MICHAEL'S STORY:Michael* (38) believes his problem stemmed from being marginally sexually abused on several occasions when he was only eight or nine years old.
He says the incidents prematurely sexualised him and he remembers being "overly curious" about matters sexual in relation to his peers. This developed into an obsession with sexual magazines and masturbation which he used to cope with stress in everyday life.
As an young adult he says he became very controlling in relationships which caused a lot of fighting. His partners were often uncomfortable with the intensity and frequency with which he wanted sex.
"It got a lot worse when I got access to a computer for work about 10 years ago and I discovered internet pornography."
"I have never really been interested in hardcore pornography, the issue was always about getting people to give themselves to me. I really realised I was in trouble when I began spending five or six hours a day - often late into the night - fantasising, masturbating, moving through websites. Hours and hours were being lost, and I was exhausted.
"I suppose I felt guilty, but mostly just exhausted and disappointed with myself. I felt a real lifelessness which was affecting my ability to do my job.
"I didn't know what my problem was, I just knew I was having a problem. I felt it was something to do with the way I approached women.
"I went to a few counsellors but none of them picked up on my addiction.
"Then one therapist diagnosed the problem and handed me an Alcoholics Anonymous book and suggested I put the word sex in every time I read the word alcohol. I was terrified. Everything in the book was about me, once I changed those words."
GARY'S STORY:
Gary* (45) says he grew up in a house with an alcoholic father and a depressed mother, and there was a lot a pain around the place. He says releasing tension through sex or masturbation became a way of medicating away the pain.
"As a teenager I would retreat away to my room and get into a sense of oblivion through masturbation and fantasy where I couldn't feel anything. While most teenagers grow out of that, I held on to it as a medication. Then it graduated into pornography and the internet, which made fantasy easier.
"It was a way of avoiding any kind of intimacy and this became extremely destructive to my marriage. I had a public face of someone who was a successful family man, but there was this underground life. I maintained this double life for years, which involved a lot of deception and lying . . . pretending I was somewhere when I wasn't . . . saying I was spending money on one thing when it was for another. I think I crossed a boundary when I started being unfaithful to my wife and going to prostitutes a lot.
"It came to a head when I couldn't conceal it any more and I was being caught more and more. I was out of control and powerless. I would go after pornography even when I didn't want to, which I know sounds kind of strange to people who don't know addiction. There is that sense of complete compulsion. I recognised I had an addiction from talking to people who had addictions in other areas.
"Initially I went to a psychiatrist, who told me there was no such thing as sexual addiction and offered me medication to suppress my libido. It was only when I went to counselling and began to address some of the core issues that I began to get better."
* Names have been changed