Health care

By Norine Dworkin-McDaniel, Special to Lifescript

Celebs like Tiger Woods get busted for their extramarital sexual exploits and then claim addiction. But what’s the difference between a bad boy and sex addict? And how do you know if your guy is one? Here are 10 clues…

Ever since Tiger Woods plowed his Cadillac Escalade into a tree, spilling his private life all over the media and then retreating to a sex addiction treatment center, a lot of women might be wondering if their guy is hiding secrets.

After all, if the world’s most famous athlete could conceal his cheating for years, who’s to say regular guys couldn’t?

It’s hardly news that men like sex. But that perception – and expectation – can make it tough for women to figure out what’s normal and not when it comes to their man’s sexual demands.

According to research by pioneering sex addiction researcher/therapist Patrick Carnes, about 3%-6% of American men and women have a sexual compulsion, ranging from obsessively watching Internet porn, excessive masturbation and cyber/phone sex to frequent anonymous encounters, regular visits to prostitutes or massage parlors and strings of affairs.

Even if you catch your man cheating, how do you know if he’s acting out a compulsion or just being a player?

Motivation is the key difference between an addict and a womanizer, experts say. The latter is feeding his ego with conquests. A sex addict turns to porn or anonymous hookups the way an alcoholic reaches for scotch.

“Someone else might go for a run, call a friend or zone out with TV,” explains Lisa Paz, Ph.D., a Miami marriage and family therapist. “The sex addict relies on sex to release stress and stabilize their mood.”

So if your partner has been unfaithful or is acting suspicious, how can you tell if sex addiction is to blame? Check out these top 10 warning signs:

1. He’s glued to the computer.
In the past, men didn’t have many visual sex outlets – just a magazine or video.

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