Unable to feel pleasure
For context- Its been 2 years since I broke up with my ex of a year, after them I had flings and I didn't like what I was doing at that time and my body rejected it. Upon my friends talking me into getting over them I resorted to it. I've always been self conscious of my body and looks so I thought I was with someone too good looking for me(the same friends would whisper about this). After that, I've felt very reclused and not gone on any dates and a lot of friendships broke. I tried masturbation but it was painful and I couldn't find pleasure in it. I tried it again after almost a year yesterday, i forced myself to like it but I didn't feel good, a lot of tightness in my hips and my body was rejecting it again. I've not had a good relationship with sex and shame is a big part of me that I've been trying to demolish. please help me out in understanding why this is happening to me.
I'm ao sorry you feel this way.
Is there any history of sexual encounter you have faced? Because it shouldn't feel so hard to feel pleasure.
Also i would recommend watching p*rn to first like the idea of physical touch. And your liking and your boundaries.
Not feeling confident about physical appearance is tough and I too face it. But tbh it's all in our head. We think a lot about what they will think after seeing our body which makes us question ourselves. But in real if we embrace our body and take good care of its hygiene then apperance doesn't matter.
Try to explore your body and don't be so hard about feeling things. Let your body feel what it wants. And yes, I'll say start with masturbation only and then go ahead with flings to explore.
I’m reading this and I almost felt like I wrote it. I completely understand. My ex broke up with me a little over 2 years ago and I have not talked to or tried to talk to a single guy and my self esteem is in the crapper. I barely leave my apartment, and when I do, I never bother to care what I look like because I think no one is interested in me. I don’t talk to any of my friends either.
As far as the masturbation goes, I understand a little bit about that. I think it’s because your emotions are shut down so you can’t enjoy it, or feel like you shouldn’t enjoy it. To me, it seems like your body is physically reacting to what your mind thinks. I don’t have that part but I definitely have some kind of shameful feelings about sex, and I haven’t ever looked into getting help for it. I’ve thought about it and can’t find a single time that someone said or did something to me that completely shut me off. I wonder if my issues are that I can’t let myself enjoy it because of my self worth or self esteem issues? Maybe you might have something similar?
I just recently started therapy and found out that I’ve been completely shutting off my feelings and friends as a coping mechanism. My last ex shattered my trust, so I chose to only be around people that couldn’t hurt me- my family. I knew them and their quirks and I would never be surprised because I knew what to expect. It was comfortable and predictable, which is what I thought I needed.
As I’m talking with this therapist, she is helping me understand that traumatic events take place in your body AND your mind and sometimes the two can become disconnected or shut down. Essentially the “freeze” of freeze/fawn, fight/flight. I can easily look at things that happened to me and logically understand them and pick them apart, but I have no emotion attached to any memories, good or bad. Heck, I barely have any memories of anything either.
So, I’d definitely look for a therapist that works with the mind and the body. My trauma comes from childhood medical trauma, an ex that had crippling PTSD and would go into screaming rages and break everything, to an ex that knew all that and used it against me and emotionally cheated on me. There is hope and there are people that can help! Please reach out if you need anything.
