Sex after memories resurface of CSA

[DD]

To start with, I am currently not in a sexual relationship. I've run away from the topic completely since memories of CSA have resurfaced. Now I am thinking about it.
I have knowledge of some parts in my dissociative system and they don't agree on this topic at all. Some want to just run fast and far away. Other wants to heal this area too. And so forth.
I don't want to talk about this with the other because previous such discussions have not gone well. But I don't know what to think and how to proceed. Ideas?

[Armee]

Only you can decide what is right for you. It will probably be triggering. That can lead to healing with the right partner. With someone who doesn't feel emotionally safe to explore this with, I don't know.

I'm sorry you went through this and are still going thu it.

[blue_sky]

DD It breaks my heart to know that there are so many of us who go through CSA, we didn't deserve it.
I have been married to an amazing guy for over a decade now but we still haven't figured out the physical relation side of things. Sometimes I am better, other times it ends horribly.

For me, it feels like if the adult me is in "control" of the brain, I think it's better but if little or teenage me is in "control", it gets really bad followed by flashbacks and crying and depressive mood for days-to-weeks.

I really want to heal too. Adult me really does. But little and teenage me are too scarred and too scared to heal.

I wish I had an answer for you. I have seen T and Gyno but the healing part has been quite slow. Processing the core memories with EMDR has been helpful slowly because nowadays the flashbacks are not as "rough" if I may say.

I have been suggested to see a T who specialises in that physical relationship department but I haven't mustered enough guts to see one yet.

[Armee]

I've been chewing on a similar question in my own mind...flashbacks and dissociation aside, I actually can't physically feel anything at all aside from some pressure. There's no sensation. It would probably take many more years to work up the nerve if there was a solution but does anyone know about sort of that deadening of the nerves?

[DD]

Talked with my therapist about this today. He's of the opinion I could just tell the other honestly what's the situation and ask if he wants to help me heal here.
Some healing has already taken place. I used to need being fat because no one bothers a fat one. Well, that was my thinking anyway. Losing even a bit of weight would make me panic. Now I've lost 12kg and no panic yet.
But yeah. Sex scares me on a very profound level. With the man I am thinking of, it got a bit heated while staying fully within the boundaries I have set last week. And all I could think about was how far I can let this go before he can't stop anymore. The assumption is always there that it will go horribly wrong.
He did pick up on the change in mood fast and also my dog came to lick our faces probably sensing my discomfort. Good dog.

[NarcKiddo]

DD - I am glad to hear that the man both stayed within the set boundaries and picked up on the change in mood. It does sound as if he might be somebody you could think about trusting as suggested by your therapist.

Armee - your last post raises some thoughts in me. I have never been a victim of any kind of SA, but my mother was physically intrusive and engulfing so I never really felt my body was my own. My mother also was/is obsessed with sex and brought me up to believe that a) I have to have a man in order to have any sort of worth as a woman and b) that all men require sex and I had better be willing and good at it.

Not trigger warning - but possible Too Much Information warning

So I became willing and good at it, but have never had a climax with any partner and very rarely on my own. I can become aroused and like the idea of sex but the actuality is a waste of time for me.

You mention not feeling anything other than some pressure. I feel a bit more than that but not much. It is not pleasurable. I wonder whether our brains are simply not prepared to deal with any sensation because we perhaps do not want to be having the experience at all (for our own individual reasons)? In my case I was also terrified of becoming pregnant so that did not help and the fact I was using reliable contraception did not help my fears. That, of course, does not explain any lack of feeling when on my own.

I'll stop here because I cannot contribute anything to this discussion from a SA point of view, but I was interested to read what others say because of my own feelings around sex.

[Blueberry]

DD, I'm so glad your dog turned up to lick your face. That's lovely. I'm smiling thinking about it. FOO dog sometimes brought me back from near-dissociation (not in any sexual context) and often licked my sore feet and legs. Dogs are perceptive.

I avoid sex like the plague. Any situation that could become sexual like a man I was attracted to took my hand, my whole arm goes numb.

I'm glad you are in a place where you can consider it. That says to me some healing is going on. I wish I had more to say that could help, but I don't.

[DD]

That is already a lot Blueberry! Thank you also Armee, NarcKiddo and Blue_sky.
I was also taught that a woman should always make sure the mans needs are met. That is a horrid and one sided view I will not pass on to my daughters. It should be about meeting needs of all involved and respecting the boundaries of all.

[blue_sky]

Yes I was also told "men will always be men and will always want sex". And that if I didn't comply, my husband would be unhappy and leave.
It took a lot of conversation and my husband repeatedly telling me that he wouldn't leave me if we don't have sex and that sex isn't everything in a marriage.

And yet I still have days when I feel like I'm not "good enough" for him. 



Also loooove dogs who can sense emotions. One of my dogs (i have two maltese) always forces his way onto my lap and starts protecting me from literally everyone when I am low/crying/scared. And also licks my face.
He's like my secret emotional support animal 

[DD]

My dog is also very much an emotional support animal. When I am upset, stressed etc he will growl at other dogs to keep them away and bark more at things that could be dangerous (in his mind). He will stay close to me and keeps bugging me for attention to get me to focus on him and not on disappearing in my head. He gets me out 4 times each day no matter how I feel. I sometimes think why on earth I got him when I did and made my life so much more difficult but most days I know. He keeps me functional, calmer, and in every way doing better than I would without him. He's a 1,5 year old Lapphund.

[DD]

So an update and also here trigger warning =====




I did try sex with the man I mentioned and he clearly wants everything to be consensual. He's trying now to reassure me that he does not want sex if I don't. We did a couple of times but the last time I started getting flashbacks and dissociating. But I did manage to communicate this and we stopped. Since then I haven't wanted anything. I need to work at just the fear of him leaving if I don't say yes. I need to find the actual ability to consent. But we are discussing this openly and honestly. And he takes this as me trusting him in a very profound way. Which it is. I am being honest with not knowing how this is going to go. I have no clue. I just have these fears, these flashbacks and body memories.

[Armee]

Oh this is fantastic news DD!!! I'm so sorry for all the flashbacks and triggers. That does suck. But to have someone who recognizes what an honor it is to be trusted and part of your healing what a gift, to both of you.
 

I find now that I can have a couple trigger and flashback free romps and then I don't know what is different I'll have one filled with flashbacks and lay shaking and reliving it for an hour or all night and then want nothing to do with it for several weeks. It's my pattern even though I can't figure out why sometimes it's OK and sometimes it's not. The triggers have lessened over time though of processing and working through it.

[Blueberry]

Yes, great news DD

[DD]

I'm so happy to hear the progress Armee 

I also could not figure out why this time there were flashbacks. It is odd. But I am very happy I have someone to help.

[Chart]

Yes, yes...
this topic has not been posted in for at least 120 days.
I have an idea which might be TOTALLY off-base... but...
Is there not a strong correlation between Dissociation and Multiple Personality Disorder?
I might be completely wrong, but DD has kind of been the evolutionary development from MPD.
That is to say, all the crazy confusion experiences (especially around sex, have to do with Dissociation. It's perhaps easier to think in terms of multiple personality. Just as a person never swims in the same river twice, so too we never have sex with the same person twice. We are not the same person nearly each time we engage in deep physical intimacy. Especially when our brains are so profoundly impacted by neurological "alterations" from early developmental trauma.
And sex is like nanotechnology, it's such a hair-fine trigger-system. So, in my opinion (and experience) the way we react each time we engage in sex is nearly impossible to "predict" the reactional "outcome"... Sometimes we're fine, sometimes it's great, sometimes so-so, and sometimes horrible (especially with a trauma history.
Sex is a crapshoot.
Sorry for the rant, but maybe that can ease up the feelings of responsibility, confusion and, potentially, guilt.
And yes, I think there are (a few) men who intuitively know this and are OK with women who don't understand how to navigate their own mysterious delta.