Here’s the Deal with Porn Addiction

First of all, I want to remind you that the word addiction has extremely negative, actually straight up harmful consequences when it’s used to describe someone’s challenges with porn use that feels out-of-control. That said, the feeling that you are addicted to pornography is very real. So, here’s the lowdown. 

What causes porn addiction? 

There are biological and psychosocial factors that cause you to feel addicted to porn, or like you must use it compulsively. First, the biological factors: you can certainly program the brain and body around dopamine-seeking. You get a hit of dopamine every time you seek out porn, and it’s usually not very difficult to find exactly what you are looking for. At first, you might get hits of dopamine from just visiting porn sites - the act of doing something taboo lights us up. But this level of taboo gets old after a time and the brain wants more dopamine, so you raise the stakes. You seek something more exciting. And more exciting. And MORE EXCITING. Think about eating your favorite dessert - the first bite feels like fireworks! And you could definitely even go for more after your first serving. However, if you eat this same dessert over and over every day for a month, you're going to get bored, as well as lose the excitement for eating this wonderful thing. You'll start craving something different. 

c/o giphy: cake

And it’s not just dopamine seeking that gets old… folks with a penis can also accidentally train sensation in their penis by stroking it with a certain pressure or grip. You sometimes have to "raise the stakes" on sensation from stroking your penis as well, which is a factor that sometimes accompanies porn addiction. This sometimes leads to delayed ejaculation and anhedonia. When you’re someone whose brain doesn’t produce enough dopamine, porn and masturbation are great ways to get a burst of it. 

Next, the psychosocial factors: Often, porn is used as a tool to soothe anxiety (general, social, dating, or sexual anxiety), depression symptoms, loneliness, or the feelings that come from reality-based experiences not being quite as good as fantasy and porn experiences. You get dopamine and fulfillment from our social experiences, from feeling desired, from desiring others and connecting with others. Many times, high levels of religiosity is associated with porn addiction. People don't want to "cheat" but they also are pulled in by the exciting feelings that eroticism gives humans - longing and anticipation, breaking taboos, power and control, overcoming ambivalence about a belief. It becomes a way to soothe anxious feelings and fill in a person-to-person connection gap, as well as an instant way to experience excitement, pleasure, desire, and fulfill dopamine wants. 

What are the warning sign(s) that someone is watching way too much porn? 

The sign that someone is watching too much porn is when it begins to negatively impact your relationships, work life, responsibilities, and sense of self. 

Porn use alone is not a problem. Healthy sexuality is important to our core human experience. However, if you find yourself unable to stop thinking or fantasizing about porn and it is distressing to you or someone important to you, whose opinion matters to you, it is then something to work on. 

How can someone best support loved ones suffering from porn addiction and want to stop? 

First, you need to change your language. Though porn use can feel addicting, you actually want to encourage ownership over this behavior and the feelings that go along with it; thus, you can begin to refer to it as out-of-control sexual behavior. It's a mouthful, but an important one. Twelve-step, addiction-based programs are harmful, and many clients I see have to actually heal from that work itself. Addiction implies that we are powerless over our choices and behaviors - the first step of SA treatment is "We admit we are powerless over lust - our lives have become unmanageable." You have to pay attention to the labels and language you use, which further exacerbate shame feelings or anxiety feelings, which can be part of what initiates the cycle of out of control porn use. 

Second, you need to learn to talk about your erotic dilemmas. Eroticism doesn't just speak to sexual love and desire, it refers to the feelings of vitality and aliveness. You know that feeling you get when you put on a new outfit and you feel like a million bucks? Or that feeling of traveling somewhere you've always dreamed of going? Or that feeling when you've had a really great sexual experience from beginning to orgasms? Yeah, that feeling of aliveness. You don't have tools to talk about sexuality or eroticism, let alone when we have a dilemma because we feel anxious, shame, or straight up haven't learned to speak about these things aloud with another human being. You only know how to talk about sex when it causes danger or illness. It is an adult skill to learn to talk about sexuality. 

Third, you need to stop pathologizing desire and porn. Porn is not a bad thing - it's a tool. Having interest or desire for sex and masturbation doesn't make you bad, exploitative, misogynistic, or gross. You can help someone you love by first understanding your own values around sexuality, as well as your biases, then having an open conversation with them. You can repeat our understanding of where your person is at and why before you add our own hurt in. You can help them by learning to discuss meaning. You can learn about attachment, the agency you have in your behaviors, and sexuality itself. You can also help them by taking them to therapy, or signing up for sexuality-based classes, workshops, newsletters, podcasts, instagram accounts, etc. Take the pathology out of sex. 

And for those partners of folks who have out-of-control behaviors around pornography use, you might have the following question: How can I help someone if they don't want to stop but are causing their lives and the lives of others to deteriorate?

People need to be aware of consequences, as well as feel them. You need to let your loved one know what the consequences are to their choices, and then you need to stick to those consequences. People have agency - they are not powerless most of the time.* Also, people don't have to stop using porn - they have to stop the harmful disruption to their life and strive for balance. How can you help support someone in their dopamine seeking? How can you engage with them and talk about the pieces that lead to out of control porn use, such as how to manage anxiety or loneliness? You need to lean into your relationships, as well as clear the muck out of the way in order to see the actual problems. Complex issues deserve complex conversations. 
*Compulsive sexual behavior has recently been added to the ICD10 - note that the diagnosis has many rule out factors, which make it very specific and difficult to receive. This is because OCSB has to do more with agency, values, and feelings most of the time, rather than it being a compulsion that someone is out of control of.