colliding views

colliding views
C

Cement

Registrant
I am struggling, suppressing feelings about sex and women and horniness. The area is so gray for me; there arent clear boundaries between what is appropriate and not. Nothing is really out of bounds. Some things should be out of bound, shouldnt they? Nothing really is for me. It might not be my cup of tea, but unless it hurts or smells real bad, any sexual desire expressed between consenting adults doesnt intrinsically offend me.

This makes for some very uncomfortable moments, because my wife finds a lot of sexual stuff disgusting. She even said last night she thinks that she is starting to hate sex. Then she absolutely harangued me about pornography and the idea of other people being involved in sex (a reference to our early courtship fantasy talk about a mnage a trios). I find sexual stimulus in fantasy and images of naked women, yet I am trying to keep my sexual activity strictly limited to my wife, including looking and getting turned on. But my wife isnt interested in sex, and berates the idea of some things that I find arousing (as fantasy). I am kinda stuck. This is the kind of Good Boy repression that can lead to acting out. So I am scared. I have to hide my true feelings from my wife because she will get upset with them, but in order to survive I have to purge these feelings by expressing them, even just in words. And I have the self consciousness that she is watching me. Hidden feelings plus guilt and shame equals depression, at best.
 
Your wife sounds like she has some problems with sex. No matter how enlightened most of us are, we still are left with the residual conditioning of a sexually repressive society. It is not wrong, it is not bad, and there is nothing to be ashamed of. To feel desire is a natural part of a relationship, you should not feel the need to repress your desire. It is not fair that you feel you must repress your own sexuality to accomidate your wife. Start talking about it, dont let it sit still and grow into an even bigger problem.
 
Dear Cement,

I don't agree with Broken's sentiments. It is good that you realize you have some boundary issues re sex. If you are not already, I suggest you find a good therapist to work on this stuff.

Having said that, I offer the following:

Guys who have been sexually abused frequently have difficulty with hyperarousal...sort of free-range libido. They can make anything sexual.

Relationships are built on mutual respect, not mutual exploitation. If you're expecting your wife to fulfill your fantasies, and she's feeling used, you're doing to her what was done to you. You're not loving her. Why would she want to be sexual with you if it's all about you? What about her? She wants to be held, loved, validated, appreciated, made to feel safe. You're offering sexual gymnastics. This is not to say that sex shouldn't be fun, spontaneous, etc., but primarily I believe it's for the bonding of a relationship. It may be that I come across as somewhat high-minded when I say this, but really, it's rather pre-adolescent for us to expect that our appetites (whatever they may be) should be satisfied because we want, when we want, neverminding if the other doesn't want.

Self-command doesn't always mean sexual repression. It can mean focusing (from the Latin root for "fire") the sexual energy into something bigger than the fast food release many of us have become accustomed to.

You acknowledge that you have boundary concerns with this. What are you reenacting in your fantasies? Are you seeking to control or otherwise undo what you have previously experienced?

These issues are yours, don't make them your wife's by intimating that they're your right to fulfill. You're on a slippery slop, my friend, because the fulfillment of one fantasy, or even the escalation of it, has the same dissociative effects as other addictions. You're living in two worlds (or too many worlds), and you need to be about the business of integrating them into
One.

I encourage you to dig deep into what and who you are. Are your fantasies in charge of you, or are you, if not in charge of them, at least listening to them?

Having written all this, I can say that it's a tall order; it's not easy. I have been there, and unfortunately realize I could be there again in short order.

It takes a lot of courage to put your past in front of you and to stare at it. Try to make connections between what you want to enact and what you experienced in the past.

Respect you wife and the relationship. Your boundary stuff is taxing them both to the limit. Part of being a man, and what we didn't learn (because we were abused and our boundaries were violated)is to establish boundaries.

Again, I hope you are addressing these things with a qualified therapist.

JM
 
Thanks for the concern - my wife and I are each in individual therapy and in conjoint therapy.

We are talking, and that is good, but we come from two very divergent points of view, held together by our love for one another, yet constantly afraid the other will leave, or worse, betray.

So, I was sexualized incorrectly, to use the most innocuous term I can (in order to discuss the results as clinically as possible). I am, therefore, hypersexual, able to sexualize almost anything. My lust for pornography, strippers and prostitutes hasn't meshed well with my held philosophy of female empowerment. So, the difficult part for me is...

I would like to be able to put some space between me and this learned sexuality of humiliation and degradation, but it feels almost like an instinct. I need to relearn to abc's of sex, and I have, to some extent. I am VERY fond of cuddling and being held. Nevertheless, even though I have quit smoking, I still crave a cigarette sometimes. And smoking is NOTHING compared to this urge.

I don't know that the urge will ever go away. And even if I never act on it, I feel that I am betraying my wife unless I get rid of it.
 
oh, I have to give this PS.

I have been free and "clean" of porn, srippers, prostitutes and acting-out for more then four months now, excepting a near miss from last week, documented on this board. Even internal fantasy has slowed to nearly nothing. But the desire lingers.

James Michael, I just reread your post and I realize there may be some issues that I paint with broad strokes. The struggles my wife and I have are philosophical, not practical. Guilt is poison to passion and the guilt I already have (about these horrible THOUGHTS and wants I feel I shouldn't have) mix with my wife's now-stated view that anyone with such desires is a pervert. I end up feeling kinda shitty.
 
Betrayal does not occur in the mind, it is the result of an action. As long as you do not betray your wife by acting in violation of whatever agreements you have regarding sex, you are still in possesion of your integrity. Lots of people have desires like yours, most of whom were probably never abused. I think its great that you are being so honest and forthright in talking about what is really going on in your head. I also thing its great that you have maintained four months of sexual "sobriety" in not acting out. You are still in the early phase of your sexual recovery and these feelings you are having are perfectly normal. In fact, it would be weird if, given your history, you weren't having thoughts and feelings like this. The important thing is to keep talking about it. I quit using speed one year ago this week, and I struggled a lot with cravings during the first six months, especially right around the six month point. Things have gotten a lot easier, but there are still times when I just want it. That will probably always be the case. As long as you don't act out, there is no betyral. So give yourself some credit! Take care.
 
I am very grateful to all you guys, especially Roy and Wuame.

I am struggling, and the struggle isn't located where I might expect it.

Get past acting out, and Philosophy awaits me, a bat in its hand. "Defeat me and you will face Boredom's smothering cloak. You will submit, you will give in to the anguish, whether by misstep, misfortune or simple failure."

There is no place to hide. I always hid so well - I could mesmerize myself, hypnotized, sedated and quiet. Everything is so raw...it is right here, and I don't like feeling it. Right now i prefer when I couldn't feel. At least it didn't hurt.
 
Sorry to hear you are hurting so badly. We've all been there, and will be again. Remember that all feelings are temporary and life will get better. That may sound trite, but I know that I need to be reminded of that sometimes when I am suffering. So now its my turn to remind you. :)
 
Wuame
my "doc" is the same one as yours, he gets around ! But he's getting old and tired and his medicine's past its sell by date. He's losing his grip.
Someday soon he'll retire, hopefully to somewhere far away.

Lloydy
 
I've been continuing to struggle with my sexual dysfunctions and perverse fantasies and desires. I've found the following passages helpful:

"But as a result of working through his fantasies in analysis and experiencing his early relationship with his father and mother, these fears disappeared along with his other symptoms, and he could begin to develop in a free and healthy way." Alice Miller, For Your Own Good, p202

"He was acting out here the deep humiliation, intimidation, destruction of dignity, loss of power and torment of the little boy he once was."
Alice Miller, For Your Own Good, 223-4

She goes on to say how filled with shame about himself the person is. And this quote from Victims No Longer, by Mike Lew:

"If you get at the root of a problem, the symptoms tend to lessen and disappear.... It doesn't happen magically or overnight, but as they move through their shame, as they continue to rebuild trust and self-esteem, and as they continue to forge healthy friendships and intimacies, their sexual problems begin to diminish." p60

From my earlier studies of my perverted sexual fantasies, I had tried to analyse the fantasies themselves to see what feelings were being expressed in them. For this, I found [Private Thoughts] by Wendy Maltz helpful. I have so far discovered, basically, that I am aroused by hurting people, by causing them pain, to hurt, cry, whatever, and also by anonymous dirty sex, such as with a hooker or a one-night stand in a nightclub. For one thing, in both cases, there are no intimate feelings involved: I don't love them and I'm not concerned with whether they love me. Actually, I'm very concerned with whether they love me, that's why it has to be anonymous so I'd never see them again, anyway, or someone I somehow have control over or guaranteed affection from. Somebody who even if I hurt them or disappoint them or do something that is embarassing for me, I can trust that they will love me, nevertheless. Why am I aroused by hurting people or in anonymous situations?

I think the quotes above have helped me start to get to the roots of these feelings. I'm thinking that wanting to hurt somebody is an expression of anger/hatred/contempt/cruelty, which I have for one of two reasons, or both: when my father was humiliating me and also when I was being sexually abused, it caused me to hate them but I repressed it because I was afraid of them, and now I take it out in fantasy on weaker people whom I don't fear; and/or, when these things were happening and I was being humiliated, I also felt inferior (and ashamed) and I wanted to be like the people who were doing this to me, big and strong and better, as it seemed to me at the time. Either way, this sadism/cruelty/perversion/sickness/anger/hatred/contempt is within me, somehow, from somewhere.

For me it is still a struggle to accept myself as this way, or even if I get over all this, I will always have been this way for years. I am ashamed and horrified by being this way. I suppose two things are helping me become more accepting of myself as the monster that I sometimes feel myself to be. First, just feeling ashamed and horrified over and over again, like any other feeling, consciously, and they start to abate. And second, I need to make the connection between the abuse and the perversion more specific and more directly connected in my mind, ie, I need to keep asking myself, Am I just a sick fuck? or is this the sick contamination of some sick things that were done to me? I guess I really need to believe the second, but even thinking about this is hard.

If what the quotes above say is true, then in order to deal with my fantasies, I have to access my feelings of shame, humiliation, pain, fear, inferiority, low self-esteem, violation/betrayal, nakedness, disgust, self-contempt/hatred and the memories of the childhood trauma that caused these feelings. Sexual recovery, then, would be just like any other part of emotional recovery. One thing that seems to support the case that these emotions are the underlying causes of my sexual problems and my perverse fantasies, is that I definitely feel all of these bad feelings very strongly, in fact, they are most of what I feel. I am very ashamed of myself, feel inferior to the human race, and have very low self-esteem. I am also very contemptuous of others. And I have very little emotional intimacy or trust and I am afraid of rejection. So that connection is somewhat plausible.

I noticed something about my fantasies the other day while masturbating. If I masturbated about somebody whom I considered very sexy but above me, I couldn't get aroused. I felt so inferior to her that I couldn't even think or feel about sex towards her. I know at a deep emotional level that she wouldn't be interested in me and I would be so afraid of fucking things up and being humiliated by her laughing at me, rejecting me and abandoning me, that I couldn't even try to fantasize about her. Then I thought about somebody whose not as sexy, but who I know could become emotionally dependent on me, ie, she could my victim, I could hurt her and she wouldn't reject me, and I feel superior to her. And then I got aroused by the thought of doing all these bad things to her. This is my perversion. I am ashamed and sickened by it, but I've got to face it to cure it. As usual, so people don't get the wrong idea, I feel obligated to mention that I've never hurt anybody. In fact, when I'm actually with somebody, I'm so self-conconscious about my body and my performance, so afraid of rejection and anxious about what they think of me, I feel so disgusting and inferior, that I often become a sexual servant. I think that is the connection: the same feelings that make me an innocent almost asexual servant in real life also underly the feelings that make me a monster in my fantasies. The solution, as I now see it, is to work out my pain, low self-esteem, shame, etc, and be healthier and develop and express and act freely in both situations. Another possible wrong turn here is to try to avoid fantasies entirely. I've been lead down that path by the horror of my fantasies, but I occasionally remember that what I really want is not no fantasies, by exciting loving sexy fantasies.

I guess, right now, at the end of the day, I believe in the correctness of this approach enough to keep at it, but my insecurity makes me continuously doubt whether I'm doing the right/best thing and whether it will work.

Ryan
 
Ryan:

It sounds as tho you are getting to know your problems and their roots very well. Most importantly you are getting to know yourself: how to heal yourself, how to be yourself. Of course you're insecure, but you are on the right track and I know you'll keep at it, especially with that kind of good reading, and good support like here. Way to go!

Wuame
 
Ryan
I've written often about my own battle with the fantasies that were so at odds with the person I wanted to be, although for a long time I didn't see it like that.
Mine eased off real slow, they still appear make no mistake about that, but they have lost there power. Masturbation now is just a hard physical effort. And it's got to the stage for me where what you describe as the "uanatainable supergirl fantasy" not working for you - now the stranger + blow job fantasy no longer works for me.
Unfortunately neither does anything else, although I'm to scared to indulge other fantasies incase they take on the life and power that the old ones did. And likewise with porn, I just daren't.
I don't need to either, I'm married to a very sexual woman, but I also lack the ..... whatever it is.. to initiate sex. Although I am getting a bit better very slowly.

So I guess I've just about become asexual in the effort to get rid of the fantasies and the acting out that went with them - not to mention all the guilt and shit. Is it too high a price ?
No, I have my sanity and my wife and I are working out ways of getting me over my problems.

I hate the fantasies and their all conquering pervasivness, I had a bad day on Tuesday - the first for months - and it wrecked me.
I can live without that.

We can all live without that shit.

Lloydy
 
what a thread! This has probably been the toughest one for me to read. Cement, your honesty and effort is so comendable, it's awesome. I wish I had that strength. Working on it. Wife and kid are out of town tonight and I sat down at the computer with a (not so) subconsious intention of surfing porn all night. Then I came here instead (thanks for being here) - and found this. I had to drag myself through the posts. I am so stricken with lifelong sexual dysfunction and a compulsive attachment to porn. There is so much wisdom and inspiration in your words. I only hope, as RecoveringRyan put so well, that by accepting my feelings, the dysfunction dissipates. No sign yet, but it's early days for me. I really can't imagine ever being sexually functional or confident. But I forge ahead. And I'm so encouraged by the work going on here.
Thanks again to all you guys.
-Al
 
I can relate to what all of you are expressing. I've been married for 10 years, but I've kept my steady girlfriend of 28 years. My wife could sense it and always had a fear that I would leave her. I finally confessed & explained that my girlfriend was actually my right hand.
Giving up my girlfriend was really hard.

I stopped initiating sex several years ago. If we had sex it was because my wife wanted it. She had begun to hate it and it had become painful. All of that has changed.

When I learned of my abuse(4 weeks ago) I told my wife. Over the next week I told her the details and everything about me connected to my abuse.
My wife has been very understanding. Being honest with her has broken down all of the walls between us. We have grown closer in the last month than in the previous 10 years.

Getting back to my girlfriend, I wanted to give her up and focus all of my sexual energy on my wife. Bless her. Except for 4 nights, we've done it every night or day for 4 weeks. I'm almost over my girlfriend--I've visited once in 4 weeks. I tell my wife when I'm in need, and we talk about it, and the thought of being with her gets me through the crisis.
It may never be perfect, but it is so much better, and just keeps getting better.
I still have a couple of issues to work through. Genital numbness is the worse. Combine that with a little Prozac, and I'm in for a long, hard evening(the crude pun is for Roy).
Communication and honesty have been the keys to getting through this.
The support and encouragement from you guys has been wonderful--I couldn't have done it alone.
 
This gets deeper and better, you guys are describing just what I feel as well, and New To This - you seem to have made that great leap to actuslly asking or initiating sex with your wife.
I still can't get that bit, I was made to ask for sex with my abusers so I guess I still equate it that way. Even though I realise this it's still the major problem for me. Why can't I, after 28 years of marriage, just get on with it and make the first move ??
Boy, that pisses me off .......

I'm going to try Wuamei's trick and flush this shit. Or perhaps I should do what most of my school reports said - "Could do better if he tried"

Here's to dumping the fantasies and porn ;)

Lloydy
 
you were not very clear on your thoughts towards what you were doing. I misunderstood. If you are obsessing about something, then its not healthy, but sexual desire is a natural thing. All i was saying was that suppressing your sexuality will not help your relationship any.
 
God I need this thread of posts.

Lloydy,

As you know, I have the same problem with not being able to initiate sex. I think for me the problem is that I feel guilty wanting anything, including sex, and I feel ashamed and disgusting in addition, when I would want sex, so I just can't conceive and feel the desire, and I'm so afraid of rejection, ridicule, and abandonment that I can't ask. That's my problem and I had thought it might be yours, too. But then I read your later post about having been made to ask for sex by your abusers and it rang a bell with me. I cannot ask for anything. I can't even tell my grandmother what food I would like when she wants to make me a dinner. I simply can't express my will and desire to/on another person. I think this is because I was so humiliated by my father as a child, when he yelled and laughed at me or punished me for everything I wanted or everything I wanted to do. There is just too much pain and humiliation already inside me from asking for things, that I cannot risk it now. It seems the solution to this is to admit the pain and humiliation and feel it, and eventually not be so afraid of it again in the future, so that I'll be able to risk asking for things and even be able to bear the pain of refusal without dreading it so much that I'm unable to do it. Maybe these thoughts will help you, I don't know, 'cause it's hard to guess what feelings are repressed in somebody else's or even my own unconscious.

I'm definitely as asexual as I can make myself be.

New To This touched (pun intended) on something that I've noticed is a big part of my sexual problems: genital numbness. It is so shaming for me, to admit this and to talk about this. But I have very little sensation in the places where I was touched by my perpetrator, which includes all of my genital areas. I didn't realize this until I did an exercise suggested by Wendy Maltz in the Sexual Healing Journey, which is basically just touching yourself and seeing how it feels and how little or much you feel. So I laid back and touched my penis and I noticed that I didn't really feel that much from just caressing it. I really was quite numb as far as physical sensation goes. I think this contributes to my masturbation/fantasy problem as well as to my occasional sexual dysfunction of not being able to have an orgasm: I can't feel that much through my penis. So, when this is happening, I am less stimulated by sex and have more difficulty having an orgasm, and I need more extreme fantasies to arouse me. Another way of putting it is that while masturbating, much less of the stimulation comes from physical sensation and therefore much more has to come from imaginary fantasy, so these have to be ever more intense. I was surprised how much sensation I was able to feel in my penis after just caressing it gently for a while and focusing on my numbness. I can imagine that this much better level of sensation would make sex that much butter. Also, I remember I was with a girl for a while who had been sexually abused. I eventually figured out that if I massaged her body for a while before sex she would get more aroused. I used to think it was only that she needed more than the usual amount of foreplay, but I've since begun to wonder whether she was numb, too, and would only feel and trust to feel after a comparatively long while of gentle caressing.

The whole touching myself sexual exercise thing seemed kind of corny to me and I was afraid and ashamed to try it. But it worked, I've got to admit. My fear and shame still prevent me from doing it that often though. The image of me lying there in bed alone just touching myself, but not really masturbating, in order to recover sensation in my numb body--well, you can see how ashamed I am.

Ryan
 
Ryan
we're on the same wavelength here my man.

I too am afraid to ask for anything, and always end any request with a garbled "I'm sorry, I don't want to be a nuisance" etc etc....
I apologise for everything and ask for virtually nothing. If I'm short of loose change in the morning and need a smoke I dread having to ask my wife, and end up doing a grovelling act.
She doesn't stop me having the change if I need or anything like that, I just have a problem asking.

the sexual numbness sounds a bit interesting, perhaps we've beaten them sensless ??
But what's the score with that ? I'd like to know a bit more about it.
And don't feel ashamed of doing something to help yourself. ( just don't get caught ;) )
If it works, it's right Ryan. Let me know more please.

Lloydy
 
I re-read this string and realized how screwed up our thoughts about sex became because of our abuse.

Breaking out of my old habits has been really difficult.

I though it might be helpful if I summed up the last month.

I went to a psychiatrist for an evaluation. He really pissed me off because he spent an hour talking about me being sexually repressed. About 30 hours later I remembered the circumstances of my abuse. Four days later, under hypnosis, I remembered the details.

I told my wife when I remembered that I had been abused. When I remembered what happened, I told her the details.

Then came the hard part, telling her all of the things that I had done because of the abuse.
She knew that I had been looking at porn on the net. She thought that I was looking at other women. I had let her think that because it was easier than telling her I was looking at men.
Learning of my abuse let me put my attraction to men in perspective: my first sexual experience was with another boy(even though he forced me, it was still fun). I didn't want to be gay, I was just re-living that first experience--trying to understand perhaps. I flushed that shit.

The hardest thing was telling her that I had acted out a as teenager. I had several encounters of my own choosing just like my abuse.

After telling her all of this, it was really easy to tell her how much I needed her, but I had to flush a lot of shit first.

The secrets I was keeping were a real barrier to being intimate. Being honest about myself and my past allowed me to be honest about my current needs also. I would recommend some honesty. Lets face it, if you're married, how suprised could your wife be at this point. They know or sense more than we give them credit for, but they also know better than to ask.

I'm dealing with the numbness with her help. We've made a game out her making me shiver. She's even learned a new trick(something I would not let her do before). I'm having to retrain myself to feel. The numbness was so bad that I could not relate to a guy doubling over in pain after getting hit in the crotch--I was that numb.

I made some connections between my abuse and my sex life. I was really turned off by French kissing. My wife did that once and I asked her not to do it again. When I remembered my abuse it made sense: it felt about like a limp penis getting hard in my mouth. When I made the connection, I got over it. Now I enjoy those deep probing kisses.

I never talked during sex. That's an easy one to explain--its hard to talk with a dick in your mouth.

About the porn: I could spend hours on the net. I didn't know what I was looking for--I was just looking. As soon as a picture loaded, I clicked on another. I think I shut down a couple of free sites. Now I think that I was looking for my perp, trying to make myself remember my abuse.

So far, every problem has had an explaination.

I don't mean to keep bragging about how much I'm getting, its just that in 10 years we never did it this often. Not counting today (yet) we've done it 25 out of the last 28 days.

A month ago I was no different than you guys in my sexual life. So guys, quit taking matters into your own hands, try some honesty, flush a load of shit and go for it.

Devon
 
fellow men:

wow, this post and the replies are fantastic! they really hit home for me and make me think hard about myself and my reliance on porn and masturbation.

wow, i feel a bit overwhelmed by it all! i am reading and writing in a public forum so i am somewhat uneasy. i do not want a child peering over my shoulder and reading any of this. but, i know i truly need to read this.

please keep this line of sharing up men. i truly need it for one. i need to go guys but i will return asap to hopefully read and share more. thanks so much

bec
 
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