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I'm writing this to help me understand and process various memories. Many of them are very private and potentially disturbing... I'm not sure what I'll end up writing about but I'm not filtering myself here so take care. I believe in the value of (digital) group therapy and telling one's story to a sympathetic crowd, so I'm making these public for now and I welcome any comments or support.
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I have a hard time remembering an age when I wasn't aware of sexual feelings. I can't pin down how old I am during my earliest memories... there are a lot of gaps in my early childhood. More is missing than is remembered. I look for context to date my memories. I can't remember when I started masturbating; in my earliest memories I had always been doing it. The first definitive memories of masturbation that I can place were some time around third or fourth grade and it was very routine by then. I remember that my brother and I had a new set of bunkbeds that were made out of metal, and they squeaked a lot when I was shifting around on the top bunk. The noise must have been audible through the wall in my parents' room... one night my mom stormed in and I desperately tried to pull up the covers but she pulled them down and looked at my erection. I was so ashamed. She made a disgusted sound and dropped the blanket then told me to stop it because I was making too much noise. Soon afterward she bought me a book about sex and puberty, but it was a very awkward experience.
I'm fairly sure I must have ejaculated, but I don't have any memory of that until later. Again, it doesn't seem like anything new. The earliest memories I can pin down of ejaculating were some time around fourth or fifth grade. I remember... ejaculating into my hand and feeling like I should taste it but being extremity repelled by the idea. I eventually told myself that I had nothing to be embarrassed about and forced myself to eat it, as a way to get over the feeling of shame... to prove to myself that I could do it. Eventually that became part of my routine.
I remember masturbating compulsively for long stretches of my life, especially my teenage years. Three or four or five times a day... morning, recess, lunch, at home, at night... I just couldn't stop.
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There are several things I want to talk to my therapist about and I want to jot them down here so I don't forget about it:
Reconnecting with sorrow - the time I cried without feeling anything
Driving faster than I mean to... taking risk/focusing myself on the task at hand
The times that I sit down at my computer and can't focus on anything... just tab between pages without really accomplishing anything
When I read disturbing content to deliberately numb myself
Being sexually aroused by things that I do not want to be aroused by
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At my therapist's prompting I asked my mom about whether I had ever complained about blood in my stool or constipation. She said that when I was still in diapers that I was very constipated, to the point that they would sometimes have to use suppositories and it was very unpleasant. I'm not sure what to make of that yet.
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