Arousal response from fear

[JT_B]

I have a childhood trauma history. When my nervous system is very activated, my body (I have a vulva) has a response similar to sexual arousal with lubricating/ “getting wet”/ swelling/ etc… It’s really confusing, and I feel a lot of shame and powerlessness around this. To clarify- I don’t feel sexually turned on when I’m activated but my body acts as if it is. It feels like my body is broken because fear, anxiety, fright, freeze mode make my body act as if it’s sexually aroused when I’m not. Being on Testosterone has only made this worse where I even thought I had peed once when it really was just my body going into that mode. My health care provider told me this can happen for people who have experienced sexual trauma. I trust her yet I worry she might just be saying that to make me feel less ashamed. I bring all this up because I have a pelvic exam with her next week which is activating and scary on its own but then I also feel so distressed over the fact that when I’m anxious my body acts like it’s preparing for sex.

Anyway, I am posting here because I need some reassurance that I’m not the only one who has experienced this. I can’t find any articles online about other people experiencing this. I only can find articles about how during actual abuse it can be normal for a victims body to respond in that way…. But I can’t find anything about sexual abuse survivors bodies experiencing arousal response from fear and anxiety for many years afterward.
Having this experience normalized or more understanding for myself I feel like might help me with the shame and fear, and also the resent I feel towards my body.
(And to be clear Im not asking for resources around the pelvic exam- that was just more context and It would feel like too much to talk or read about right now- super activating topic to dive into even though my doc is the best and safe. I just want to understand this response my body has to fear. ) thank you!!!!!

[Carly]

Hey JT_B -- up top I want to thank you for trusting us with your story, it sounds like this is a deeply personal topic for you. There can be so much stigma around this, and I know how hard it can be to open up sometimes. Your doctor isn't just trying to comfort you, this is definitely something that survivors can experience. I personally have not, but I'm hoping that folks that have feel comfortable chiming in for support. I think it's important to understand that just because there isn't a lot of information out there doesn't mean that it doesn't happen, especially with experiences like this that often do come with feelings of shame or confusion. In the meantime, sex educator Emily Nagoski has a TED Talk on arousal non-concordance, the term used for when there's a disconnect between physical response and the experience of pleasure or desire, that might feel comforting to you. There are also some other message boards that focus specifically on survivors - like Pandora's Project - where you might be able to reach others who are working on this as well.

I know you said you're not really looking for pelvic exam resources, but I wanted to check in still -- is this your first one? Do you want to talk through anything? It sounds like you're developing a good relationship with doctor, and I'm hoping that will put you at ease a little bit. Let us know!

[JT_B]

Thank you Carly! I just watched Emily Nagoski's talk (thank you for that btw!). I liked Pavlov reference of how the dog doesn't want to eat the bell or thinks the bell tastes good. And the point on "genital behavior doesn't predict subjective experience". The aspect that I am still hung up on though is Emily only mentions arousal non-concordance for sex related stimulus. I seem to experience arousal non-concordance for NON sex-related stimulus such as panic and anxiety attacks, intense feeling of fear, flight or freeze mode/ nervous system activation for non-sex related triggers. For example, I could be really activated over something triggering that someone says or does or finding out bad news or my nervous system perceiving a threat, and my body has that genital arousal behavior. So I would be really curious in hearing if anyone has known of that being a thing for anyone else. And I guess rare, worst case scenario if let's say no one on this planet has ever experienced that except for me...that doesn't automatically mean I am broken and gross. My need for reassurance I think is to calm the part of me that's shameful and fearful of my own body and its' responses, and that those arousal responses feel like my body endangering me. I suppose it could make sense that due to my abuse history where I felt extreme fear and anxiety and freeze mode during abuse that now my body has that arousal response tied to fear & anxiety even if there's no sexual component with the fear and anxiety nowadays. or at least that's my theory?

And thanks for the offer of resources/ support re: exam, but I really cannot go any further into addressing/discussing the exam as a whole here outside of just the arousal specific piece I am mentioning. There's a lot of complexity with the exam stuff and I have a plan around it. I'm afraid parts of me would just become more guarded or feel worse by accepting resources or discussion around the exam due to some of the complexity and particular history of mine that would take a lot of explaining. Sometimes when people give me advice around that exam stuff or try to send me resources, I feel worse because there's so many barriers I have that are overlooked or not addressed so I feel more discouraged, activated, alone and not seen. But thank you for the offer

[Mo]

While I don't have a specific citation or any research to point to around this, I have heard a couple people I know discuss this sort of arousal response from a frightening situation. None of them went into a lot of detail about their experiences, so I don't have much detail to provide beyond that, but I can at least say this is something I've heard of before. I wish I had more information to provide here, but hopefully it's at least a little helpful to know this is something other folks experience.

[Michaela]

Hi JT_B,

Emily breaks down the idea really well, but you're right, she doesn't talk directly about arousal non-concordance with things that are not sex-related stimuli. I do not know your experiences or history so I cannot pretend to know exactly why your body reacts as it does. However, I can provide some more scientific evidence in support of the theory that you mentioned. The whole idea around Pavlov's dogs is called classical conditioning (here's a link if you want to read more about the science– I could probably find more resources too if you want). It’s the idea that a stimulus that is entirely neutral, like the bells, can be conditioned the create a bodily response through the pairing with another stimulus. This is something that psychologists have observed over and over again because it is a super common way that we, as humans, behave and react. Although a lot of the examples of it may be around things like hunger stimuli (Pavlov's dogs) it occurs in many different contexts and can be combined with ideas of arousal non-concordance if the conditioned response is physiological signs of arousal.

Let's take an example of something like nerves. Maybe person X decides to masturbate to relieve some nerves before an upcoming event. Then the next week they have an exam that they are feeling nervous about and they masturbate again because they might have found relief in it. Nervousness was an entirely neutral stimulus not connected to anything sexual. But, the next week they are standing waiting for the bus which is late and they are starting to feel nervous about missing an event and boom their body starts to react even though that person is not even remotely interested in anything sexual at that moment (instead they are in public chatting on the phone with their mom perhaps). So, classical conditioning can lead to arousal non-concordance and it is definitely not rare or unheard of. I could probably even brainstorm a whole lot of other examples of this phenomenon happening because it is so common.

So, it is entirely possible that something like this is happening, or maybe it's something different altogether. Bodies can do weird things sometimes that we don't always understand at first, but there is definitely nothing wrong or broken about it. Does this help to alleviate some of that shame and fear?

I wouldn't be surprised if you decide to share this experience in support groups or online forums for survivors of sexual abuse that there are many more who have experienced similar things. Also, just because your body is reacting in this way right now does not mean that it will react in this way forever. If you didn't pick up on it, I love psychology, and one of the reasons I do is because it has helped to show me how possible it is for people to grow and change if they desire to do so. <3

I want to mention that seeing a therapist could also help you to dig into it further to better understand why your body is reacting in the way it does. Would therapy be something you would be open to?