Vaginismus

I can’t have sex. When I’ve tried in the past, it has either hurt like hell or was pretty much impossible. There have been a few times where it didn’t hurt and was actually pleasurable, but for the most part, it has hurt. This is due to a condition known as vaginismus, where the pelvic muscles tighten.

This could be out of fear, maybe a reaction to my sexual assault last year, or the emotional abuse I endured in high school, I don’t know. I do know it needs to be solved because it’s wreaking havoc on my sex life.

Not only do I want to have sex, I’m all about the intimacy. I’m an old-fashioned, hopeless romantic who wants to make love. But I also feel like I’m letting down my boyfriend. I know my boyfriend last year was very frustrated with this, kept asking me when I was going to get better so we could have sex. When we did try and I wanted to stop, he’d sometimes try to get me to keep going, insisting it would be okay, the pain would stop, etc.

Sometimes I’d try to “play through the pain” so to speak for his sake, and then cry afterwards. I cried because of the pain, and because I let myself be used like that despite how it felt for me. And I was ashamed that I couldn’t give my man what he wanted.

Women are constantly bombarded with the idea that all men want sex, and sex needs to be a big part of a relationship to keep them satisfied. If sex isn’t hapening, something is wrong. If you don’t have sex with him, you must not really love him or want to be with him . . . or you’re just a cold-heart bitch and ultimately a bad girlfriend. Not having sex is used as a justification for cheating.

I feel like a failure sometimes. I do everything else “right,” I just can’t usually give him sex, and when we do make love, I don’t think he’s penetrating as deeply as he can or wants to because his frigid girlfriend has a vagina problem. Not that I necessarily think he’s disappointed or frustrated, but hey, if one guy was, maybe he is too.

I want to be the perfect girlfriend. I know I’m flawed, I get jealous sometimes, sometimes I get paranoid that he’ll leave because I’m just not good enough. I try to be superwoman, every guy’s dream girl, and I hate myself when I fall short of it. and vaginismus makes me lacking in an important area. This has more of an impact on my self-worth than my self-pleasure (I have a vibrator so I don’t go nuts from lack of sex).

Also, the fact that I can’t have sex leads to feeling like I shouldn’t have any intimacy. After all, I don’t want to be a “tease,” I know guys get frustrated when they fool around, pleasure the girl, and don’t get sex in the end. If we shower together and he washes my hair, I feel like I practically owe him sex. So why even do that? In the end I feel like I need to deprive myself of any intimacy so I don’t give my man with blue-balls.

I know a lot of these thoughts are anti-feminists and very self-degrading, probably a result of quite a few douchebag experiences. But this is, at the very least, one woman’s perspective on what it’s like to have vaginismus.