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This is going to be long and rambly and yeh....I need to get it out so...
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
Um, yeh. I can't really ignore this anymore. If I keep ignoring it I'm going to be single pretty soon so I kind of need help.
First things first: it's been nearly two years since I was last able to have sex comfortably. That's...a long time. Some of you will know that I had a problem with pain and that I've been to see people and there's nothing physically wrong with me down there aside from my need to relax properly. But obviously the expectation of pain means I can't relax which means it hurts which means I expect the pain. Vicious cycle. So this has affected my relationship pretty badly. I'm not comfortable giving, and much as I try to work on it, I can't get over the fact that I have an extremely sensitive gag reflex. I've tried but really...I just can't. So....he doesn't get much. He never really has but at least before he would get sex. But he doesn't anymore.
On Saturday we went out for Valentine's Day. We've had a bad year so far and so we wanted to do something special because he's fucking off to Australia on Saturday (having been in the Philippines/Prague for three weeks about a fortnight ago) and I basically won't see him until April. I will be the first to admit that I am massively dependent on him. I get easily bored of people in general and there are only a very few people for whom that isn't true (and one of them I'm not even friends with anymore, but that's a whole different can of worms), so I find it difficult to be social with people. I was just about comfortable with him going to the Philippines because his friend was getting married and then Prague was his other friend's stag do and blahblahblah. But when he told me he was going to Australia for the first friend's second wedding (he's an Aussie, his wife is Filipino, they're having two, it's all a bit weird, but whatever) because he was getting the tickets for free, I was a bit put out. Then I found out that he's coming home the Monday before my cousin's wedding, so I won't see him the weekend after he gets back, annnnnd now he's going to see his uni friends the weekend after that and I am too socially retarded to be comfortable spending time with people I barely know. But whatever, you know? I've been trying to be less clingy and dependent so I said he could go even though inside my head I was screaming at myself to tell him he couldn't. That was HARD for me.
So anyway, Saturday night. It was...amazing. We went to a posh restaurant and then we came home and watched a movie and then we went to bed and for a change, I initiated the sex stuff. That never happens either, but we'll get to that. All goes fine and stuff until he says he won't do it 'normal', he wants me to go on top. I haven't done that in...a long time, because you know, I'm still trying to get missionary down without pain. But I figure I might as well try it. It doesn't hurt at all. I was completely relaxed and there wasn't even a hint of pain. Great, right? Except then I had a panic attack. A big one. Like I've never had before. I was shaking and I couldn't breathe at all and my heart was beating faster than I thought it could, and then I burst into tears involuntarily. It was great. So no sex. And now I feel like he hates me, so I'm crying into my pillow and it's all spectacularly shit. Hurrah.
So for the last few days I've been thinking about it. For a long time I've known that I don't feel comfortable with him touching me unless I initiate it. I've never said anything about it to him before because I knew he'd blame himself, like he blames himself for our lack of sex life because he thinks I'm not attracted to him anymore. I figured that the panic attack was because I'm so used to sex = pain now that anything different just feels wrong. But that's not the only problem. The sex = pain thing has kind of meant that anything to do with sex kind of terrifies me. I might well be used to it, but that doesn't stop it from being PAIN, you know? The idea of sex really freaks me out now and...I don't know how to stop it being that way. Add to that the fact that I've put on weight. A lot of it. I have put on so much weight that I am physically repulsed by myself. I don't want anyone to tell me I'm not fat or that I'm wrong or whatever; there's a reason I don't post photos of myself anymore. I've gone from a 14 to an 18 in less than a year and that's NOT OK. He still tells me I'm beautiful all the time, he tells me he loves my body and that he always will. But I don't know what he's looking at because it can't be me. I don't want him to touch me and realise how fat I am. I don't want for him to end up being as disgusted with me as I am with myself.
Yesterday we had a bit of an argument. I'm not feeling great this week and my sister, being the wonderful human being that she is, really pissed me off. I was thinking about jobs after uni and I realised that the only ones I would be able to get, I would be incapable of doing because of my stupid fucking phobia of calling people and answering unknown numbers. So we were talking about it and he started talking about therapy and that kind of struck a nerve because I know I need to do something like that about the sex stuff. So I told him. Everything. And typically for him, the bit that he picked up on was the part about how I don't feel comfortable with him touching me. Aaaaaaaaaaand long story short I ended up making a half-assed attempt to break up with him last night because I know he couldn't be happy with how things are. Except he didn't do what I expected him to do and try and fight me on it. So we had a great long conversation about it and honestly? Right now I'm not sure how long this is going to last. It's like we're teetering on the edge and it would just take one more thing to tip us over. He said that we would work on it and we'd get better and stuff and I really am going to try, but sexual intimacy is so important to him (it's important to me too, but not on the same scale anymore, because I'm so scaredof it) that I don't know if it's going to last.
I don't know what to do. I can't imagine my life without him at all, but I know he's not happy with how things are and I have no idea how long he's going to wait for me to fix myself. I can't fix myself without him (because seriously, vaginal dilators, while useful, are no use for me right now) but I can't keep stringing him along like this. I don't want his stupid dickhead arsehole wanking housemates to be right. I don't want to have to imagine them in my head telling him that he's better off without me, because I know they would.
My whole shitty life is a mess right now and all I can think about is making it easier on everyone. I don't deserve to be here. He deserves so much more than I can give him. I'm a failure and I just shouldn't exist.
Help
.
First things first: it's been nearly two years since I was last able to have sex comfortably. That's...a long time. Some of you will know that I had a problem with pain and that I've been to see people and there's nothing physically wrong with me down there aside from my need to relax properly. But obviously the expectation of pain means I can't relax which means it hurts which means I expect the pain. Vicious cycle. So this has affected my relationship pretty badly. I'm not comfortable giving, and much as I try to work on it, I can't get over the fact that I have an extremely sensitive gag reflex. I've tried but really...I just can't. So....he doesn't get much. He never really has but at least before he would get sex. But he doesn't anymore.
On Saturday we went out for Valentine's Day. We've had a bad year so far and so we wanted to do something special because he's fucking off to Australia on Saturday (having been in the Philippines/Prague for three weeks about a fortnight ago) and I basically won't see him until April. I will be the first to admit that I am massively dependent on him. I get easily bored of people in general and there are only a very few people for whom that isn't true (and one of them I'm not even friends with anymore, but that's a whole different can of worms), so I find it difficult to be social with people. I was just about comfortable with him going to the Philippines because his friend was getting married and then Prague was his other friend's stag do and blahblahblah. But when he told me he was going to Australia for the first friend's second wedding (he's an Aussie, his wife is Filipino, they're having two, it's all a bit weird, but whatever) because he was getting the tickets for free, I was a bit put out. Then I found out that he's coming home the Monday before my cousin's wedding, so I won't see him the weekend after he gets back, annnnnd now he's going to see his uni friends the weekend after that and I am too socially retarded to be comfortable spending time with people I barely know. But whatever, you know? I've been trying to be less clingy and dependent so I said he could go even though inside my head I was screaming at myself to tell him he couldn't. That was HARD for me.
So anyway, Saturday night. It was...amazing. We went to a posh restaurant and then we came home and watched a movie and then we went to bed and for a change, I initiated the sex stuff. That never happens either, but we'll get to that. All goes fine and stuff until he says he won't do it 'normal', he wants me to go on top. I haven't done that in...a long time, because you know, I'm still trying to get missionary down without pain. But I figure I might as well try it. It doesn't hurt at all. I was completely relaxed and there wasn't even a hint of pain. Great, right? Except then I had a panic attack. A big one. Like I've never had before. I was shaking and I couldn't breathe at all and my heart was beating faster than I thought it could, and then I burst into tears involuntarily. It was great. So no sex. And now I feel like he hates me, so I'm crying into my pillow and it's all spectacularly shit. Hurrah.
So for the last few days I've been thinking about it. For a long time I've known that I don't feel comfortable with him touching me unless I initiate it. I've never said anything about it to him before because I knew he'd blame himself, like he blames himself for our lack of sex life because he thinks I'm not attracted to him anymore. I figured that the panic attack was because I'm so used to sex = pain now that anything different just feels wrong. But that's not the only problem. The sex = pain thing has kind of meant that anything to do with sex kind of terrifies me. I might well be used to it, but that doesn't stop it from being PAIN, you know? The idea of sex really freaks me out now and...I don't know how to stop it being that way. Add to that the fact that I've put on weight. A lot of it. I have put on so much weight that I am physically repulsed by myself. I don't want anyone to tell me I'm not fat or that I'm wrong or whatever; there's a reason I don't post photos of myself anymore. I've gone from a 14 to an 18 in less than a year and that's NOT OK. He still tells me I'm beautiful all the time, he tells me he loves my body and that he always will. But I don't know what he's looking at because it can't be me. I don't want him to touch me and realise how fat I am. I don't want for him to end up being as disgusted with me as I am with myself.
Yesterday we had a bit of an argument. I'm not feeling great this week and my sister, being the wonderful human being that she is, really pissed me off. I was thinking about jobs after uni and I realised that the only ones I would be able to get, I would be incapable of doing because of my stupid fucking phobia of calling people and answering unknown numbers. So we were talking about it and he started talking about therapy and that kind of struck a nerve because I know I need to do something like that about the sex stuff. So I told him. Everything. And typically for him, the bit that he picked up on was the part about how I don't feel comfortable with him touching me. Aaaaaaaaaaand long story short I ended up making a half-assed attempt to break up with him last night because I know he couldn't be happy with how things are. Except he didn't do what I expected him to do and try and fight me on it. So we had a great long conversation about it and honestly? Right now I'm not sure how long this is going to last. It's like we're teetering on the edge and it would just take one more thing to tip us over. He said that we would work on it and we'd get better and stuff and I really am going to try, but sexual intimacy is so important to him (it's important to me too, but not on the same scale anymore, because I'm so scaredof it) that I don't know if it's going to last.
I don't know what to do. I can't imagine my life without him at all, but I know he's not happy with how things are and I have no idea how long he's going to wait for me to fix myself. I can't fix myself without him (because seriously, vaginal dilators, while useful, are no use for me right now) but I can't keep stringing him along like this. I don't want his stupid dickhead arsehole wanking housemates to be right. I don't want to have to imagine them in my head telling him that he's better off without me, because I know they would.
My whole shitty life is a mess right now and all I can think about is making it easier on everyone. I don't deserve to be here. He deserves so much more than I can give him. I'm a failure and I just shouldn't exist.
Help
. 0
Comments
polycistic ovary syndrome (PCOS, a few of us here have it), did they test you for that when you reported the pain? One of the features of it is insulin resistance, so without medication you retain glucose without converting it to glycogen. You could also ask your doctor if you're hypothyroid (underactive thyroid gland).
It's worth ruling these things out; I spent years feeling shit before I realised it wasn't my fault.
Hope you can stay strong.
I'm sure he doesn't hate you, but is hurting for the unhappiness this is causing you - and physical contact is a way that we show care and try to comfort - to find that that is making things worse for you be saddening for him.
I get the sex thing, I really do. And the conversations about feeling comfortable, about no pressure, about maybe therapy, about whether it was something I did. It goes round and round in circles every day, week, month. Nothing ever seems to change it even if you try hard, you pretend sex doesn't matter in the hope that not thinking about it will take the stress off. But in the end it was all for naught.
I think in future relationships for ME personally, when things are that up in the air with every encounter mired in stress and worry, you either work on fixing it immediately, or call it a day, because relationships are supposed to be fun and happy and if they're not something has gone wrong, somewhere.
That's just me though and my experience, I wouldn't want to put myself through that stress again. So my only advice for you, is as I said above - work out what you want from a relationship, and ask yourself frankly, is this what you are getting? If not, can it be changed? If it can, how can you change it?
edit: not trying to be doom and gloom btw, just think sometimes you need to stop and think - where is this going?
I'll have a look at PCOS. Especially now that I'm sleeping badly again. That comes with painful periods and excess body hair, right?
Amongst other things. For me it was painful periods, excess weight, excess body hair, depression. Patient UK's info on PCOS.
After Theo was born, Laura had problems, basically it was really really painful down there, and it made our sex life nearly dead for 2 and a bit years, I know how he felt, he probably does blame himself, I did the same, purely as her lack of wanting (caused by the pain) made me feel unattractive to her, I wish I could say telling him it is not him and not to blame himself, would work but for me it didn't,
Do you believe therapy could help? not just with the intimacy issues but also the telephone problems?
I wish you the best, but as shyboy said, what are you wanting from this? this is more important than anything.
Um no, sorry. Not least because people can't be failures, cause that implies that there's never any hope for anything in their future, and there is ALWAYS hope.
A plane can fail to fly, and a car can fail to reach a land speed record, but a person cannot fail to be a person, a decent, worthy, lovely person until they are no longer for this world, and you, my lady, have got a whole load of time left. Oh, and having sex problems and gaining weight does not mean in any way that you are not a decent, worthy, lovely person, actually.
What it means is that life is shit sometimes, and right now you are face down in the shit. And I KNOW it's hard, god knows I've spent plenty of time arse over tit in the shit myself, but it's not forever. What you need to do is keep trying to change things. Try and try and try again, and I promise you that one day you WILL change things.
And in the meantime, you have a lot of people around for these kind of epic, rambly pep talks to keep you kicking :wave:
You're gonna make such an awesome mummy