I don’t talk much about abortion. It’s not a big issue for me, but my thinking on it has been fairly consistent: Most abortions are immoral and abortion should be legal for the first trimester. I like what France does – you have to indicate that you are in distress to get an abortion.
When I hear women celebrating their abortions, that disturbs me. When I hear women say that abortion is just something that every woman goes through, that disturbs me. But what primarily disturbs me in these conversations is the painful recognition of my own moral weakness.
I identify as a sex and love addict, and as an addict, I recognize that when I am in the throes of addiction, I’ll use everyone I can to meet my addictive needs.
My stepmom has a good nickname for me – “User!”
I first had sex in February of 1989 and that relationship lasted until I moved to Australia that September.
Once down under, I decided to convert to Judaism, and as part of that commitment, I determined to not just abstain from sex, but to abstain from behavior and situations that made sex more likely. Eventually, to get my wild self under control, I quit masturbation for over a year and as much as possible avoided touching women. This monk life was accompanied by isolation and depression as I struggled with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. I spent about 20 hours a day in bed.
In 1992, a Seventh-Day Adventist scholar counseled me that my greatest need was for community. I agreed with him. I began placing and responding to single ads and a trickle of women came to visit me in Newcastle, CA 95658. My commitment to chastity weakened in the presence of attractive women, and in the face of one woman’s outrageous curves (E-cup breasts), I plunged into sin. I enjoyed my plunges so much that at times I decided to up their intensity by going in raw and pulling out before my climax.
“I can’t believe you did that,” she said. “You’re normally so disciplined.”
“What would you do if you got pregnant?” I asked.
“I’d get rid of it, and I wouldn’t even tell you,” she said.
The sex addict in me was thrilled while the thoughtful considerate part of me was appalled.
Once launched into my fuckathon (by 1993 I had regained enough of my health to live two-thirds of a normal life), I tried to reassure myself that I was doing my promiscuity ethically. This was a delusion. I think most women regret sex that does not lead to marriage. I’d tell myself that I’d never touch a married woman. Then I repeatedly encountered married women who delighted in leading me on for the attention highs and then springing “I’m married” once I began my final march to intercourse.
I don’t believe I’ve ever had sex with a married woman, but way too much of the reason for that was luck.
To the best of my knowledge, I’ve never impregnated anyone nor ever caught an STD. I’ve never broken the law, though there was that time when I was shagging in the back of my girlfriend’s station wagon in the empty synagogue parking lot and the police rolled up on us and we got off because the officer recognized me as the guy who’d opened the door for him at the synagogue a few days previous.
At the time, I lived across the street from the shul. There was a mixed race couple next door (black guy, white woman). To demonstrate my non-racist credentials, I showed the guy around the synagogue one day. Shortly thereafter, he disappeared and the police showed up looking for him due to charges of assault on his girlfriend. She told us that she was afraid of him.
At least two girlfriends (I was first with Beverly Hills adjacent Woman A for a few weeks and then I had a pre-arranged trip to New York for a month to stay with Woman B, then I came back to stay with Woman A until she wised up, lent me $500 to repair my car, which I paid back within two months) broke up with me in 1994 because their friends, family and therapists told them that I was using them. At the time, I was desperately poor and living out of my car. It was a blessing to stay in their nice apartments. Both women were five years older than me and they were ready to settle down. My two previous girlfriends were 8 and 11 years older than me.
The more sex I had, the more positions and scenarios I tried, the more partners I had, the more I thought about sex. I became intoxicated and then addicted. Twelve-step programs and growing older helped me get better. I’ve been emotionally sober in this arena since 2012 (meaning that I respect my behavior over the past 12 years with women as I have not acted like a pig, and I have not engaged in mortifying self-destructive and socially destructive behavior such as promiscuity and cheating and lying).
Kamala Harris reminds me of the many women who’ve scolded me. Yes, I’ve usually deserved the scolding, but on those occasions when the scolding was over the top, I did not appreciate it, man. Remember when senators interrogated Brett Kavanagh over his drinking? I hope someone interrogates Kamala Harris over her drinking.
