Something that I've been trying to do in my recovery is to reach out and make some friends. I haven't been making a ton of effort at it, but I have been trying somewhat to be more social and build relationships with others.
The reason I've been working on this is because in my workshop we talked about the type of person that gets stuck in sexual addiction is one who needs and lacks relationships and intimacy. When I hear the word intimate I tend to think of "being intimate" with someone - but in addition to that, what it really means in a relationship is closeness, transparency, commitment, devotedness, affection, fidelity, and mutuality.
I realized that I really stink at developing intimate relationships. Sure, I ALWAYS had a pretty tight-knit group of friends growing up - through all grades in school and in through college - but everything was so superficial. We never talked about the weightier matters that glue people together and enable them to trust and lean on each other. From the outside, no one really had problems and everything was lovely and perfect (kind of sounds like church, haha). We didn't really talk about our troubles or our needs. Maybe the girls did, but we sure didn't.
Even now I still have trouble with this. When my wife and I have gotten closer, I have had this weird natural reaction (that I hate) to mess things up, to push her away and distance myself. I think mainly because when it comes down to it I fear intimacy because intimacy means truly seeing and being seen, and I haven't been good at not rejecting others because of their inadequacies and I have an intense fear of being rejected after my inadequacies are discovered. So this is something I really need to work on. I have a lot of mental tapes that I run through my head in this area. I guess it's good I realize these things and that they are a problem. Knowledge is power. My wife and I really working on developing true intimacy between us. The first 2 years of our marriage have been pretty dramatic and traumatizing, so it's taking some rebuilding. We're trying to create a safe environment with each other so that can happen, and we have been making progress which feels great. I really feel like we're going to make it and be fine. (On a plus note, I'm coming up on 20 months of sobriety, which is beyond the 18 addictionologists say are required for the brain to really start healing from addiction - go brain!).
Anyway, when it comes down to it I've really only had 2 really intimate friends in my life (aside from my efforts with my wife): my buddy Jonny and my little sister. These relationships weren't always intimate - they became intimate when one of us decided we would open up to the other person about our troubles, and then in turn the other person opened up about theirs. We accepted each others' faults and supported each other in a non-biased way. We could tell each other anything and usually did. (This is another reason why it's a bit more challenging with my wife, because while my inadequacies and weaknesses didn't really affect my friend or sister, they have deeply wounded my wife - just another challenge along the way that deserves mentioning). These are two relationships that really helped me in my early years of recovery. Another that comes close to it is one of my brothers-in-law.
I read "5 Types of Friends Every Man Needs" in the art of manliness blog today and it really solidified my belief that I really need friends. In addition to working hard to build intimacy with my wife (which is the first priority), I also need to try and build intimacy with a few other friends. As my wife and I discovered, if we just are with each other every day and only have each other to talk to, it gets hard. We need friends to reach out to. The article says that a person can usually maintain about 150 friendships in their life, which I'm sure varies but is pretty close to the truth. Which makes me wonder, how many of those beloved facebook friends to I actually give a crap about? haha.
Within those 150, a person usually has the capacity to have about 5 intimate friends with whom they share a certain level of transparency, devotedness, affection, and mutuality. How many of these do I have now? ... I'm not sure. I have a few good friends that I have a higher level of intimacy with than others, but it could be improved greatly. And I don't want to be the guy that just sits and throws his problems around at everyone and is a burden all the time, but I feel like there are times and places where it is appropriate. However, I've been going through some of the hardest times of my life in working through our martial troubles, and aside from a bishop and counselor, the only other person that I've really talked to is my father. And I think it's an important balance to maintain, and I still don't really get how appropriate it is to talk about marital problems with friends and to what level it is appropriate to go into... something to think about I guess.
So the 5 types of friends are: a mentor, a handyman, a work buddy, a bachelor, and a fitness buff. This is already getting way long and I'm kind of tired so I'll do another post later about what each of those entails and possibly who fits or could fit into that friend category for me. And hopefully I can think about how I can develop closer relationships with a few people that can further enrich my life and help fill the need for intimacy in my life.
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