It's tough to tell exactly whether a person is afflicted with sexual addiction. After all, sex is a natural human urge. Yet societal norms dictate that a line has to be drawn somewhere. For a start, one has to recognize that sex addiction is a neuro-chemical problem. Those who have it can't help doing what they do. Most of it can be attributed to circumstances that they didn't have any control over. To prove the point, professionals claim that those who have been diagnosed with sex addiction share common traits that point to severe trauma and intimacy issues. Thus, treatment should be done in a systematic approach, taking care to address all the issues that point to the root of the problem.

Understanding the nature of sex addiction is always a good start to curing those who are suffering from it. There is a specific set of criteria to identify addiction, and we're going to discuss them in full detail.

The first one and the most telling is the addict's loss of control. He or she can't help acting on the sexual urges even if there's a deep sense of urgency and the full intent to control them. It's primarily a compulsion disorder. The effort to stop is there, but even repeated attempts prove fruitless. Thus, a man with a strong sense of values can be shaken to the core and be made to do things that are contrary to his sensibilities because of sex addiction.

Another criterion is preoccupation in which the sex addict thinks about his urges almost every waking hour. It permeates his every thought, and will think obsessively on the ways by which he can satiate his fantasies. It's not just the behavior itself, it's also about the obsessive thoughts. As a result, the person afflicted cannot maintain focus on everything else that he does, which brings us to the next criterion.

Sufferers find that sex addiction often interferes with their obligations in life, be it domestic, social or professional. Most of them eventually get separated from their spouses or lose their jobs if the addiction is not addressed as soon as possible. The person knows that his life is on a downward spiral but he is powerless to extricate himself from the nosedive.

Lastly, sex addicts unable to act on their sexual urges for a time experience severe distress. They become irritable and prone to anger. Sleepless nights become the norm, and some even displace their sex addiction to another form of addiction. For example, a person who has tamed his or her sexual urges might get addicted to mind-altering drugs as a result. As such, no progress has been made on the part of the sufferer.

In a sexual addiction treatment, these alternating addiction cycles should be monitored so that maladaptive addictive behavior can be sublimated to behaviors that are more tolerable to the society.