how to get rid of sex drive?

[catcreature77]

hi, I've posted a few things on this forum before & even though everyone's been very helpful I've kind of come to the conclusion that I don't think there is a healthy and comfortable way to explore my sexuality at the moment. this is really upsetting because I still have a sex drive and have thoughts/fantasies occasionally even though they disgust me to no end. I don't feel comfortable in my body as long as I keep having these thoughts. so is there a way to stop this? I've looked elsewhere online and I've heard everything from some medications working to some herbal remedies (spearmint is mentioned?) to fasting. do any of these actually help with lowering libido? and are there any other methods you would recommend

thx again for everything

[Straif]

Hi catcreature,
I was reading through your previous posts, and I am so sorry that you're still struggling with feelings of sexual shame and discomfort around desire. It seems like you've been recommended and read https://www.scarleteen.com/read/feeling ... xual-shame, but it might be helpful to remind yourself that you can take it slow and there's nothing wrong with you. I understand it can be frustrating if you've been doing that and not feeling like you're making "progress," but neither healing nor sexuality are ever linear paths.
Can I ask if something changed to convince you there was no way to have a "healthy and comfortable" sex life right now?

[catcreature77]

nothing changed and that's exactly it. Nothing I've done or looked at has changed the way I feel and I don't know if anything can short of, I don't know, surgically removing my ovaries (which seems more and more appealing every day )

The responses I've been getting are all along the lines of 'you're normal and valid and there's no reason to feel ashamed!!' which doesn't help at all. I know everyone means well but if there's no reason to feel this way, WHY do I feel this way and why can't I stop it?? For a very brief moment I had an interest in erotic literature but then just reading/listening to it made me feel so dirty and uncomfortable that I had to stop.

I know this sounds dramatic but I generally feel like sexual arousal being pleasurable is one of the biggest lies I've ever been told and it doesn't help that everyone here keeps doubling down on it.

[maille]

Hi, catcreature77.

It can be true that everything you are experiencing is valid but also that everything is still really frustrating. We can totally hold space for both of those thoughts!

It sounds like sexual arousal is really uncomfortable and not pleasurable for you, so I wouldn't want you to force any 'more positive' or perceived 'typical' feelings about it. I am glad you listened to yourself when consuming erotic content. It may not be for you at this point. It may not be for you ever. And that is totally cool, too.

Would you be willing to give this article a read for me and share what feels true of you from it? It kind of reads like a choose your own adventure tale, so kinda fun.

[catcreature77]

it feels fucking stupid if i'm honest
so wanting sex is fine. not wanting it is fine. feeling good is fine. feeling bad is fine

if everything's equally okay and acceptable why does this forum even need to exist if all you're going to do is validate everything i say and tell me there's nothing wrong with it when there IS something wrong with me and i don't know what and i don't know how to stop it

sorry if i'm not making sense

it's not that 'i don't want to have sex' it's not that simple it's that whenever sex or sexuality or physical attraction or anything like that is brought up in conversation i feel bad like really really fucking bad and i want to kill myself (except don't worry because i don't i'm exaggerating)

literally nothing anyone can say is making me feel better
what the fuck do i do
it's not shame or guilt based btw part of it is but that is definitely not the whole of it

i wish i was asexual so badly but at the same time there's a part of me that desperately wants to experience sex and desire and pleasure NORMALLY, like a normal fucking person without all of this unnecessary baggage attached

[Heather]

Hi there, catcreature77. In the future, I ask that you please don't post things here like that you want to kill yourself in that way. If you are not in earnest, that kind of hyperbole can be very activating (especially for those of us who have been suicidal or have had people in our lives commit suicide), and emotional exaggerations like that also make it very hard for us to sort out how you are actually feeling. You'll also note some talk about suicidality in the user guidelines you agreed to when you registered for the boards.

All of those things are equally okay, you're right. That's because human sexuality -- and human beings and our lives, in general -- are wildly diverse, so how we experience sexuality and what we all want from it varies a whole lotl, including for any given person over the course of a lifetime.

Our message boards exist to answer questions that people have about sex, sexuality, relationships and bodies, and things people want to talk about regarding those areas. We hope that the conversations and exchanges we have with everyone in our direct services will help them feel informed and supported, but we can't ever promise to help people feeling bad that we can help them feel better, because sometimes people need things we can't provide, or need to do things for themselves that we can't. There also isn't a way for people -- including removing your ovaries, since the desire for sex comes mostly from our brains, not our reproductive organs -- to get rid of or reduce their desire for sex, so that's why we can't offer you that.

What you seem to be expressing that you're experiencing is sexual shame or aversion -- you talked about disgust, and disgust is usually about one or both of these things -- which is usually really upsetting and feels bad, but is also very common for people. You've asked why you are feeling this way. We can't know the answer to that, but I can suggest some questions you can ask yourself that might help you answer that, things like:
• What kind of ideas and beliefs about sex were you raised with? Do you think those gave you a positive or negative view of sex?
• What has your experience with sexuality been like so far in life, including what, if anything, you have been exposed to when it comes to other people's sexuality?
• What has your sex education involved so far? Has it helped you feel more or less comfortable with the idea of sex and sexuality?
• Was there a time when sex and sexuality didn't create these feelings of disgust, or have those feelings always been there?

[catcreature77]

I really shouldn't have said that about wanting to kill myself I just wasn't thinking and didn't know how else to say it... I hope I haven't triggered anyone with what I said and I'll think more carefully about how I word things in future.

to answer your questions. my family have never had a negative view of sex, I was raised by my mother (a very sex-positive feminist) and currently live with my grandma who is more conservative but still very accepting and understanding. if I've ever felt shame about my sexuality it's not come from anyone around me, my family are also very supportive of me being bisexual so there's no issue at all there. but they're not exactly helpful either (mainly because they *are* so accepting. it feels like they don't understand where I'm coming from at all because nobody else I know has had these issues)

as for experience: none. I am very repressed and inexperienced, I've never had sex or been in a proper relationship. my friends are all leagues ahead of me in that regard. the furthest I've ever went with anyone is when I was being abused by my mother's boyfriend and I don't want to talk about that even though I know it was probably the cause of most of these issues

sex education has been pretty much normal? I knew about sex from about primary school & since then I've had lessons at school about safe sex, consent, healthy relationships, not going into graphic detail but I still felt very uncomfortable in those lessons to the point where I had to walk out of some of them. I have looked at some resources into sex and sexuality including the ones here at Scarleteen but they just seem to make me feel worse

and finally, basically ever since I started experiencing sexual arousal I didn't like it. I remember being very little, touching myself to see how it made me feel and absolutely hating it, or waking up with a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that I didn't know how to get rid of. I didn't even know those feelings were sexual in nature because they weren't caused by anything that I registered as sexual (and a lot of that I recognise now was the beginnings of a fetish but I'm not even going to get into that). I don't think I've ever had a single pleasurable sexual experience and I don't think I ever will.

I'm really sorry for bothering you guys so many times (is there a limit on how many posts I can make?) but I don't know where else I can go with this.

[Sofi]

Hi catcreature77. There isn't a limit to how many posts you can make - as long as you're following our user guidelines, you can keep writing to us for as long as you want or need to.

I'm so sorry to hear you went through the abuse you mentioned by your mother's boyfriend (ex? hopefully he's not around anymore). I know you said you don't want to talk about it, and I won't force you to. But as you said, there's a good chance that's at the root of many of these thoughts and feelings you're having. Have you ever had the chance to talk to anyone about it, whether it be a mental health professional or a friend/family member? Working through that with a therapist would be extremely beneficial, and we're happy to help you find someone to do that with.