Dear Madina:

Good to read back from you two months and 2 days after you last posted, although I wish you were feeling better. First, congrats for starting a relationship with a man who is “amazing, caring and loving“!

Now, let’s look at your update: “I am attracted to (him) physically… recently we had sex and like there is no chemistry. I didn’t feel it“- first, you felt physically attracted to him, then, within the circumstance of having sex with him, your fear went up and your physical attraction for him disappeared. This is quite natural: think of animals in the wild, like deer, being busy eating, mating, resting, whatever they do…  the moment they hear a possible predator approaching, they feel intense fear, get tense, and gone is their feeling of hunger (they immediately stop eating, I’ve witnessed this), gone is their sexual drive (they immediately stop mating… I imagine, didn’t witness this in person). All they do is freeze and look for a  predator. Same with humans: when there is significant fear, we freeze and gone is hunger and sexual drive.

Let’s look for evidence of your fear in your original Aug 18 post: “it scares me a lot!.. I get panic attacks about that… I am scared of men, I am so scared of being hurt or abused again”- there’s the fear.

Back to your update: “And all these OCD thoughts came back. I think that I can’t be with a man… I think that might be a sign I should start dating women“- and here is the panicking and overthinking and jumping to conclusions.

“what is wrong with me?“- your fear went up, your sexual drive disappeared, that’s all, is what I figure.

anita