It’s different for everyone.
co-dependency
Withholding Sex Is a Form of Psychological Abuse
Originally posted at: https://gentlepathmeadows.wordpress.com/2016/08/20/withholding-sex-is-a-form-of-psychological-abuse
Alexandra Katehakis, MFT, CSAT, CST is a Senior Fellow at Gentle Path at The Meadows. The following is an excerpt from her book “Mirror of Intimacy: Daily Reflections on Emotional and Erotic Intelligence.” You can find it at www.TheMeadowsBookstore.com or on www.Amazon.com.
Withholding love or sex is psychological abuse and results from early trauma. Withholding is altogether different from not having sex or not reciprocating love. People don’t have sex for many reasons. They might be traumatized. They might suffer from sexual dysfunction. They might be practicing self-care and setting appropriate boundaries for them. They might even be engaging in the political act of a sex strike in an effort to enact social change. There are equally many reasons why people might not reciprocate love. But to withhold sex or love as a punishment is a different matter altogether, and is always the result of learned emotional or mental abuse. Manipulating loved ones might appear to be a thought-out strategy, but it’s always compulsive.
Withholding exemplifies how deeply we hurt ourselves when we try to hurt others, and how deeply hurt so many of us have been. The phrase, “This hurts me more than it hurts you” (commonly uttered before corporeal punishment), is actually true. A caregiver doling out physical pain literally experiences the punishment along with the person they are hurting. Unfortunately s/he is also reinforcing a psychological pattern that brings psychic agony and isolation. Likewise, those who purposefully withhold love or sex certainly feel the pain of isolation from their actions.
Like any addiction or compulsion, such habitual behavior doesn’t just disappear. Because withholding is often masked in denial, it can be difficult to confront. Withholding is a very human quality; most of us at one time have given and received “the silent treatment.” Since most solutions to human troubles involve caring, attention, and love, to withhold means to deny solutions. Such withholding is probably a leading factor in many personal, social, and global conflicts.
Help for Sex Addiction and Intimacy Issues
If you’re a man who’s struggling with sexual compulsions or intimacy issues, the Rio Retreat Center at The Meadows offers 5-day workshops which may help you break free from self destructive behaviors and strengthen your relationship with your partner or spouse. The Men’s Sexual Recovery Workshop helps participants to address sexual obsessions and compulsions, broaden their views about sexuality, maintain positive relationships and avoid the harmful patterns of the past.
In A Man’s Way™ Retreat you learn how The Man Rules™ affect all your relationships with others and yourself. You will also look at how past experiences affect your ability to be present in your relationships and stand as a healthy man in the space you have created for your life.
And, for those who need a more comprehensive treatment experience for complex sexual addiction and intimacy issues, The Meadows Outpatient Center offers a Sex Addiction Intensive Outpatient Program, and Gentle Path at the Meadows offers a 45-day inpatient treatment program based on the work of world-renowned expert Dr. Patrick Carnes, who is also a Senior Fellow at The Meadows.
For more information on these programs and many others call The Meadows at 800-244-4949.
Toddler Tears
by
Last night I went to another meeting last night. It was a much more of an intimate venue and more comfortable setting. During the meeting everyone was sharing stories of their past. I decided it was time I shared a bit about myself. As I began to relate my story of my addiction, how I have let everyone I love down, how I don’t remember who I am anymore, how I hate the person I see in the mirror I began to cry….
This wasn’t a manly single tear down the face cry but a full on snot bubbling sob. I was crying like a three year old who had just dropped their popsicle in the sand. It felt good to let all that emotion go in a room full of strangers, to feel unencumbered by people’s preconceived notions. While I was speaking a rough looking man got up and left the room, I assumed I had sickened him with my display. He had declined to speak earlier but when he returned he addressed me directly and began to cry himself. He said he remembered what it was like to be in my shoes. How I had taken the first steps and recovery is possible. I hope to god he’s right.
I start “real” counseling on the 29th. I can’t wait and I’m ready to do this once and for all. I pray that the ones I have hurt and betrayed the most someday forgive me. I know I have a long road ahead of me but every journey begins with a single step.
You Can Do It
Different effects of stress on the brains of men and women related to empathy
originally posted at: http://www.psypost.org/2016/07/different-effects-stress-brains-men-women-related-empathy-43688
BY DANIEL REED ON JULY 6, 2016
The different effects of social stress on the brains of men and women are related to their response to empathy for pain, according to a study published this July in the International Journal of Psychophysiology. The study provides evidence that each sex may engage in distinct mechanisms to cope with stress.
Empathy is an essential aspect of social functioning. It allows people to build an understanding and mental representation of other peoples’ emotions and feelings. Research suggests that the brain mechanisms involved in how people empathize with others in painful circumstances involve two distinct responses. Firstly, there is an early emotional response seen in front-central regions of the brain; and secondly, there is a later cognitive evaluation, over the parietal area, where attention is either directed towards or away from stimuli.
As humans are a highly social species and face social stress on a regular basis, it can be expected that stress affects how people react to their environment. Therefore, the extent to which someone empathizes with another in pain is thought to be influenced by social stress.
Within this area, it has been proposed that men and women are distinctively affected by social stress. Men supposedly become more self-oriented, engaging in “fight or flight” behavior, whilst women react by creating and caring for social networks.
The study, led by Cristina Gonzalez-Liencres of Ruhr-University Bochum, involved 60 healthy participants (30 women and 30 men), half of which were exposed to short-term social stress. To measure empathy, researchers recorded the electroencephalography (EEG: which detects electrical brain activity) of the participants, while they observed photographs of hands in painful and neutral situations. Participants also had to fill in an assessment of their empathy in response to the photos and had their cortisol response to stress measured (via saliva samples).
Results revealed that different effects of social stress on the brains of men and women were related to their response to the pain empathy task. The late brain activity, associated with cognitive evaluation, was uniquely associated with a change in cortisol in stressed males. This was despite similar empathy ratings reported by all participants. This suggests that men used more cognitive processes in response to social stress and provides evidence that each sex may engage in distinct mechanisms to cope with stress.
The findings are useful to help understand the unique effects of social stress in men and women, as well as for the separate mechanisms that each sex undertakes to cope with socially stressful situations. This may be useful for understanding psychopathological conditions which are influenced by high levels of social stress.
