There are things in this blog that my daughters don’t need to read. However, I feel I need to thank them and the wisdom they shared while finding themselves in the world. Because of them, I have found new ways to look at myself and everything. I hope they have found at least some of the things I’ve shared and done helpful while growing up. Thank you for your kindness and uncensored views on the world. Now close this page if you are related to me or know me 🙂
I have always considered myself a Heterosexual, though I hate that we feel the need to confirm this. Surely, a label is only valuable in some academic studies. We are all human, and we get to explore and be who we are, how we like, with whom we like and love. That said, for most of my life, I haven’t questioned this, or at least not in a healthy way.
Sex has always been something I loved; however, being in the moment, losing myself in it, has always been a struggle. Being in the moment with a busy mind has always been a challenge, with the constant overthinking and second-guessing.
My thirst to be with a partner, the attraction, the lust are ever present, but a traumatic late circumcision and feeling inadequate (size issues) as a lover and the flow of feeling like I am letting down my partner has manifested in so many different ways, but most notably in horrendous spates of ED. At my lowest point, I did question if I was heterosexual, not due to healthy self-discovery. This was after rather thoughtless comments made by a partner at the time. It was an early toxic relationship, but I was in love, blind, infatuated, and I had no idea what a toxic relationship was. She was my first, and having been starved for affection much of my life, she became the centre of everything. Still, I realised years later, in a much healthier relationship, just how toxic and manipulative that relationship was and the damage it did to me.
ED is bad enough, but the aftermath is worse. Even with an understanding and supportive partner, I still felt a sense of failure and isolation. The anxiety of approaching someone new knowing where it might lead, the self-doubt it created in me about my sexuality (remember I am always talking about me, nothing I say is medical fact etc, please don’t read it as such) etc has a monstrous effect on your esteem, and it’s not something I could just bring up with a mate, specially not where I grew up in the 70/80s, I mean we knew nothing!
I love women, I love talking to women on all levels, and I know I am attracted to women. I actually love that first moment you find someone likes you back, the moment you both find a balance point emotionally and the possibility of a connection, a spark. I find the process highly arousing, the getting to know each other, but then the next step. The touch of skin, I love that, the lips, the first involuntary sigh or moan when the connection happens, god that is the most sensual thing I can imagine. later the slow undressing, yes, still enjoying that, but now wondering what happens if it doesn’t work, how will she feel, how do I prove how much I feel for her, lust for her, love her? I could go on, I mean I can give examples of everything, intimate, personal examples but the point I’m making here is I so desperately want to make love to this woman in a lustful way, the way I was taught I should be able to, the way it is in media everywhere. I just want to show her how aroused I am on the inside but my Penis is just not interested, it’s gone on holiday. I can’t push her against the wall and ‘take her’, or throw her on the bed and ‘have her’ or lie back while she ‘has her way with me’… because without a hard dick none of this works… or does it?
Making love and sex isn’t just about penetration is it, well not with just a penis. Lots of people without a penis manage to have sex, make love, have wonderful intimate, sensual and erotic adventures… I mean, that’s obvious, so why hadn’t this occurred to me before? All this anxiety could have been less soul-destroying, less traumatic if I’d have just realised this, or if someone had said that. Don’t get me wrong, a working penis is a happy penis (and attached man!) but, in the scheme of things it’s not the end of the world (I wish someone could have convinced me of this when I was 18!)
One thing I will say is that the fear was always mostly on my side. Whenever I met someone whom I was attracted to and who was attracted to me, when we got close to the point where we’d soon become more intimate, I’d have the talk about my ED. I thought it was so important that they would not think it was something they did wrong, or that they weren’t attractive enough… my version of the it’s not you, it’s me discussion, but before the event, so I wouldn’t make them feel less, I wanted to consider their esteem. Amazingly, it never got in the way of the lovemaking that followed, though I always felt less of a lover for it, and soon after, my penis would start working, as I relaxed and trust grew.
I am now working it out, at this later time of my life (early 60’s), I finally understand the term ‘it takes all sorts’. And I am trying to reframe something here. I mean, is it ok for me, if my penis isn’t working, to seek intimacy with a woman, something I long for, accepting that penetration might not be part of that (well, penetration with my penis anyway 😉 ) and show her exactly how she makes me feel without that, providing she is ok with that? Maybe I won’t get the chance, and life still goes on. I am working on it, I’m getting therapy, writing blogs and learning to be mindful.
So does this really matter? I mean, I’m hardly going to go on some sexual safari at my age! Well, I think healing matters and finding out why we feel about things, how we feel and where that takes us helps on the journey. We are not all the same, as much as dogma, school, and some archaic authority figures might want us to think. After healing, you can start being kind to yourself, forgiving yourself for being different, I think… I’m still working on that.
Maybe I need to accept that ‘lust’ is something that is beyond me, especially at the start of a relationship, or at least the physical lust we see in cinema and porn… the pants down, cock out and in we go lust! But it’s hard to break down that conditioning, even at my age; the mind wants what it wants.
So, after all this contemplating, do I still consider myself heterosexual? Yes, I do, but I’m not quite as vanilla as that. I doubt many people are as vanilla as that. Looking at sexuality and broadening my mind, I realise I may have facets of asexuality about me, primarily demisexuality, where I like strong emotional bonds with someone I’m intimate with, I am an emotionally driven lover and fantasist. I also value intimacy of sex, the sensory and sensual, the communion and connection. I think this is linked to trust and respect, which are as much a part of lasting love as anything. I find the erotic and sensual beautiful (not just stockings!), the intimacy of touching, kissing, and holding essential to feeling human, bring on the cuddle therapy! And I am definitely Sapiosexual, I find intelligence highly attractive and a point of connection.
A bit of me hopes my friends and family didn’t read this. It was tough to write, but also a part of a bigger, essential process of healing for me, a healing process.
Note: When I first started writing this post, I titled it ‘WOW – I know fuck all about myself’, which, reading it back, was bollocks! I have become very self-aware in more recent years, done a lot of work understanding where I come from and how I’ve come to be. This statement was probably very true in my 20s, less true in my 40s and now, entering my 60s, is only slightly true 🙂 Hence the retitle. I think the blog is filled with a lot of my working out, and it would be impossible to fit that in one post.
I will say that much of this has only been possible via several sessions with counsellors and therapists, and after reading multiple books on many subjects. Talking to someone, confiding in them, is essential to dealing and healing for me, though it’s a slow process, and you have to find the right people and methods. For me, talking about my experiences, writing things down, learning to reflect and looking at my past through different lenses has helped me understand and feel better about myself, though the road has not been simple, and I’m not done yet.
