the hardest things: sadistic fantasies/arousal, sexual dysfunction

the hardest things: sadistic fantasies/arousal, sexual dysfunction
R

RecoveringRyan

Registrant
I am a new registrant and I am grateful that I have found this board. Reading through some of the postings has been difficult but validating.

I have been needing for some time to express some of the more difficult parts of my recovery in a safe setting where I would not be ridiculed or misunderstood.

I have 2 extremely difficult problems that I can barely focus my mind on or admit, and acceptance without shame and full conscious integration are remote.

The first is sexual disfunction. Although I've had sex successfully many times, I've also had every type of dysfunction--secondary impotence, premature ejaculation and ejaculatory incompetence--at one time or another, and in one situation or another. I'm also sexually passive: I can't initiate sex, although I can hint around about it and work the situation towards it, but I can't actually start the sexual act. I think part of the reason why this has been so difficult for me is because of the humiliations that I suffered at the hands of a couple of different women during one-night stands or brief encounters: "What's the matter? Can't get it up?" And, "Oh, no wonder. I know why..." And having no ability to feel humiliated consciously so that it eventually goes away, but instead deny and forget it.

Second, I am most aroused either in masturbational fantasies or in person by sadistic acts. I've never humiliated anyone, but humiliating them is what would most excite me, and instead I've had less arousing sex.

Does anybody have any experience or insights with these problems?

Does anybody know of any books, articles, or postings (I used the search function on this site but didn't seem to find anything) that contain first-hand accounts of people having these problems and recovering from them?

The best resources I have found to date are [Private Thoughts] and _The Sexual Healing Journey_ by Wendy Maltz, and _Human Sexual Inadequacy_ by Masters and Johnson.

I know that going to a therapist would be a good thing to do, but I'm not ready to talk about this in person yet, so if anybody could help me through this forum I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks so much,
Ryan
 
Welcome Ryan. This is a good place to talk and begin to feel comfortable airing your pain. The good news is that you are not at all alone with your dysfunction. I have been plagued by it my whole sexual life. I was abused at 13, and my first consensual sexual encounter, at 15, ended in a humiliating lack of ability. Since then there's been some success, a fair amount actually. And as many if not more awful experiences where nothing happened. And sex, no matter what, is always an anxious experience for me. I NEVER instigate. Not even after ten years with my wife. Pathetic huh? The bad news is that I have found no magic cure for this. Though Viagra does help.

I began therapy for the first time only six months ago and it's made a great difference. I really don't think this journey can be made alone. Talking about it was not only easier than I feared, but a relief beyond my dreams. I highly reccommend it. In the meantime, hopefully you can take some solace in the knowledge that you are truly not alone. And you have friends here.
 
ARW,

Thanks for your reply. It is extremely helpful to read your postings, because I have been isolated in shame with this problem for 2 years now, consciously, and for many years before that unconsciously.

I do not think you are pathetic, although I certainly understand the feeling. I think part of the problem that I have initiating is because it's difficult and unnatural for me to feel desire and do it, in general, and with sex. I am dependent on routines, rules, what's right, and in my soul I don't really fully experience desire, and if I do, I feel way too selfish and evil acting it out.

It's really hard for me to believe that being sexually abused and my abusive and strict parents really could be the cause for my sexual problems. I secretly think that I'm trying to get out of accepting that I'm the problem, that there's just something wrong with me.

Admitting this has been extremely difficult, as well, because, for me, it cuts to the core of my being a man and a human being. I just feel lesser than everybody else, not good enough. Am I as much of a man? As much of a human being? Rhetorical questions, I know, but THE SHAME!! I am reminded of Marlon Brando saying "The horror!" at the end of Apocalypse Now, only with me it's also "The shame!"

Also, I fear the contemptous look and reaction from my sexual partner the next time it happens. Now, it's "The horror!" Dread. I am so humiliated and I have such a hard time dealing with it, by feeling it consciously without denying it.

Another complexity in my own sexual history is that I once dated a woman who had vaginismus (I think that's what it's called), anyway, she froze up whenever she got close to having sex. She would really want to, but her vagina wouldn't open. She was very frustrated with this and asked me to help her open up by forcing my penis inside her. Not realizing the longterm emotional consequences for myself, I agreed to try. I tried several times and failed, and she got frustrated and criticized me. Eventually, I got it, and she supposedly has had a happier sex life since. But I can't get the dread of not being able to get it in there out of my mind, and the humiliation, again.

It is interesting because we both are able to have sex sometimes. Do you have any idea what the differences are between when you are able to and when not? I think (hope) for me they are things like guilt, anxiety, disgust and embarassment. They've happened in situations where I've felt guilty having sex. And I've felt anxious--does this person like me? will I be a good enough sexual partner? will my performance be good enough? will she like me afterward? is my penis big enough? is it hard enough? All of these anxieties are low self-esteem. Then comes my unconscious disgust: with my own body, with my own desire (especially when my sadistic tendencies are taken into consideration), with ejaculate, with vaginas, with vaginal fluid, with vaginal scent, with sexual motions, with the idea of sex. And I'm embarassed to take my clothes off. I don't like my body, it's shape, I'm never fit enough, my skin is too pale--I don't even like women whose skin is like my color.

Are you noticing any improvement from therapy, in addition to greater comfort with the subject?

Ryan
 
Hi Ryan,

Welcome to the site. Talking about this stuff here will probably help you a lot. It has sure helped me. So great to have a place like this to talk freely with other men about such problems. This seems like a good to again recommend a favorite book of mine. "Healing the Shame That Binds You" by John Bradshaw.

Sounds to me like you have really disowned your sexual identity. The sexual part of your "self". Also sounds like there is a lot of shame about sex in general, let alone about specifics like fantasies and performance. Recognizing it is the first step. Talking about it is the next step and that will help enormously. People have all kinds of various fantasies and I suspect yours are "normal" for you. And who's to say what's normal? What is normal for you may not be normal for the next person. The more you accept this part of yourself and let yourself indulge these fantasies while masturbating, the less power they will hold over you.

I think talking with a therapist about this stuff will help a lot, provided you find a therapist experienced in dealing with abuse survivors and a broad ranging, accepting, and most of all a non-judgemental attitude about sex. The more you are able to integrate your sexual nature into your life, the better you will feel.

I struggled a lot with many of the issues you mentioned at the end of your last post. It took some time (and practice, which started out awkwardly but got pretty fun!) and effort but I think I developed a very healthy attitude toward sex. Your feelings and anxieties about sex are very common among survivors and a normal response to sexual abuse. I assure you that this is the root cause of your sexual problems and that there is nothing "wrong" with you or who you are.

You have already undertaken one of the most difficult tasks of getting help; sharing it with others. You are reaching out for help and that's great! Keep talking to us here, find a good therapist, work on accepting yourself and the beautiful gift of sexuality and you will do just fine. I really believe that.

Roy
 
Ryan
I thought I was reading a post about my sex life, it was so uncanny.

I was abused by males, but I still have deep problems, even after 28 years of marriage to a sexy lady. Slowly I'm convincing her to initiate sex, but she feels a bit wary incase it triggers feelings of my abuse.
But I was also trained by my abusers to initiate sex with them. A good beating and rape by a gang of older boys made me do exactly what they wanted.

So sex has all kinds of mixed feelings for me still. I consider myself well recovered in a lot of ways, but this is the last big hurdle for me.
When we do have sex I use positions where we have very little body contact and I rarely kiss.
Like so many others I'm haunted by memories of my abuse when having sex, I turned them into fantasies to escape them. Always the same kind of thing with me in the "humiliated role" - giving another man oral sex.
They took over and I acted out.

The "cure" if you could call it that, for me was drastic. I just cut sex out of my life as much as I could.
The fantasies have faded a lot, although they still occur. But they no longer work as well now. Certainly not when having sex with my wife, I feel it's a betrayal, and before I can stop fantasising I'm as limp as a wet rag.
In fact I'm pleased to announce that I had a fantasy about the pretty young girl who works behind the bar where I drink. That's progress as far as I'm concerned. ;)
( but is that fantasy any better or worse ? after all fantasy is just thinking about what you might never have. I suppose the difference is I did have my old fantasy, and it was the worst thing ever )

Our sex life is improving slowly, I am learning to kiss and touch more and discovering it's alright to do so. Although I still have great problems asking my wife to try something, change position, or if she likes what I'm doing.
that goes back to the abuse again, the main perp liked me to talk and say things about the sex. It's still in my mind, I can hear myself suggesting different positions to get it in further, asking him what he wanted me to do. Something a 12 yo boy shouldn't know.
Something a 49 yo man can't forget.

And Roy, you guys over there manage with 5 3/4 inches - wow !! :D ;)
But hey, if it fits it's ok.

Lloydy
 
As I wrote that last part, somehow I knew Lloydy would have something to say about it! :rolleyes: Maybe if the colonists had been something other than British, the number would be higher. :p :p :p
 
"ouch"

Lloydy :o
 
Thank you all for responding. It is very helpful for me--this initial cyber-shame-breakout. Seeing that you all are out there.

Roy--
Thanks for the book rec, Bradshaw, Healing the Shame That Binds You. I've just ordered it from Amazon. I've read some of Homecoming and like it.

It is true that sex in general is a shameful, disgusting, painful subject for me. I have become what Mike Lew describes in _Victims No Longer_ as "asexual". Sexual references, people around me with active sex lives, sexual scenes in movies, sexual lyrics in books all evoke an emotional reaction that seems to be part pain, part disgust, part shame, part fear, and part guilt, but really just feels uncomfortable and I avoid whatever it is.

I think the dysfunctions and the fantasies are the most difficult part, but the rest is all a big problem. Part of my shame (the other part coming from the abuse itself), I think, comes from the fact that my parents were very strict, never spoke about sex or permitted discussion about anything even remotely sexual, nor music nor movies (or at least they condemned them very strongly). The only thing my mother ever said to me about sex was when she came into my room late one night to admonish me, "Don't!" And my father elegantly instructed me, "Don't you go fucking around with no sluts!" Some sexual education. So I was on my own and with unconscious feelings from forgotten or uncomprehended earlier abuse.

Also, I was sort of the family emotional punching bag, so I was already ashamed of everything about myself and completely emotionally repressed. Embarassed to display myself through actions or feelings in any way. To this day, I can't do art, sing, write, or even speak my thoughts, and expressing my feelings has finally gotten to the point where I can give my grandmother a hug.

Looking back on my voluntary sexual life, I realized that sex was never not shameful, anxiety-ridden, secretive for me. I really never had a normal desire to do it. Either an overwhelming, crazy desire to do it right now and hard, or no real desire. I think my main interest in having sex was to avoid the shame of being a virgin, to keep up with the other guys in school, and jealousy of the people who were having it. These drove me to have sex, but the bad feelings were always mixed in there, too, pulling me in the opposite direction, making it confusing, intimidating and difficult for me.

I have been struggling to accept that my sadistic fantasies are natural to me, ie, they are the natural result of the experiences that I had. However, I do not want sex to be an expression of anger for the rest of my life. I'd like to enjoy some of the sweetness and pleasure of intimacy and desire (these are all just words right now). So I'm in this twilight zone, surreal stage of emotional recovery where I'm accepting who I am and experimenting with it, with the hope of eventually changing. Nonsexually, I am also sometimes amused to see what I'm doing as I allow myself to express my anger more, and all the ways that I act like my father. Again, I don't want to be this way, but I am, and the only way to change is to fully accept it and that means really living and acting that way within safe limitations. Bizarre stuff, though.

I often wonder whether my sadism comes from being humiliated continually by my father's anger and rejection, or from being sexually abused. I can't remember my feelings from during the abuse, so I'm missing one of the keys to the answer. But it seems to me that I experience I similar fury during erotic arousal that I experience when I am angrily defending myself, either against a fantasy rejection from somebody while daydreaming, or while overreacting to what people say to me. It's a killing fury, devastating. This type of fury I only remember from my father. Although it seems odd at first to think of feelings from non-sexual settings having an impact on my sexual feelings, why not? I'm angry all the rest of time, why not sexually, as well?

Thanks for the tip about the statistical avg. Does anybody know how these measurements are done? I can get different lengths from the front or back, lying or standing, that sort of thing.

Lloydy--

Yeah, I'd like to get to the point where I can be sexually aroused by the sight of a sexy lady, have the desire and confidence to just naturally initiate, caress, slide my penis inside her, and have sex until climax without anxiety, guilt or the need for additional arousal from sadistic fantasies running in parallel in my mind. Is just the sight and sensation of sex ever arousing enough, without overcharged fantasies, to make it all work. I also feel very guilty when I'm fantasizing about something else or something harmful when I'm with somebody and I have lost erections during sex, much to my embarassment, possibly partially because of this. And I would consider it a milestone if I could have a healthy sexual fantasy about anybody, so good job.

I strongly recommend _Private Thoughts: Exploring the power of women's sexual fantasies_ by Wendy Maltz, as well as the relevant section in _The Sexual Healing Journey_ by Wendy Maltz. Some of the chapter titles, to give you a taste, are "Where sexual fantasies come from", "Deep discoveries," "Guided Explorations," and "Healing and Changing Unwanted Fantasies." The other resource that I've found for this problem is "For Your Own Good" by Alice Miller, the section on Jurgen Bartsch and the brief but inspiring account that she gives of a successful therapy case at the beginning of that section.

I hope it's not annoying to you guys that I'm pouring my soul out with all these long messages. I guess I'm feeling insecure because my posts seems to be unusually long.

Thanks for all your support,
Ryan
 
I think the dysfunctions and the fantasies are the most difficult part, but the rest is all a big problem. Part of my shame (the other part coming from the abuse itself), I think, comes from the fact that my parents were very strict, never spoke about sex or permitted discussion about anything even remotely sexual, nor music nor movies (or at least they condemned them very strongly).
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Ryan, I think possibly this applies to a lot of us, especially those of us of a certain age who grew up in very repressed times. I came from a similar family, no mention of sex at all. Your fathers advice is twice as much as I got !!
And in the early sixties we got no sex education in school, well none that was on the curriculum anyway.
So without someone explaining the right way to go about it, and just as importantly having good role models to learn the social side of the mating game, is it any wonder we're so screwed up ? The only lessons we got were entirely the wrong ones, and it's a hell of a job to learn at 49yo what I should have learnt as a teenager.

What I certainly learnt was that sex was an unemotional thing with the sole aim of ejaculation. I was "taught" by one of my abusers to kiss and caress him, but it was what he wanted and done for physical sensation only, not emotional reasons. And no amount of hard work has shifted that memory and vision entirely, all I can do is work around it, and it's coming slowly.

Fantasies are so hard to overcome, and I know some people might argue - why bother ?
But when they are all consuming, all day, every day, you want them gone.
At my worst about 5 or 6 years ago I could work myself into an adreniline rush through fantasy, I was high. Now, after the very hard task of becoming virtually asexual for a couple of years I have them controlled. They no longer dominate me, and even in moments of weakness when I call upon them while masturbating I find them less and less effective.
But my sex life with my wife is returning, slowly, and satisfyingly.

Maybe there are other less drastic options, I don't know. But I adopted an attitude of wanting the fantasies gone so much that I was prepared to try anything.
The loss of the constant turmoil has made it worthwhile for me.

Lloydy
PS. you write as much as you want here Ryan, these pages have no bottom on them ;)
 
I had an opposite, but equally damaging upbringing. My mother was way too open in discussing sex and her sex life with us. It made me feel ashamed and uncomfortable, and mixed up my sexual yearnings with love for her. a mess. It's true what you guys are saying that your parents' attitudes have a huge effect on your sexual confidence - regardless of the SA. Add abuse and you've got a serious shindig of sexual guilt and dysfunction. I can't break it yet. As good as I'm feeling some days now, I can sense I'm years away from a breal in the clouds with that problem. Day by day.
Maybe in the future they'll have a way of removing the "screwed-up parents" memory chip. Until then...
 
Hi Ryan,

As a social worker with 6 years experience providing counseling to individuals and couples, many with sexual abuse issues, I think you are an excellent candidate for psychotherapy. You have a firm grasp of the fundamentals and a high degree of insight into your own psyche. Now you need to find someone to guide you through the process of self-discovery, for which you lack the necessary perspective. "You can't see the forest for the trees", that sort of thing. Your biggest obstacle may well lie in the fact that you are intelligent and probably over analyze everything. This has been an effective defense for you but it may be time to let that go, start experiencing your feelings, and let someone else do the thinking.

As you will learn in the Bradshaw book, a lot of the deep toxic shame we live with is directly and unconsciously connected to feelings themselves. In your case, as with many SA survivors, just having sexual desire triggers an "internalized shame spiral" so that it appears to the conscious mind that sex in general is disgusting, painful, something to be afraid of. What's really going on is an automatic shameful response to your own natural sexual arousal, which gets disowned and externalized, therefore not felt or experienced. This all happens in a split second so is never brought to your awareness. Getting in touch with both the true nature of the shame you live with and your sexual feelings will go a long way in healing the damage.

You are already way ahead in the game by realizing that in order to change something you must first accept its existence within yourself. That can be very hard to do, easier said than done, but you seem to be there so that is good news, even though its uncomfortable. I'm talking about your sadistic fantasies here. That also may be the way you dealt with the shame you feel about being abused sexually, and emotionally abandoned by your parents. The shame becomes intolerable to your internal survival so it gets projected onto your sex partner. It takes an enormous amount of strength to have those fantasies going on in your head while you are having sex and not act them out. So believe the fact that you are up to the challenges and opportunities for growth that lie ahead. You also mentioned being amused by the ways in which you act like your father. If you can laugh at yourself and your various pathologies, you will ultimately be fine. Living consciously with a sense of humor is a good recipe for mental health. :)

I can totally relate to what you said about being the emotional punching bag for your whole family. Toxic shame has been a major driving force in my life, destroying my self-esteem, causing me to loathe myself. Still cannot express myself fully or honestly with most of my family. I have buried and disconnected from any artistic talents, this in a family of artists. Strangely, I am gifted with writing abilities, but only write about factual things, never my internal thoughts or feelings. That would lead to exposure of my inner world which is still an unfathomable vulnerability.

Measure your dick with a tape measure, not a ruler, when you are standing up, along the top from the base to the tip of the head. Make sure you have a raging hard on, since every millimeter counts! :D

All my best,
Roy
 
Lloydy--

I think my parents' condemnation of sex, combined with my previous abuse experience, make the whole subject unthinkably and unfeelably shameful to me.

What's more, the emotional nothingness, or worse, unconscious hate, resentment, and anger that was/is what my parents, sister, and I feel towards each other under a guise of normality make healthy emotional connections impossible for me. So, not feeling love, and not having felt loved, it didn't seem strange to me that sex unconsciously seemed like a gross, emotionless, exciting, impersonal physical act.

Now, years later, I'm trying to figure out what feelings are appropriate to sex, what sexual arousal really feels like, what love is, something like what I would be if I were healthy. Words, words, words. But the problem is much bigger than sex and requires much more courage to face: I don't love anything, nobody that I know really loves me, this never happened. Me and all my family, relationships and friendships have been emotionally unhealthy people who don't feel love, who are leaning emotionally, desperately and resentfully on others out of a repressed and denied need to be loved. It is only now that I can admit that I want to be loved and that everything that excites me to do are things that I believe will impress people (including having sexual experiences). And that's as far as I've got on the emotional thing: looking for other people who are working on their emotions, too. Really doing everything out of a repressed need to be loved means that I don't do things because I want them, because I desire them. I think the path to healthy self-esteem and healthy desires lies through this "I need or needed to be love(d)" thicket. But I can't see ahead.

I also have removed all sex from my life over the past year, other than in therapy, and when my desires--in inevitable but humiliating moments of weakness--make me throw myself on the sword. I had to move out of NYC into the countryside because I couldn't take the pain and swirling of all the sexual feelings I would have just walking down the street and looking at the people around me there. Yeah, I want different fantasies and different feelings. I want to fantasize arousedly about making love with a beautiful woman. Not about beating, raping, humiliating, emotionally torturing, torturing, hurting somebody. All of this is horrifying to my extremely moral conscious mind and I WANT HEALTHY SEXUAL DESIRES!

Lloydy, you're not responding to my book recommendation Private Thoughts....

ARW--

My mother recently got a new boyfriend and they have been having sex. This has been very disgusting to me, even though I like her new boyfriend better as a person than my father (mixed feelings there). And my mother's way of telling me about it was immature, bragging. I was embarassed.

I think the way of removing the screwed up parents chip is through years long acceptance in a self-aware way, that every single feeling, thought, act is determined/influenced by my parents. Not in a general way, but on a one-by-one basis. I look at my grandmother and I think, "What the hell are you doing?" That's what my father used to yell at me. I say, "What's going on, Grandma?" But I'm smiling, because I know that my father's fury is within me.

Roy --

I am overintellectual because my feelings are too painful and because I got pride from my parents for being smart and validation in other ways for it and that seemed to be goodness and happiness to me for a long time. I am trying to break out of my shame, I have ordered the book you recommended. Given that these postings are my first 48 hours of interacting with other people about this subject, I'm feeling pretty good about myself right now. I will go to a therapist when I feel ready. Right now I don't feel ready.

Why? I ask myself. I am very afraid to expose any part of myself. I have very few interactions with people (I read a lot). I have always been a loner. This is a difficult pattern/feeling for me to let go, because it is self-protective and the world seems so harmful, or uncontrollable and potentially harmful to me. Ever since I was born, I was resented and hated by my parents, the family misfit. I've always been alone emotionally and rejected. And I think I'm stuck in the unconscious emotional trap of viewing the whole world with the dread with which I felt my parent's hollering when I was a baby/infant/child/adolescent/adult. I don't know what it's like not to be this way. And these first steps breaking out with my innermost parts and shames are very hard. So, don't push me too hard about going to a therapist. Also, I've tried several therapists and had bad experiences. I've found reading Alice Miller, The Courage to Heal, Victims No Longer, etc, much more emotionally validating than talking with any of the people I know or have met. And now I've found this board, which I'm obviously thriving on. If you know an EXTREMELY sensitive therapist in the northeastern US, I'm taking suggestions.

You seem similar to me in that you are articulate but reserved--your writing is excellent. You also analyse and advise more than you share your own experiences. Sometimes reading your posts, I feel both heartened and admonished. The hurt child who wants to be loved inside of me feels a little bit of rejection, too. If you are like me in this respect, you will feel a similar reaction to the second sentence in this paragraph. I am a loving, intelligent person inside a hurt, lonely core, inside an intellectual, contemptuous, angry shell. Are you like this?

Thanks for the dick-measuring guidelines. I'm embarassed about being embarassed about my dick size. But I am insecure about it. The toxic shame that binds me.

Thanks all. Thank goodness these pages have no bottom!

Ryan
 
Ryan
I'll check out the Wendy Maltz book, they have a good selection at the place I help out at, or I'll get it through Amazon. I'll take help from anywhere, thanks.

Roy's raised some good stuff there, especially about therapy, and the tendancy for us to over intelectualize our situation.
But I believe that if we are in a situation where we are intelectualizing it we are ready to respond to therapy. The thing I say to everyone is do your homework and find one that knows SA and all it's quirks. I was lucky in that respect and I found myself in a situation where I could relate anything to him and he led me to my own answers. And I agree with Roy, you're thinking hard about it so you're probably ready.
Trying to do it yourself just leads to going around in circles, the answers we give ourselves are just slight variations of the answers that didn't work before. We need leading away from our circular thought, and a good therapist will do that.

The family thig has made me think about the relationship I have with my in-laws, and how much better that is that that I have with my own parents.
My late mother in law was a quiet woman of remarkable strength and understanding despite her total lack of conventiional education. Shejust had wisdom. And although I'm not religious I often walk through the graveyard and stop for a chat.
My father in law is an Irish navvy, and is the only person I have spoken to in his sort of position, and that's a poor description of it, who actually talks to me as though I'm an adult. We share secrets and filthy jokes, laugh and get drunk. I trust him totally.
When they were together they held hands, laughed at risque jokes on the tv. Things that never happened in our house.

Why can't I do that with my parents ? It goes back to not being protected as a child I guess.
And as they get older and frailer I know I'm going to have that relationship, or any chance of regaining it.
But I can't try to regain what we've all lost because to tell them what went on would destroy them, and there's just the slightest chance that they might turn round and say "We know what happened" that would destroy me.
I don't think they do at all, but I don't KNOW.
It's gone, lost forever and I have to accept and deal with it.
We go through the motions but it seems meaningless most of the time, the other week I reprogramed the timer on their vcr and he shook my fucking hand......
It's gone, but we do what we can.

Families eh ?? a minefield.....

Lloydy
 
Dear Ryan,

Doesn't that completely suck? To be struggling with a boatload of shame and embarrassment and then feel ashamed and embarrassed about feeling ashamed and embarrassed! Stop the insanity! If its any consolation, I think every guy in the world feels insecure about their dick size if its anything short of 8 inches which is, as we discussed above, 2.25 inches longer than, dare I say, "normal". Who wouldn't want an extra inch? :cool:

Instead of viewing what I said to you about getting into therapy as "pushing" try to see it as "encouragement". Of course you will go when you are ready, to do so prematurely would be ineffective. Especially since you have had some negative experiences with therapists. There sure are some clinkers out there. It is so important to find one with whom you have a good connection. A referral helps a lot, which is difficult if you are not open with a lot of people. Maybe someone here can make a recommendation. Some people do better in therapy than others and those with a high level of insight into their internal processes tend to be more successful with it. I think this is actually more important than intelligence, which also helps but can get in the way, too.

I appreciate the feedback you offered near the end of your last post. I am definitely more reserved in a setting like this than I am in real life, where I am decidedly animated and expresseive. I am strongly inclined to be open and straightforward, occasionally too much so. And I definitely analyze and advise more than I share feelings and vulnerabilities. An old and automatic defense mechanism. This is something I dislike about myself, something I am trying to change. I have had some very negative experiences in my life when I have asked for help or made myself vulnerable by sharing what is frightening and close to my heart. It seems like people have gotten scared and freaked out, running away, making me feel like a pariah, or offer benign platitudes making me think: "why did I open my big fat mouth?". That said, I will make a more concerted effort to share my feelings here. I have found more love and acceptance here in the last month or so than almost anywhere, ever. The only other place I feel this free is in my recovery program run by Kaiser, my health insurer. Everyone here has been really great. As with all sexual abuse/assault survivors, trust is a major big fucking deal, so it takes time. Thanks for the nudge. :)

I am curious about what I said that evoked a feeling within you of being rejected or admonished in some way. Neither of those was a conscious intention on my part. I may be answering my own question, in that yes I do find myself having a similar reaction to the second sentence, indicating the aching need for love and approval we all seem to have so pervasively. I am like you in many respects, the loving person inside the hurt person inside the angry person. A difference might be that I am just a little further down the path of discovery than you, as Lloydy is further down the path than I. I am learning to not take things so personally, that I am not responsible for other people's feelings, that I always have choices, and to feel my feelings. The beautiful part of this recovery process is how we all reach out to one another, like a chain of men being pulled along by the guy in front and pulling along the next guy in line. Sometimes we change places and there is no one upsmanship. Just a bunch of guys with different pieces of the puzzle helping each other out.

As for sharing, for starters I am feeling pretty lonely tonight if I stop and think about it. I had a productive day painting at my mom's house, but here I am on a Friday night, 40 years old, single, unemployed, and alone. I'm glad you guys are out there.

Roy
 
Roy,

Yes, it does suck. These emotional downward knots are frustrating to me because they make therapy take even longer than just recognizing, accepting and feeling your feelings, and then letting them let go of you. Instead, you first have to do that for the feelings, such as shame, guilt, disgust that are making the other feelings unacceptable to you. Then, do the same thing all over again for the underlying feelings. For example, I was and am terrified of my father. The thought of him makes me anxious, even though he's been dead for 5 years. My Mom's new boyfriend makes me anxious because he evokes this unconscious fear of my father. But the problem is further complicated by the fact that I am ashamed of being afraid of him, and that I was ever afraid of him, even as an infant or small child. I feel like a sissy, wuss, pussy, girl, wimp, faggot (sexism and homophobia not intended here) for being afraid and so was only able to admit it recently and am still struggling to accept and feel it. So when I see my Mom's boyfriend, it's hard for me to even know what I'm feeling on a moment-to-moment basis. Discomfort, anxiety, unpredictable and uncontrollable reactions. I think that these feelings that block the underlying feelings are what Freud called resistance, the cause of repression. It seems that they are all negative self-referential feelings, such as those I listed above.

You are right about pushing vs encouragement. I am like what Alice Miller describes in For Your Own Good: recommendations, friendly help, anything said to me about me or told to me to do I resist and resent and get angry. This is probably because of the way my parents ordered me around, criticized, punished and ridiculed me for 20 years. This is also why I like this forum so much, because I share with other people about myself and they share with me about themselves and I can express myself and I learn from watching them without hating them. I understand that you're not being pushy, but let's not talk about me going to a therapist anymore unless I bring it up, because I am so sensitive to this. Although, anybody with any referrals in NY/Boston areas, I'll take the contact info.

Roy, you rock! You didn't get mad at me about that second sentence. I was dreading that you would. My need to be loved causes me to constantly dread anger. I know the defense mechanism you are talking about: analyse, advise, help others rather than feeling the patheticness of my own plight and rather than asking for help for myself. I, too, am unable to ask for help. I have gotten to a first milestone on this: when my grandmother asks me what I want for dinner, I am beginning to be able to actually request meals that I like. That took a year. I have discovered this need for independence, this need to be able to do everything myself, in other people, and long lamented it in myself. I wish I could walk out the door right now and drive to a therapist's office and say, "Help me." I can't. Why? Like you, I've had some bad things happen when I've asked for help. My last girlfriend kicked me out when I started to fall into depression/face my feelings and the things that happened to me. I asked her if I could just stay for a few weeks to get something sorted out. But she really couldn't take it, for her own understandable emotional reasons, and she wanted me to leave immediately. Yes, I felt like an unwanted, rejected, hurt, freak. A friend that I went to for business advice manipulated me and tried to take everything he could from me, including my girlfriend and some friends. But I think the problem is much deeper than that. I think I angrily resolved in some deep, unconscious way to need nothing from my parents (which practically meant as little as possible, because I was dependent on them for everything I got) at a very young age. Similar to not crying. I think that my parents hurt me enough and I just protected myself against it by feeling nothing and proudly, scaredly needing nothing. Why did they hurt me? I think my needs and desires were too much for them. They probably punished me for crying when I was an infant. They were themselves money-anxious and emotionally wounded so lacking energy, so buying me things and doing things with or for me were probably threatening to them, so they punished me when I asked. It was almost a family joke that if I asked for something I certainly wasn't going to get that.

I think the things you said about me were right, I'll have to study them more thoroughly. The split-second shame that kills my feeling of sexual arousal without my ever being aware of it, is dead on, and I have been looking for validation of that for a long time. I really thing the problem is my understandable over-sensitivity to people talking about me, making suggestions to me, or trying to help me. I'm liking the sharing thing right now.

Although I am ashamed to talk so much about my own need to feel loved, I think that I am beginning to get a glimpse of what you are talking about with not taking things so personally, not being responsible for other people's feelings, feeling my own feelings. The always having choices thing is new and I'll have to give that some thought. I don't think I have that many choices, which is why I refrain from commitments. But I think it's because I unconsciously need to be loved and understood and I unconsciously dread the rejection of any disagreement or anger that makes interactions so difficult for me and that causes me to lose me temper so often. When I'm aware of this need to be loved and am able to consciously feel the dread of being hurt, and also to consciously feel the hurt, then it's all not so dreadful and I don't get as angry, ie, I don't take things so personally. This is all new in the past few days, so I obviously wasn't doing it with some of these posts. This also enables me to feel my feelings more, because I'm not unconsciously repressing the ones that I know will be disapproved of because of my unconscious need for love.

Anyway, I feel like a girl for all this needing-to-be-loved stuff!

I feel pathetic, sad, and lonely being unemployed and alone. Especially on Friday and Saturday nights when I jealously imagine everybody else going out with all their friends while I stay home.

Ryan
 
Ryan:

Welcome to the board. I'm fairly new here but have already found it a good place to be, as I'm sure you are too.

ARW:

My problem was also with my mother being way too open with me sexually: in about any sense of the word "open" you can imagine. :(

All:

My sexual fantasies have involved rape, tho not so more recently. I have sexual addictiveness or obsessive compulsive behavior, fantasy & masturbation, always with attractive women.

Yet I have trouble having an orgasm when making love with my wonderful wife. Talk about sexual dysfunction.

Getting to know more of the truth, getting to know myself, is helping me to learn to give & receive true love & intimacy, especially with my wife. I believe the rest will come (ok call it a pun if you want to!) with time.

My therapy, especially confronting my mother therapeutically, is really helping. Long way to go, but its progress not perfection.

Peace

Wuame
 
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