilitated a 5 day intensive on Group Psychotherapy-Leadership and Facilitation. I had attended this course 12 years ago, and June has been a mentor to me for over 20 years now. Some relationships in your professional life stand alone, and this one does for me. Many an hour has been spent either in group, or in supervision and on the phone seeking advice to my latest existential dilemma. Always, once I am done, clarity and a brighter direction are the result.
 To have a mentor champion you, is a gift that keeps giving, and this last week was like Christmas.

June is passionate about the work, believing wholeheartedly in the premises ; That we are , who we are, wherever we are, and therefore Group Therapy, focusing on Process and Relationship gives us a unique opportunity to work relationally in a group setting, were all we need to know is available to us in the room, in the here and now. Therefore any intervention, develops a new skill, will reveal a growing edge, and give us access to feedback about how others experience us. All of these things can  be difficult to embrace, especially when we have come from shame based families with Developmental Trauma histories. On top of that some of us have Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or as Bessel  van Der Kolk would have it called, Development Trauma Disorder. 

One day the regulatory Psychiatric community will catch up (they just included Gambling as a disorder!) but until then, we will stand at the edge of the treatment field and keep offering support and trauma informed care. If our Fight Flight Freeze is easily activated, or we have developed personality disorders were disassociation is present at a high level, making it impossible to filter out others realities, and allowing us to have a clear sense of our own, then Yalom style process groups might not be for you immediately, but even those clients can spend some time working to develop Affect regulation skills and boundaries that allow this form of therapeutic support to be of benefit.

The week includes 5 days of Morning Didactic down loads on the philosophies, tools and skills necessary to facilitate group. Afternoons start with watching the Godfather of Group Therapy Work, Irving Yalom on film, then for the last two hours, you ARE the group. That’s right. You become a member of a group, only stepping out of the group to facilitate the group of your peers for an hour, and then receive feedback from June who supervises the group.There is simply nowhere to hide.

As a caveat, this is not the first time I have done this, as I did the course over a decade ago, but I had also spent years in a group, that June facilitated of peers in the field. We hired June to come and run the group, and in doing so teach us the finer art of running the group. It was some of the most enlightening and challenging hours I have spent in recovery. Every time I would look forward to going to group, that would be the week that my growing edges revealed themselves, I  often went home heavy carrying the gift I received, usually wrapped in sandpaper. I never regretted a moment, but there was many a time I had wished learning about yourself , and learning to communicate better, was easier. But relationships take relationship, being in contact, reality to reality. The internal spiritual crisis that Pia Mellody writes about, cannot be resolved by defences and roles, but only through being honest , where we would usually be dishonest, especially through omission.

Therefore, whether it being a training group, or one for your own recovery, you quickly learn there is where to hide your true nature. You are going to be revealed. Even if you chose to sit there, and contribute at a surface level, through niceness or humour, the group will quickly see that this is how you keep yourself safe, and with your consent give you the feedback of what that is like for them to experience. What fosters member participation is that this feedback is usually not your first rodeo. Because we are who we are wherever we are, it will ring in your ears, reminding you of the key relationships of your life, and how you have heard it before. We certainly can remain in denial, or be dishonest about its familiarity. But you will know it’s the truth.

A group well run, is very safe, and participates at the level the member is in consent of working at, respectful of individual boundaries. Just experiencing this level of safety to experience self and others is a revelation for some, whom have come from families where it was based on the old adage; Don’t Talk, Don’t Trust and Don’t Feel.

It will come as no surprise that the benefits of the group, as identified by Yalom himself are

1.       Instillation of Hope.

2.       Universality.

3.       Imparting Information.

4.       Altruism.

5.       The corrective recapitulation of the primary family group.

6.       Development of Socializing Techniques.

7.       Imitative Behaviour.

8.       Interpersonal Learning.

9.       Group Cohesiveness.

10.   Catharsis.

11.   Existential Factors.

As you can see this list is exhaustive in its opportunities, if you are willing to consent to take risks and share yourself in the here and now you can  grow in amazing ways personally.

After years Yalom researched the benefits from groups members themselves and they came up with the following benefits:

1. Discovering and accepting previously unknown or unacceptable parts of myself.
2. Being able to say what was bothering me instead of holding it in.
3.  Other members telling me honestly what they think of me.
4. Learning how to express my feelings.
5. The groups teaching me about the type of impression i make on others
6.  Expressing negative and/or positive feelings towards another member.
7.  Learning that I must take responsibility for the way I live my life, no matter how much      guidance and support I get from others
8. Learning how I come across to others.
9. Seeing that others could reveal embarrassing information and take other risks and benefit from it helped me to do the same.
10. Feeling more trustful of groups and other people.

For many years I have had the opportunity to run group. In treatment centres, and in private practice. As I have said , I have been part of groups. Self help, 12 step, weekend retreats, Men’s groups, Process Groups . All have met for different lengths of time, some peer driven, some didactically based and task driven. All have taught me something.

As I head towards my 30^th year of practicing Psychotherapy, I have started again to facilitate Process groups again, true to the nature of Yalom’s vision and protocols. Men’s groups and mixed groups. The opportunity is accelerated learning. Life is short, especially if you are dealing with the impact of developmental trauma. Years wasted in stressful relationships, where it felt like you were given the rules for scrabble and you were looking at the game of monopoly.

Process Groups take courage that is for sure. But we get that in recovery, when you surrender in the first step and work your way through the steps towards spiritual awakening. This awakening provides us with courage, as the serenity prayer challenges us to reflect on.

God, Grant me the Serenity

To accent the things I can not change

Courage to change the things I can

And the Wisdom to know the difference.

This courage, if exercised in a process group, with the support of a good facilitator and in the company of others travellers Trudging their road to Happy Destiny, can be a game changer. To not accept the pathology that we inherited, but to have the Courage to reveal ourselves, so we can get the feedback and support and opportunity to make the changes necessary to Thrive and not just Survive.

If you work in this field and you work with groups,  I could not recommend this course more highly. In the afternoon, we would watch Irving Yalom facilitate a group, and we would then discuss and then be in group. One thing becomes very clear when you are in the company of June Lake. You realise she is now a master in her own right. June  might have been a student of Yalom once, but her breadth of knowledge , experience and the ability to work with students at what ever level they are at, to hold them in deep regard and respect and illuminate their growing edges with clarity and compassion I think is her greatest skill.Dont miss an opportunity to learn from a world class practitioner. 

When June facilitates group, she regularly implores you to listen for the music, not just the words.
 When you watch June in action, it is music. Beautiful Music

Please contact June Lake for all training course. Details on the flyer. Contact me if interested in joining a Process Group.

New book on Sex Addiction

Like how the groundbreaking work by Patrick Carnes working with Sex Addiction opened up  better resources to deal with all addictions, Alexandra Katehakis builds on Patrick's work and combines the neuroscience of Dr Allan Schore, who better informed us about impact of Developmental Trauma that drives the Addiction issues in our lives.

Pia Mellody , who in creating a pathway out of her own personal hell once she was sober, but still suffering with what she defined as the Disease of Codependency , the work was largely created from her own experiential wisdom, allowing it to be critiqued harshly by those in the field of addiction. Now , forty years latter , as the best selling book in the field of trauma is called The Body Keeps the Score, by Bessel Van Der Kolk-Pia Mellody  has been exposed as frighteningly before her time.

 Before the words amygdala was being used as much as it is today, and our sub-cortical knowledge of the impact of trauma largely unknown to coalface workers, Pia Mellody was working with the affect dysregulation that results from adverse childhood experience, redefining what we called trauma, and working with the Body and the Feeling states like no other before her. The results were astounding.

Recently a long term recovering person lamented that nobody is coming through  as the recovery Giants start to pass on. I said no,  your wrong. John Bradshaw RIP, stated once that he stood on the shoulders of Giants to do his work . Well his broad shoulders have many feet resting on them , and an  inspirational voice standing tall is Alexandra Katehakis.

https://www.gentlepathmeadows.com/blog/item/72-katehakis-new-book-on-sex-addiction-now-available

Adult Children of Alcoholics forst Sydney Unity Day!

There is a lot of Buzz about this Unity Day in Sydney.

ACA 1st Anniversary Unity Day

July 17, 2016, 9am - 5pm

McMahons Point Community Centre

165 Blues Point Rd, McMahons Point NSW 2196 Australia.

If you have come from any dysfunctional -less than nurturing or stressed parenting, then there could be some Gold in this fellowship

I look forward to presenting the workshop on Pia Mellody's concept of Re-parenting. It has been an essential life changing concept to know how to identify when I am in the symtoms of my trauma. To connect with the Wounded Child and learn how to nurture, support and connect instead of going to the Adaptions and criticize , abandon and neglect myself, continuing the abandonment and Toxic shaming of my childhood.

One of my favourite talks Pia has on record is titled Mapping your Recovery, and it is this talk she gave at and ACOA conference that I will be drawing on for this presentation through my own personal experience. You can purchase this MP3 from the Meadows, Treatment Center, Arizona, USA.

ACOA started with working with Adults from Alcoholic Family systems, however with what we know now about all addictions impacting the same rewards system in the brain, as an affect regulator to cope with attachment issues from developmental trauma , neglect and abuse, it opens up the wonderful tools of Adult Children of Alcoholics to be useful to all folks that grew up in a dsyfunctioning family system. Anything that gets you half an inch closer to God ( your Miracle) (Your core self) Take it. Look forward to seeing you there! Please share this post and flyer with anyone you think might benefit