Click, Click: Why Porn and Gambling Addictions Are So Devastating

There are many similarities across addiction, the most telling of all being that the addictive behavior has turned out-of-control and that it is negatively impacting an individual significantly in aspects of personal and professional life. And yet, there are two vices in particular that stand out in terms of their immediate accessibility and ability to cause rapid destruction. Porn and gambling addictions share the dubious similarity in that both activities are “legal” in nature, are accessible in seconds, and are becoming increasingly embedded in our day-to-day lives and society.  

There are newer, faster, freer, and more technologically-savvy ways to access porn — we are no longer talking about stumbling across your grandfather’s collection of Playboy Magazine — while it is almost impossible to walk in a major city or watch a professional or college sports game without seeing multiple ads for betting sites or apps offering discount codes or “best picks of the day.” Entire segments on mainstream sports channels are now dedicated to promoting placing wagers on games, with small fine print on the bottom of the screen functioning to warn viewers of the potential addictiveness of gambling and offering up resources to helping those in need. There is an uncanny parallel to the ways in which smoking was viewed just a few decades ago — billboards and advertisements flooded the streets, radios, and televisions, while research on potential negative health effects was ignored or pushed aside for years in the interest of big pharma (or, in this case, state-government profit).

The Accessibility Factor

When discussing either porn or gambling addiction, one word continues to come to mind: accessibility. Namely, an individual has the ability to pull up explicit imagery or video on his or her phone in mere seconds, while it is possible to wager one’s entire life savings in this same time frame. Click, click. Furthermore, while the long-lasting and far-reaching effects of either addiction are undeniable, the actions themselves can be completed in almost any setting. Sitting at the family dinner table or mingling at a holiday party? Reach into your pocket, take out your phone, click on an app and bet away. One might even wager (no pun intended) — due to the prevalence of screens — that this move can even be conducted while actively engaging with a room of people. Pornography is already widely considered a “closed-door” activity, so one’s ability to stare off into a phone screen, regardless of setting, is not prone to ringing any alarm bells. Though other addictions often follow a pattern of increasing isolation from others, pornography is already built on this very foundation. As such, addiction to pornography is frequently experienced in complete isolation, without direct knowledge from the outside world. While loved ones may recognize some of the tell-tale signs of addiction, such as decreased levels of intimacy and increasing distance or avoidance, few would leap to the conclusion that their partner is suffering from addiction to pornography. In this sense, both pornography and gambling addictions are “silent struggles” — there is less suspicion from the outside world about one’s magnetic draw to these behaviors. Offering support in any capacity will often lead to denials of anything being wrong, creating a toxic cycle of confusion, frustration, and secrets between addicts and those closest to them.

The Moment of Weakness

During both active addiction and while in addiction recovery, urges are normal parts of the process. An individual’s brain is programmed – based on months, years, or even decades of conditioning — to turn instinctually to certain vices as coping mechanisms, most often in times of increased anxiety or stress, discomfort, or avoidance of emotion and feeling. In many cases, these relationships have acted as the longest ones in an individual’s life. During early recovery, learning how to manage these urges is essential — as therapists, we often employ “Band-Aids” as a first line of preventative measures; designed to disrupt established cycles and promote measurable and motivating progress. We are aided by a few natural factors: A recovering alcoholic trying to kick an addiction is able to remove all alcohol in the household and the nearest liquor store may be a good 10-15 minute walk or drive from home, providing the individual time to “urge-surf,” as well as to reach out to support systems. A half-bottle of whiskey would certainly not be within an arm’s reach of the bed. Pornography and gambling addictions do not offer a similar cushion. Simply put: Everybody has a phone. We can employ measures such as sleeping with it outside of the room and/or blocking certain sites and apps, but the length of time between onset of urge and potential action is significantly shorter than with other addictions.

Treatment Options

For many of the reasons listed above, it can be more difficult to identify an individual’s problematic relationships with pornography or gambling. Many other addictions offer a trail of “clues” along the way for loved ones to identify and put together the pieces; for example, it is rare that a drinking or drug-usage disorder is brought to light completely out of the blue. There is often one or several discoveries and consequential behaviors that will trigger an individual with such addictions to seek professional help; in many cases, loved ones may come together (such as in an intervention) to try and help, and, at the very least, express serious concerns about certain behaviors. This scenario is seldom the case with pornography or gambling addictions, where one’s support system is frequently left grasping at straws for answers, even if they have picked up on increasingly problematic behaviors in an individual’s life.

From a therapist’s point of view, it is rare for an individual to come forward and seek help entirely on one’s own. There is almost always some sort of push to do so that stems from an aggregation of support and/or societal pressure. And as thus, we often rely on a discovery about the individual’s behaviors in order to begin therapeutic work. Even when one begins individual therapy — a staple component in addiction recovery — there is often a steeper hill to climb in the early stages, as there is more likely to be denial or minimalization of the problematic behaviors should the discovery or recommendations of loved ones be of a more abrupt nature. For example, a spouse may find a trove of pornography on one’s computer, putting together a large missing puzzle piece on why the individual has been exhibiting both physical and emotional signs of distance and distress for a long period of time — this discovery would represent a sudden shift in the relationship between the two, and an individual may feel ambushed and coerced into seeking help. In such cases, there is commonly an additional period during the early stages of therapy that is spent on allowing the individual to come to his or her own conclusion that the behaviors are problematic and in need of change, which can take a lengthy period of time should one not truly believe this sentiment. There is also the deep unpacking of a number of emotions towards those involved in helping them to reach out for help.

In addition to individual therapy, group or 12-step programs are especially important to incorporate in one’s recovery from pornography or gambling addiction. These individuals have endured addiction in essential isolation for prolonged periods of time, and the significance of surrounding them with peers who have experienced similar issues and the bevy of emotions that accompany them cannot be understated. While getting from “my spouse thinks I have a problem” to regular attendance in group meetings can take an especially lengthy amount of time with these two particular forms of addiction, it is vastly important — as with any addiction — for individuals to hear and feel that they are not alone in their struggles, and that many of the people in the same room look like, sound like, and are very much just like them in multiple facets of life. Gamblers Anonymous (GA) is a firmly entrenched staple in the world of 12-step programs, and its being brought into the mainstream media (albeit often in small print) can only be a positive. The path of pornography-addiction recovery can be slightly trickier, as individuals may be served more effectively by first attending a longstanding and established forum such as Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA), as this type of meeting often functions as a “catch-all” for more specific behaviors such as pornography addiction and can help introduce an individual to a whole world of others struggling with a myriad of sexually-related behaviors. A drawback to this approach would involve the individual — already hesitant at attending a sizable meeting — not feeling connected to those in the room, as they may feel that issues discussed are not be specific enough to which to relate personally.

Conclusion

Addiction has the powerful effect of isolating an individual over time, as behaviors become increasingly problematic and destructive. Gambling and pornography addictions can frequently represent some of the extremes of these issues, with easy access and natural “hidden-activity” status. As such, it is more important than ever to try and de-stigmatize addictions to these behaviors, in hopes of encouraging family, friends, and loved ones battling internally to come forward and seek help on their own volition. For individuals struggling with these coping mechanisms, the earlier they seek help, the better. Gambling addiction can ruin an entire individual — or family’s — financial situation in a matter of mere seconds. Pornography addiction can slowly erode personal relationships and intimacy, causing increased frustration and toxicity. Individual therapy is an excellent starting point, though often, more support is needed — especially during early recovery.