The book Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment says, Numerous studies show that once we become attached to someone, the two of us form one physiological unit. Our partner regulates our blood pressure, our heart rate, our breathing and the levels of hormones in our blood. As our bond grows through perhaps getting married, combining our homes, having children together, or working toward common goals, we become more and more interdependent with one another. When it comes to betrayal trauma recovery, sending partners off to seek individual therapy doesn t do either partner much good. Betrayal Trauma Recovery for the Unfaithful Partner: How To Help Your Spouse Heal From Your Affair Recognize That Your Partner s Trust Will Not Come Easy After Infidelity To trust right now is an act of bravery. A further 72 percent suffered from physical abuse; furthermore, frequent abuse was even more strongly associated with sex addiction than occasional abuse. People with a history of trauma can manifest a variety of different responses that are rooted in their traumatic experiences. This can include a deep-rooted sense of unworthiness, efforts to block or numb residual feelings, finding pleasure in extreme risk-taking, compulsive deprivation and re-creation of the trauma experience. Bottom Lines, Border Lines and Top Lines All this discussion of sexual sobriety leads to the need to discuss exactly what constitutes a "relapse" in sex addiction. The simple answer is that relapse is defined as any sexual activity that falls outside of pre-determined boundaries. Sometimes people in 12-step recovery refer to acts that would constitute a relapse as "bottom-line behaviors". Your reactivity decreases and your distress acceptance takes the charge out of the fear equation. The secondary gain is that you begin to apply this constructively compassionate mindset to others as well. The Early Recovery Couples Empathy Model incorporates these skills to help you to become less reactive to your environment and the reality of the betrayal. Each person is unique, but he found that, in general, patients moved through these stages before being in recovery. The developing stage. This first stage can take up to two years. During this time, problems caused by the sex addiction grow. The patient begins to realize that she has a problem and may even reach out for help, but can t commit.