Desensitizing / Building Intimacy

[leira]

I've been married 24 years to a wonderful husband. He's been very tolerant of any oddities without knowing my total story -- as he said recently, he "figured out early on it wasn't about him" --

A year and some ago I entered severe ptsd-land, and started therapy a year ago. She wants me to build a sense of intimacy and desensitize myself to touch issues by reaching out and touching him briefly -- on the leg, thigh, whatever I can do.

Oddly enough, my heart ends up racing in fear and it's insane and crazy that I can't touch my loving and supportive husband and father to my two children without panicking, and yet....

Just wondered if others have overcome intimacy issues in a similar fashion?

 

[fresh_start]

leira,
I have been been with my husband for 10 years in total with 4 of those being married to him, and yes, I have had to deal with intimacy issues. We would try to be intimate and I would have the start of a panic attack. I found that by starting with touching an area of the body that isn't a trigger area (like maybe a hand or another area that feels okay) we could slowly move towards other things. I have been blessed with a really patient and loving husband who respects my boundaries. When you say "no" it's very important that it be respected, so you can have your safety and security needs met when you are doing work like you are trying to do. After being together for 10 years, I still cannot do certain sexual acts because of my personal experiences, and may never be able to do those things. And you know what...it's not insane and crazy to feel fear like that when you have experienced whatever it is that you have. It's a very normal reaction, to an extremely stressful and what was at that time traumatic event.