28-year-old Frankie Considine had already slept with more than 130 men.
She even had sex with four men in just one day and was desperate to find another man to do it again.
“I could only function and carry on with my day if I knew when I was going to get my next hit of sex,” she shared. “It was such a priority to me, I’d plan that over work, self-care or going out.”
However, it took a huge toll on Frankie’s physical and mental health. She contracted multiple STIs, spiraled into depression, and fell pregnant without any idea who the father was. She was also diagnosed with sex addiction.
In an interview with Fabulous, Frankie said: “I’d call in sick to work or cancel meeting friends if I could have sex. I’d make sure it happened every day.”
But Frankie believes her addiction to sex occurred because of the trauma after her parents’ divorce. She was 13 when her mother moved out and because her father worked as a taxi driver, she was always alone in the house.
“I’d go online and talk to people for attention,” Frankie shared.
She was 14 years old when she lost her virginity and went on to have a relationship with guys. She even cheated on her boyfriend after one year into their relationship.
“Even though I loved him, I was having sex with someone else at least every fortnight,” she revealed.
But after her mother passed away due to cancer, she ended the relationship. “After I dumped my boyfriend, I dropped out of uni and my attitude was ‘let’s go crazy!’ I lost a lot of weight. I looked good and I got lots of blokes. I started enjoying being single.”
“Losing Mum was life-shattering,” she continued. “I wasn’t interested in drinking or taking drugs. Sex was my coping mechanism. It was very much about the thrill of the sex but also the intimacy, being with someone close to you, which replaced the loss of my mum.
“It was like that little quick fix – but I got so hooked on it.”
She admitted: “It’s no surprise that I got STIs, contracting the HPV warts virus and then chlamydia twice in 2013.”
Frankie also started battling panic attacks, anxiety and depression. “About a year into the addiction, I realised I actually wanted a relationship.
“I wanted someone to love me… but a lot of the guys I was sleeping with obviously just wanted a quick s**g. I got very depressed, but I still couldn’t escape the addiction.”
She was 22 years old when she got pregnant. Struggling to identify the father and still in the depths of mental problems, she decided to have an abortion.
“This was a wake-up call – I had no idea who the dad was. It was a total Jeremy Kyle situation and I had to have an abortion,” she expressed.
“After that, I didn’t stop, but I did calm down,” she shared. “I wasn’t having sex anywhere near as much.”
Thanks to regular counseling, Frankie managed to overcome her anxiety. She then started an on and off relationship with a guy she met on Tinder but never told him of her past.
Frankie then discovered that she was pregnant and gave birth to a girl. But when her daughter was 6 months old, she and her partner broke up and she began seeing another therapist for support.
“Talking about it with my therapist, I realised none of it was my fault… I reckon there are loads of other people like me out there but they are too nervous to come forward,” she said.
“There is so much stigma around being a sex addict. People think it’s an excuse, but we aren’t sluts. It’s a genuine illness.”
Frankie’s friends have been “nothing but supportive” since she told them about her condition.
“I’m very reserved now. If I’m seeing someone, I don’t want to have sex straight away. If they initiate it or want to talk about it, they almost get blocked from my phone – I’m that fearful,” she said.
“I’m scared if I sleep with them too soon, will I go back down the spiral?”
Frankie uses EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing) to control her sex addiction. Now single but dating, she hopes that she will settle down one day and won’t let her past hold her back.
“I’m not going to let it stop me from finding love.”
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