CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A psychotherapist based in Charlotte said more people are coming to him with an addiction to pornography than ever before, and he only expects cases to increase.
Ryan Wishart said his practice saw a 50 percent jump in clients seeking help with porn addiction in 2015 when compared to 2014.
“Some clients are usually struggling through this for years before they see me,” Wishart said.
A woman named Lili Bee decided to share her personal experience in hopes of raising awareness to the issue.
Years ago, Lili founded an organization called Partners of Sex Addicts Resource Center, or PoSARC.
She's based in New York City, but has helped start a support group connected with the organization in Charlotte.
"We would share everything with each other. We were best friends," Lili Bee said, talking about her former boyfriend.
Bee said it was a friendship that quickly blossomed into a relationship.
Within six months, Bee said she and her boyfriend were living together and within years, they were discussing marriage, until she said she discovered his fixation with pornography.
"It was just a whole other side of him that I knew nothing about," Bee said.
Her boyfriend agreed to couple's therapy, and that was where he confessed pornography had become a problem for him.
"He said it's an addiction and in that moment, just the room started swirling for me," Bee said. "I just thought this cannot be happening. How does one even get an addiction to this?"
Wishart said pornography addiction can be like substance abuse.
"People start with something more benign, and over time, they need something more exciting and different," Wishart said. "That escalation is sort of like needing more beers to get drunk."
But not everyone who drinks becomes an alcoholic.
Wishart pointed out underlying issues like anxiety, depression, or obsessive compulsive disorder can often feed an addiction to porn. People who grew up in households with the Internet can especially be at risk.
"We have this whole generation of folks who are first exposed to pornography in demonstrably different ways than the generation before them," Wishart said.
Wishart added that technology has been, and continues to be, a huge role in porn addiction.
"It's particularly dangerous in adolescence," Wishart said. "The brain is going through so much transition and change, it's sort of pruning and growing. So, the things you're being exposed to in adolescent years are the things that are harder to sort of rework later in life."
Bee decided to end her relationship, but used her experience to start Partners of Sex Addicts Resource Center.
"I feel really honored to be able to help women, and in some cases, I work with men," Bee said. "I'm able to walk them through this, having been through it already."
Bee and Wishart recommend individual, or couple's, therapy.
Wishart said the American Psychological Association has not yet listed porn addiction as a diagnosable mental health disorder. However, he expects it to be listed once more research is done.
"The good news, with a diagnosis, often comes better treatment approaches," Wishart said
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