Addiction Specialism
Pornography & Compulsive Behaviour Therapy
Understand the behaviour without shame, restore choice, and rebuild the relationships and self-respect that compulsive use erodes.
Presenting Challenges
Are you or a loved one experiencing these patterns?
- 01.Using pornography for longer or more often than intended, with repeated attempts to cut down that do not hold.
- 02.Escalating content or time spent, accompanied by a growing sense of disconnection from your own values.
- 03.Secrecy, shame and self-criticism that make the behaviour harder to talk about and easier to repeat.
- 04.Effects on intimacy, work, sleep or mood that you would like to address before they deepen further.
Therapeutic Approach
How we work together to restore agency:
- ✓Beginning without judgement or moral framing, and establishing a confidential space where the behaviour can be described honestly.
- ✓Mapping the loop — trigger, urge, behaviour, relief, aftermath — so the pattern becomes visible rather than mysterious.
- ✓Using CBT and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to build urge tolerance and reduce avoidance-driven use.
- ✓Using compassion-focused work to address the shame that maintains secrecy, alongside practical environment and boundary design.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is compulsive pornography use an addiction?
Clinical opinion is genuinely divided, and diagnostic frameworks differ. What matters more in therapy is your own experience: whether the behaviour has become difficult to control, whether it conflicts with your values, and what it is costing you. We work with the pattern in front of us rather than with a label, drawing on behavioural addiction models where they are helpful.
Will I be judged or told that pornography is wrong?
No. This is not moral or faith-based work, and the aim is not to impose a position on pornography. My role is to help you understand your own pattern and decide what you want your relationship with it to be. Shame tends to maintain compulsive behaviour rather than reduce it, so a non-judgemental stance is a clinical necessity, not simply a courtesy.
How is confidentiality handled for sensitive work like this?
Sessions are confidential within the standard professional limits that apply to all HCPC-registered psychologists, which I explain fully at assessment. Enquiries made through this website should stay brief — there is no need to describe the behaviour in detail before we speak, and the enquiry form is not the place for sensitive disclosures.
Let's discuss how we can work together
I offer a free, no-obligation 15-minute phone conversation to explore your needs, answer your questions, and see how we might work together.