Remember to identify one of these five feelings: anger, sadness, loneliness, happiness or fear. I can see as you look at the pictures from the Memorial Day family picnic that you feel sadness because now you question the reality of what really happened on that day. It feels like I contaminated the joyful event. While the first few months of sexual recovery does require somewhat rigid boundaries, it is essential to help addicts negotiate the line between healthy sexual recovery and a healthy nurturing of self. Despite the negative consequences caused by their addiction, recovering addicts need to find ways to love and value the addiction. A couples therapist that sends your partner to heal alone with me or another therapist sends them towards failure and more self-blame. In reality, they just need to seek healing with you. One day at a time. The only person who can help a hurt partner heal is their unfaithful spouse. No one else. You are the one who has the power to help them regain trust and want to forgive. Common accountability measures include: Accountability software: Use monitoring software to track his online activity. Financial and technological transparency: Request access to his financial and technological accounts. Full disclosure: Consider guided therapeutic disclosure for complete honesty. Recovery support: Encourage him to seek counseling or join a support group. Feelings of confusion, betrayal, abandonment, and even anger and hate, are normal responses under these circumstances. At this point, the spouse faces a choice in her response to her partner s addiction and actions. Her response will determine whether she grows emotionally and spiritually, or whether she emotionally stagnates. Sex Addiction as a term first appeared in the mid-1970s when a group of people in Alcoholics Anonymous got together to apply the principles of 12-step programs to issues of compulsive sexual behaviors. Research has shown that sexual addiction and substance abuse are often correlated. An estimated 40-64% of sex addicts also suffer from substance abuse disorders.