Repulsed By Normal Affection Between Adult And Non-adults

[Kintsugi]

I say "non-adults" because this disgust has extended to affection toward dogs. That's right. I am a total dog lover. But dogs. Also dogs. Let me explain.

I developed what I imagined to be a normal distaste for kissing my parents when I was around puberty. This has now developed to the point where just typing the phrase "kissing my parents" makes me want to vomit all over my keyboard. As a footnote, my primary trauma was sibling incest, not parental incest.

I first noticed how bad it was getting through media depictions of parents kissing their children on the lips. It just horrified me. It sent shivers through my body and made me want to crawl out of my skin. It made me want to scream. I would be mortified.

In real life, seeing these displays of affection between parents and their children is even worse. I just want to separate them.

And then, I don't know when, but hearing my fiance kiss one of the dogs on the nose or head just sent me right into the same exact frenzy as seeing this on television/in film. It's a really particular sound. I will give cartoonish smooches to the dog, but the sound his lips make somehow sounds extremely intimate to me.

And this is really the crux of it. It's okay if a parent kisses their child on the cheek with a big smacking noise. You know the one. You purse your lips, form a vaccuum, and it makes that Looney Tunes kiss sound. On a child's lips (even a baby), it still freaks me out, but it's not as terrible a reaction.

But this awful, tender, gentle kissing noise makes me want to hurl. It makes me want to hit something. It makes me want to just disappear in a puff of flames--combust on the spot.

There's a specific movie where it's just the worst. I think it's The Green Lantern. It's a scene where the father/protagonist comes home, and his son (who looks about ten years old) is sitting at a table or something, and the father comes up behind him and gently gives him [what I perceive to be] a prolonged kiss, lets his lips sit there, sniffs the boy's hair, and kisses his head again in the same way. Holy shit, just writing about it makes me want to flip the f*ck out. It makes me angry and disgusted and terrified. I can feel panic and rage rising in my chest and throat as I type this. I cannot stand that scene.

I become extremely irritable when my fiance does this with the dogs. I know it's all just appropriate ways of expressing love and affection, but it totally bugs me out. But how the hell do I explain that shit?

Worse, everyone in my family is now having babies. And so people are kissing the babies' lips. And I just want to snatch the baby away from them.

I never ever want to kiss these kids' lips. I don't care how much I love them. It scares the shit out of me to even think about, and it just sounds so f*cking wrong to me. I think of kissing a baby as akin to smacking it. It does not register to me as affection or love or something that is a normal impulse. I think it sounds sick and damaging and horrible, even though this isn't the case, and I know that rationally it is probably okay and maybe even healthy. But why the lips, people? And the sound. I'll never produce that sound. That sound is the sound of intimacy as far as I am concerned.

And I'm constantly thinking, if I have children, will I have this compulsion to kiss their lips? Can I have kids if my version of showing them affection is a cartoonish kiss on the head, or kissing my hand and placing the hand on their cheek?

I am so completely disgusted by this, and I just don't know where it comes from or how to cope.

 

[digger]

But why the lips, people?

I never kiss kids on the lips, even my own - it's makes me feel really uncomfortable even just reading/writing about it. Personally, I wouldn't class kissing on the lips as 'normal affection' between an adult and child. I've never really considered my take on it to be odd though till I read this.

 

[Chava]

You could totally have a kid and just kiss them on the cheek or head. Plenty sweet enough. I don't like the lip thing either. I don't really judge it or care, but I'm pretty sure it's not necessary. I would have been plenty happy with a parent that held me or talked to me.

I feel horribly slimy when anyone puts their arm around me and on my shoulder...like if you were to my left you could possible touch my left shoulder, but not my right. omg I would probably start hissing...well actually, when it has happened I've tensed and pulled away and just hurt people's feelings. I did this when younger to a couple adults who were just trying to be supportive or proud of me, or whatever and they were confused when I jerked away. ICK.

 

[illusionist]

I have the same problem, no kissing on the lips of kids....even as far as kissing my partner.....I just can't do deep kissing on the mouth without internally freaking out and wanting to run. Luckily my partner understands this, so it is not a problem between us. I know exactly where it comes from...have overcome the sexual problems a long time ago but can't overcome a simple deep kiss.

As already said, you can still show your kids affection without the need to kiss them on the lips. The forehead or the cheek is just as affectionate.

 

[Kintsugi]

@richter scale Interesting, because I am more comfortable with a deep, passionate kiss than a peck. Maybe a peck makes me feel like a child, and I have a lot of icky stuff wrapped up in that? This is actually also a problem in my relationship right now. We'll be together six years this Fall, so there's a lot of pecking in day-to-day life... I would prefer something deeper, even as a quick "Goodbye" kiss.

I think I just want things to be nice and clear. Sexual kissing = go for it. Platonic kissing = no lip-to-lip action. Pecks should, in my worldview, be Looney Toons kisses.

Oh god, now I'm thinking about Pepe le Peau, and how much weird stuff there is there. f*cking cartoons. C'mon, trauma. Let me have something.

 

[GWhizz]

I would have been one to totally cringe if I'd seen a parent kiss their child on the lips before.

But my 20month old has just recently mastered blowing kisses and kissing his favourite bear when he goes to bed. And completely out of his own initiative has started giving me or my partner pecks on the lips or cheek.

Guys, this is my adorable little boy, my world, the person I'd do anything and everything to protect.

But I don't wish to curb his natural affection. He's doing it out of pure innocence just as he hugs his little friends or pets our neighbour's cat.

All I can do is teach him boundaries. I'm all about gentle parenting and don't wish to give him negative associations based on my fears and past.

To me, there's nothing disgusting about it, if the parent isn't purposefully teaching their child to behave in this way, and where it's solely the child's decision. I never say 'give mama a kiss' for example. But I do say 'blow kisses goodbye' and 'wave bye bye'.

I'm learning as I go, to embrace my child's loving behaviours. I don't want him to be the inhibited person I was.

 

[illusionist]

I'm thinking back to when my kids were young.....cartoonish kisses were exchanged when we were having a laugh....when my kids were in pain it would be a prolonged kiss on the forehead or cheek.......bedtime would be a peck on the cheek with big hug in a swaying action.....cuddled up to read a story would be kisses on the top of the head as I tousled their hair. I think kissing has a ' language' of its own and its something you may well develop naturally when you have your own kids.

 

[moonbeam]

I always cringe when I see parents kiss children on the lips. I don't understand kissing children on the lips. No no no. It's just wrong.

 

[littlelostchild]

There is something intimate about kissing on the lips. In my view, it's not for parents to do with their children.

 

[Neverthesame]

I was never abused, but since I developed ptsd, that smacking kissy sound drives me insane.

I don't have the slightest idea why. I first noticed it during a time when I was single for quite a while. So naturally I just assumed that I was jealous of others receiving affection I was not.

Nope. Later on when I had gotten into a romantic relationship which became serious. I still hated that noise.

I am only guessing here, but maybe it's a hyper-arousal thing? Because it's not a threatening sound (at least for me). But it is loud and distracting. Hard to keep my ears focused on the "no longer existant, but still very enormous threat which is going to come out of nowhere to end my life in some horrible way any second now" feeling.

 

[anonymous]

After I learned that most babies get HSV-1 from adults who do the baby kissy thing, I was thoroughly disgusted. (HSV-1=cold sores, HSV-2 =genital herpes although they can occasionally swap locations.) Of course the cold sore virus is widespread in society with the majority of people having it dormant in their systems, only causing havoc if you got shafted in the immunity department. But still, GROSS!!