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[sky]

Hey everyone!

So I’ve been talking to this girl for awhile, we had plans to meet but I freaked out and told her I couldn’t do this and I blocked her. I cried a lot because I really want her. I went to therapy and she helped me realize I was molested not to long ago and that’s why I have so much fear etc. I’m gonna talk more about it with her to figure out how to push past.

My question though is, I really like her, we both have vaginas, she’s okay with going my pace but what I wanna know is, can we have a healthy/good sex life with not taking off clothes? Does that make sense?

[Mo]

I'm glad you were able to have a productive conversation with your therapist. How is therapy going overall, right now?

In terms of sex, it's possible to have a healthy and satisfying sex life without removing clothes, if that's what everyone involved is comfortable with. There's no one way that a sexual or physically intimate relationship has to operate; part of how you craft a healthy relationship is for both people to be able to talk about what they do and don't find appealing or comfortable for them and make mutually beneficial decisions based on that.

[sky]

I’ve only been once and it was super rough. So rough that I ended up relapsing on cutting because I couldn’t handle the way I was feeling. 4 months down the drain. But I’m okay now, until Wednesday when I go again.

Yes she’s okay with the way I wanna do things (not having clothes off) but she’s 10000% open to having real sex. Idk what to call it, oral is I guess a better terming for it.

[sky]

I told her I wasn’t gay and asked to be friends and she said no. So, I’m giving up fully on relationships, forever. I don’t wanna go to therapy today or ever again

[Heather]

I'm not sure I understand why (if I have this right) you felt like you had to be dishonest with the girl you were talking to -- telling her you weren't gay -- in order to ask for a platonic relationship. Do you want to talk about that?

I'm sorry to hear about your relapse, and that the therapy appointment you had was tough. Why do you think it was?

I have also noticed you do forever-pronouncements often -- in other words, that you have a bad experience or don't want to do something and instead of allowing yourself to decide not to do something for now, or even just to feel your feelings about a thing not having gone how you'd like, you go to saying you won't do it/don't want it/forever. I'm wondering how you feel like that serves you, especially given that -- like anything any of us put a forever on -- that's never how it winds up playing out. Do you want to talk about that?

[sky]

Well I don’t wanna be gay so, I like about it when I catch feelings and I really liked her and I miss her. Therapy was hard because I got triggered about the sexual assault and I spiraled out of control. Sure we can talk about it all

[Heather]

I'm sorry that's how a first visit was for you. Sometimes that can happen if we so never ever talk about a thing so have it locked up so tight that any address of it is massive: is that the kind of thing that happened for you? Were you able to talk about it with the therapist?

Separate from your feelings about being gay -- a conflict anyone can understand given the world we live in -- why tell someone you liked, someone gay themselves, no less, that you aren't when you know you are? I have my own guesses, but I'm curious what you think about why you did that.

Per the forever stuff, what do you feel like it gives you to say you're done with/over something forever, even though you know from experience that's not how the things you say that about play out?

[sky]

Hey heather,

Yes that’s how the first appointment want, I talked to her about it. I don’t know but now I think I am ace again and I’m nb trans masc and I don’t know anymore

[Heather]

Hey, sky. You know, my sense of you over all the time you have been here is that you are someone who is questioning. "I just don't know" paired with a pretty nonstop round robin of different identities is what questioning usually looks like. Do you think that that's an identity you can just let yourself have for a while instead of -- what seems to me, anyway -- trying so hard to land on something, make it fit and cement yourself to it?

[sky]

Is that an okay identity to have?

[Heather]

Absolutely!

One, ANY identity is an okay identity to have, this one very much included. There is nothing wrong with being questioning nor identifying that way.

"I'm questioning right now." Try it on. How does that feel?

http://www.scarleteen.com/article/polit ... uestioning

[sky]

Okay well I cried a bit when I read that so I’m assuming that means it works haha

[Heather]

I suspect you probably feel relieved. It's exhausting, IMO, trying to put yourself in a place when you're just not somewhere yet, trying to fit into boxes that don't really or don't yet fit again and again.

[sky]

Yes relived. It’s extremely exhausting. I have a question for you and I don’t know how to word it so I’ll try my best so you understand. Can sex/relationships be a trauma thing? Because I’m afraid to Get into a relationship because I could be abused again and I’m afraid to have sex because I don’t like people touching me. I’m 99.9% sure I was also molested by my best friends brother when I was a kid and ever since after him I never really like physical touch of any form. But I do get horny and stuff and I fantasize about being with someone who I like but the idea of that actually happening is, terrifying. The thought of someone touching me while kissing me rips me up, which is why I always try to be drunk and then even when I am I’m still very afraid. So that’s why I’m using the ace label again but it’s trauma related so is it actually valid? I hope I made sense

[Heather]

ABSOLUTELY. In fact, sex and intimate relationships are two places that are most likely to bring up or cue trauma for us and where it can be hardest to manage our trauma. How you're feeling is so normal.

You know, it's not anyone's business why you use a label you do, IMHO. I also want to make sure that you know that in the event you don't know if you're ace, but you know that you are not able to be sexual with other people right now because of trauma, you are allowed to have that boundary without being ace. In other words, that can look something, in a conversation with someone else, for example, like this, "I have sexual desire but I also have some big trauma history and I'm not able to be physically sexual with other people right now or probably any time soon because of it." This is the kind of thing that people dealing with trauma and having intimacy/sexual issues because of it will say. It's not an uncommon thing to need or say, I promise.

But in the event that you don't feel able to do that and an ace label feels like the way you can have that boundary? I think that's okay, too. I think whatever you need to give yourself that boundary and avoid doing things that create even more sexual trauma for you -- like sex you have to get drunk for will, btw -- is a good thing, okay?

[sky]

I understand. It’s just the way I was raised it’s that someone won’t really love you unless you’re giving them sex. So I have in my mind that no one will love me unless i have sex with them. If they tell me they love me without sex then I will know that sex will make the love stronger. So I keep telling myself I have to be okay with sex and I just have to let someone insert whatever they want and then I’ll be able to be loved because all I want is to be loved. Stupid right.

[Heather]

That's certainly been clear to me (that you feel that way), but I'm so, so glad to hear you say it out loud. It's easier to get to the truth of our feelings when we can voice them.

It's not stupid that you feel that way: you likely believe that because messages you have been given and your history up until now has supported that belief. But that certainly is a false belief: in other words, it certainly isn't true. People who love us will do so without us effectively bartering for their love with sex. In fact, if we have to do that, we can be pretty sure whoever we have to do that for does NOT love us.

By all means, if and when we already have intimacy with someone, if we both can come to sex we both actually want, and come to it fully aware (not drunk, for instance) and have it in a way that gets us closer, yes, it can further our intimacy or love. But that's not just about sex, period -- just putting our body parts together can't do that, you know? It's about the *way* we are together.

I think it might also be good to try and remember that love isn't something we can or do only experience in sexual or romantic relationships. If and when we've experienced child sexual abuse -- or any kind of sexual abuse -- it can be common to believe that, but that's also false. And I think it's pretty clear that for you, it's probably really unhealthy for you to only try and find (and give) love that way, given all of this. For you, trying to create, nurture and gradually grow relationships that are platonic into mutually loving relationships is probably a much better place for you to start, IMHO.

[sky]

Thank you for understanding and letting me talk.

But intimacy is always touching, so I don’t know if I can even have that so I stick to talking to people online but then it hurts me because I’m incapable of love or intimacy. Fuck my life.

[Heather]

Touching in only one KIND of intimacy, actually. How about you read this, then we talk more?

http://www.scarleteen.com/article/polit ... and_sonots

[sky]

Yeah intimacy is not for me

[Jacob]

Did you get a look at the peice Heather shared? It defines intimacy very very broadly. Including non-physical, non-sexual stuff.

[sky]

Yeah, and I just don’t wanna do any of that.

[Heather]

So, here's the thing: in order for us to experience love in something other than a broad, general way, we have to love ourselves, and in order to get to those places, intimacy of some kind generally has to be involved. We have top be willing to be vulnerable with someone else and vice-versa, and share the kinds of things in that piece in trust and with care. When we do, over time, and we do so, both mutually and in a mutually caring and healthy way, that's basically how love grows.

If we don't want to do any of that, then yeah, love relationships aren't going to be a thing we have.

If we want to do things like that, including because we want to experience love, but we don't feel able to -- either because we're too scared of getting hurt, don't feel resilient enough -- we can work on that over time to see if we can change any of that, and we often can. Same goes with learning how to be safe for others and pick safe people, build trust, all of that.

Is the issue something like that, or is it more like that you just have no interest in actually being in a mutually intimate relationship, what you're looking for is more just wanting to feel love from someone else without building or sustaining a shared relationship that love can mutually grow and be mutually shared in?

[sky]

I’m afraid because I think I’m just seen as someone easy to manipulate and abuse so I’m just not gonna date or anything

[Heather]

I hear that.

So, it sounds to me like something that tells you is that an initial step you'll need to take in order to be able to seek out love relationships is to learn how to emotionally protect yourself, probably including going very gradually with building relationships, so that you can be and feel more safe.