Dov Answers

Dov Responds: There are two things here, as I see it: 1- the 12 Steps themselves, and 2- 12 step culture. The culture of the 12 step fellowships is described pretty well in the sefer "B'nei Machshovah Tova" by the Piasetzner hy"d even tho he surely never heard of AA...

Yaakov asks Dov: If someone (who is likely an addict) asks us about the "issur" in these things, how do you suggest we steer them to the real issues? Dov Responds: Try to see if they are really convinced that if they could be convinced it were assur, they'd stop. Once ...

Dov Answers: I'm told by a CSAT friend of mine that the current opinion among many CSATs is that it's better to avoid using the 'addict' label and model with clients, at least initially, and that giving the label is potentially damaging for many who are not addicts (and c...

Miri writes: Hi. Your organization seems to be wonderful and helpful to many people. Hashem should pay you all back thousand-fold!!! I am not sure if you can help me with this but I'm a bit stuck and not sure where to turn right now. I had a sexual experience when I was...

I like to be real, not philosophical. The body is craving the masturbation and does it ("leiv chomed uk'lei mayseh gomrin"). And the body rarely cares about philosophy, of course. The body is what's getting the payoff here. I would never have stopped due to halacha - aye,...

Dov Responds: One of the safer places for a female sexaholic is a sexaholics meeting because the men there are known entities - they are all essentially wearing a sign over their heads that says to the female member, "Hi. I'm a womanizer/stalker/worshiper of people like y...

The Torah does not talk about any mental illnesses directly. The main reason this omission vexes so many and is a recurrent topic on GYE is simple: this particular addiction happens to involve a sin, while alcoholism and drug-addiction do not. Suddenly, an emergency ens...

I believe that the main reason we cannot find one eitza that works is because an eitza is always, that means without exception, nothing more than a gimmick. Gimmicks are tricks that are used in order to bypass real change. They may prevent the behavior, but consider this...

Dear GYE, I don't know what my husband does or doesn't do regarding the Internet - he plays the innocent card - but I caught him watching porn several years back, and he never came clean to me, saying, "it's in my past, I'm doing GYE." He gets your emails but they rarely ...

"Dear Nathan! Congratulations! That is beautiful. May Hashem be with you! In my opinion, your struggles in SA had nothing to do with their definition of sobriety, but rather with your sponsor. A sponsor should not consider lusting to be a fall unless the sponsee acted ...