Lust Lost and Found

This post is a rework of "Lustless" posted in Feb. 2019.

Can Something You Never Had be LOST?

With my girlfriend at the time, lust wasn't exactly 'lost', rather it never developed. I guess you couldn’t have found two more neophytes as far as sex was concerned, when we started dating. First serious relationship for both of us. No sexual experience. I was from an up-tight religious background, and my girlfriend was from a broken home, living with a protective mother. Add to this her serious medical condition. Our courtship involved a lot of joint volunteering, caring and charity type activities. We were young, optimistic and idealistic. As far fetched as it sounds, we really were 25 year old virgins in the ‘age of Aquarius’ when we married.

Due to poor time planning and travel, the wedding night was sexless (not that unusual apparently). We only had a long-weekend due to study commitments, but a full honeymoon was planned in the semester break. But our sexual initiation this first weekend was very fumbly and definitely less than lustful. 

Back at our new apartment, between settling in and study, our sexual start to married life wasn't improving. Five weeks later, we went on our formal ‘honeymoon’. But daily travelling and a different bed every night, left our “honeymoon” sexless.

Our first six months was a very fumbling, intermittent sex life. Between women’s issues and her other health problems 2 or 3 times a month, sex was infrequent and mediocre. I think there was one very good encounter when I took the whole day off and we spent half the day in bed, mostly in fore-play, finally achieving successful coitus. Whilst my wife enjoyed extended foreplay, she was mostly not comfortable going below the waist. In month’s 7 to 12, despite moving into a house from the 1 bedroom apartment, sex virtually ceased, with my wife no longer able to relax enough to allow penetration - vaginismus, ‘frozen vagina’.

Over the next couple of years, the vaginismus subsided, but her health problem meant that we visited hospital ER more often than we had sex (4-5 times per year). As for quality, “Think of England”.

We finally found a medical specialist that was somewhat supportive of us starting a family by carefully reducing medication by half and closely monitoring my wife's medical condition. It was a matter of treading the fine line between the congenital danger of high dose meds. and the dangers of a low dosed medical condition. Using the Billings method, conception was achieved in 3 months. Wow, sex, whether she wanted to or not, once a month for 3 months - the most frequent sex in our married life before (or since). The 9 months of pregnancy went smoothly health-wise, though sex was off. Then life was hit for a six when our child was born with multiple congenital conditions requiring immediate life-saving surgery, then full repair and follow-up surgeries over the next 5 years.

The first couple of years post natal, were sexless. I guess conjugal relations were of such a low priority, that the years slipped by. In hindsight,  I estimate that over 20 years, we averaged between 0 and 2 times per year.

At around the 30 year mark, we were empty-nesters, mortgage paid and a comfortable career. My wife’s medical condition had settled a little. I started pressing/encouraging increased (resumed?) sexual activity, but with little success. It seemed to be a matter of “Well, if you really must. Hop on and get it over with” - hardly encouraging - 'sympathy sex' at best. I backed off somewhat and tried to get her interested in mutual masturbation, but there was no interest - touching ‘down there’ was off limits, and oral was abhorrent to her.

Eventually, I got her to talk about our situation, but all I got was “I just don’t enjoy sex and never have”. Well, after that smack in the face, I promised that I would never ‘bother’ her about it again, and I haven’t.

It was 3-4 years later, that she started to open up a bit more about her childhood. It seems that her introduction to sex was as a pre-teen, hearing her drunken alcoholic father having his way with his wife and hearing her mother pleading to be left alone. Even in the 1960’s, a woman was still her husband’s chattel and conjugal rights were expected. "Rape in marriage" was inconceivable by definition of ‘marriage’.

After a few months, she asked her mother about it, and she had her first ‘lesson’ in sex-ed, including rape. The ancients described this as "The sins of the father will be visited on his children to the 3rd and 4th generation" (Ex.20:5, Num.14:18, Deu.5:9).

Never a truer statement has been made, than "The must important sexual organ is the one between our ears"!

So that just leaves me. When we vow “For better or worse, in sickness and health”, I guess we all assume that the worse and sickness will only be a small percentage of married life. How one deals with and transcends the "worse" is a measure of your character and depth of love. Our relationship had virtually declined into ‘patient and carer’. Any hope of 'normal' marital sex was totally LOST! I started going through bouts of depression. Who cares for the carer? It was through discussions with a friend at work, that I started to realise that there was no point in just blaming circumstances for one’s unhappiness. I had to take responsibility for my own happiness, thinking outside the square of societal conventions. The Good Book tells us to ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’ - I had been taught the first half all my childhood, but not really much about loving myself - that was always seen as being ‘selfish’.

And so I ‘bit the bullet’ and started taking some occasional ‘me time’ with some ‘Ladies Of Pleasure’. I had tried once before on a business trip, but it was over in a couple of minutes and I remember thinking "Is that all there is!". But this time, I was lucky to find a kind, more mature lady, that was very understanding of my situation and led and guided me through a lovely time.

FOUND

And so it was that in my mid-50s, I FOUND what I had never had. Through a forum of men in situations like myself, I learned about brothels and private sex workers, of the wide range of services available and of all the different types ladies, from 'star-fish' to nymphos. With some delightful ladies, I discovered/learned about the differences between women and men's arousal patterns, of pleasuring a woman, how mutual enjoyment can be far better than individual pleasure, that love and sex can coexist separately. I learned the difference between love-sex and fun-sex. I learned how humor and laughter can enhance the sexual experience. I learned to give and receive oral for the first time - I've had some wonderful teachers. I've learned about Booty Buddies, Friends With Benefits and Sugar Daddys. OMG I feel so embarrassed to be confessing my sexually deprived upbringing.

In the anonymity and privacy of brothel pillow talk, I have had ladies confide things they might not even share with a BFF, of their likes and dislikes as far as client behaviour is concerned, and I've learned a lot about fellow men's lack of sexual education, experience and confidence - just like me. So I set about to write a BLOG about what I was learning, of personal experiences and educational essays, then later fictional pieces.

For others in situations like mine, I wrote "A Lustless Relationship Survivors Memorial".

I've found fulfillment in my writing, of bringing pleasure and sex-positive knowledge to a wider community. And I've found a wonderful community of fellow writers, that support and encourage.

Losing IT Again

But with age, I discovered declining libido, of Erectile Dis-function. Then we add on prostate cancer and the impact of roast prostate by radiotherapy and how that leads to further ED, lower libido, loss of ejaculation ability and lowered tactile sensation.

But I'm working on IT. With regular ED meds. and regular self-love and trial 'test drives', all is not completely lost, if not totally re-found! Never is there a truer saying than "Use it or lose it!".

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Lustless Relationship Survivors Memorial

Survivors

I've just been watching on TV, the US National Covid-19 Memorial service and was moved to write this post. First, can I reach out in love and compassion to fellow bloggers that have family that have had or are currently going through Covid-19 illness. Receive our virtual hugs from near (appropriately socially distanced) and far.

The second trigger was a survey on twitter that I saw yesterday, about frequency of sex in a relationship, showed that 30% of respondents  said "What sex?".

Memorial - Sharing Pain

So I just want to reach out to fellow sufferers/survivors of lustless relationships, to let you know you are not alone, that by sharing our experiences in our blogs that we are supporting each other. Frankly, when I read posts of wonderful sex between couples, I sometimes have my eyes well up a little, not exactly in jealousy, but a with twinge of pain.

But let's also remember and reach out to our partners that have lost or never had libido. In neurophysiological literature, like this, we see the multi-faceted parts of the brain involved in sexual arousal. In our current context, it is important to note the functions of the 'prefrontal cortex' and 'cingulate cortex' in blunting or suppressing sexual response and processing conflicting responses. 

• There are small numbers whose brain fails to develop certain parts (nature). 
• Then there are those whose nurture has trained their brains with so much negativity to human sexuality, that those blunting, suppression circuits over-ride sexual stimulation. The 'training' doesn't have to be explicitly sex-negative - growing up under an abusive parent can leave an indelible scar of negative feelings about that gender in general.
  
• Even a simple fall off a bicycle by a child, can cause Acquired Brain Trauma which can damage those delicate libido circuits. 
• Lets remember especially, those girls that through cultural norms, have had their genitals mutilated to deliberately deny them sexual pleasure.
• Lets remember couples who's relationship has broken down in the broadest sense, that withdrawal of sexual relations comes out of anger and punishment.
• Now we come to the later-life loss of libido, that once was present, but lost due to accident, disease, aging or high pressures of life. Aging libido is often just  slowing of response and lack of spontaneous response. The other side of that coin is organic disease where despite libido desire, the body doesn't respond - the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. Some diseases, say like testicular cancer, so mess with a man's self-image, that their libido is irreparably psychologically damaged. I've heard similar stores about women after a mastectomy. After aging, the largest numbers would be car accident victims, whether ABT or paraplegia.
  

The Other Half

So how do we, the other half of the situation, cope with endless 'head-aches', 'sympathy fucks' ("Oh, alright if you must. Hurry up, hop on and get it over with"), to outright withdrawal of intimacy - 'don't touch me', to separate bedrooms? There are three responses needed:-

• Where libido is simply diminished or slow to respond, we the other party, must never pressure, but work to remove external pressure, make special times together and enjoy what you can achieve together.
  
• Relationship repair and nurture. Note however, that many of the above causes can't be 'fixed' with counseling of psychology. It is mostly a matter of making the most of what you do have, non-sexually. But if there is broad relationship breakdown, perhaps the best solution is to sever the relationship sooner than later.
  
• The other is recognizing your own needs for happiness, to Love Yourself. Hopefully, you can get your partner to at least understand, agree with or go along with your solution. It might be having your partner assist you in relieving your ache. At the other extreme you might need to pay for transactional relief.
  

God Given Sex

Finally, in response to the religious sex-negative types. Sex and libido are God given parts of our lives. I would venture to say that they are the most God-like parts of our being, in that they are the core of the creation of life. Couples that enjoy great sex, often say that there is a spiritual component to that part of their life. In the Christian bible, in the book of Genesis 1:27-28, God commands, "Go forth and have sex (multiply)", so who are we to disobey God's command.

"Love Your Partner As Yourself"

 

A, B, C - (new) beginnings (#AtoZChallenge)

Let's start at the very beginning,

A very good place to start,

When you read you begin with A-B-C,

When you sing you begin with Doe-Ray-Me.

"Sound of Music"

It was over 30 years into a 'lustless' marriage, that my wife finally dropped the bombshell that "she didn't enjoy sex, and never had and didn't want it". But marriage is not just about the sex - there were lots of reasons to stay together, not the least being my increasing role as her carer with her medical condition. Needless to say though, it messed with my psyche with bouts of depression.

It was a lady at work that finally inspired me. She was a real go-getter, divorced, raising a teenage boy, building her own house, looking to start a new relationship. I learned to NOT let circumstances control my life and feelings, but to take responsibility for my own happiness. I realised that it wasn't just my wife's condition, but that I had all sorts issues from my own upbringing as well as societal mores that I had to re-evaluate.

So I finally took the plunge into transactional sex. Fortunately, here in Melbourne, Australia, the sex-work industry is legalized and regulated. It was an enormous learning experience for me. From simply getting used to various procedures and protocols of how brothels operate, to introducing and selecting ladies, negotiating the whole range of service offerings, learning about sexual techniques and positions that I had never experienced before, to finding, understanding and negotiating the whole client-lady 'relationship' issues. It was almost as bad as negotiating the whole dating scene.

But sexually, I was like a kid let loose in a lolly shop. So many ladies, so many experiences, so little time. OMG, is this what married life should have been like?

Health wise, my chronic depression lifted, though home-life was still heavy going. My 'outings' provided periodic boosts to get me through the following couple of weeks. It provided much needed respite. Who cares for the carer? What I've learnt is that the most important thing is to learn to care for yourself. To be a better lover/carer of someone else, love yourself as well.

Well I finally found a parlour, "The Main Course", a short tram ride from work, with a range of more mature ladies that I hit it off with. With a flexible work-place, I was able to get out for long 'lunches' once or twice a month. I ended up with about a dozen ladies whose company I enjoyed and would visit semi-regularly. My 'problem' became deciding who I should see next, to spread myself evenly amongst them. I came up with my "A-B-C" system - April, Bianca, Cristal, etc... My visits were now alphabetical, so I got to visit each of my dozen 'regulars' once or twice a year.

Another major learning experience, was about relationships. During numerous pillow talks, I got to learn a lot about and appreciate all the different experiences and relationships that got these ladies to this point. Most importantly, relationships must be equally two-way. There is no place for 'ownership' or 'possessiveness'. Years earlier, in our marriage vows, we did not 'take' each other, but 'gave' ourselves to each other. I had a short booty-buddy 'relationship' with one lady when she left the brothel. But when the time came that she found a proper boy-friend, I was happy to step aside and happy for her happiness.

"Vive ut vivas" (Live life to the fullest). "Ancora Imparo" (Still Learning).

 

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Lustless

Now I know this post doesn't naturally fit in the normal theme of "The Cunning Linctus", but it is a story that needs to be told. Sexual desire (lust, libido) is the basis for procreation, and is intricately tied to our self-image/identity. There are all sorts of reasons why lust can be stunted, so it is important for 'sex positive' writers to take a step back occasionally and gain some understanding of why some people are 'sex negative' - they are not all just evil religious spoilsports.

So, going back 50 years to the start of my relationship with my wife.

Courting

I guess you couldn’t have found two more neophytes when we started dating. First serious relationship for both of us. No sexual experience. I was from an up-tight religious background, and my girlfriend was from a broken home, living with a protective mother. Add to this her serious medical condition. Our courtship involved a lot of joint volunteering, caring and charity type activities. We were young, optimistic and idealistic. As far fetched as it sounds, we really were 25 year old virgins in the ‘age of Aquarius’ when we married.

Wedding and Honeymoon

A mistake we made with our wedding, was travelling a couple of hours to the honeymoon hotel. Due to a late start, no sex that night - not all that unusual I am told for  a wedding night. This ‘1st’ honeymoon was just a long weekend due to study commitments, so there was just one fumbling sexual encounter.

Back at our new apartment,  between settling in and study, our sexual start to married life was not exactly hot and steamy.

Five weeks later, we had planned a 2 week holiday as our formal ‘honeymoon’. But again we misjudged the situation, and daily travelling and a different bed every night, left our “honeymoon” sexless.

Now I know many men would have walked away from the ‘marriage’ at that point claiming non-consummation, but not us.

The Marital Bed

Our first six months was a very fumbling, intermittent sex life. Between women’s issues and her other health problems 2 or 3 times a month, sex was infrequent and mediocre. I think there was one very good encounter when I took the whole day off and we spent half the day in bed, mostly in fore-play, finally achieving successful coitus. Whilst my wife enjoyed extended foreplay, she was mostly not comfortable going below the waist. In month’s 7 to 12, despite moving into a house from the 1 bedroom apartment, sex virtually ceased, with my wife no longer able to relax enough to allow penetration - vaginismus, ‘frozen vagina’.

Over the next couple of years, the vaginismus subsided, but her health problem meant that we visited hospital ER more often than we had sex (4-5 times per year). As for quality, “Think of England”.

Starting a Family

We had discussed starting a family with a number of my wife’s medical specialists, but none were very supportive of the idea. A new specialist discussed the pros and cons with us and the risks involved - the risks to the pregnancy of her medication vs the risks of not being medicated. But he was encouraging and we set about slowly reducing her medication to about half. To achieve pregnancy as quickly as possible, we used the ‘Billings method’ of temperature monitoring to identify her ovulation days. So we were having the most frequent sex of our married life - once a month whether she liked it or not. Conception occurred soon after.

But the joy of the birth was short-lived on discovery of our baby’s own medical condition (Fallot's Tetralogy) that would require serious surgeries over the following several years. Any thoughts of further children were quickly put out our minds, and a vasectomy sealed it.

Post Natal Years

The postnatal hormonal changes and half strength medications caused my wife’s condition to flare up badly, so back onto full strength meds. But breastfeeding was thus out of the question. With the dangers of her medical condition, carrying or bathing baby alone were out of the question - a bit of a kick in the guts for motherhood.

Some new medications were coming onto the market, so we went through a series of attempts at new meds, but with numerous side effects, and mostly with no improvement in her condition. The one med that showed promise, caused anaemia and massive weight gain.

When your medical condition can throw your body into uncontrolled spasms or convulsions at a moments notice, then the merest hint of sexual arousal or possible orgasm, sets off alarm bells. So add body-image issues to her medical condition, married life wasn’t a bed of rose petals. The first couple of years post natal, were sexless. I guess conjugal relations were of such a low priority, that the years slipped by. In hindsight,  I estimate that over 20 years, we averaged between 0 and 2 times per year.

Empty Nest - Resuscitation or Expiration?

At around the 30 year mark, we were empty-nesters, mortgage paid and a comfortable career. My wife’s medical condition had settled a little. I started pressing/encouraging increased (resumed?) sexual activity, but with little success. It seemed to be a matter of “Well, if you really must. Hop on and get it over with” - hardly encouraging. I backed off somewhat and tried to get her interested in mutual masturbation, but there was no interest - touching ‘down there’ was off limits, and oral was abhorrent to her.

Eventually, I got her to talk about our situation, but all I got was “I just don’t enjoy sex and never have”. Well, after that smack in the face, I promised that I would never ‘bother’ her about it again, and I haven’t.

Long Overdue Explanations

It was 3-4 years later, that she started to open up a bit more about her childhood. It seems that her introduction to sex was as a pre-teen, hearing her drunken alcoholic father having his way with his wife and hearing her mother pleading to be left alone. Even in the 1960’s, a woman was still her husband’s chattel and conjugal rights were expected. "Rape in marriage" was inconceivable by definition of ‘marriage’.

After a few months, she asked her mother about it, and she had her first ‘lesson’ in sex-ed, including rape. The ancients described this as "The sins of the father will be visited on his children to the 3rd and 4th generation" (Ex.20:5, Num.14:18, Deu.5:9).

A modern brain scan surprised by showing the degree of brain trauma from a simple childhood accident. Mapping the area of trauma with areas of brain function, suggests the possibility of impaired pleasure centres.

Never a truer statement has been made, than "The must important sexual organ is the one between our ears"!

A Detour Through The Psychosomatic Wilderness

This twelve months of medical incompetence, perhaps even mal practice, was so traumatic it requires a post of its own - "Unmedicated". 

Who Cares For the Carer? Loving Oneself

So that just leaves me. When we vow “For better or worse, in sickness and health”, I guess we all assume that the worse and sickness will only be a small percentage of married life. Our relationship had virtually declined into ‘patient and carer’. I started going through bouts of depression. Who cares for the carer? It was through discussions with a friend at work, that I started to realise that there was no point in just blaming circumstances for one’s unhappiness. I had to take responsibility for my own happiness, thinking outside the square of societal conventions. The Good Book tells us to ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’ - I had been taught the first half all my childhood, but not really much about loving myself - that was always seen as being ‘selfish’.

And so I ‘bit the bullet’ and started taking some occasional ‘me time’ with some ‘ladies of pleasure’, but that’s another story too. When one’s home cooking is all DIY, it’s nice to dine out sometimes.

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To Punt or Not To Punt, That is The Question

When sex in one's marriage comes to an end, you are left with a turmoil of emotions. The decision to move forward into commercial sex might seem straight forward, but it is like the first time you stood on the edge of a diving board, petrified about taking the plunge into the pool.

"To punt, or not to punt, that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of celibate matrimony,

Or to take arms against a sea of scruples,

And by opposing end them? To fidelity: to begging;

No more; and by a fuck to say we end

The heart-ache and the thousand natural aches

That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wish'd. To fuck, to come;

To come: perchance to ecstasy; ay, there's the rub."

(With apologies to The Bard)

NB: 'Punt': to take a (monatory) risk or gamble;  in this context to take a gamble to pay for a sex worker. Fortunately, here in Australia, Sex Work is legal, highly regulated and safe, so the only "risk" is whether you will get the quality of sex you paid for or desired.

Sabbatical Back-Sliding

So much for my sabbatical abstinence. This 24/7 carer stuff is heavy going. The doctor now tells us that the leg cast must be non-load bearing for 8 weeks (ie. 5 more), then a load-bearing cast for another 4 weeks, taking us to mid. January. And my patient can’t manage crutches, so I am stuck as wheelchair pusher, bum wiper, cook, bottle-washer, etc, etc, etc. So the opportunity to go out shopping is a relief. Last Friday, I had to go to the pharmacist for meds. and was told there would be a 30 minute wait, so I popped down to my “local” to have my own aches ministered to.

Now week days in suburban parlours is a bit hit-or-miss with respect to the quality of ladies available. But this Friday lunch time was busy - three ladies in bookings and two available, including G who had been called in for an extra shift. Now G might not be poster-girl material and her escorting days might be past, but her winning smile, cheery attitude and lovely personality won me over.

Up in room #5, after the preliminaries, I formally introduced her to Thomas the Tongue Engine and her enthusiasm jumped up several notches. Before I knew it, she was on her back with legs splayed showing me her very large luscious lips and telling what she wanted me to do to her. Of course I was more than happy to oblige. And what lips - major, major majora.

When she finally came down, she rolled me over and started to lavish her tongue on my tackle. But with my continued digital attention, we never got past the cover-all to CBJ - she was too anxious to feel me inside herself (“Never mind the length, feel the thickness”).

The main course was very enthusiastic, cowgirl, reverse, arched back, squatting, grinding, maximizing stimulation of her clit at every opportunity to at least one more orgasm (hers) before mine.

G is a talker - sexy talk - and lets you know in no uncertain terms what she is going do to you and what she wants.  She is certainly a personality that hit it off with me and an hour on my next visit would be awesome.

Cunning Conversations - Longmatrimony?

Now one doesn’t normally go punting for the conversation, but finding a lady with whom you ‘click’ and who has a similar sense of humour makes the time so much more enjoyable.  Its not that there is much time for conversation, but whilst dressing, showering or just cuddling up for the remaining minutes before the buzzer, I have had many very interesting "Cunning Conversations", which will appear at irregular intervals in the “Cunning Linctus”.

Several years ago in the early stages of my punting career, I had a lovely time with an athletic young lady exploring quite a number of positions.   "I have a chart of all the Karma Sutra positions on my bedroom wall at home" she replies, "but I haven't learnt them all yet". (Somehow or other, I never did get to see her again to work through that list).

During our cooling off time, we got talking about “life” and I mentioned how long I had been married.  Then in all seriousness, she asked me, “What’s the secret to a long marriage?”.

WTF?  Here is a young (mid 20’s?) prostitute who has just fucked the brains out of a man twice here age who is “cheating” on his wife, and she is asking for advice on the secret of a long marriage? 

I guess the short answer is, “Don’t get caught!”