He examined the steps these patients took in recovery and treatment and was able to outline the general stages and how long they lasted. 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. This profound and sudden change in our sense of security and connection sends our bodies into panic and lights up the fear center in our brain like a giant Christmas tree. When our fear center goes into overdrive our ability to think and reason diminishes quickly and our ability to function takes a nose dive. For some people, there are specific triggers which cause the onset of manic episodes. For example, there may be certain places, times of the day, or thoughts that lead to manic episodes involving sexual acting out behavior. For others, manic states may appear randomly. In this case, the manic state is often caused by irregular brain chemistry. However, conditions don t want to go away despite our best efforts and intentions they seem to camp out in our lives, building and creating more and more disruption and pain not just to ourselves but often to those around us. The man at the pool had been in this condition for as long as he can remember. Sex addiction, in particular, creates a sense of excitement and pleasure, while simultaneously ensuring emotional distance and avoidance of true connection the kind of intimacy that can leave one open to being hurt. Putting in the Work in Sex Addiction Recovery The process of recovery for sex addicts involves identifying those behaviors such as obsessive masturbation, pornography use, anonymous sex, exhibitionism, etc. When wives internal world of perceptions and intuition does not match up with their external world of what they are seeing and being told, they can develop feelings of being crazy. That is often the result of internal and external worlds not seeming to match up. When these wives are offered the truth it finally allows them to feel sane.