Scarleteen

So I have been going through a rough time. I grew up in the church and often times felt shame for wanting to have sex before I got married. A part of me really wants to explore sex and physical intimacy but at times i fear my views from the church. I want to break out of this but at times i don't know how. Even though in christianity masturbation is seen as sinful I do it anyway : )

I want to have sex and I know I will. I want positive sexual encounters but I don't know where to start. I'm hoping by viewing my body in a healthy way and engaging in safe sex will help me break out of the shame.

I rememeber when I was younger and I was masturbating in my room for the first time when I was in high school. I got walked in on and i was grounded for a month.

I'm willing to take the steps to get out of this shame so I can enjoy sex.

Hi staplesj,

Oof, the grounding on top of the already shame-based messages can really set the precedent in your brain that masturbation=bad. I think a good starting place is actually our Impurity Culture series; it's written by two authors who went through the process of unlearning the negative messages about sex from their religious upbringing. For instance, they actually wrote a piece engaging with the issue of masturbation: https://www.scarleteen.com/article/poli ... s_selfcare. I also find this article is a good starting point for unlearning some shame, especially if it's tied to ideas of sin: https://www.scarleteen.com/article/poli ... uality_sin