I’m Reading This Book About Porn Addiction for a Friend is Joshua Shea’s fourth book about pornography addiction. He writes, “I’m creating this guide because spending time on TikTok and other social media has made me realize how many people, especially young Americans and people in countries where any sex talk is taboo, don’t have access to any information, much less good information, on how to begin taming their pornography addiction.”
Josh explains that the book isn’t intended to treat or cure anyone; rather, it’s a starting point for people who haven’t felt ready to talk about the issues that they’re having. In terms of what kind of labels to attach to those issues, he encourages readers not to get too caught up in that; if you feel the need to ask if there’s a problem, then there’s probably something going on.
The book includes a blend of information about porn addiction, Josh’s own personal experiences with addiction, treatment (both good and bad), and recovery, and stories adapted from the experiences of clients he’s worked with in his coaching practice. These stories include males and females from a variety of different backgrounds, which gives readers an idea of the diverse experiences people have struggling with pornography use. There’s an exploration of common symptoms that people experience as part of pornography addiction, the kinds of things that can trigger problematic porn use in the first place, and the nature of addiction as something that happens in the brain that’s fundamentally the same issue regardless of what it’s focused on.
Scattered throughout the book are prompts to complete assessments, which cover things like adverse childhood experiences, patterns of pornography use, and prompts for writing your own story.
When it comes to anything mental health-related, I’m a firm believer that one size does not fit all, and I like that this book takes the approach that recovery is a very individual journey and different people will find different things helpful. Josh encourages readers to seek out additional sources of information and to adapt strategies to make them more personally effective. He also emphasizes that it’s important for readers to actually put the various strategies presented into action, and not half-ass it or give up after just one try. And yes, Josh did actually write “half-ass,” and I think it was a great choice to write this book in regular-person-speak rather than professional-speak.
One of the strategies that’s suggested is an alternative to stopping porn and masturbation essentially cold turkey. It’s a creative approach that involves disentangling the two, and I thought it was a great idea.
This book is written in a way that I think is likely to be really effective for the target audience, and I think both the writing style and the kind of information that’s given are likely to be a good fit. In the first chapter, Josh explains that the goal of the book is to act like a surrogate initial session with him. This book isn’t meant to fix anyone; rather, it’s an attempt to break the ice for those people who haven’t felt comfortable talking to anyone about their problems with porn use. For anyone who’s in that particular boat (or cares about someone who is), I think this book would be a great choice.
I’m Reading This Book About Porn Addiction For A Friend is available on Amazon (affiliate link). You can find Josh on his website paddictrecovery.com.
You can find my other reviews on the MH@H book review index or on Goodreads.
I’ve also reviewed Josh’s previous books: