Intimacy Anorexia Characteristic #1 - Busy
Busy - Intimacy anorexics stay so busy that they have little time for their spouse.
Fully Restored
God wants every addict who takes the journey and does the hard work of recovery to be fully restored as a son or daughter of the Most High God and be rid of all slavery thinking and behaving. His desire is to see them restored to him and to family members and friends.
Admitting
Step Five: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
Searching
Step Four: Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Be Wise
Be wise about who you let praise and touch you on a regular basis. Women know that men like praise and touch, and some will use this knowledge to seduce you. If a woman praises me, I am cautious. If she continues, I am extremely cautious because deep down I know I’m not really that amazing. As a married man, if a woman touches me, especially if it’s on a regular basis, I definitely set clear boundaries.
Say Goodbye to Blaming
Blaming is important to the survival of the entity of intimacy anorexia. Blaming is the insider game. The anorexic really believes that circumstance, their spouse’s abuse (real or imaginary), family of origin issues or personality is to blame for the lack of intimacy, criticism or sexual disinterest.
A Kind Voice
I don’t know if you realize this or not, but next to God, you are the loudest and most consistent voice your spouse will hear throughout their life. So you decide what kind of voice your spouse hears. You can choose a kind voice that supports and encourages your spouse by putting wind under their wings or another not so positive voice. You can choose a silent voice or a gruff voice that discourages, degrades, and minimizes your spouse on a regular basis, but this is not the best choice.
The Power to Carry Out
Step Eleven: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.
Recovery can be Measured
Luke 15:20: “So he got up and went to his father.”
Sexless Marriage: Intimacy Anorexia
Self-Will
Some of you are struggling with self-will. You don’t want to submit to a person or a process, even if these could free you from your current addiction. Overvaluing your opinions and will can make your road to healing longer and more painful for both you and those who love you.
Preoccupied
When you’re preoccupied with the one you love it’s almost all-consuming. You wonder what they’re doing, thinking, feeling or experiencing while at the same time you’re working, in class, just doing chores or other activities. Then you become preoccupied with past conversations together, hugs, kisses, notes, or things you did together. You go into an almost timeless state reviewing the movie of your relationship and pushing pause to think and feel about this or that moment.
The Miracle of Marriage
When someone does not believe their marriage is a miracle, a separate creation of God, they walk in various degrees of being deceived. What I mean by deceived is we believe something God doesn’t. A deceived person could look at a child and see him or her as a number, instead of a miracle made in the image of God. In the same way, a married person can be deceived by sensing their marriage as less than an amazing miracle. One of the characteristics of a married person who has a degree of deception is that they have no awe of their marriage. To them, it’s just a marriage. This person is rarely aware of all the miracles it took for them to get married or to stay married. A deceived person might live their life as if their marriage is a legal arrangement, a mutual living situation or even worse, something to be distained. Take a few moments thanking God for the amazing miracle of your marriage.
Removed
Step Six: “Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character."
Stay Openhearted
The comments or dialogue is what happens to the anorexic after connected sex. The spouses state that the anorexic “gets cold,” “leaves me physically or emotionally,” “gets angry,” “gets very distant,” “critical” or “picks a fight the next day.”
Forgiveness Exercise
Many of us have had things done to us by others. Often, we have done things or allowed things to happen to ourselves or even simply abandoned or neglected ourselves.
Have Fun in Your Marriage
What issues do you need to walk through to make fun a part of your marriage? How often do you want to plan for fun? What is reasonable for you to do for fun in a year? You might choose to schedule a getaway annually, biannually or quarterly if you can afford it. Agree on a frequency for fun and then discuss your financial ability to plan for this expenditure. It will be a lot less fun if you spend your entire time worrying how much all of it is costing.
Four Boundaries to consider for social networks
Today's addict faces an even more dangerous world. In the old days you had to go into the dealers part of the neighborhood, the part of town where they sold porn, or your neighborhood bar. Today, with social networks, the invitation to act out come to you on your phone and computer.
Shame
Shame is something that can make anyone retreat. We don’t want anyone to know about that secret thing we did or had happen to us. Shame is insidious. It lurks between the surface and bubbles up here and there leaving us emotionally incapacitated sometimes at the most inconvenient times.
The War of Love
Being married, you are automatically engaged in this war of love. That doesn’t mean that your spouse is the enemy and that you are the side of justice. No, the war is not about right or wrong it’s about being Christlike and seeking the truth as an opportunity to grow.
Lust hates you
The truth about lust is, it hates you. Lust knows it is not good for you. Lust knows it is causing self-rejection, distance with your spouse, friends and children. Lust knows every drink you take of it sucks the life out of you. But lust has you believing it is medicine instead of poison.
Consequences for Sexual Avoidance
Sexual avoidance and disconnectedness are real issues for intimacy anorexia recovery. If a person does not initiate when it’s their turn or says no when the spouse initiates, there needs to be a real consequence.
Coming to Ourselves
Luke 15:17: When he came to his senses, he said, How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death!
You Can Trust God
Step Eleven: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.