About Recovery Nation

At Recovery Nation, we are committed to helping individuals overcome love, sex, and pornography addictions by providing a structured, holistic approach to recovery. Rooted in healthy, empowerment and personal responsibility, our mission is to guide individuals toward lasting change by fostering a deeper understanding of emotional health, values, and self-awareness.

Founded by Jon Marsh, a trailblazer in the field of addiction recovery, Recovery Nation has been a cornerstone of support and growth for countless individuals. After Jon’s untimely passing, our team came together with unwavering resolve to continue his legacy, ensuring that his innovative methods and compassionate vision live on.

As a community, we embrace the complexities of addiction with empathy, offering resources, guidance, and personalized coaching to help individuals regain control of their lives and relationships.

Recovery Nation is an active recovery and healing community that provides free information and assistance to those seeking to change the role that the sex/love addictions have played in their life. While originally developed in 2001 as a community education site for those with sexual addictions, Recovery Nation has since expanded its services to the partners of those struggling with such behavior as well. Soon, it will be further expanding its services to couples, parents and clinicians.  We are actively working to include other addictions as they would benefit from a Health Based Recovry as well.

RN is a privately funded site that is developed/maintained solely through our membership fees, donations, site services, book sales and volunteers. All of the tools are available free to those who have a sincere need for them through our scholarship program. The workshops, the forums, the support groups, the checklists, the managers…they exist to help people help themselves.

This site is not for everyone…

This cannot be over-emphasized. The information and strategies employed at RN will not apply to everyone with an addiction, nor will they apply to every partner of a sexual addict. But in having been introduced to tens of thousands of people since 2001, it does apply to most. Also important to understand is that RN does not focus on inducing someone’s motivation to recover, nor is it about convincing someone that healing a relationship damaged by sexual addiction is possible. If you are not already motivated to recover, you shouldn’t be here. The information is powerful when embraced by those actively applying it to the goal of recovery. If they are not already working towards that goal with sincerity, there is nothing here that will guide them onto that path.

Similarly, if you are here to determine whether or not your relationship is salvageable…well, that is a legitimate reason for being here ‹smile›…but don’t focus on the answer. Instead, put that question on hold and focus instead on learning about sexual addiction and the truth about what you will likely face in whatever decisions you may make down the road. With your partner or without. Do this with an open-mind…not with the intention of trying to close your mind.

As stated previously, RN exists to educate those who are sincerely trying to help themselves. It has been estimated that there are between 16-21.5 million sexual addicts in the United States (Stanford, Duchesne, MSNBC 2001 — I think). We actively work with about 100 at any given time. Do the math. It is critical that the people we work with actually WANT to be here. And that they WANT to recover and/or heal. There are plenty of other options available for the other 21.499999999 million people whose recovery is not predicated on active effort and commitment. Here, it is.

Permanent recovery can occur. Permanent healing can occur. Relationships can be rebuilt stronger than ever after the discovery of an addiction. Each has its own transition that must occur for permanent change to take place. This site’s purpose is to educate people on how to do just that. Not to counsel them. Not to support them (though this is a good secondary benefit of the site). But rather, to educate them through their transition from addiction to health. Or from chaos to stability. Or from disillusionment to reality.

We would rather have a community of ten active people pushing themselves towards health than to manage a community of thousands taking a passive approach to change. So if you are going to be here, be here fully. Participate fully. Recognize that Recovery Nation is no longer an ‘outside source’ in your recovery and/or healing. It is YOUR personal resource, to use as you see fit in rebuilding your life. That is why we exist.

Jon Marsh

The Founder of Recovery Nation.

Jonathan Marsh founded Recovery Nation and served as its primary recovery coach until his death. He  authored each of the site’s workshops and wrote extensively on addiction and recovery over the last ten years of his life. Jon facilitated Health-Based Recovery workshops internationally and throughout the United States. He presented at the 2006 International Conference on Marriage and Family and gave numerous media interviews on the subject of sexual addiction. Jon’s breakthrough work, He Danced Alone — provides a raw and harrowing look into the heart and mind of a sex/love addict. This book is offered free on this site as an educational tool for select audiences.

A married father of four, Jon experienced a twenty-year sex and love addiction before making the transition to a healthy life nearly eighteen years before he died. In the years from this transition, he had openly shared his experiences with the sex and love addictions, as well as his health-based path through recovery. He facilitated more than seventy-five clinical workshops in addiction assessment and treatment throughout the United States and coached over five thousand online workshop participants.

Having lived with his family in Omaha, Nebraska, Jon worked in such renowned clinical/behavioral treatment and personal development settings as the Menninger Clinic, the Salvation Army and Boys Town. He held various positions, working hands-on with chronically mentally ill and homeless persons. From 1997 to 2005, he held the position of Director of Health Education & Training with an addiction assessment firm committed to improving the efficacy of mental health/addiction treatment and clinical services through technology.

In the summer of 2006, he resigned his position coordinating a five-year, federally-funded addiction treatment project that involved teaching a philosophical shift from the historically ineffective medical-based addiction treatment model to a culturally-oriented/value-based treatment model for indigenous communities across the United States to focus exclusively on developing Recovery Nation into the premiere resource for those seeking a permanent end to their addiction.

Jon died on May 2, 2009.  This was a great loss to his family, to RN and to all of the past, present and future participants of his workshops. Jon had a vision to apply Health-Based Recovery (HBR) not only to sexual addiction but to all forms of addiction including gambling, drinking, and drugs etc. He also envisioned a separate place where people of faith would be able to pursue HBR in the context of their beliefs in a community of others of the same faith. One such site was already in the works when Jon died and will be completed by the people that were helping Jon create and launch the site. He had also initiated other projects that we at RN hope to complete for him and bring to fruition. We will forever be grateful for the work Jon did to bring HBR within everyone’s reach and for all the personal sacrifices he made to help others.

Visit Jon’s Memorial Here