So I am in therapy, or pre-therapy really.
I hope to feel better about myself, more complete and have some control over myself from this exercise. Already I think just thinking about getting better has helped. At the same time, I feel like to some extent the therapy is only making me worse. Usually when I get stressed I resort to old tricks, but in this case its not the stress, its the ease with which my therapist handles these situations. If I were amongst normals I would feel guilty and embarrassed, they would make me feel that way -with looks and silence, disgust or genuine anger and inability to understand. My therapist however only wants to help me deal. Get me to stop feeling bad for the things that are part of me, and get me to feel good about stopping the things I claim to want to stop... but I never really know if I do or not.
I mean, I enjoy sniffing my roommates underwear. I love it! Its so exciting and so delicious. Yet I hate the idea that I would do that to her. Make her uncomfortable or betray her trust. Its got nothing to do with the underwear... and everything to do with my meeting my selfish desires while ignoring hers.
So my therapist asks me to write about one of these events to try to figure out what I am thinking and feeling at the time. I can't figure out when I am not thinking about it, which makes it hard to talk about... but when I just choose a moment to start writing about it I go on and on because my thoughts don't stop. They haven't ever stopped.
At any moment the desire is there.
Yet I understand the behavior is not impulsive... I am doing it after intentionally deciding to do it. When I retreat (as I did a minute ago before writing this) I do so intentionally feeling the situation is wrong.
The hardest thing though, is that I want to tell everyone. I want to tell my roommate, my friends my family my therapist. I sometimes even want to tell my coworkers things.
I get so excited both by the thing itself, and my feelings for people, and my desire to get rid of it all, and the process of letting it go that I want to rush through it.
I want to tell the world.
Probably because I am hoping they will react like my therapist.
But my therapist has been trained to pretend to not care... these people would all be hurt.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Sex Senses
Bless me Father for I have sinned, it has been almost two months since my last confession.
Like a predator I wait
for the smallest noise,
differentiating between the creaks of the floor boards and the seated weight.
Like a predator I stalk,
sniff the air for something vibrant
long to catch a whiff, the leavings of my prey.
Like a predator I follow,
steps behind my prey I watch and smell intently
catch moments of serenity in her absentmindedness
Unlike a predator of the animal kingdom in my kingdom I am detested
I am not watched on tv with so much excitement for the kill
but with animosity, the viewer self righteous and I the contemptible
I am feared
made a monster for the biological drives I give in to,
despised if I am open, humiliated if I am not
Readily identified as inhuman for following the scent,
attuning the ears and enjoying the possibilities of my attraction to another.
When we are little we play games like hide and seek, wait and listen for the approaching footsteps, love the intensity of the silence, the nervousness and exhilaration of the anticipation. I still do, on the other side of the door the subject of my affection relieves herself. The simple process and each sound so distinct... but the door muffles it. So I wait and listen intently. I pretend as if I am not listening. I pretend as if I am not concerned or wondering. I pretend as if I don't wish I was along side her, or if not that then recording the process. I pretend as if I haven't fantasized about her in the act, or with me. Watching, touching, tasting.
I pretend as if every part of my true self doesn't want to call out to her and say "I love you and everything you do, and want to experience it with you..." but I am reluctant, I pretend, for I know she would be disgusted. Would never look at me the same. Would feel nervous and scared to do anything natural around me. Would feel objectified and used. So I pretend... as if I wasn't a predator or a passionate lover (though perverted), and pretend to be normal. "Ick, girls don't use the bathroom."
A second confession.
I have been sneaking into her room. Carefully pulling and pushing aside the wrong garments to find prizes in her dirty laundry basket. I learned to do this so long ago. I must have been 11 or 12. I thought I had moved on.
I thought I had self control. I know she would be freaked out and hurt if she found out. I continue to sneak, like a child, like I am ashamed, like the world has taught me I should be.
I seek out the most strongly odored items. The shorts and underwear. Sometimes I can't contain myself and my tongue reaches out for more. I am glad she sweats, I love her smell, I love the scent of the room when she sleeps, I love following her when we walk.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Porn
"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been 15 days since my last confession."
I mentioned in my last post that I became quite the viewer of pornography. At times in my life I have spent 4-5 hours in front of a computer or tv screen, or reading a story or magazine that enticed my lust. I have questioned this desire many times, am I an addict?
By some definitions I could be:
Has it interfered with my relationships? Yes
Has it kept you from fulfilling other obligations? Yes
Has it made you tardy or absent from school/work? Yes
Has it changed the way you view the world and yourself? Yes
Has it kept you from meaningful relationships? No
Has it kept you from making new friends or interfered with family? Previous post excluded NO
Has it caused legal trouble? No
Has it caused the loss of a job or other similar punishment? No
Most importantly for many:
Does it make you see yourself or the opposite sex as an object? No, not in real life at least
I have a hard time taking these things seriously in that sense, am I voyeur by choice? Is it learned or genetic? Did it come from obsessive excitement seeking or was it already within me?
But could it affect my job, relationships with friends and family, future ability to pursue goals, Yes Yes Yes.
And is that worth it?
Well I would like to say no, I will stop this minute, its not worth the risk, but at the same time I am not sure I am A) capable B) want to C) have the support I would need D) have alternatives for my sex drive. I am not currently involved in a relationship. I am not currently interested in anyone in particular and I am not currently of the view that I should stop "using" porn and start "using" women I meet in person. (Does that make sense?)
It is easy to say, well then don't "use" them, get to know them etc, but we live in a society in which 25 % of the adult population lives alone, about 30 % of the population (in any age group) is single at any given moment, about 50 % of marriages end in divorce and about 40% of children are being raised by parents who are not together. One could say well that means there are lots of people out there right? But in actuality what these stats show is that people have a hard time meeting and an even harder time staying together in our society.
But here is the real problem, the addiction or whatever you want to call it is a self defeating cycle.
Like most addictions, the symptoms are temporarily relieved by the substance. I feel lonely, bored, ashamed etc, I jerk off (temporarily solving the problem) afterward I feel lonely, bored, ashamed again. The cycle repeats. Physical barriers do sometimes prohibit repeating, but that hasn't kept me from enjoying myself way too many times in a day. Also the physical release isn't even necessarily the point, but rather the excitement of the search, its not like I watch the same video over and over, it is a drive for something new, something fresh and has in the past lead to something more dangerous, something more taboo.
These dangerous taboos are what tend to cause the massive upheavals that get people in trouble. Whether its the politician or celebrity who suddenly gets caught being blown in a Men's Room, or the teacher, priest or doctor who is accused of molesting their students/parishioners/patients. Regardless of whether they did it or not, if there is "shady" porn on their computer they are going to jail. Shady in this case being anything but vanilla sex. Parents have even been accused of creating child porn when taking pictures of their children in non-sexual, normal-child living situations (if in the buff)... like eating, or playing with toys or whatever kids do.
So say I am a priest, I'm not because I am not catholic, but say I am really into Bondage and Sado-Masochism (its in the priestly tradition-both condoned and not), anyway one can argue that I might not be following the right religious path, but if it were to come out that I was into a fetish, should that mean I am expelled from my position? Should it mean I shouldn't have access to the parishioners?
Or regardless of the action... If I who had some non illegal, but certainly inappropriate actions with a younger family member of the opposite sex. If I state that publicly, should I not be able to work around children? Should I not be able to have children? What if I stopped, made effort to keep it from happening again, spent 10-20-30 years of my life trying to make up for it?
Well I have been on a tirade here... but regardless I was reading in a book about pornography addiction, that one of the proposed causes is that at a young age the fear and shame of acts becomes so intertwined with sexuality that the person seeks this form and feeling again (a mix of fear/shame/powerlessness/abuse of power/ excitement/lust).
So when I mention that I have a great deal of shame over my sexual desires, when I state that I feel a great amount of guilt and self loathing over my past actions, when I fear for my sanity, soul and moral self, when I struggle constantly with ideas of right/wrong it seems entirely plausible that both my source of mixed feelings towards my sexuality and my desire to temporarily numb myself/ excite myself from beyond those feelings through the use of porn, is indeed an addiction like state and probably caused by some mixture of these feelings at a younger age.
Now if that is the case, what do I do about it?
I mentioned in my last post that I became quite the viewer of pornography. At times in my life I have spent 4-5 hours in front of a computer or tv screen, or reading a story or magazine that enticed my lust. I have questioned this desire many times, am I an addict?
By some definitions I could be:
Has it interfered with my relationships? Yes
Has it kept you from fulfilling other obligations? Yes
Has it made you tardy or absent from school/work? Yes
Has it changed the way you view the world and yourself? Yes
Has it kept you from meaningful relationships? No
Has it kept you from making new friends or interfered with family? Previous post excluded NO
Has it caused legal trouble? No
Has it caused the loss of a job or other similar punishment? No
Most importantly for many:
Does it make you see yourself or the opposite sex as an object? No, not in real life at least
I have a hard time taking these things seriously in that sense, am I voyeur by choice? Is it learned or genetic? Did it come from obsessive excitement seeking or was it already within me?
But could it affect my job, relationships with friends and family, future ability to pursue goals, Yes Yes Yes.
And is that worth it?
Well I would like to say no, I will stop this minute, its not worth the risk, but at the same time I am not sure I am A) capable B) want to C) have the support I would need D) have alternatives for my sex drive. I am not currently involved in a relationship. I am not currently interested in anyone in particular and I am not currently of the view that I should stop "using" porn and start "using" women I meet in person. (Does that make sense?)
It is easy to say, well then don't "use" them, get to know them etc, but we live in a society in which 25 % of the adult population lives alone, about 30 % of the population (in any age group) is single at any given moment, about 50 % of marriages end in divorce and about 40% of children are being raised by parents who are not together. One could say well that means there are lots of people out there right? But in actuality what these stats show is that people have a hard time meeting and an even harder time staying together in our society.
But here is the real problem, the addiction or whatever you want to call it is a self defeating cycle.
Like most addictions, the symptoms are temporarily relieved by the substance. I feel lonely, bored, ashamed etc, I jerk off (temporarily solving the problem) afterward I feel lonely, bored, ashamed again. The cycle repeats. Physical barriers do sometimes prohibit repeating, but that hasn't kept me from enjoying myself way too many times in a day. Also the physical release isn't even necessarily the point, but rather the excitement of the search, its not like I watch the same video over and over, it is a drive for something new, something fresh and has in the past lead to something more dangerous, something more taboo.
These dangerous taboos are what tend to cause the massive upheavals that get people in trouble. Whether its the politician or celebrity who suddenly gets caught being blown in a Men's Room, or the teacher, priest or doctor who is accused of molesting their students/parishioners/patients. Regardless of whether they did it or not, if there is "shady" porn on their computer they are going to jail. Shady in this case being anything but vanilla sex. Parents have even been accused of creating child porn when taking pictures of their children in non-sexual, normal-child living situations (if in the buff)... like eating, or playing with toys or whatever kids do.
So say I am a priest, I'm not because I am not catholic, but say I am really into Bondage and Sado-Masochism (its in the priestly tradition-both condoned and not), anyway one can argue that I might not be following the right religious path, but if it were to come out that I was into a fetish, should that mean I am expelled from my position? Should it mean I shouldn't have access to the parishioners?
Or regardless of the action... If I who had some non illegal, but certainly inappropriate actions with a younger family member of the opposite sex. If I state that publicly, should I not be able to work around children? Should I not be able to have children? What if I stopped, made effort to keep it from happening again, spent 10-20-30 years of my life trying to make up for it?
Well I have been on a tirade here... but regardless I was reading in a book about pornography addiction, that one of the proposed causes is that at a young age the fear and shame of acts becomes so intertwined with sexuality that the person seeks this form and feeling again (a mix of fear/shame/powerlessness/abuse of power/ excitement/lust).
So when I mention that I have a great deal of shame over my sexual desires, when I state that I feel a great amount of guilt and self loathing over my past actions, when I fear for my sanity, soul and moral self, when I struggle constantly with ideas of right/wrong it seems entirely plausible that both my source of mixed feelings towards my sexuality and my desire to temporarily numb myself/ excite myself from beyond those feelings through the use of porn, is indeed an addiction like state and probably caused by some mixture of these feelings at a younger age.
Now if that is the case, what do I do about it?
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