Something that's been on my mind

[flowerofthewoods]

This has been on my mind for awhile now, so I want to just get it out.

When I was was a little kid, I very abruptly developed severe incontinence and had some X-rays done that showed my muscles were too weak to close all the way. My mom told me that it was because I had held it in too long instead of going to the bathroom when I needed to, and put me on a pee schedule. I never fully recovered, just got it fixed to a manageable level.

I took a drama class in middle school, and the teacher told me that the way I portrayed anger was very masculine. I have a number of behavioral quirks that are very masculine that other women don't seem to share or understand.

The first time that I put in a tampon, I panicked so badly that I nearly fainted, and had to spend time lying on the bathroom floor with my feet propped up on the side of the bathtub. I've never been able to use tampons.

As a teenager, I found the idea of sex to be repulsive and frightening and was very asexual until I met my husband. The first time we had sex was a lot more painful than I expected, and I bled a lot more than I expected. Currently, while I want to be able to want sex, my body won't cooperate. I can find something to be very mentally arousing, but have no physical response. On the flip side, I can feel very turned off, and my body will show entirely different signs. I also find orgasims to be very frightening, and prefer to avoid them.

I have absolutely NO memories of ever being sexually abused. I do have an older cousin who has been caught sending sexually explicit messages to 12 and 13 year old girls over the past few years, and our two families had spent a lot of time together during the right time frame. He also has a bizarre fixation with me that seems to keep going even though I've cut off all contact with him and most of my extended family for years now, so honestly it's not that hard to imagine that he did do something to me when I was little.

I don't want to start jumping to conclusions and making accusations, especially since I don't have any memories about it, but I've always felt like there was something that was abnormal about me, and sexual abuse might be the explanation. If so, how would I know and where would I even begin with addressing it?

[Butterfly]

How terribly traumatic and painful those feelings and memories must be for you. While I have no direct experience, I can say that I have some memories of fear surrounding  A particular relative and had never been quite able to put the memories clearly in mind. One thing I have learned is that sexual abuse can take many forms including overt sexual behavior or unwanted attention. Here's some information that might help make some sense of what you feel.
http://outofthefog.website/top-100-trait-blog/sexual-coercion
http://outofthefog.website/top-100-trait-blog/2015/11/4/sexual-objectification

Even if you can't get to the root cause of why you feel the way you feel, that does not change your reality of today and the troubles you face working through it. Have you spoken to your medical doctor or gynecologist about the issue?

[steadybowl]

Dear flowerofthewoods,

I'm so sorry for what you're going through.   Big hugs to you. So awful.  So not fair.

I too have some weird unresolved, not consciously remembered issues around sex. My body tells me something loud and clear, but as far as memory?  Very little, very vague.  I have spent lots of time trying to remember.  Not a fun project and hasn't been very helpful to me - just brought up lots of worrying, shame, feelings of being worthless, weird almost flashbacks.

For me, it's been more helpful to focus on me and not try to dig up unremembered trauma.  Kind of as a variation on inner child stuff, I've gone over and over bad sexual experiences in my teens and replaced them with a fantasy, another version of myself, being the perfect partner for myself at that time in my life. Guess what, the perfect partner then (and now) isn't about sex - it's about closeness, consent, tenderness, physical touch, unconditional attention and loving without sex as a payment to pay for that affection.  And it is also about being desired, playing with that sexual energy, enjoying it.   Most of all, it's about me not getting so wrapped up in whether the other person is enjoying it and staying with myself and what I want/don't want.

Along with the healing fantasies and related, it's about how do I touch myself and bring pleasure to my own body.  Sharing with my spouse comes second (not that that was going all that well anyway!).

I like the author Betty Dodson who insists that our most important sexual relationship is with ourselves.  She also gives some pretty frank and practical advice, i.e. tells women to focus on the clitoris and use a good lubricant with yourself like almond oil.  Penetration is just not where it's at for many women.  Certainly your body seems to be telling you that loud and clear.  There are so many other ways to be with yourself or someone else.

Take care of you!  Sending gentle thoughts,

steadybowl

[Sesame]

I'm sorry you have experienced this, flowerofthewoods. While I remember some events that made me very uncomfortable, I have the distinct feeling that more happened which I do not recall. After that, I had horrible nightmares and suffered a panic attack the last time I saw the person I believed to be responsible. He has also been accused of molesting his own daughter and a neighbour's daughter, but it seems he got away with all of it because of mental illness. He also has an unexplained and disturbing obsession with me. Unfortunately for me, my mother was also a covert sexual abuser, which only made everything worse.

When it comes to sex, I also started off feeling like it was dirty or wrong somehow, despite not being raised in a religious household. I developed vaginismus, which is when everything spasms painfully when you attempt to insert anything. I never successfully used a tampon either, but can now successfully use a menstrual cup (which is much bigger and trickier than a tampon). I had no option but to resort to self-treatment because gynaecologists and the like only told me to get drunk, drown in lube and light candles, none of which cure vaginismus. If you feel like you might have this, I could give you some advice if you like.