Larry - I've not spoken with you before but know all too well what you're dealing with. Maybe it will help if I can share my perspective on these compulsions. I understand them to be something that comes up in association with something that is bothering us. For me it's being left alone at home or traveling between home and someplace far from home where I know I will be away for the night. This brings on a great deal of anxiety for me because much of the abuse I endured happened when I was alone (except for the perp) or when I was living away at school as a boy. So there is a correlation to what happened to us when we were young and to how we react to things now. It also seems to me that we have a compulsion to sort of recreate the abuse, not so much to abuse ourselves but in order to find ourselves in similar situations that we initiate thereby giving us some sense of control over the situation. But it never works, we are not in control of the situation, and for me, I go right back to the psyche of the 9 year old who was raped. But that doesn't stop the compulsions from coming. I suggest that you ask your therapist not to admonish you for not being stronger. I also suggest that you stop admonishing yourself for something that you can't control, by that I mean the compulsions, we can't stop them from coming. Maybe you and your therapist can create some tools that will help you to control how you deal with the compulsions. Try to figure out what triggers them and work from there. In the meantime, masturbation, regardless of the fantasies that accompany it, is a good, harmless way to ease the urge to put yourself in a risky situation. I wish you peace and hope this has offered some help. The shame is not yours.
