Body parts

[Catnime]

Hi, I'm a 21 year old lesbian, and I'm in a relationship. My partner wants to get more involved sexually, which I'm fine with, but I've never been comfortable with the idea of my own vagina. The thought of touching myself horifies me. She has done things to me and I'm fine as long as she's the one touching me. She's been slow and I haven't had the chance to touch her at all, so I don't know if my discomfort entends to other vaginas. Is there something wrong with me? Is this normal? What can I do to fix this?

[Jacob]

Hi Catnime!

Welcome to scarleteen!

I'm sorry to hear you're feeling uncomfortable and frustrated. It does sound good that you are enjoying what you have been doing with your partner and that it sounds like she is being considerate, and that's awesome.

With the touching your own vulva, I don't think this is wrong or abnormal... people feel many many different ways about doing different sexual things. There's no right way to feel about pleasure, or what is unpleasurable. I would say taking pressure off yourself to feel a different way and judging the way you're feeling will be a really good first step if you do want to explore further and get more comfortable touching yourself.

It sounds like moving slow within your relationship has worked so far for creating sensations that feel nice and at least ok as you become more comfortable. Maybe the same strategy could work as you move forward with your own self-pleasure. Starting slow, not putting any pressure on yourself to have any particular outcome. Just take notice of what feels nice, what feels uncomfortable, and do more of the former and less of the latter. You might want to focus on other parts of your body which do feel nice... and see if that change in comfort levels leads to feeling any different about direct touching, or you may discover other sensations or body parts which work for you. This sounds like it might work with your partner too.

The best thing I can advise is to talk about it, read about it, and feel it out, while making sure you aren't putting yourself through anything unecessarily uncomfortable.

Demistifying your sexual anatomy could be useful too, and understanding how it works, so that it becomes a bit more real, and less of a 'scary-thing'.

Does this help? Is there other parts to your story that might be contributing or which you might need assistance with?


(Here's a great place to start reading:
With Pleasure: A View of Whole Sexual Anatomy for Every Body)