Hope & Freedom offers numerous Three-Day Intensives that are tailored to the specific recovery needs of clients. Intensives are offered for both men and couples. For men in recovery from compulsive sexual behavior who are in a committed relationship, it is strongly suggested that the intensive work be done as a couple.
Are you tired of your compulsive sexual behavior? Have you tried to stop many times before and been unsuccessful? Have your lies and addictive behavior damaged your relationship to the point where you wonder if it will survive?
We believe that sex addiction need not bring an end to marriage. If there is a willingness on the part of the sex addict and the partner to give themselves wholeheartedly to the recovery process, we believe that most marriages can not only survive but can thrive in recovery. Our treatment process is different from some others in that a stated goal of our process is to restore the marriage relationship.
Three-Day Intensives are not for everyone. Intensives are not a three-day cure. There is no such thing. They are designed to be three days of hard work that will help you get to the root of your addiction, strip away barriers to recovery, and put your life and relationship on the road to recovery. These three days of concentrated and demanding work address issues that may otherwise take a year or more of therapy for equivalent results.
This program is very rigorous. In fact, it may be the most rigorous short-term treatment program of its kind. We are very selective in accepting couples into this program because we want to make sure a Three-Day Intensive is the appropriate treatment choice.
If you are looking for an easy fix to a problem that you have developed over many years, keep looking. This program is not for you. We work only with highly motivated individuals and couples who are ready to do whatever is necessary to put an end to all acting out behaviors once-and-for-all and engage in the difficult but rewarding process of rebuilding their relationship.
Application Is a Three-Day Intensive right for you?
Click here
to complete an application
to find out.
Completing the application does not obligate you to attend an Intensive. Someone will contact you after you submit the application.
Intensives consist of a combination of individual sessions and couples sessions. We have sessions each morning and each afternoon. Assignments are given to work on each evening. Additionally, there are mandatory 12-step meetings that the couple attends each evening. As the name implies, the three days you spend at Hope & Freedom will be intense.
We only have a limited number of spaces available for intensives. To be considered for an intensive you much complete an application by clicking on the link at the right. Completing this application does not obligate you in any way. It does help us determine if an Intensive is right for you.
If you are married, we will only consider you for an Intensive if you come and work as a couple. A major focus of our work is on seeing relationships restored. We cannot do that unless we have both partners present.
Please ask your partner to complete an application after you are through. Once we receive both applications we will set up a teleconference where Dr. Magness will personally review your applications, take you step-by-step through a Three-Day Intensive schedule, answer your questions and then conduct your screening interview.
You will be told whether or not your applications have been approved by the end of that teleconference.
The focus of these Intensives will be on:
Equipping the sexually addicted person with the tools he/she needs to develop new thought and behavior patterns to counter what is often a long-standing pattern of addictive dysfunctional behavior. Many of our clients are able to stop all compulsive and addictive sexual behaviors permanently. This is our goal and we will do everything in our power to help you achieve that goal.
The second focus of Intensives is to lead couples in a process that can ultimately lead to restoration of trust in the relationship.
For the Partner
During the Intensive, a significant part of our work will be with you. Initially, the work will be helping you deal with the trauma that you have experienced due to your partner’s acting out. Additional work with you will center on helping you define, develop, and maintain healthy boundaries, empowering you within the relationship, determining what you need to feel safe in the relationship, and helping you develop a long-term plan for taking care of yourself. We will also lead you in a process that is designed to lay a foundation upon which trust can be rebuilt. A significant focus of our intensives also includes developing intimacy on an emotional, physical, and spiritual level. Part of our focus on the last day of the intensive is on the subject of healthy sexuality, how to move toward it and embrace it.
Click on the plus sign (+) to the left of each topic in order to view that specific information.
The following Three-Day Intensives are offered through Hope & Freedom Counseling Services. The exact content of your intensive would be tailored to your specific needs.
Recovery Foundations Intensive for Couples (The focus of this intensive is to lay a foundation for restoring trust in relationships rocked by sex addiction.)
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Understanding the origins of your addiction.
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Establishing a foundation for continued recovery.
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Integrating recovery routines into the couple relationship.
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Reestablishing trust in the relationship.
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Establishing intimacy on an emotional, physical, and spiritual level.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Recovery Foundations Intensive for Men
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Understanding the origins of your addiction.
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Establishing a foundation for continued recovery.
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Learning basic tools for remaining free from compulsive behavior.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
High-Profile Client Intensive (This intensive is good for any high-profile person including senior executives, professional athletes, politicians, actors, broadcast personalities, and other celebrities.) These are offered at a discrete location in the Canadian Rockies or at a resort setting in the United States. Call our office at 713.630.0111 for more information. (Read more about our work with High-Profile Clients)
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Understanding the origins of your addiction.
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Establishing a foundation for continued recovery.
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Learning the tools of recovery.
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Examining the celebrity/executive psyche.
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Boundary issues for celebrities/executives.
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Minimizing damage caused by past sexual acting out.
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Safe business travel.
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Integrating recovery routines into family life.
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Establishing intimacy on an emotional, physical, and spiritual level.
Pastoral counseling—procedures to better protect the minister.
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Special considerations involving a minister’s sex life.
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Dealing with religious misinformation about sex.
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Coping with sexual taboos.
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Boundary issues as they relate to parishioners.
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Dealing with shame.
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Reestablishing spiritual disciplines.
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Integrating recovery routines into family life.
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Simple steps to becoming the true spiritual leader of your home.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
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Examination of the viability of future ministry.
**When necessary, we can provide a greater level of anonymity by conducting the Three-Day Intensives for Clergy in the conference room of a nearby hotel.
Restoration Intensive for Couples This intensive is structured for couples where the client has been in recovery for sometime but has had a slip or a relapse.
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Learning from relapse. (Postmortem of relapse.)
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Focusing on current crises in relationship.
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Reestablishing trust in the relationship.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Restoration Intensive for Men
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Learning from relapse. (Postmortem of relapse.)
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Trauma Survivors Intensive for Couples This intensive is designed for couples where one or both partners have experienced significant trauma in the past. The trauma may be as far back as childhood or as recent as trauma that has resulted from current sexual acting out.
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Focusing on the impact of trauma on daily life.
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Understanding the impact of trauma on current or past relationships.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Trauma Survivors Intensive for Men
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Focusing on the impact of trauma on daily life.
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Understanding the impact of trauma on current or past relationships.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Step-Down Intensive for Couples This intensive is designed as a step-down treatment for couples where the client has just returned from inpatient treatment or from an extended intensive outpatient treatment facility.
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Reentering public life.
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Identifying and dealing with daily triggers.
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Learning new thought and behavior patterns.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Step-Down Intensive for Men
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Reentering public life.
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Identifying and dealing with daily triggers.
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Learning new thought and behavior patterns.
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Preventing relapse.
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Developing a Personal Recovery Plan.
Couples Communication Intensive This intensive is only open to couples who have already done significant work in recovery or where sex addiction is not a factor. For couples in recovery, prerequisites to this intensive include a complete disclosure and the establishment of a period of unbroken sobriety. The material for this intensive draws heavily on the work of Pia Mellody and Terry Real.
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Identifying healthy boundaries around talking and listening.
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Learning core self-skills and relationship skills.
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Recognizing losing strategies in a relationship.
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Establishing a “Fair Fight Contract.”
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Learning the core negative image of self and partner and understanding the relationship grid.
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Understanding emotions in the relationship.
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Working through real-life issues.
Couples communication sessions consist of two double sessions each morning, and two double sessions each afternoon.
The daily schedule for Couples Communication Intensives is as follows:
8:00 – 9:30 am Session 1
9:30 – 10:00 am Break
10:00 – 11:30 am Session 2
11:30 – 1:30 pm Lunch (on your own)
1:30 – 3:00 pm Session 3
3:00 – 3:30 pm Break
3:30 – 5:00 pm Session 4
Special Topic Intensives
We also offer a variety of other special topic intensives to fit the need of various clients. If you have need for a Three-Day Intensive with a different content focus, please call our office at (713) 630-0111 to find out about availability.
Super Intensives
Super Intensives are special purpose intensives that are offered to couples with long-standing difficulties that have not found resolution by any other means. Addiction may or may not be a factor. Since Super Intensives preclude doing work with other clients during the duration of the intensive, only a limited number of these are offered each year. Only couples who have failed to resolve conflict and/or reestablish trust by more traditional types of psychotherapy will be considered for a Super Intensive. Couples desiring more information on Super Intensives are encouraged to contact our office to see if they meet the criteria to be considered for this rigorous therapeutic intervention.
Referrals from Other Therapists
When another mental health professional refers a client for a Three-Day Intensive, the content of the intensive is customized to meet the needs of the client, in consultation with the referring therapist. Clients referred by another therapist must sign an agreement to return to the referring therapist after the intensive.
To book a Three-Day Intensive, please call (713) 630-0111.
Advantages of Intensives
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Intensives allow clients to do the equivalent of several months (up to the equivalent of six months) of therapy in a three-day period.
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Intensives allow clients to get started in recovery with a maximum of anonymity. Clients travel to Houston and then stay in a hotel near Hope & Freedom and do their recovery work in complete privacy, minimizing disruptions to job and family.
What Can I Expect?
Three-Day Intensives are psychotherapy sessions that are designed to get to the heart of the issues at hand quickly, receive concentrated focus, and push for resolution that is both achievable and lasting. You can expect an intensive to be—well—intensive! As the name implies, intensives are designed to dig deeply into issues that have contributed to your present situation. Revelations of additional sexual behavior, long-held secrets, trauma from childhood, and other issues are common during intensives. Strong emotions are often the result.
For this reason, you can expect to experience a wide range of emotions during the intensive. You may find yourself reconnecting with past wounds and trauma that bring a flood of emotion to the present. When couples are doing work together, they sometimes become aware of deep-seated emotions that make it very difficult to be in the same room with their partner during the three days.
Our goal is to help you to process the pain and emotions in a safe and healthy way.
High Profile Clients
For clients who need greater anonymity, we offer Three-Day Intensives in a discrete location in the heart of the Canadian Rockies or at a resort setting in the United States. Please call our office at 713.630.0111 for additional information as to available dates and accomodations.
Preparing for an Intensive
As client get ready to come to an intensive, they are encouraged to make adaquate preparations to help ensure the success of their concentrated work. First, clients are encouraged to spend time thinking about the events that have contributed to the need for the intensive. In the case of someone who is a sex addict, it is important to make a complete, detailed, but confidential list of all acting out behaviors. The more detailed and complete this list, the more effective the intensive.
Clients who participate in a Three-Day Intensive are encouraged to take care of all business and family matters before coming to the intensive and then not conduct any business during the intensive. Frankly, we have found that clients who conduct “business as usual” during an intensive get only limited benefit from the experience. For this reason, we strongly encourage clients to wait and schedule an intensive when they are able to devote their full concentration to therapy for three days.
In order to maximize the effectiveness of this time, we make the following suggestions.
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Leave cell phones, pagers, Blackberries, PDAs, iPods, laptops, and other electronic devices at home.
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Refrain from conducting business during the duration of the intensive.
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Limit phone calls to one per day to check in with family.
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Do not drink alcohol for the thirty days preceding the intensive.
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Refrain from all alcohol use during the intensive.
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Do not watch television during the intensive. Some clients even request the hotel to remove their television set during their stay in Houston.
We have also found it beneficial for clients to stay an extra day or so after the intensive to process with their partner what they have learned and accomplished during the preceding three days. This is a good time to spend a few days sightseeing or just walking in the many parks in Houston. This time can be important as couples make plans to reenter life and consider how their relationship may be different in the future.
We will be glad to discuss the many Houston area attractions and entertainment options for you to enjoy after your intensive.
Fees
Please call our office at (713) 630-0111 for information about fees.
Intensives are scheduled upon receipt of a nonrefundable and nontransferable deposit of ½ the total fee. The balance must be paid at least seven (7) days prior to the beginning of your program.
Please review your schedule before booking an intensive. Intensive programs are scheduled in advance based on availability. Should you request additional sessions in your intensive, Hope & Freedom Counseling Services will make an effort to accommodate your request. Additional sessions are at the usual individual therapy rates.
For the convenience of our clients, we accept the following credit cards: Visa, Master Card, Discover, and American Express.
Accomodations in Houston
Clients are encouraged to stay in one of several hotels that are within easy walking distance of the Hope & Freedom office. A list of area hotels as well as restaurants that are within walking distance will be sent to clients once they have booked an intensive. Clients who live in Houston are also encouraged to stay in a nearby hotel and give their full attention to the content of the intensives. (Meals and lodging are at the discretion and expense of the client.)
Daily Schedule
Intensives for Couples (except for Couples Communication Intensive)
Morning One session for primary client
One session for the partner
A double session for the couple
Afternoon One session for primary client
One session for the partner
A double session for the couple
Evenings Attending area 12-step meetings
Is a Three-Day Intensive
right for you? Click here to complete an application to find out.
Completing the application does not obligate you to attend an Intensive. Someone will contact you after you submit the application.
Doing assignments in preparation for sessions the next day
Intensives for Men
Morning
Two double length sessions
Afternoon Two double length sessions
Evenings Attending area 12-step meetings
Doing assignments in preparation for sessions the next day
To Schedule Your Intensive, call (713) 630-0111
We will be glad to give you additional information about Intensives and help you determine if this is the appropriate treatment modality for you. Please call for available dates. Intensives are offered most weeks of the year, Thursday through Saturday.
We work with only one couple at a time. Dr. Magness personally facilitates all intensives.
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