Moving Forward With Sexual Difficulties

[cherryblossom]

Wow! That certainly is a very tricky and delicate situation. I find it very hard to imagine how your T can stay impartial and respect your confidentiality, whilst having a beer with your husband! :eek: Whilst I can't obviously question his (your T's) confidentiality, I know I would have a hard time talking to someone 'so close to home', as the phrase goes. For me, it would make it near impossible to talk about sexual/ physical relations of my marriage with my T, if my huband passed the time of day with my T over a beer in the local pub!

I'm going to be honest and say that I don't honestly think this is a good therapeutic relationship to be in. Your therapist shoud be just that ; your therapist. He should not be your friend or your husbands friend. I am not suprised that you have problems discussing intimacy with him. He is the wrong person to be your therapist! I'm not suggesting that he's not trust worthy, or aware of his obligations regarding patient confidentiality....... but he is friends with your husband! Of course you can't talk to him about your past sexual abuse.

If you ever want to move forward with regards to your previous sexual abuse, you will either need to find a way to do it on your own, or find another therapist. I would whole heartedly recommend the latter. I am rarely this adament about my advice, but I truely believe you cannot move on from this while your Husband is drinking buddies with your Therapist.

 

[WonderingWhy]

I agree with you CB. However I think she is in a tough spot being that there are so few therapists available. I give her credit for going as far as she has in therapy. she really is in a difficult spot.

Small towns are nice, but in a situation like this it would be very difficult. As I said we have hundreds of therapists in my area.

 

[Lucycat]

I am working through one of the books ( The Survivors Guide to Sex by Staci Haines) and it is very enlightening. I am going through it step by step. At first I wanted to skip the bits I am uncomfortable with then realised,' hey what's the point. Its the difficult bits I need to tackle'.

One of the things I have really taken on board is that just like you have a pain threshold, you have a pleasure threshold too. I had never thought about that before but it makes perfect sense. If something feels nice I can't handle it, and space out. I have to work at increasing that level of tolerance slowly. I feel that now I understand it just a little better it gives me something concrete to work on.

I spent the weekend on a Christmas shopping spree in the BIg City with a really good friend, Laura. But as well as getting christmas pressies, I treated myself. Number one on my list was some nice new sexy underwear! I brought it home, showed my husband but just could not quite put it on. Not Yet. That feels so stupid, but it is there ready for when I feel ready to wear it.

Laura now knows what has been going on in my life. I have already put on here about the small world I live in. Laura was already my best friend, when I had to tell her she would be getting a professional call about me. She is the Child Protection Police Officer here so the police in the region the abuse occurred who contacted me, had to deal with her. Nightmare. However it took the decision from me as to whether I would want to tell her, and that made it easier. She has backed of professionally, and contacted her equivalent in the next town to be my Police contact. This was so Laura could support me as a friend and it has worked well.

Anyway, Laura knows that I am trying to heal sexually, and although it feels really strange I am taking the first tentative steps to talk to her about sex, just as is advised in the book. At the weekend she persuaded me that we should go into an Ann Summers shop. I have never been to such a place before, but it was nowhere near as scary as I thought. We had a bit of a giggle although we bought nothing. Maybe next time:oops:

 

[Bin]

Hi Brucielucy,

your father is in jail because of what he did, not because of what you said. Or, for that matter, did.

Your case is not dissimilar to my own, in that I was 'in denial' of my abuse for nearly 3 decades. The problem I have, however, is that the police have lost all trace of my complaint (10+) years ago, plus subsequent statements, and now I have to go through the whole damned thing again!! I am far from happy about this, as you can probably imagine.

Whichever way repressed memories burst upon the conscious mind, the effects are overwhelming and, it would seem, a complete mystery to outside observers - unless they, too, have experienced similarly. But I am delighted to read you are making great progress. Recovery is possible, but it is a long and difficult road to travel, and not a journey one can easily make alone. Hence, having a supporting husband is a huge bonus; your past may not, as you say, be 'what he signed up for' but sadly it is part of you and as you say, once the cat is out of the bag, there's no way of going back.

I honestly doubt you are 'letting him down': from what you describe, you are meeting this extraordinarily huge mountain head-on (which is the only way, assuming you have the mental and emotional strength to do so) and you will beat it in the end. Due to my particular circumstances at the time, I had to manage my own recovery, and have, finally, got there in somewhat difficult circumstances, so it can be done. The good news is that recovery is about regaining your 'true-self' whilst getting rid of the 'false-self' your trauma constructed. Regrettably, however, it is not possible to be the person you were pre-trauma given the cognitive and emotional impact of the trauma on the psyche, but you can gain mastery over it.

I, too, sometimes yearn for the days of denial because they were, in many respects, so much easier than having to face the reality of one's trauma and its appalling consequences. Discussing aspects of one's trauma is bound to be uncomfortable - after all, isn't that one of the things we [subconsciously] avoided for so long? No, discussing intimacy does not in my view make you anything but someone who was sexually corrupted and is trying to make sense of a very complex situation as best they can.

Keep up the good work!!

Bin.

 

[Lucycat]

Hi Bin,
thank you so much for your positive and kind comments.

I cannot believe what you must be going through - 10 years down the line and the police have lost the paperwork. What a nightmare. For me the legal process took just short of a year and that felt like a lifetime. It took a further 2 months for them to find and return my birth dertificate which they managed to lose, but at least I have it back now, Not that I particularly want it, but it is such an important document!!

I have only just spotted that you are a fella. I know I am being inordinately sexist, but I would not have expected such sensitive and understanding comments from a man. Yes, my husband and therapist are both men, but you have just shown me that there are other compassionate men out there, that I have not, and never will meet. It is strangely reassuring:-)

I appreciate that you have been through your own trauma and that will have helped shape you. It must be even harder for you as the world is a biased place. I am glad that you have 'finally got there' in your recovery and it gives me great hope.

best Wishes,
Lucy x

 

[Bin]

Thanks, Lucy, for your kind words.

Long ago I decided to use my past to try and help others in a similar situation - to the limited extent I can. My area of interest is research, particularly into CPTSD. To this end, I recently gained a degree in psychology and would like to gain a master's / phd but, sadly, it is a grossly underresearched area (in the UK) so finding a sponsor and funding is no easy task.

But I'm still trying....

 

[cherryblossom]

Keep trying Bin, never give up :D

 

[Lucycat]

I can imagine. Not until I was diagnosed myself with CPTSD did I have any interest in it. Well, why would you? Now I want to read everything I can on the subject. My T. has been very helpful. He has a special interest in Trauma and has lent me some of his text books which I have found fascinating.

But I guess it is not a hot topic and I can see your struggle with research funding. As CB has put - don't give up!!

 

[Lucycat]

Hmmm. With a sore face anything intimate has been out of the question! He just kissed me yesterday and I squealled as he touched my sore nose!

Never mind, plenty of time!

 

[Bin]

HI BL,

one consequence of childhood sexual abuse is a fixated, or arrested, psycho-sexual development. Thus, you don't develop a 'normal' sexual interest. Rather, you remain asexual. This was certainly true in my case - I couldn't understand 'what the fuss was all about' among my peer group during adolescence: I just didn't get it at all. I do now, but alas a little late in life!

Another consequence of this, of course, is that it increased my isolation from my peers as they grew and developed whilst I remained a child in so many ways, and therefore less and less able to identify or interact with them. Sad days.

 

[Lucycat]

Hi Bin,

What you have put above makes so much sense to me. I always thought it odd that my peers were experimenting at a time when I couldn't see what the point was. My first 'normal' sexual experiences were such a disappointment that I didn't bother trying it again for quite some time. I had never connected that with the trauma I went through.

My T. describes me now as a 'born again virgin'. In some ways I can relate to the idea of that, but at the same time I don't actually know what it feels like to be a virgin. My abuser did not take my virginity, but I later 'gave it away' - and that is how little it meant to me. It is a strange concept.

I too felt quite isolated from my peers. Interesting that you say you remained a child. I was reading this week of 'adult children'. Not a term I had heard of before but could immediately relate to, and explained so many of my behaviours, and it must be said, misbehaviour.

My Husband is very understanding through all of this. It helps that he is a psychiatric nurse, but I am by no means his field of expertise. He realises that I am going through a huge process of change, and recently said before I get to adult I must live an adolescence. He was able to laugh when I asked if this meant he expected me to go and sleep with every man in town! :oops::no:

 

[Bin]

You are so right about having to live through adolescence - I feel the same way and sometimes act like one!! We have so much in common regarding the aetiology of our PTSD. The first time I reenacted as an adult (did nothing throughout school - ironically) I was raped, but it did nothing to deter me from putting myself through the whole miserable process time and time again. Happily, those days are now long gone, but of course each time I succumbed, I was negatively reinforcing the original trauma. The answers I was so desperately seeking (i.e resolution) continued to evade me. Sad, isn't it?