enough. Sex addicts/cybersex addicts are rarely sated and live daily with a sense of unsatisfied longing. Mood and Emotion There are problems with mood and emotion regulation and stabilization in ADD and sex addicts. ADD/sex addicts often say they live on emotional roller coasters – the need for risk and intensity in life and in sexuality is ever-present. For the ADDer, feeling states fluctuate with extreme alterations in the highs and lows over hour or even minutes. Maintaining emotions on an even keel is an intricate process involving fine adjustments by different parts of the brain and nervous system. Since setbacks throw ADDers off balance easily, they may try to adjust their instability with a sex/internet binge to balance mood and brain chemistry. The release of endorphins and dopamine from sex temporarily settles the physical, emotional and biochemical roller-coaster that many ADDers experience on a daily basis. Distractibility The ADD mind drifts hither and yon. It daydreams, wanders and drifts among loosely and tenuously connected thoughts, often moving to sexual fantasies that quell its restless energy. This is the famous “distractibility” of ADD. An ADDer might engage in sexual fantasies when he should be working. The radio in the ADD brain seems to have a malfunctioning scan button that won’t let him switch channels efficiently. The sex addict’s solution is to stay tuned to one channel only and it is usually sexual fantasy to which the channel is set.
Once he’s in his compulsive, rigid focus, it’s hard for him to turn off the scan button to redirect. Hence, distractibility is not the only problem; ADDers can also have problems with hyper focusing, or over focusing. Once the person’s attention is captured, he can