People addicted to love and sex meet weekly in a ground-floor room in Neos Kosmos to share their experiences for 90 minutes. It is Greece’s only SLAA (Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous) meeting, a 12-step recovery group similar to those for other addictions.
Two days before Valentine’s Day, five members – four men and one woman, ages 40 to 60 – attended. The meeting opens with readings, including “The Characteristics of SLAA”: “We confuse love with need, physical and sexual attraction, pity and/or the need to save or to be saved;” “We feel empty and incomplete when we are alone;” “Our romantic or sexual obsessions or fantasies immobilize us or seriously distract us.”
Members speak for six to seven minutes. One man said he stopped using Viagra but feels insecure after his marriage collapsed. A woman said the group helped her free herself from someone to whom she had surrendered her self-esteem.
