Being OK with being a sexual being

Being OK with being a sexual being

LoneWolfX

Registrant
TRIGGER WARNING!

This relates strongly to my post in the Sexual Identity
Forum here

It feels as if I am a little unusual in my feelings in regard to being a sexual being. I mean I get the impression (it may well be confirmation bias?) that the majority of guys here went on to have normal relationships. I am not suggesting, however, this was not very very hard and there were huge issues and obstacles to overcome. And a lot of guys get married and have kids.

In contrast I shy away from relationships and intimacy. I guess they sort of terrify me. My abuser got satisfaction through what he did to me and that was a turning point in my life. So I must admit I do have sexual desires and act on them in the form of masturbation. But I don't feel good about it. The fact that it is pleasurable and ends in ejaculation disgusts me. My mind says that I am just as disgusting as my abuser - my body works just like his. I think the worst part is ejaculation - it makes me feel extremely dirty. As far as I recall the abuse started with me seeing him ejaculate in the pool (it was on purpose not accidental). So ejaculation has a strong association with the abuse. Like the squirting when he made me do oral on him or drinking his semen out of a glass tumbler. My mind also tells me that women also see ejaculation as disgusting. I dunno if they do and just tolerate it or it is just in my mind.

I know that sex can be used for good or bad but I can't get past the bad.
 
Hi LoneWolf

While I would agree that lot of guys here do go on to good relationships. (I won't say normal I hear them struggle). I have never had a healthy sex life and finally stopped trying 20 some years ago. I always faked having a good time and ejaculation with women while not knowing why and freezing during sex with males. This says to me that the abuse took the pleasure away. Flashback during and after to horrible times and places. I am one like you that has mot had a safe sexual relations. I had a period of time I was hyper sexualized for many years felt like I was just as bad as my abusers. I always felt like a piece of garbage sneaking off to find sex and feeling even worse after

While things are a little different in our reactions to sex you are not alone here my friend. I have give up on having sex until I feel I am healthy enough to go there as it just hurts to much. An activity that most enjoy and never get filthy feelings afterwards.

Take Care
Esterio
 
I have little to no contact wiry others in a sexual way more cause I feel I just want to be alone. I have accepted that it is from my past which made me be this person who wants to be invisible. I struggle with this love hate feeling towards my parents cause of the past. My outlet is masturbation which is something I feel shame over afterwards. I regret memories that come in to play I hate myself over it. I know I am not alone but I feel like I am the only one.
 
@smc1972, just being able to talk about it here is going to loosen those shackles a little bit. I think all of us here understand those feelings of shame and regret, and even that feeling of being alone. But you're not alone here.
 
Just this morning I pondered the possibility that I don’t WANT to be intimate. I have been functioning under the impression that I couldn’t. Fine line, the cause is the same.
Sorry, that’s not helpful. Just chiming in that you are not alone.
I can’t imagine being naked and vulnerable, ever
 
That title and the posts are completely opposite - own up to the title - we ARE sexual beings. We were created to not only procreate (make babies) but to enjoy sex. It was meant to be a way of merging 2 souls to become 1. Unfortunately, that experience was skewed for most of us due to the abuse.

There should be no shame in how our bodies were created. These are natural, biological functions. I think there is also a lot of "transference" of the guilt and shame that should be projected onto the abusers, but instead, we place it on ourselves, where it DOES NOT belong.
 
Strange I have lived life on both ends of the spectrum. When younger and feel safe I enjoyed relationships and sex. As I began to feel alone, abandoned and unsafe the thought of intimacy scared me. Some how in the latter stage I saw him everywhere, I felt him when attempting intimacy. I would have syncope and dissociative episodes. It all became so overwhelming to me. I did not know my emotions, I did not feel safe with me. Why was his imprint appearing later in life, why was the experiences with the abuser my benchmark because it was no who I was or am. He grasped and took over and my sexual being was not me any longer. As I healed and found love and safety I returned to the days of enjoying sex, finding it fulfilling. He was no longer in the room, I did not feel his touch or breath. I could not change what he did to me and had me do to him, I could only accept it happened. I realized their was no joy or fulfillment in the acts he taught me to do, nor what these acts my sexual being. I was freeing myself from that imprint that would take hold of my mind. It had caused destruction in many ways in my life. Today I rebuild and am the sexual being I was meant to be. I wonder how she ever had the patience to make me feel safe.

Kevin
 
Kevin, she knew you were worthy to be loved, and did not mind helping you reach that realization. Mine did too!
 
Hey there LoneWolf, I’m sorry you feel that way. I agree with what NC Survivor said, sex is both normal and built into our DNA, instinctual. I wonder how our species developed so many biases and stigmas about somethjng so basic?

Maybe because I was so young when my father molested me - 3, 4, maybe 5, and it was only a handful of times, I don’t have the same fear or aversion so many here have about sex. I don’t equate sex with what I experienced- I only remember it as violent and painful and terrifying - I think my memories, feelings and the effects of those events would have been the same if he had attacked and hurt me with a hammer or a lead pipe or piece of 2 x 4.

I think I’m lucky that way, because I like sex. My problems with relationships - more lack of them really - is about my self-image, body image, lack of self confidence. He did that to me all along, and it got much worse after testicular torsion surgery at 12 and his perversions inflicted on me after. But even that didn’t make me hate sex, especially as a theoretical concept - it just makes me - still - feel just completely unworthy of any woman’s interest.

Believe me, I wish I could fix my problems and be the man I would like to be. I’ve just never found a way to do that in practice, even the things which in theory look easy. I stuggle, maybe make some progress, and then collapse in a heap of negativity, depression, shame, guilt and fear - and then just regress.

I know a lot of people say they are happy being celibate or being asexual, and if that works for them, great. That’s not how I was designed I guess, and, while I’ve always mocked and denigrated my own masculinity - one testicle, the body definitely not of my dreams, about 1/100th of the courage I would like, and no real “man card” to play any of the time - I’m mostly unashamed of the fact that I masturbate pretty regularly - I think it’s both physically and psychologically healthy. The only shame I feel in it is the kind of cultural baggage any of us over 50 probably have.

It wasn’t ever spoken about when I was growing up except as the butt of a joke on tv or movies - even then it was all euphamisms and/or implicit. Even in what passed for “sex ed” in 6th grade in school - one day when they separated boys into one classroom, girls into another, and explained the biology and anatomy of human sexuality - fortunately, one 6th teacher was a man - I don’t remember anything being said about masturbation or birth control or relationships or even STD’s - that was the mid-1970s, so pre-AIDS. I know no one in my life like a doctor or male teacher ever asked about it or talked about it, good or bad. I think I learned the actual word masturbation from a weird place - the Dear Abby column in the newspapers, because she - an older Jewish woman in the 1970s and 1980s, would somtimes respond to readers letters about it, and she actually published a booklet about sexuality for teens. Even before Dr. Ruth came along, I think. In 9th grade gym, a couple of boys joked or teased about “choking the chicken” and I knew what they meant anyway by that time, 14 going on 15.
 
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