“I recognized in August, I needed help,” Phillips recalled. “I started calling facilities. I couldn’t stop myself from doing the things I was doing, even knowing the consequences.”
Phillips made the decision to attend the clinic on Oct. 23, 2009, two days before he was fired by ESPN for his affair with production assistant Brooke Hundley. The 22-year-old Hundley also was let go by the company.
“People look at sex addiction as an excuse,” Phillips said. “It’s not an excuse. I’m fully responsible for everything that I did and accept responsibility for that. I’ve broken my wife’s heart. I’ve damaged her and our relationship in a terrible way.
“I think of all that my family’s gone through. People choose to participate in a relationship, but my wife and kids didn’t. With what my wife and kids have gone through, the trauma that they’ve faced, not only from having a father and a husband that’s a sex addict, but the trauma of the media attention, they’ve been through a lot.”
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