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[Photo: © 2009 2009 VH1, all rights reserved]
The newest in the line of serious VH1 series will debut this Sunday at 10/9c. It’s called Sex Rehab and will not only educate us about the addiction, but also show us what the addicts have to go through to get treatment.
Because of this, licensed marriage and family therapist Jill Vermeire did an interview where she talked about working with Dr. Drew and about how the show will deal with the celebrity sex addicts. I was lucky enough to find the interview and wanted to share soem of it with you. This is an excerpt of that interview:
Q: First, do you want to talk a little bit about your background in treating sex addiction?
A: I got my master’s in clinical psychology at Pepperdine. I originally started working with drug and alcohol addiction, and I fell into sex addiction. I thought I was going to work in sex therapy, but I got a job at the Sexual Recovery Institute. That is an outpatient program for sex addiction, which I didn’t even know existed back then. I was fascinated and intrigued by the whole thing, and stayed on for a couple years and really got some intense hands-on experience and ended up getting certified as a sex addiction therapist through SASH. I’m pretty good at doing the work, so I stayed with it. And then I worked at a treatment center called the Meadows, where I learned about the other side of sex addiction, which is the female side, and the “love addiction” part. I got back to L.A., and really carved out my niche. And I’ve been doing lectures, in-services, training and working with the men and the women with sex addiction for probably five or six years now.
Q: How did your involvement in this show come about?
A: I guess they had started looking for a sex addiction therapist, and as they did their research and started talking to people, a lot of people mentioned my name. [Producer] Steve Longo called and asked if I would be interested. It’s such a sensitive subject, and knowing reality TV, I had the instant concerns of, “Oh god, are they going to exploit? Is it just a bunch of crazy people who just want to be famous and they’re not going to be serious about it? It’s just going to be a bunch of hijinx and mishaps that they’re going to put on TV.” But when I started seeing the production team, and found that they really wanted to hear my ideas and they really did want to implement real treatment, I felt a lot more comfortable. That’s when I agreed to sign on. You get nervous as a clinician, having built a pretty good reputation for yourself, doing something like this — something that’s never been done, with the sex addition part, but also knowing how reality TV is. But after meeting Drew and getting the sense that they were going to listen to the ideas and that I was really going to have a strong voice in what we did, I agreed to do it. And I’m really glad I did.
Q: What was your opinion on Celebrity Rehab when you were asked to do this show?
A: Without knowing what really happened the whole time of filming, but having watched the show, I thought, “Well, it’s definitely shedding light on addiction. And it’s a good voice for people who are struggling with addiction to see.” I mean, the world is influenced by celebrities. So to put it on TV definitely brings attention to it. I know from hearing feedback from some of the cast members and people in the real world that it really has influenced a lot of people to get help. But I also thought, “Well, they definitely do things that you don’t really do in regular rehab.” I’ve worked in a lot of rehab, so I could definitely feel the TV aspect of it. Sober House was more entertainment. I thought that show was a little bit more in the reality TV world, and not so much in real-treatment world. And I’ve talked to Dr. Drew about this stuff.
Q: But you’re confident that Sex Rehab will accomplish more than what you saw on the Rehab shows that came before it?
A: Yeah. It’s going to challenge what the world believes, or doesn’t even know, about sex addiction. The main thing is that it’s not about sex. It’s not a bunch of perverts in trench coats. And it’s not about being a porn star, though we did have porn stars on the show. What I’m hoping will come through is that underneath any sex addict, whether you’re a porn star, or celebrity, or just a regular person, it’s really about the pain and the shame and severe consequences. It can be really life threatening, and there really is treatment, and hope for recovery. Underneath any sex addict, no matter who they are, is a very wounded person who needs a lot of support and education and help.