How to treat Tiger Woods’ sex problem
by Mira and Charles on February 23rd, 2010The ultimate low-down on how you fix a wandering willie
A lot of people have been wondering, How do you treat a problem like Tiger Woods’? What’s the best treatment? How is he actually being treated? Does the treatment work? And what exactly is the problem being treated?
Whew! That’s a lot of questions. Let me try to sort it all out.
What is the problem? The problem is a behavior. In this case, the behavior is having sex with a lot of women who are not your wife. This is not a sex addiction. There are people who like to have sex very often. There’s nothing wrong with that unless it reaches the point where it interferes with your life. But if Tiger just wanted to have sex a lot, he could have done so with Elin. He could have masturbated when she wasn’t available.
But Tiger had a wandering willie. So much so that it might ruin his life if Elin decides to divorce him, he loses day-to-day contact with his kids, and his career suffers serious damage. But in Tiger’s case it wasn’t just that he wanted sex with other women. He wanted relationships with other women. We know that from the texts he sent. He wanted sex with amateurs, which is much more dangerous than sex with professionals, because sex with amateurs involves feelings and a million and one complications.
What’s the best way to treat this problem? There is no one best way. But there are some things that all effective treatments have in common. What they have in common is the attempt to help people answer these questions:
What do you want? You know, Tiger doesn’t have a problem if he decides that what he really wants is to have a bunch of relationships with a bunch of bimbos (or with a bunch of botanists, for that matter). We might not approve of that decision, but if it works for him, then what the hell. The problem is what we call counter-intentional behavior. Or as we sometimes refer to it: “I can’t help it” behavior. In a situation like Tiger’s what you usually find is that people are very confused about what they want. So part of Tiger’s therapy would be to get him to zero in on what he really wants. And if he wants to be with Elin and his kids, then the next step is to help him sort out his other desires so he can channel them in more productive directions or stop them in ways that actually work.
How do things work? Even the smartest people can have dumb ideas about how things work. (Dumb people have even dumber ideas; it’s just that we don’t expect as much from them.) Tiger, one of the most well known people in the world (except to the Dalai Lama) obviously had the idea that he could have a boatload of affairs under his wife’s nose and never get caught. “I guess I didn’t think this through” would be a huge understatement. And, based on our wide experience with cheaters and their spouses, we could confidently say that he had no clue that his wife would respond the way she did if she did find out. So therapy has to be about helping people understand how things work and what makes sense.
How can you hold yourself accountable? Accountability is crucial. In AA it takes the form of meetings and a sponsor. In Tiger’s case, it could be anything. But it will very likely include a hot-line to someone if he should find himself drifting to the dark and dangerous side. There will probably be ways for Elin to check on his texts as trust get restored.
And by the way, trust CAN be restored. It happens all the time. Not only that, but it is often easier that most of us think. We want to trust the people we care about. So even if Elin was deeply wounded, and of course she was, she can trust Tiger again if neither of them screw up the trust-building process.
How can you get your needs met? Just because a person’s needs have led him in a bad direction doesn’t mean he can ignore those needs. A good careful therapy for Tiger would help him identify the needs that led his willie to wander and then find better ways to meet those needs.
Who are you? For most people in Tiger’s situation, there’s a big gap between who you think you are (Superman!) and who you really are (a really, really lucky ordinary guy). You don’t have to be a billionaire super-star athlete to think you’re above the rules that apply to ordinary people. Or to think you are entitled to things other people can’t get. So therapy with Tiger would have to consist of work on helping Tiger see much more clearly who he really is.
One more thing. Really good therapy is like building a Lego tower. One brick at a time. You just have to figure out the next issue to deal with and a way to deal with it. Then the next. Then the next. This is what good therapists do. We’re not guided by theory and procedure as much as by just following closely what is evolving right in front of us, along with being guided by where we want the person to end up. And group therapy and/or peer support groups can be very helpful.
How is he actually being treated? We don’t know. There is an article in today’s New York Times that talks about this, but it’s all in the details. Unless we were there with Tiger and his therapist, we can’t say we know what’s going on and no one else can either.
Does the treatment work? Actually the question should be, How effective is the best treatment? The answer is (and you’re going to hate this), It depends. Suppose you said, Is cancer curable? And of course the answer is, Whose cancer? Some cancers are quite benign, some quite lethal. But even with the same cancer, it appears in different forms in different people. So you treat and hope for the best. And it’s the same with Tiger’s wandering willie. If he’s committed to change, if his therapy gets at all the issues and does so in a practical, problem-solving manner, and if he has a lot of support, then the prognosis is very good.
