Groups
These groups deal exclusively with men and sexual addiction/compulsive sexual behavior and their spouses who suffered in large part because of this issue.
WHAT IS A CONFIDENTIAL FMO IMPACT GROUP?
- A safe place to share your thoughts and behaviors – the good, the bad, and the ugly.
- A two-hour weekly meeting with like-minded men all struggling with sexual addiction.
- A place of acceptance where you will build a safety plan to help prevent future relapse.
- A meeting dedicated to the study of a Christian curriculum with an end goal of healthy sexuality.
- A place of discipleship where “iron sharpens iron” and men mature in the community.
FMO - A Small Group Overview: The 40/60/20 Format
Our For Men Only small groups are structured in God’s grace around accountability and knowledge. We need both in the healing process, but there is a reason why we must put accountability first. Our addictive lifestyles are built on isolation allowing us to keep our secrets. For disclosure to happen, for recovery to begin and healing to take place there can be no secrets. Therefore, we must move toward vulnerable transparency, practiced first in our FMO group, then with our family and significant friends.
With that in mind, men in FMO groups will spend the first 40-minutes evaluating the previous week’s behavior using the FASTER Scale relapse awareness exercise. You will learn how to use this tool during the two to three meetings of the First Steps process before you attend a group. We can learn much by evaluating the previous week’s behavior; how and why things went well or how and why we have fallen anywhere from Forgetting Priorities to Speeding Up to Relapse or moral failure.
Each person will share their self-evaluation guided by the leader with the entire group of up to 5 or 6 men or in smaller groups of 3 or 4 as needed. We will read what we have written. Your small group leader or partners will ask “why” questions if they believe your answers need clarification and/or expansion.
The 60-minute center segment is devoted to the pursuit of knowledge through the current curriculum over and above what you are learning through your devotional life, formal teaching of the Word, and persona journaling. For you to experience the value of accountability you must gain both knowledge and a greater sense of self-awareness (applied knowledge).
Our primary curriculums are Pure Desire Ministries International Seven Pillars of Freedom workbook and The Genesis Process for Change workbooks One and Two. You will study valuable information on false intimacy involved with porn use and self-sex, false belief systems at the root of your insecurities, sexual addiction, and more importantly, you will acquire a greater sense of where you are in your addiction and how you arrived at this place in life. These materials will also give you the tools to risk change and by faith increase your hope!
The last 20-minutes, of each meeting, are devoted to the creation of a new step in your safety/relapse prevention plan and identifying accountability partners for the coming week. This will entail the use of the double bind worksheet to define the obstacle (or problems) you identified in your FASTER Scale. You will then create a plan to overcome them and share with your accountability partners what this plan looks like in action – who, what, where, why, and when.
The For Women Only (FWO) Ministry of the Nathan Project is a recovery and discipleship program comprised of one interactive closed confidential support group, workshops, and one-on-one meetings with our Women’s Ministry Director, Vicki Kardos. The group provides a safe place for open honest discussion of issues and concerns facing women who are spouses, partners, or ex-spouses of men involved with the compulsive use pornography, sexual addiction, and/or other sexually habitual behaviors.
The support group and workshop, curriculum, and supporting materials are designed to provide a gateway of opportunity for change and health. This occurs through teaching, sharing, and a thorough understanding of Biblical principles that undergird a woman’s personal growth through discipleship in Christ.
When disclosing our fears and concerns to one another, listening and sharing knowledge gained through personal experience, we increase our abilities to deal with each new day, increase our clarity of thought, and personal effectiveness. We learn to develop and maintain healthy boundaries. We help each other find significance and courage to move outside our comfort zone, recognize our value, and find our identity in Jesus Christ and Him alone.
The main support group uses “S.T.O.R.M.” Surviving Trauma and Overcoming Relational Mistrust curriculum created and written precisely for FWO Groups. This 14-week support group was developed from a desire to change lives. It can be the gateway to the future dealing successfully with problems specific to your relationship with a sexual addict.
When women show up at the front door for the first week of ‘group’ it is often the first time they have stepped into a “support group.” Especially one dealing with this issue. They are scared, but hopeful. Many of them feel the shame of their husband’s addiction. They feel guilty for not supporting him enough, staying with him or not staying with him, loving him yet feeling unloved. They feel they are in a relationship that is slowly stripping them of their dignity and self-worth. They have suffered in silence when somewhere deep inside they know they have a voice and the ability to communicate pain.
Most often, here among other voices, they find understanding and validation while hearing and sharing their stories. Longing for something different, something better, something honest, and safety where they can speak truth. Here, they will connect with the pain of other women in an established space, a space where God can unveil to them a gift of incredible value, His love for them and His desire to bring them to a healthy life.
Though sharing and reaching out to one another may have a sorrowful and despairing wrap around it, the faith to risk and unwrap pain can expose a beautiful pearl of healing grace
and redemption-based thinking of empowerment, hope and freedom; rather than fear-based thinking and its hopelessness, confusion, and bondage.
Ladies, the truth is God has a lot to say about our identity as part of His glorious creation. The sexualized culture we live in has women believing lies about themselves, sometimes our minds have become jumbled, trading the truth of how beautifully and wonderfully made we are for a lie that can result in self-loathing and loneliness. The FWO Support Group is a healing space of recovery and discipleship.
You are invited… Vicki
For information and availability of For Women Only (FWO) Spousal and Partner Support Groups using “S.T.O.R.M.” and other curriculums
Vicki Kardos, Co-founder and Director of Women’s Ministry
Serving Central and Southern New Hampshire
56A Appletree Drive
Goffstown, NH 03045
Vicki@nathanproject.net
(603) 682-7828
Kathy Tardif
Serving Greater Portland, Maine Community
kittenrehill@fairpoint.net
(603) 307-9241
WHAT WE DO IN FMO
- Begin building an intimate relationship with God by His grace trusting in Him.
- Participate in a detailed plan of study, accountability, and commitment to change.
- Study the resource material and engage the curriculum by completing all assignments.
- Live in accountability with FMO brothers sharing struggles and victories with authenticity.
WHAT FMO IS NOT
- An unsafe place of criticism, condemnation, shame, or confusion.
- A place of denial where the addiction to obsessive and compulsive sexual behaviors is ignored.
- A secret place where men wear masks to hide their fears, faults, and feelings.
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