I have often thought that having no sexual feeling at all would be a blessing. Sex has always been a huge issue for me.
It was made a huge issue by parents who believed it wrong and dirty, nuns and priests who taught the same, and of course the sexual abuse I experienced didn’t help.
In Religious Education I was taught that good truly good people didn’t have sex. They were celibate. That is what God preferred. Falling short of that, then one could only have sex with a person one was married to, of the opposite sex of course, and then only in order to have children NOT to be enjoyed or had just for fun.
Masturbation was of course a mortal sin and in the case of men was akin to murder. Women didn’t masturbate of course. And they only menstruated if they had unclean thoughts because pure women did not menstruate. I kid you not.
So even before I reached puberty and experienced my own sexual feelings, I felt a heavy burden of guilt. I knew I was dirty and bad because of the sexual abuse I was experiencing and given my teaching about sex, I felt responsible. I did not feel I had no choice in the abuse. I felt I was the guilty party, I was the one who was indulging in wickedness. The one time I tried to tell, that is exactly the response I was given. Punishment and disgust. I didn’t tell again until I was much older, an adult, and I made the mistake of telling the local vicar and his wife who reacted the same way. They prayed for me to be forgiven.
I once in the depths of despair came very close to cutting my penis off. In that disturbed mental state I was in, I thought that this would accomplish two things: punishment and removal of sexual desire. I don’t know what stopped me, but I am glad I didn’t follow through.
The issue is sex. Not gay sex. Not straight sex. SEX. Had I been heterosexual, I’d have just the same issues. In fact worse, because children might well be in the picture and there is no way I could healthily parent children.
I feel positive about feelings of passion and love. Like those I have for John. I have never felt aht was wrong. It’s me. That’s the trouble with these idiots who think we CHOOSE sexuality. How daft can you can you get. Even dafter is the idea that it is about only sex. Dishonestly, people often give as their excuse for hating us that their religion prohibits us. That is not true. If they did not have this bigotry IN them, they would not accept their religious teaching on this. They seem to have no trouble in rejecting dress codes, food codes and the idea that women are subservient to men. To blame one’s bigotry upon a religious idea is disingenuous. There is no logic at all to thinking something wrong with homosexuality.
The trouble we have in society around sex is precisely because of the way we have debased it. Not through our sexual behaviour but through our teaching of sex as something wrong. When in fact it is a normal human impulse and not just for perpetuating human kind but also as a means of fulfilling deep spiritual and emotional needs.
There is no conclusion here. I am not about to write how I recovered from all this. I still would prefer to have no sexual desires at all. I still find it impossible to view sex, male female, male male, female female as okay. Intellectually I understand this is illogical and that sex IS okay. Some damage just takes a long time to be undone or just can’t be.
3 comments:
You're right. I'll say that I, as a woman, am probably a bit luckier than you in that I am one of those women who, after menopause, gradually lose sexual desire. Of course the fact that it becomes painful without taking hormone replacement factors into that, too. I think men tend to keep their sexual desires for a longer time than some of us females. There's no point in trying to make you "fixed." It just doesnt' work that way. I'm sorry, Colin, and I know you are handling this as well as anyone could.
Colin, I know what you mean about folks ignoring some parts of their religion's legal code: everyone I know, more or less, follows a "swiss cheese" bible. They like to throw darts at people they see as sinful, but ignore the parts which would condemn them. It's a BIG part of why I left the church and ministry.
Kim in IA
I never once spoke to my parents about sex as a child, but somehow managed to end up with what I believe is a healthy attitude toward sex. I try very hard to pass that on to my kids. I have always talked to them about sexuality, just as I have about any other physical or emotional aspect of life. I don't avoid the subject and I answer questions directly and honestly. I tell my kids that sex is normal and healthy, that it feels good, and that it is something to be shared between consenting adults, never between an adult and a child, never with force, and never if it scares you or makes you feel bad. I stress safe sex with them and when they are old enough, I will stock the house with condoms and make sure they know how to use them, although I have made it clear that I would much prefer they wait until they are old enough to deal with the physical and emotional consequences of sex. My boys are 10 and 13 now. They are both mortally embarrassed by the subject, but I know they have the information they need and hope they will grow up to have healthy, happy sexual relationships.
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