Sex addiction

A running index of my thoughts on whether sex addiction is real, and whether I have it.

A glossary of sorts — what I actually mean when I say “compulsion” and “addiction,” and why the distinction matters more than you might think.

I keep circling back to this one, because smart people I admire keep getting it wrong in the same way.

Pubescent girls affect me in ways I wish they didn’t. Here are some thoughts about all that.

It wasn’t the sex I was addicted to — it was the endless, shimmering promise of it, glowing on screen after screen.

I sat in the dark for hours, waiting for a woman to make me come to life again. Then I’d scurry home and pretend I’d never been there.

I’m unnervingly talented at engineering the rejection I claim to fear most.

I was ashamed of the wrong things, and I lied without knowing I was lying.

My confidence is a surprisingly reliable barometer of my mental health — and my proximity to old, dark habits.

Fragile male ego, professional hierarchies, and the long slide from smartest-person-in-the-room to peon at the base of a smaller hill.