Dr. Patrick J. Carnes is a nationally known speaker on sex addiction and recovery issues. He is author of Out of the Shadows: Understanding Sexual Addiction (1992), Contrary to Love: Helping the Sexual Addict (1989), The Betrayal Bond: Breaking Free of Exploitive Relationships (1997), Open Hearts (1999), Facing the Shadow (2001), In the Shadows of the Net (2001), and The Clinical Management of Sex Addiction (2002). Dr. Carnes’ article, “18.4 Sexual Addiction,” appears in Kaplan & Sadock’s Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry (2005).
The New York Times suggested his book, Sexual Anorexia: Overcoming Sexual Self-Hatred, “will create a new wave of understanding about sexuality and the dynamics in intimate sexual relationships.” Dr. Carnes is co-editor of Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity: The Journal of Treatment and Prevention, a Taylor and Francis publication and the official journal of the National Council of Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity.
Dr. Patrick Carnes is the primary architect of the Gratitude program for the treatment of sexual and addictive disorders at Pine Grove Behavioral Health & Addiction Services in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. He also pioneered the founding of the Certified Sex Addiction Therapist program. This has evolved into a network of local, regional, and residential programs which specialize in this work.
From 1996 until 2004, Dr. Carnes was Clinical Director for Sexual Disorder Services at The Meadows in Wickenburg, Arizona. While there, he developed a therapeutic technology based on his landmark study of the recoveries of 1,000 sex addicts. This work is summarized in Don’t Call It Love, which has been described by The New Age Journal as “the best book on the market about addiction and its costs and consequences.”
Previously, Dr. Carnes designed the sexual dependency unit at Golden Valley Health Center in Golden Valley, Minnesota. This unit was the country’s first in-patient facility for sexual addiction. Since that time, he has been instrumental in the development of treatment facilities across the country.
Dr. Carnes graduated in 1966 from St. John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota, with a Bachelor of Arts degree. He received his Master’s degree in 1969 from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, and a Ph.D. in counselor education and organizational development from The University of Minnesota in 1980.
Dr. Patrick Carnes was awarded the distinguished Lifetime Achievement Award of the Society for the Advancement of Sexual Health (SASH). Each year, SASH (formerly known as NCSA/C) bestows a “Carnes Award” to deserving researchers and clinicians who have made outstanding contributions to the field of sexual medicine. He also was awarded the 2000 Counselor of the Year Award by AzAADAC in recognition of his contributions to the field of addictions treatment.
