Dear Yoker:

I apologize for my mistyping of your name, and thank you for correcting me.

A little summary of what you shared: you are a 17 year old teenager, a Muslim, Egyptian living in Egypt, attending a military all-boys school. Egypt is 65% Muslim and the religion prohibits sex before marriage. As a child you and your female cousin slept together regularly until you were 12 or 14 without warning, that is, you weren’t  prepared for the change. You feel lonely during the night but also during the day, “I feel empty inside… like something’s missing… like I lost something very Valuable…it makes me sad all the time “. You wrote that there is something “so extraordinary about having  someone (opposite gender) by your side”

You long for physical closeness with a girl of your age. Question to you so I can understand better: it was four or three years ago that the sleeping arrangement with your cousin was cancelled. Did you feel this sad and empty ever since, 3-4 years at this point, or did the sadness and craving increase lately?

anita