Although I was able to stop for 16 months, back in January I started up my old fake Facebook profile again. For more that 4 years I had a fake profile of a young woman who was a lesbian. For part of that time I was very promiscuous looking for opportunities to be intimate as often as possible with other girls. This profile took on a life of her own and at times, especially when I was unemployed for well over a year I felt like I was her more than I was myself. After I was hospitalized I thought I would be able to shut her down for good but that lasted only 16 months when she came back with a vengeance. She was starting to ruin my life and threaten my career. My wife knew something was drastically wrong again and confronted me about it but I lied like I always do. Within a week she caught me in a lie and I finally confessed the whole thing. She had me go onto the Facebook profile and do a public confession that I was not in fact a beautiful 25 year old lesbian but was indeed a normal looking middle aged man with a serious mental illness and addiction to sex and other people. I am addicted to intimacy but I struggle to find intimacy in the real world. My wife is an amazing woman but our love life has been nothing special ever and has been dismal the last few years. On line I got to where I didn't even care about sex as much as I wanted close, intimate friends who I could talk to and love and care about even if everything I said was a lie. At least it was someone who would listen. Now that I have confessed everything, I handed the account over to my wife and she changed the password. I can never go back to that profile or use the stolen pictures I had been using. I deleted the Gmail account so soon Facebook will permanently delete the account anyway but the damage is done and I hurt a lot of people through my lies. Still I am addicted and want back on there. I want so badly to create another fake profile so I can have some friends again. My real life friends just don't get me so it is really hard to know how to relate to people in real life.

Has anyone else created a fantasy world because of their addiction?

How are you dealing with it?

What has helped you overcome this addiction?

Thanks,
Mac