As a condition, sexual addiction has been around apparently going back as far as we have recorded history. However, it has only been in the last two or three decades that a clearer understanding of it is being reached and inroads begun into effectively treating it.
Starting in the late 1970’s a psychologist and researcher, Patrick Carnes, Ph.D., was instrumental in the initial identification and treatment of sexual addiction as a condition. He is also responsible for getting accurate information about it into the hands of professionals as well as the public through numerous national lectures and educational TV appearances, and recently by answering questions about it in an AOL chat room on the Internet. Among the books he has written on the subject are Out of the Shadows: Understanding Sexual Addiction, and Don’t Call It Love: Recovery from Sexual Addiction, which are excellent sources for learning in more detail about sexual addiction.
