AASECT-Certified Sex Therapist · Certified Gottman Method Couples Therapist · Practicing Therapy Since 1988
Individual Therapy for Sex and Porn Addiction in New York
Online Sex Therapy for Out-Of-Control Sexual Behavior Throughout New York State
Specialized Sex Therapy in New York
You opened a website or app intending to spend a few minutes looking at porn or checking messages.
An hour later, you’re still there.
You know you need to get back to work, go to bed, or spend time with your partner. You’ve told yourself several times that you’re going to stop, but you keep finding another video to watch or another message to answer.
By the time you finally close everything, you’re frustrated with yourself. You had other things you wanted to do tonight.
You may be increasingly concerned about how much of your day revolves around sex or pornography. You think about checking an app while you’re supposed to be working. You look forward to having the house to yourself. Sometimes you’re so occupied with anticipating a sexual encounter that it’s difficult to concentrate on anything else.
And the uncomfortable part is that you genuinely enjoy some of it.
You like the attention. You look forward to the excitement of someone new expressing interest in you. You enjoy watching porn, even when you’ve promised yourself you wouldn’t. Sometimes the anticipation is more exciting than whatever happens afterward.
You may wonder how you can want something so much when you’re also trying so hard to stop doing it.
Perhaps you’re someone who generally considers yourself capable of following through on your decisions. You manage responsibilities, meet deadlines, and handle complicated problems at work. Other people depend on you.
But when it comes to sexual behavior, you keep making decisions that contradict what you told yourself you wanted.
You might set a limit in the morning and abandon it that night. Or you might find yourself mentally negotiating with yourself about whether you can watch porn for a few minutes, even though you know how often a few minutes turns into much longer.
Your life might still look fine from the outside. You’re getting your work done, paying your bills, and showing up for the people who need you.
But you know what you’ve been giving up to keep everything going.
Maybe you’re sacrificing sleep because you stay up watching porn. You’ve stopped making time for hobbies you used to enjoy. You turn down invitations because you’d rather be alone, or you’re sitting with your partner while thinking about when you can check your phone again.
You may be embarrassed to admit how much time you’ve spent on something that doesn’t always leave you feeling satisfied afterward.
And you may be keeping more secrets than you intended.
Perhaps your partner doesn’t know about the subscriptions, messages, or sexual encounters. You’re worried about what would happen if they discovered them. Or they already know something, and you’ve promised to change because you’re scared of damaging the relationship further.
You may recognize that sex or pornography has become a way to deal with stress, loneliness, or boredom. Sometimes it gives you relief or makes you feel wanted. Other times, you’re having a normal day and still find yourself returning to it.
You’ve begun wondering how much longer you can keep arranging your life around something you don’t feel able to control.
You want to be able to enjoy your sexuality without having it occupy so much of your life. You want to concentrate when you’re working, be present with people you care about, and make decisions about sex or pornography without repeatedly losing hours to behavior you’d already decided to limit or stop.
How I Help You Change Sexual Behavior That Feels Out of Control
People sometimes come to me after spending years trying to manage their pornography use or sexual behavior. They’ve set limits, deleted apps, made promises, and tried to stay occupied with other things, but they keep finding themselves drawn back.
I’ve been a therapist since 1988, and I’m an AASECT-certified sex therapist. My training in human sexuality helps me understand what makes certain sexual experiences so compelling, including the attraction of novelty, excitement, sexual pleasure, or feeling desired.
I also have extensive experience working with LGBTQIA+ clients and people in open, polyamorous, and other consensually non-monogamous relationships. I understand that someone can enjoy casual sex, have multiple partners, or pursue unconventional sexual interests without those choices being unhealthy.
What concerns me is when you’re spending more time on sexual behavior than you intend, repeatedly breaking your own limits, neglecting responsibilities, or violating agreements with partners.
My experience allows me to consider your sexual interests, your relationships, and the difficulties you’ve had managing your behavior without assuming that your sexuality or relationship structure is the problem.
Learn more about my approach to individual sex therapy for out-of-control sexual behavior →
What I Can Help You Address in Sex Therapy
1. You can begin trusting yourself to follow through on decisions about sex and pornography.
In sex therapy, we’ll look at why previous attempts to change your sexual behavior haven’t lasted and identify opportunities to make different choices before changing course becomes especially difficult.
Together, we’ll develop a plan for those moments and examine what happens when you put it into practice, including what needs to change when something doesn’t go as expected.
You can begin building confidence in your ability to keep the commitments you make to yourself. Being home alone, having an unexpected free evening, or experiencing a strong sexual urge doesn’t have to mean repeating a behavior you’ve decided to stop. You can begin collecting evidence from your own experience that you’re capable of making different choices.
2. You can get your time and attention back instead of organizing your life around sexual behavior.
In sex therapy, we’ll examine how much time and attention sexual behavior has been taking from other parts of your life. That includes time spent anticipating the next opportunity, arranging your schedule, concealing what happened, or worrying about being discovered.
I’ll help you understand why certain situations make sexual thoughts particularly difficult to set aside. We’ll work on recognizing when you’re beginning to organize your time around the behavior and identifying what would help you make a different decision.
You can spend an evening alone doing what you intended, concentrate on work without repeatedly checking a site or app, and enjoy time with people you care about without thinking about when you’ll next have an opportunity for sexual activity. You can regain time and mental energy for the parts of your life you’ve been neglecting.
3. You can understand what you’re seeking from sexual behavior and find other ways to meet those needs.
In therapy, we’ll explore what you’re getting from sexual behavior that you haven’t been able to find elsewhere. It might be relief from stress, excitement, feeling wanted, or something you haven’t recognized yet.
I’ll help you understand what you’re feeling and wanting in those situations, including needs you’ve struggled to express or satisfy in other parts of your life. We’ll explore how you can meet those needs more directly, without repeatedly engaging in sexual behavior that conflicts with your intentions or creates unwanted consequences.
You can begin responding to loneliness, stress, rejection, boredom, or a desire for excitement in ways that genuinely address what you’re missing. You can have more choices about how to spend your time and meet your needs, rather than repeatedly turning to sexual activity and regretting it afterward.
4. You can stop organizing your life around secrets and begin earning back your partner’s trust.
If your sexual behavior has involved dishonesty or broken agreements, I’ll help you understand what taking responsibility requires. We’ll examine what makes honesty difficult, including fear of your partner’s reaction, shame about your choices, or the temptation to minimize what happened.
I’ll help you prepare for difficult conversations and learn how to answer questions truthfully, acknowledge the harm you’ve caused, and avoid making promises you aren’t prepared to keep. We’ll also discuss what consistent behavior and accountability can look like over time, recognizing that your partner may need considerable time before they feel comfortable trusting you again.
You can stop deleting conversations, concealing charges, inventing explanations, or worrying about what might happen if your partner picks up your phone. Instead, you can begin living more honestly and giving your partner reasons to believe what you say. You can feel better about how you’re treating the people who matter to you, even while rebuilding trust remains difficult.
5. You can enjoy your sexuality without feeling ashamed of your desires or afraid of losing control.
As an AASECT-certified sex therapist, I’ll help you examine your sexual desires and preferences without assuming that frequent sex, pornography, masturbation, or consensual sexual interests are inherently unhealthy.
We’ll distinguish between sexual desires you enjoy, behaviors you’ve decided you want to change, and feelings of shame or discomfort that may come from judgments you’ve learned about sexuality. We’ll also explore how to pursue sexual pleasure in ways that respect your values, your boundaries, and any agreements you’ve made with a partner.
If you’re partnered, we can address difficulties discussing sex, differences in desire, and concerns about intimacy. When appropriate and with your agreement, your partner may participate in some sessions.
You can feel more comfortable with your sexuality while becoming more confident in your ability to make deliberate choices. You can enjoy sexual pleasure without treating every desire as a problem, and make decisions about your behavior without repeatedly violating your own boundaries or relationship agreements.
What to Expect in Sex Therapy for Porn and Sex Addiction
Understand Your Sexual Behavior So You Can Change It
In our first sessions, I’ll ask about your sexual history, the behaviors you’re concerned about, and how they’ve affected your life. We’ll discuss what you’ve already tried to change, what happened when you tried, and what you want to be different.
I’ll also want to understand what makes the behavior so compelling for you. Maybe you’ve noticed that certain feelings or situations make it harder to resist a certain behavior. Or perhaps you keep making the same decisions even when you know exactly what the consequences could be.
I’ll help you examine what happens before, during, and after those experiences, including the choices you make long before you engage in the behavior. We’ll also explore your sexual desires, relationships, and experiences with sex to understand what may be contributing to the difficulty you’ve had changing.
My experience as an AASECT-certified sex therapist helps me recognize when sexual habits, emotional difficulties, relationship concerns, or conflicts about sexuality need different kinds of attention. That means our work can focus on what’s relevant to your situation rather than relying on the same advice you’ve already tried.
Make Changes That Work for You
Once we understand more about what’s happening, I’ll help you address the difficulties that have made changing your behavior so challenging.
That might involve working through shame that makes you reluctant to be honest, learning how to handle strong feelings without immediately turning to sexual activity, or addressing sexual dissatisfaction and relationship difficulties you’ve been avoiding.
We’ll also identify opportunities to make different decisions before you reach the point where you typically return to the behavior. I’ll work with you on how to respond in those situations, and we’ll discuss what happens when you try those changes outside our sessions.
When something doesn’t go as planned, we’ll examine why. Rather than simply asking you to try harder, I’ll help you understand what happened and what needs to change in our approach.
Sex Therapy for LGBTQIA+ Adults and People in Open Relationships
I have extensive experience working with LGBTQIA+ clients and people in open, polyamorous, and other consensually non-monogamous relationships.
I don’t assume that having multiple sexual partners, enjoying casual sex, using hookup apps, or having unconventional sexual interests means your sexual behavior is unhealthy.
What I want to understand is whether you’re able to make decisions about your sexual activity that are consistent with your intentions, your values, and the agreements you’ve made with partners.
If you’ve broken relationship agreements, we can address that honestly without treating your relationship structure or sexual identity as the problem.
Sex Therapy for Neurodivergent Adults
I’m an autistic therapist who also trains other mental health professionals in working with neurodivergent clients. My teaching includes autism and sexuality, ADHD and executive functioning, sexual and gender diversity, and adapting therapy to neurodivergent people’s needs.
If you’re autistic or have ADHD, I’ll consider how your attention, impulsivity, need for stimulation, routines, sensory experiences, and communication style may affect the sexual behavior you’re trying to change.
I’ll use my experience to develop approaches that fit how you think, communicate, and make decisions. These differences can be important when we’re figuring out why previous attempts haven’t worked and what approaches are likely to be useful for you.
Who is A good fit for Sex and Porn Addiction Therapy?
I work with adults whose pornography use or consensual sexual behavior has become difficult to control and is causing problems in their lives. This can include people who are facing legal consequences related to their sexual behavior, such as an arrest for purchasing sex.
You may be a good fit for therapy with me if:
You’ve tried to stop watching porn, using hookup apps, paying for sex, or engaging in other sexual behaviors, but you keep returning to them.
You’re spending more time or money on sexual activity than you intended, and it’s beginning to interfere with your work, relationships, or other responsibilities.
Your partner has discovered sexual behavior you’ve been hiding, and you’re scared your relationship may not survive another broken promise.
You haven’t been caught, but you’re increasingly worried about what could happen if you continue.
You’re doing things you once told yourself you’d never do, and you’re concerned about where your behavior could lead.
Situations Outside My Clinical Practice
→ I don’t provide specialized treatment for sexual offenses, including sexual assault, rape, voyeurism, child sexual abuse, or offenses involving child sexual abuse material (CSAM). This includes situations where someone hasn’t been arrested or charged.
→ I also don’t provide forensic psychosexual evaluations or prepare reports for legal proceedings.
AASECT-Certified Sex Therapist for Problematic Sexual Behavior
I’m Kate McNulty, LCSW, LICSW
I’ve been a licensed therapist since 1988, and I’ve worked with individuals and couples dealing with out-of-control sexual behavior for decades.
Over the years, I’ve worked with people whose sexual behavior has put their relationships, careers, finances, or personal lives at risk. Many have tried repeatedly to stop on their own, sometimes keeping their behavior secret for years before deciding to get help.
As an AASECT-certified sex therapist, I bring specialized training in human sexuality to understanding why changing sexual behavior can be so difficult. I’m interested in what makes certain experiences compelling, what keeps someone returning to them, and what needs to change for them to make different decisions.
I help clients understand why they keep returning to sexual behavior they want to change, address what has made previous attempts unsuccessful, and make decisions they can follow through on.
If the description on this page sounded like your situation, I’d like to help.
Logistics
Pricing, scheduling, and online therapy sessions
All sessions are conducted by secure, HIPAA-compliant video. I work with adult clients across New York.
Sessions are private pay, billed at $500 per hour and $750 for 90-minute sessions. I am not in-network with insurance and cannot bill them directly. For more information about pricing, please see the pricing page.
How to get started in sex and porn addiction therapy
To schedule your first appointment, please choose a day and time on my secure, HIPAA-compliant calendar by clicking the button directly below.
After I approve your request, typically within one business day, you’ll receive new client forms via email, which you’ll review and digitally sign before we meet.
Areas Served in New York
I’m independently licensed in New York as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW #086198), and I work with clients via secure, HIPAA-compliant video across the state.
This includes:
New York City, including Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island
Long Island, including Nassau and Suffolk Counties, Hempstead, Garden City, Huntington, Smithtown, Islip, and the Hamptons
Westchester and the Lower Hudson Valley, including White Plains, Yonkers, New Rochelle, Scarsdale, Tarrytown, Mount Kisco, and Peekskill
The Hudson Valley and Catskills, including Poughkeepsie, Beacon, Newburgh, Kingston, New Paltz, Rhinebeck, Middletown, and Woodstock
The Capital Region, including Albany, Troy, Schenectady, Saratoga Springs, and Clifton Park
Central New York, including Syracuse, Auburn, Cortland, Utica, Rome, and Oneonta
The Finger Lakes and Rochester area, including Rochester, Greece, Brighton, Pittsford, Fairport, Canandaigua, Geneva, and Ithaca
Western New York, including Buffalo, Amherst, Williamsville, Tonawanda, Niagara Falls, and Jamestown
The Southern Tier, including Binghamton, Elmira, Corning, and Olean
The North Country and Adirondacks, including Watertown, Plattsburgh, Glens Falls, Lake Placid, and Saranac Lake
If you’re anywhere in New York State, I can work with you.
Common Questions about therapy for out-of-control sexual behavior in New York State —
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Yes. You don’t have to wait until you’ve lost a relationship, missed work, or experienced another serious consequence.
If you’re regularly spending more time on sexual behavior than you intend, struggling to redirect your attention, or finding that your schedule increasingly revolves around sexual activity, we can work on understanding and changing that.
I’ll help you examine what makes the activity compelling, why the limits you’ve tried haven’t lasted, and what would help you make decisions you can follow through on.
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Yes. I have extensive experience working with LGBTQIA+ clients and people in open, polyamorous, and other consensually non-monogamous relationships.
I won’t assume that having multiple partners, enjoying casual sex, or choosing a non-monogamous relationship means your sexuality is unhealthy.
We can discuss difficulties with sexual behavior, honesty, boundaries, and agreements with partners while respecting the sexual interests and relationship choices you want to maintain.
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Yes. I’m autistic myself, and I teach continuing-education courses for other therapists on autism, ADHD, sexuality, executive functioning, and neurodivergent-affirming care.
If you struggle with impulsivity, intense interests, shifting attention, or managing routines, we can examine how those experiences affect your sexual behavior.
I’ll take the way you think and process information into account when helping you identify approaches to changing the behavior that’s creating problems.
Still Have Questions about therapy for sex and porn addiction?
Use the button below to send me a message. I will respond within 2 business days.