Recovery for Self or Spouse: Does it Matter?
In addiction therapy, an individual usually seeks counseling when their partner or spouse demands they go into therapy or risk losing the relationship.
In my own work with male sex addicts, that is even more true. Clients are clinging on to a thread of relationship as spouses are threatening divorce or separation. This fear is enough to get them into the door and start their recovery.
Yet does it matter later in recovery if they’re doing it for themselves or for their spouses? I would say very much so. Only when a client intimates that his recovery comes first and foremost in his life that I realize how much it matters to him. In other words, clients may come in because of their spouses but they stay in recovery because of their own desires.
But there are times when guys come into therapy and are very committed to therapy and may even spend more than one year in counseling. But when their relationships end, their desire for therapy also ends. They quit therapy at a time when they are most vulnerable emotionally and are prone to relapse. I often don’t hear from those clients again but from those who do come back later, they will acknowledge their hearts were only committed to therapy to keep their relationships together. When it ended, they also realized the recovery was mainly for their spouses.
The irony is most guys committed to recovery never have to verbalize their commitment because it oozes out of them. Those who are doing it for their spouses on the other hand may question when they can leave therapy, bring up how their spouses are pleased they’re in therapy, and center their sessions on how they can “win” their partners over to trust in their recovery.
