Guilt and shame surrounding sexuality

Greetings,

Lately, I've been experiencing some troubling thoughts surrounding my sexuality. When I feel horny, or if I have a sexual experience of any kind, I sometimes feel overwhelmed by guilt and shame. It doesn't happen all the time, but it's been happening more and more recently. I can give two examples of cases where this happens, but before I get into that sort of detail, it might help to have a little background information on my recovery so far:

I have been actively focused on recovering from my addiction to porn for about four years. I failed many times for most of that time, relapsing over and over again and spiraling into a cycle of shame and hopelessness. A couple of months ago, I found this community, which has been enormously helpful. It helped me realize two important factors: that I couldn't defeat my addiction on my own, and that abstinence from pornography isn't enough to overcome an addiction. Since then, I've told my girlfriend about my addiction and of my plans for recovery, and I started seeing a therapist (which has been massively helpful in tackling this issue). I am in the final stretch of a 90-day reboot right now, but 90 days is more of a milestone for me than an end-goal. I see 90 days as a new beginning, as the point where I really have a second chance to live a porn-free life, which is really my end-goal. My end-goal is to completely remove pornography from my life, and to restore a healthy mindset about my own sexuality. One final, but relevant, detail: I am allowing myself to masturbate and have sex during my reboot. I know this is controversial on this forum, but I believe masturbation (in moderation) can be a healthy part of one's sex life (unlike porn), and one of my recovery goals is actually to get to a point where I am more comfortable with the idea of masturbating.

Now, for two examples of cases in which I feel incredibly guilty and shameful about my sexuality... At this point, I have a higher sex drive than my girlfriend, meaning that I want to have sex more often than she does, and there are many times where I propose having sex and she will turn me down. I am well aware that imbalances in sex drive come and go in long term relationships, and I don't consider her lower sex drive to be a deal-breaker for our relationship. Having said that, here are my two examples:

1) Sometimes, when I spend time with my girlfriend, I get extremely horny for her and I want to have sex, but she tells me she is not in the mood. I completely respect her boundaries there, and I really appreciate that she is comfortable enough with me to tell me that she's not in the mood. I don't know if my body is unique in this respect, but sometimes getting turned down for sex can be severely painful in my groin region. Sometimes, it is so painful I can hardly walk. In cases like these, I see masturbation (without porn, of course) as a healthy alternative because it relieves the sexual tension in my body and relieves the physical pain. This is a solution that my girlfriend and I have discussed, and she is comfortable with me doing that in cases where she is not able to have sex with me. Nevertheless, when I do it, I still feel incredibly guilty. I feel horribly ashamed. It feels like I am slipping back into my old habits, even though I know I am not. This does not happen very often (maybe once every other week), but it is usually the only reason I masturbate these days, and it is always a rough experience for me. I don't see masturbation as a replacement for sex, and I obviously prefer having sex with my girlfriend to masturbating, but I think of it as a logical, healthy alternative when sex is not an option. Even though I think of it that way, my body still seems to reject it when I do it. My theory surrounding this is that my habits with pornography almost always included masturbation. For years and years, I would almost always watch porn when I masturbated, and I would almost always masturbate if I was watching porn. This behavior has made porn and masturbation almost synonymous in my mind, and I think this may be the key to understanding the shame and guilt I feel surrounding masturbation, even when I'm not watching porn.

2) Sometimes, I will talk with my girlfriend about sex and the difference in our sex drives with the goal of understanding what she is going through and what things feel like in her body. These conversations always end up in the same place: we will agree that there is an imbalance between our sex drives, both of us agree that this is something we can work through and something that we want to keep an open conversation about, but then I start to feel guilty about even asking her for sex in the first place. It almost feels like there's a demon in my head, saying stuff like this:

• You're too sexual, you freak.
• You're pushing her away with all these sexual advances
• You think about sex too much / you put too much value in sex
• You'll never have a normal sex life because of your addiction

I know that none of these thoughts are true, but they still resonate within me loudly. It feels horrible, and my girlfriend can sense that I'm feeling this way about myself through my body language whenever we talk about this stuff. I become very insecure and apologetic, and it makes her uncomfortable. I don't know exactly where these self-critical thoughts are coming from, but they're there despite their absurdity, and I don't know why they come up when I talk with my girlfriend about our sex drives. I'm sure that my addiction or my recovery has something to do with it (maybe my addiction lashing out at me for putting it to sleep?), but it's not clear to me how all the dots are connected.

Anyway, if you've read this far, I really appreciate it. I'm reaching out because I've always found this to be a really supportive community, and it would be invaluable if I knew someone else had been through something like this before while recovering. I would appreciate any advice / insight / words of wisdom. Thanks so much.

-Ridley

 

Thanks for taking the time to respond, and thanks for the encouraging words. I know that I've come a long way since I realized porn was a problem for me about four years ago, and I consider both the openness with my girlfriend and the decision to start seeing a therapist to be huge steps in the right direction.

Thank you for the tip. I will certainly look into it and see if I find it useful as well.

Yeah, I think I've reached a point in my recovery process where the only way for me to proceed is to learn to forgive myself, love myself for who I am, and find enjoyment in everyday things. It's difficult, and sometimes that destructive self-talk is so loud I can't hear the music of life itself.

Thanks again for taking the time to respond. It means a lot to know I'm not alone.

 

Hey, thanks for responding, and thank you for the encouraging words. I think a large amount of my success thus far has been due to realizing that a life of porn usage is a life of slavery (or 'shackles' as you put it). A life without porn is a life of freedom, and I'm just starting to realize how that it something to be celebrated.

Congratulations I'm glad you've seen such success.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who struggles with that. I'm glad you're meeting your goals!

I don't really see it as a problem. It's just the way things are right now, and it's okay. We are still intimate with one another on so many other levels (emotionally, conversationally, spiritually, etc). All things considered, she and I have a very healthy sex life, and I'm grateful that porn hasn't taken away my sex life with her. My struggle is more of an internal one: it's about the way I feel about myself and my own sexuality. As I said in my OP, differences in sex drive come and go in long term relationships, so I don't really think of it as a problem or a deal-breaker in our relationship.

I think I'm starting to dig deep into that, and it's part of why I made this post in the first place. So far, the only thing I can think of is what I said in my OP: I think I masturbated to pornography so many times over the last decade or so that the two have become synonymous in my mind. However, porn and masturbation are not synonymous: porn is a perversion of sexuality, it reinforces an idea that sexual satisfaction comes from images on a screen and from novelty and from an abundance of potential partners. Masturbation is about your body, and when you do it without porn (and without fantasizing about porn, as you touched on), it reinforces an idea that sexual satisfaction comes from your body, which is true (it also comes from connection with another person, which is why masturbation is never as good as sex with a real person). I know that these two things are different, but my mind still confuses the two, and the feelings of shame and guilt that I have from watching porn often get wrapped up with my feelings when I masturbate, even though I'm masturbating without porn or fantasizing about porn.

 

Thanks for responding, and that's very encouraging to hear. I feel things getting stronger between me and her as well.

Yes, I have been entrapped for about a decade, so it will definitely take some time to heal.

Also, that is a real, tangible answer, and it's actually a rather encouraging one. I expect it to take a significant amount of time before that connection between P&M really starts to break down. My therapist has also given me similar advice surrounding that, and he also said it's going to take some time to heal. The more I talk about it with him (and other people I trust, like my girlfriend), the more I journal about it privately, and the more I discuss the matter in this forum, the more understanding I gain about it. I can feel myself healing, even if it is a slow crawl. Thanks again for responding. It really helps.

 

Hey, @GhostWriter, thanks for taking the time to read through and respond. I really appreciate your time.

It tells me quite a lot. Sex is very complicated, and it amounts to a lot more than just two bodies moving together. It's about her and how she feels about herself, it's about me and how I feel about myself, it's about our relationship, it's about how we feel about one another, it's about how comfortable I feel with myself (and she with herself), and lots of other stuff as well. Many different factors can influence someone's sex drive: your diet, your mental health (depression can be a major factor), exercise (or lack thereof), medication, etc.

All of these underlying factors are far more important to me than the frequency of sex that we have. So, to answer your original question, it tells me that one or more things in that list of items in the previous paragraph is out of balance. I think she and I are aware of this and are doing our best to keep an open conversation going about it, and I can feel us healing one another.

I do not see how I am repeating the same thing over and over again. Masturbation without pornography is a new step for me in life. It is something that I have not ever done before (only a few times since I started recovery), and it is not something I am trying over and over again. I am learning about myself and the role I want masturbation to play in my life. I'm trying to figure out what direction you're trying to point me in with this comment, but I'm a little lost. Are you saying that you don't think I will ever not feel ashamed / guilty about masturbating?

I had a feeling people would doubt me about that detail, but I can assure you that the pain is very physical. It is not something that lasts for a few minutes and goes away as soon as I get up and do something productive for an hour. It has lasted throughout an entire day for me multiple times. It can become very bad sometimes, to the point where it makes it difficult for me to walk. From my research, it seems to be uncommon (or maybe not generally well understood). I can only state that it is extremely real for me, and that it's difficult to explain because only I know what things feel like inside my body.

I think the main question I've answered is why I feel so horrible after I masturbate. I think I have a pretty decent understanding about that: It's because porn and masturbation are practically synonymous in my mind, and a lot of the feelings of guilt / shame that go hand-in-hand with pornography come up when I masturbate (even when doing so without porn). I know that porn and masturbation are separate things, and it's going to take time before my brain is comfortable with the idea of masturbating.

I have taken your advice and read and re-read what I have posted here, but I don't think I'm seeing what might be very clear to you. As you've said, I am not even aware that I have answered some of my own questions, and I can't be aware of which things I am unaware of.

Would you mind elaborating a bit more on this? Not only is my knowledge of brain regions limited, but I also don't know which decisions you are talking about.

I agree with you, but I don't know that we agree for the same reason. I agree with that statement because I think that masturbation can be a healthy part of one's sex life, but that it hasn't been for the majority of my life because of my use of pornography. I don't believe masturbation is inherently unhealthy, but I believe pornography (or fantasizing about pornography) is. I am not sure where you stand on that matter, so I'll ask: do you think that my brain isn't okay with masturbation because of my past experiences and behaviors, or do you think that it isn't okay with masturbation because there's something inherently unhealthy about masturbating? If you believe the latter, could you elaborate on your answer? I want to learn and to try to see what you see.

Don't worry, I haven't taken it that way. I know you're here to help me, and I really appreciate you taking time to write in such detail.

 

It makes sense, but I don't think I need to go to that level at this point in my life. It has already taken me a large amount of courage and sacrifice to join this forum, to tell my girlfriend (and some of my family members) about my addiction, and to start seeing a therapist, and I am very happy with the success I have seen thus far. I appreciate the advice, but I don't think sex camp is the right answer for me at this point in my life.

 

I understand there is a difference, and I am quite familiar with some of the (scarce, mind you) research that has been done on the effects of masturbation on the brain. I believe part of the reason the research is so scarce is because it is difficult to find subjects who do not regularly engage in masturbation to compare to those who do. I have researched the topic, and am always open to reading more on the subject, but most of the results I find are inconclusive at best and misleading at worst, whether the researcher is arguing that masturbation is unhealthy or not.

The quotations are confusing me. Are you meaning to suggest that the activity I've described in my OP is not masturbation, but rather something else?

I have determined that, but it is not a rock solid belief. I am still very sensitive and confused about the place masturbation takes in my life, and the place that I want it to take. Overall, I believe that it is okay and that it is a healthy, natural part of human life. I have the humility to accept that I might be wrong about this fact, but I haven't yet been convinced otherwise.

I have engaged in some of these debates myself, and the conclusion I've come to is that the subject matter is not clearly understood. I do not cherry pick, and my goal is not to prove to anyone (even myself) that masturbation is healthy. My goal is to understand reality and to see the truth. If you believe I have not yet seen the light on this matter, that's fine, and I think we can respectfully agree to disagree on the matter.

No, it's not. I have not even provided any resources to you in this conversation to support my conclusions. I have simply stated what I believe, and we have not even had a proper conversation on the matter. It is clear to me now that we disagree, but I'm also sensing a reluctance to discuss the matter (as per your comment that it has been discussed "ad nauseam"), so again, I'll just suggest we agree to a truce for now.

That's a lot to assume about me, considering we haven't even engaged in a proper debate on the matter. Actually, I'm quite open to discussion surrounding masturbation, and I have the humility and the rationality to accept that my conclusions may be misguided. It may be that I have yet to see the light, but as I've stated, I think the role of masturbation in human life is generally not well understood. It's a highly controversial matter (especially on this forum), and I think there's a lot of gray area surrounding it.

There's an implicit assumption here that I have never abstained from masturbation before, which is false. I have abstained from masturbation for extended periods of time in my life before (up to several months).

It does not currently have a stranglehold on my life, though I agree that it did before I seriously committed to recovery. Contrary to that, I actually have felt quite liberated from it lately. I do not feel a compulsion to masturbate, and it does not feel like I am doing it because I am out of control. I feel like I decide when I masturbate, rather than masturbation being a constant thorn in my side that I have to structure my life around. I understand that if you believe masturbation is inherently unhealthy, this isn't going to convince you of my conclusions anyway, but I'm stating it mostly so that you can understand my position, and not to try and persuade you.

 

The part of your comment that says you don't have time for this when there are many people who seek help implies that I am not seeking or wanting help. You are implying that I am not worth your time, and that I am not worth the potential help you have to offer to others on this forum. Please, think about how that looks from my perspective. You are essentially dismissing any notion that I am worthy of help simply because I believe something differently from you. I am not arguing with you. I am not trying to force my opinions on you, and I am not trying to convince you to believe anything other than what you already believe. I am simply asking for your perspective, and you are dismissing me.

Just to be clear: I do want help, and I do value your opinion, and I take conversations like these into consideration when weighing my options and when shaping my actions. I would not have created this thread if this was not true.

I believe that porn addiction (or any addiction, for that matter) is a brain disease, so I am not in denial about that. I don't know what I might have said that suggests otherwise.

I have not asked for any proof. Are we reading the same thread?

What masturbation argument? I have not posed forward any argument in favor or against masturbation...

 

If you feel that your resources are better spent somewhere else, then that's fine. I don't take offense to that, and I don't believe I need to be on anyone's priority list. I appreciate the time you've put into responding here, and I don't want to come off like I don't recognize that. I just don't want to give the impression that, because of my beliefs about masturbation, I don't want or need help. I do need help, and I have asked many questions during our conversation.

Maybe this is the one I should have been asking (sorry, it's a long one):

To be totally clear with you, I don't know what to believe about masturbation. I was raised in an environment where I received mixed messages about it. On the one hand, my parents were very hush-hush about it, and my father even once told me that people who do it are pathetic losers. On the other hand, they told me that it was a natural part of growing up and discovering your body. I have talked with my parents about my addiction to porn since I started my recovery, and even after coming clean with them about that, they still remind me "you know it's still healthy for you to masturbate sometimes, right?" I have talked with my closest friends and my brother about it, too, and I've received similar responses from them. My current girlfriend believes masturbation is a healthy part of human sexuality, and every girlfriend I've had before that has had a similar opinion. In short, every authority and emotionally supportive figure in my life has told me that masturbation is okay, and that it's not something that I should feel ashamed or guilty about. Nevertheless, my brain tells me otherwise, and I've been in many debates with people on this forum over whether or not is damaging. The debates haven't given me any clarity on the matter, but at the very least they've helped me realize that I ought to be questioning whether or not masturbation is healthy, so I've looked into it and reflected on it (with no luck). I have researched the topic to the best of my abilities, and every time I end up more confused than I was before: I know that random google searches for healthiness on masturbation are bound to pull up clickbait-tier articles written by people who don't know what they're talking about, so I look a bit deeper than that. I look through academic and medical journals for peer reviewed sources that demonstrate the validity of their conclusions using falsifiable, repeatable experiments. I've looked through the PubMed databases, I've looked through the International Journal on Sexual Medicine, I've looked through the Oxford Journal on Sexual Health, every time searching for keywords "masturbation", "masturbation and relationships", "masturbation and sexual health", "excessive masturbation", "masturbation and pornography", etc. In short, I am making an effort to learn, and I am keeping an open mind all the way through. Having done that, I am still confused. I am not able to come to the conclusion that masturbation is unhealthy. I've seen that masturbation is more common for people in relationships than single people, I've seen that people who are more depressed tend to masturbate more often, I've seen that masturbation decreases stress levels, I've seen that masturbation has been used as treatment for certain sexual disorders, I've seen that shame / guilt about masturbating has been given a medical definition and is recognized by sexual therapists as a treatable condition, I've seen that masturbation increases the prevalence of certain hormones in the body. It's all very fascinating to me, but none of it seems to compel me to believe either way, so I guess I default on what the people in my life have been telling me and, admittedly, what feels good for my body. So, here's my question: Why am I so confused about masturbating? Is it because of my addiction, or is it because it really is a difficult topic to understand? What can I do to find clarity on the matter?

Again, I really appreciate your help, and I'm sorry if I have pushed you down a path you have been down with many addicts many times before. I am not trying to fight against you or your words. I embrace learning and I embrace change, and I feel that I could be on the brink of discovering something really important about myself.

 

Actually, no one ever really explained to me how to do it. I really did discover it on my own one night when I was alone in my room during puberty. I agree that the idea just didn't "poof" into my head, as I had learned that penises could be used for sex (though, at that point, I really didn't know what sex was), but no one explained how to go through the motions to me in detail..

I think it comes down to the particular details of the relationship. I generally have a good relationship with my parents, and I figure the more people who are a part of my support network, the better off I will be when recovering. They may not always offer the best advice, but I'm glad that they know what I'm going through. I'm not worried about gossip, either. I can't think of anyone they could possibly gossip about this to that would affect me in any way, and the same goes with my friends.

It's not just my parents. It's really everyone that I know at a personal level. I know that if everyone believes in unicorns, that doesn't mean that unicorns exist, but it just makes things more confusing and complicated for me. I have a healthy enough level of skepticism that I'm not going to believe something just because everyone around me is saying it's true, but I also have a healthy enough level of curiosity that I'm going to look into things for myself, and even when I've done that I haven't had much luck.

I can't think of anyone in my network of people who could find out about this where it would possibly make a difference in my life.

I'm sorry, but that's a gross oversimplification of some very complex relationships with a lot of moving parts. Whether masturbation was an issue or not in any of my previous relationships, it was not the reason that things went south. If you want to know the particular details of why I have a few ex-girlfriends, I'm happy to go into detail about it, but I can assure you that abstaining from masturbation would not have been enough to save those relationships, even if it would have made things better while we were dating.

Actually, I stay away from search engine searches when I'm looking for scientific publications, because of the "clicks"="revenue" issue you mentioned. When I search for scientific publications, I search in academic journal databases, or in databases for science and engineering libraries. However, I think the odds are against you finding relevant information even when you search in those sorts of databases. There's an ocean of interesting, rigorously-demonstrated information out there, but a lot of it is irrelevant to the questions I want answered about masturbating.



About the search function you wrote, I really appreciate the time you took to write that and to explain it to me. I will put it to good use. There's no need to explain any further. I'm more than familiar with Boolean logic (though I didn't know you could use it to create more complex search engine inputs, so thanks for that). Here are some of the subjects I specialized in while I was in school:

• Boolean logic
• Symbolic logic
• Mathematical logic
• Modal logic
• Temporal logic
  
• The SAT problem
• Soundness and completeness of logical languages
• Set theory
• Model theory

I've spent way too much time studying logic