Is SA for me?

To newcomers

Welcome, we're glad you're here. If you recognize yourself in us, and think you share our problem with us, we would like to share our solution with you. Newcomers like you often have a lot of questions about our program. Below we try to answer some of them.

What is SA?

We are a community of men and women who share our experience, strength and hope with each other to solve our common problem of sex addiction and help others recover. Our main goal is to stay sexually sober and to help other sex addicts achieve sexual sobriety.

What is Sexual Sobriety?

In defining sexual sobriety, we're not speaking for those outside of Sexaholics Anonymous. Sexual sobriety for sex addicts like us means no sex with ourselves and no sex with any partner other than the spouse. In SA's sobriety definition, the term marriage partner refers to one's partner in a marriage between a man and a woman. Sexual sobriety also means becoming increasingly liberated from the many forms of sexual thinking, sexual arousal, and lust that enter our lives. This freedom is found by staying sober and using our Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions in our daily lives.

How can I stay healthy without any sexual expression?

Our collective experience is that sexual sobriety will free us from a compulsive need to be sexual. We seek to return the instinct of sexual intimacy to its proper place for procreation and maintaining a healthy bond with a marriage partner. When we stopped harboring lust and sexual arousal, the need to be obsessively sexual left us.

Is SA a type of group therapy?

SA is not a form of sex therapy or group therapy. SA meetings are led by SA members using our guidelines. No professional facilitators are present at any SA meeting. SA is a lust and sex addiction recovery program based on the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous. Whatever problems we bring to SA, we share a common solution – the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions of recovery, practiced communityally on a foundation of sexual sobriety.

How do I become a member?

All those who think they have a problem with lust are welcome to attend closed SA meetings, and can consider themselves a member if they have a desire to stop lusting and become sexually sober.

How much will it cost me to join?

SA meetings are free. There are no monetary obligations associated with membership. We circulate a basket at gatherings for contributions to pay for rent, literature, coffee, etc. In the spirit of the Seventh Tradition, we are self-sufficient through our own contributions.

I admit I went too far with sex. Can't I just cut back a bit?

SA is for those who have lost control in this area of their lives. We go to SA because we can't stop no matter what form our sexual behavior takes. We are no longer able to choose to stop.

How do I know if I am addicted?

You have to come to that awareness yourself. Recognizing your own powerlessness is what we call 'taking the First Step'. As the First Step says, "We admitted that we were powerless over lust—that our lives had become unmanageable."
It takes time and often a lot of pain to admit defeat. Sooner or later we say something like, "I give up!" or “I need help!” or “I can’t handle this alone anymore!” Each of these claims is an admission of powerlessness.
That's why trying to get sober for someone else, like a family member or employer, won't work. We must admit the loss to ourselves and seek help for ourselves.

Test yourself

Have you considered seeking help for your sexual thinking or behavior, or have others advised you to do so?
Have you tried to control or cut down sexual thoughts or actions and have been unsuccessful?
Does your sexual thinking or behavior interfere with your relationship with your spouse or your responsibilities to others?
Have you continued that behavior despite its negative consequences—humiliations, lies, illnesses, job loss, arrests, divorces, or immoral acts?
Has anyone ever told you that you are a sex addict or have you been arrested for a sexual crime?

See more questions here.

I know I can't stop on my own. I've tried before and it didn't work. Do you claim that it is possible?

Yes, it is possible. There are sober SA members all over the world, both single and married. Together we can get and stay sober in SA if we do the program one day at a time.

What should I do to get sober?

While there is nothing absolute in the program, we can share with you what we know about getting sober. We go to meetings; we do the Steps; we use the literature (both SA and AA); we have sponsors with whom we speak regularly. Many of us have come to believe in a Higher Power that keeps us sober.

Okay - I'm willing to try. What should I do now?

Contact SA.

Go to meetings, meetings, and more meetings.

Come and join our in-person meeting. To know the place and time write to us.
Join meetings online.

Check out videos and more resources here.

Talk to sober sexaholics and ask them how they got sober.

Take advantage of our program literature:

Find a sponsor. This is someone whose sobriety attracts you. Call your sponsor daily. Ask for suggestions.

DO THE STEPS. Your sponsor will show you how.

Collect phone numbers. Start calling other members to surrender your sexual temptations and lust and to connect as soon as you feel worried or panicked.

Pray. In the morning, ask your Higher Power to keep you sober "just for today." At night, say "thank you" for your sexually sober day. Pray as soon as lust strikes.

Practice our program slogans:

First things first
Easy does it
One day at a time
Let go and let God
Keep it simple

Remember, we've all been newcomers and felt the way you feel today. Reach out and ask for help. Join us because

We shall be with you in the Fellowship of the Spirit and you will surely meet some of us as you trudge the Road of Happy Destiny. May God bless you and keep you until then.

(Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 164)

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Meetings in English!