How do you communicate during sex while triggered?

[Roland]

Hello all **waves**

So I finally got therapy for PTSD. It’s EMDR which I realize is a controversial modality of therapy.

I have years of sexual abuse to unravel. My therapist suggested not having sex during this time due to triggers and spicy things that are going to inevitably pop up.

I don’t want to stop having sex. I think it’ll be harder to come back to than to figure out how to navigate during, because I just had a baby and I’m still trying to figure out my new body. I’m also a shallow bitch that goes crazy for sex, so there’s that as well.

But that said I’m well aware of the impending doom that is poking my trauma and sorting shit out. I know it can ruin everything if I’m not careful. But I also know I need to work through this shit so it stops affecting me so much.

As it stands now, when I get triggered during sex, I keep everything internal. I ground myself that my husband is not my abuser that I’m safe now etc. If something environmental or position is triggering I change those. I’ve never gotten so triggered I couldn’t recover the moment.

I really struggle to verbally say in the moment really anything. But later, usually the next day I’ll tell my husband what happened and why, but not the gory details of why he reminded me of my abuser/rape/whatever.

So my question is, if I choose to continue having sex during this process, what groundwork do I need to lay to keep myself safe? Do any of you have systems of communication that don’t rely on verbal to say you’re triggered etc? Am I dumb for wanting to maintain intimacy anyways?

I’m sad I have to deal with all this crap and honestly I really don’t want to. But the thing is I’m dealing with it anyways, on my own, everyday… it’d be nice to clear some of it up…

 

[Muttly]

Have you heard of enthusiastic consent? It has some good concepts? One of the things that silence is not consent and that you have to keep giving consent.

With my husband and I, we talk during and often after. We've learned how to make it a fun part of our sexual relationship. It helps prevent freezing for me. Part of the reason this has helped is because it's helped me practice using my words and predict when something might cause me to panic. Another part is, my husband has gotten to know my patterns so well. And since talk and my participation is such a core part, if I freeze he is going to stop.

 

[Roland]

Have you heard of enthusiastic consent? It has some good concepts? One of the things that silence is not consent and that you have to keep giving consent.

With my husband and I, we talk during and often after. We've learned how to make it a fun part of our sexual relationship. It helps prevent freezing for me. Part of the reason this has helped is because it's helped me practice using my words and predict when something might cause me to panic. Another part is, my husband has gotten to know my patterns so well. And since talk and my participation is such a core part, if I freeze he is going to stop.

Yes, my husband can tell now because I usually talk or react when I'm enjoying but when I'm triggered I go silent/freeze so he can usually tell now. I think I'm not sure, when I made this post almost a year ago we were looking at really digging into trauma therapy with EMDR, but we kinda got stuck on the sex and communication side. Now we're looking at doing couples therapy to improve sex (well intimacy, mostly emotional) and communication. I think once we have that more solid I should probably try to do EMDR again. I'm just kinda wimpy, I know if I do that there will be more PTSD symptoms, like I'll get worse before I get better and I feel mostly okay right now but ugh I know it's part of the process.