Regaining Sexual Desires

[The Albatross]

Sex is the one place where my body still holds the trauma(s). I can get all the way up to penetration and then my body cringes and muscles contract... going further results in a lot of pain. On my own I bought latex free vaginal dialators (allergic to latex) and made some progress with them but rather dislike the process, nothing whatever pleasurable about penetration for me anymore. Even though I do have sexual desires for intimacy... it is something of a Mexican standoff... mind and body squaring off in my vagina. Our therapist wouldn't touch the physical intimacy or the dysfunction with a ten foot pole. And except to say that it was a "wifely obligation for her husband" neither would our church. Which was understandable, but just made me feel more stressed about not being able to do it.

For many years my husband didn't understand and thought that I was angry at him and was using sexual with holding as a "punishment"... but he's come around to understand that that's not really the case. It is actually the one area that he is the most understanding of with regard to my PTSD traumas. But my rational mind knows I need to get this area resolved because it isn't just "a wifely obligation", it is an area where I need to heal to be able to recieve intimacy as well.

I can accept all the stuff before penetration... and we have found ways that he can get his release... but as I shared above, I was at one time comfortable with sex and penetration... more than he could handle at times and I would like to think that I could experince the whole thing without physical pain and body tension.

Glad to see a candid thread about this and it feels better to talk about it.

 

[Philippa]

I was numb for years, so I know where you're coming from.

The desire is back, but ATM I'm so incredibly jaded that it's more of a "party for one" kind of thing. All the guys I meet just want sex. On the first date. Sometimes even before. WHO NEEDS THAT?!? Sometimes I think I was born a few too many decades too late, as in it would be nice to go back to when men acted like gentlemen, not expecting sex five minutes after the first "hello"... But I digress. (No, I'm not a man hater. I was raped by a woman so it's women who freak me out, not men.)

How I became more sexual, idk, it just sort of happened.

But we are a separate breed. We don't subscribe to the status quo of an overly sexual society. And what I've learned is that this is OK. I'm not going to change because society says I'm not sexual enough. And tbh, I think that self-acceptance in this realm is paramount. Once you're comfortable with yourself, it is easier to get in touch with your sexual side.

Where am I now? Quite sexual by myself, I still feel nothing for others. Anymore I doubt I can ever be in a relationship b/c nobody will want to deal with my issues. That, coupled with the fact that nobody can please me sexually leaves me wondering why I would want a relationship at all...

Sigh.
SOL

Gosh, this helped me more than I can even tell you.

I've been going through the same thing for years now...just not interested...in ANYONE. I felt really horny the other day at a party and I wanted to have sex with these beautiful women who are in a relationship and going to have a child together...but it was all the phentamine (pill I took) speaking...unfortunately. But still...it was fun to be reminded of how lusty one can get.

I had the same conflict in the last two years, where I was feeling pressured by the whole "but you're a cougar now...you're in your dirty thirties" but who says that has to be the same for everyone at this stage of my life? It just makes the person feel worse, like they are abnormal for not being that way. Society is too over sexed as it is.

I went through a stage where I really didn't like sex...and it was so sad because I always loved sex so much before I was sexually assaulted. I just can't even remember what I used to be like. It's sad.

 

[Candy Champ]

That's an issue I've had too - and pretty much explains why I've bothered trying anything sexual with anyone at all, considering I don't "feel it". Sexual activity has never been about love or pleasure or anything like that for me. At best it's been this weird macho thing about wanting to "prove to myself", post-abuse, that I can face it; more often it's just wanting to be someone to someone else. Took me way too long to realize how unhealthy this was, either way... >_<
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This hits home so hard. This kind of mindset really messed me up in high-school. I'd be in school feeling tremendously anxious thinking about how I have to prove myself to my friends, Not to be seen as the perpetual virgin.(Lost that at 2) To see for myself if I had the guts capable of initiating sex... whilst wondering if people could tell how terrified I was, dodging dates, avoiding admirers, lying to avoid being hooked up by friends. From fear but also because it wasn't appealing; I would say I was numb but that isn't correct either, Automated/Autopilot where sex or being touched just wasn't factored in to the equation. I Really wish I told somebody back then.

There are so many day to day, repetitive rituals imposed and created by our society that If looked at, then dissected, and analyzed the conclusion would be insanity but its accepted as the norm. I’m not adhering to the delusions of society but I am dealing with dumb asses who are, as I’m sure all of you are as well. The hyper-sexualization of the West, well that's simple, thank hollywood!

I Noticed a trend of sorts, it seems with more or initial acceptance of the situation more or A problem becomes evident in performance. Not dealt with perhaps, I know I feel like this just becoming vocal and trying to accept the reality of the situation.

~JKA37 Hey I wont say much as I don't know the exact nature of the issue but this might be helpful. Talk to you boy and if everything’s understood, then I would sit him down with a pen and pad and make some guidelines. Like when to stop, what symptoms to ignore, what symptoms to look for, etc. If you start dissociating your boy would have a better idea on what might have triggered it what to do and what not to do, or at least more aware of the nature of your situation. I think this is very important. I’ve done this once and gave me much needed security. Example for me, I said "If my body becomes jerky, hold me for a sec and wait... might have to stop." "If I completely freeze up kiss me and say I love "name", that happens a bit but we don't have to quit so just feel it out. "Just kinda ground me." "If I seem or talk in a childish manner just stop for good." lay some groundwork. Just so if your to far gone you wont have to endure it, your partner should recognize this.

~HelliePig I've reread your post 5+ times, Interesting, detailed but I'm at a lack of understanding of "The sex to me doesn't seem as scary as the being seen/the cruelty/games/issues that might arise." Are you talking about abuse? Head Games? Regular(whats thats?) relationship problems? Sorry to single you out! But The line stuck to me.
Thank you for reading

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[bombwife]

I just found this site. I'm going through marital counseling and finally admitted that I get the creepy crawlies during foreplay and that my husband isn't diluted when he says that it's like I'm not there or I'm tense with this wall up. I want to enjoy foreplay which I can when I'm either intoxicated or when we have been together sharing our thoughts and feelings and just having an extended period of intimacy together. Being parents of toddlers and my husband working and going to school full-time doesn't allow for much intimacy, so the anxiety is much greater when we try to have sex. Our counselors want me to, "expose" the situation to my husband as they think he can help me. I told them that he knows about the drunken date rape. He was there for the nightmares and the panic attacks, etc. The counselors said, "There's a difference between knowing and understanding." How can someone possibly understand if they never had anyone take advantage of someone in that way? Usually my thoughts are consumed by that night over 15 years ago around the anniversary of that night that changed me forever. But now, I'm consumed again with this broken part of me yet again and the thought of having to deal with it and talk about it again scares me. Have any of you totally recovered? I noticed that when my marriage is a ten out of ten, I can have amazing orgasms. But I can count on one hand how many times I could have one without every fiber of my being fighting to relax enough to have one. Just need someone to talk to...I want to enjoy sex all the time. I don't want to hold my breath and just, "get through it." Any suggestions?

 

[jka37]

Hi friends,

CandyChamp, your suggestions seem very very applicable, and my boyfriend and I are working on implementing them. It is very confusing, switching so often...not even sure what is normal anymore sometimes, and sexual situations seem to be a landmine for personality fragments.

Lucille, thanks for the empathy. I'm with you. This stuff is confusing and difficult, and it is so hard to know how to handle it or what is best.

jka

 

[Mina]

Note: my PTSD isn't from sexual abuse or assault.

*I don’t wanna think a solid relationship with someone you could trust would be necessary to change these things although it would defiantly help.

Well, you might not want to think it, but it may be true.

...or when we have been together sharing our thoughts and feelings and just having an extended period of intimacy together.

Since getting PTSD, the emotional intimacy makes a big difference for me. Sex is physically a very intimate and vulnerable act. Allowing myself to feel vulnerable is difficult enough because thanks to PTSD, I'm usually looking for where the next threat is coming from; I can't imagine trying to have sex with someone I didn't love and trust.

Aside from that, one thing I've found fun is role-playing - in part because I don't feel like my everyday self with all my issues. Working out frequently helps as well...good for the brain chemicals, self-esteem, and body. I'm more interested in being sexual when I feel good about myself and the way I look.

Btw, I also think society tries to tell us that we should just be able to "turn on" when in reality it's more like being an oven and slowly heating up.

 

[Lucille]

I'd just like to say that I'm really glad we're having this discussion. I've participated in other threads about sexual issues... but somehow this is more open and honest.

It's very difficult for me to talk about because I really don't even know what I feel. All I know is it's definitely one of my biggest obstacles right now. It's always been hard for me to be intimate with guys I've been interested in because there are just so many emotions wrapped up in there together. There's fear and trust issues, the desire for intimacy, the hesitation to be intimate, the desire to stay true to my morals and upbringing... It's just so tough to know what I want and how to get it.

I always wind up feeling pressured to do more than I really want... sometimes even pressured by myself that I should be comfortable to be intimate. A lot of times, I feel dysfunctional that I don't want to do anything. Other times, I want it so bad that I get in over my head, and I freak out. :barefoot:

 

[Diore]

I always wind up feeling pressured to do more than I really want... sometimes even pressured by myself that I should be comfortable to be intimate. A lot of times, I feel dysfunctional that I don't want to do anything. Other times, I want it so bad that I get in over my head, and I freak out.

I can relate to this so much. (Your entire post, really, but this bit in particular.)

I feel like I don't have anything useful to say beyond "I've been there too". :/ Though maybe that in and of itself is telling...

With any other aspect of my PTSD (or life experience in general), I feel like I have advice. Like I know how to offer help to someone going through the same thing. But as far as sexuality issues go... I honestly don't know. Right now I'm abstaining from sexual contact of any kind because I feel like I can't even trust myself to know my own boundaries - and that is such a feeling of powerlessness! (All the more so because I've been so upset when others have tried to define those boundaries for me - whether they've pushed me to go further OR said "I don't think you're ready". Being denied the right to say "yes" seems as upsetting as the right to say "no".)

It's making me think of another thread here where someone asked "what is sex for?" I can't articulate an answer - maybe because I don't have a healthy one yet - but I'm starting to feel like I'm onto something about sex as a proxy/symbol/something like that for self and boundaries and connecting with people. And, by extension, numbness would have something to do with not having a healthy concept of self/boundaries/etc yet. (Maybe? Does that even make sense?)

 

[jka37]

Does anyone find that at times they really, really really want it, and then after when everything crashes they hate it and feel hurt and betrayed?

I think my alters have actually been taking over at different points and I just wasn't aware...explains the night and day difference in my feelings that happen in the span of 30 seconds.

But really...I get to this certain point, and every time it triggers a flashback (or SOMETHING) and then I flip out. And my mood, perspective, my everything is different. I have to remind myself, "I just changed here, and 30 seconds ago I was really into it."

I hate sex. And I don't even have any. Even self-pleasure has a similar result.

 

[War within]

This is so intense and difficult for me to write about-i can just say i've been there too-I see so often how much the sexual abuse that took so much from me. Yet it was the very act of sex that also brought me to understand what was wrong with me. I remember the first time I had a deep and orgasm and I was flooded with a sense of grief and panic I cannot describe. It took me years and many relationships and lots of sexual encounters to fully realize the effect the abuse had on me. Its a long road but I know I want to be close to someone in a clear intimate way because that is a right of mine that was taken by the violation.

 

[Diore]

Does anyone find that at times they really, really really want it, and then after when everything crashes they hate it and feel hurt and betrayed?

YES. :(

I know I want to be close to someone in a clear intimate way because that is a right of mine that was taken by the violation.

Sometimes I think that this is what I want (this notion of "getting back what was taken from me") more than the actual sexual encounter that's happening. And then I end up feeling disappointed and even betrayed because I didn't "get it back", because the act is so empty and numb instead of intimate and sexy.

 

[War within]

I know me too I often feel like its a battle that will never be won and that this makes me some martyr freak that's never going to be "normal" in the sex department-but I look around and what is normal-All I know is for myself I want to enjoy sex and I want sex to be fun -not some dark place that is ruled by have too's and despairs and get it over with attitude-but for and about me also.

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