Sex is Not Allowed
- Sexual Anorexia means the loss of appetite for sexual desires.
- Sexual Anorexia is not yet accepted as a disorder as per DSM-5.
- Sexual Addiction is linked with Sexual Anorexia.
No demand for sexual gratification or no pleasure after intimacy is widely considered as “exaggerated drama” or “myth”. However, as the body cannot eat what it strongly dislikes, it also cannot desire what it does not want behind the doors.
While anorexia refers to the loss of appetite, when there is a “loss of interest or appetite” or “interrupted appetite” for sexual gratification, it is termed as Sexual Anorexia. It is not yet accepted as a disorder, but it is definitely considered greatly by mental health professionals while investigating what makes the person withdraw from intimacy.
What Does the Individual Feel?
Constant or Interrupted Lack or Loss of Sexual Desire: The person might feel anger or fear when the subject of sex pops up. They might want to engage themselves in sexual acts but not be able to proceed further when faced with real experiences. At the 2011 Global Addiction Conference, Dr. Sanja Rozman explained how someone with this condition might become obsessed with avoiding physical intimacy.
Negative Attitudes about Sexual Activity and Body Image: The individual might develop certain beliefs about intimate acts and the body that disrupt their inner self from achieving sexual gratification and loving their body. Feelings of shame over past intimate experiences and sense of guilt or despair for poor sexual performance affect self-esteem. Difficulty in coping up with morbid thoughts and regulating one’s emotions further impacts daily functioning.
Extreme Isolation and Self-Destructive Actions: The individual might feel the absolute disconnection from people as the only way to keep themselves safe.
Behaviours such as substance addiction to gain pleasure temporarily and developing self-destructive patterns to limit or avoid sexual contacts might be sometimes extremely damaging.
They also may involve themselves in compulsive porn consumption or masturbation to achieve their desires. Suicidal ideations may also be exhibited.
What Invites the Situation?
Sexual Abuse Restricting the Present: Physical violation of the body in the past can lead to strongly hate intimate acts, as the past might be mirroring itself in the present intimate bonds.
False Image of Sex: Confined and negative conditioning towards sex fosters negative beliefs about intimacy.
Unhealthy Relationships: Lack of informed communication and power struggles with a partner can impact sexual relationships.
Emotional Abuse Leading to Social Withdrawal: Emotional abandonment, neglect and abuse during childhood can shape an adult that withdraws from relationships, as they lose trust in the depth of bonds. This further shapes and impacts their sexual relationships.
Physical Demands Muting Sexual Desires: Hormonal imbalances, recent childbirth, breast-feeding, medication use, exhaustion can affect libido and lead to withdrawal from intimacy.
What Can Help if the Situation becomes Self-Damaging?
Medical Treatment
Erectile Dysfunction Medications: To increase sexual functioning, men with erectile dysfunction are prescribed medications such as Viagra, Stendra, Levitra and Cialis that promotes blood flow by relaxing muscles in the penis.
Estrogen Therapy: To enhance lubrication and sexual performance, vaginal tone and elasticity are strengthened.
Androgen Therapy: To enhance testosterone, it may be prescribed to women with low sex drive, though it is not yet FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration) approved.
Medications for Low Sex Drive in Women: To help increase sex drive and performance in premenopausal women, Addyi and Vylessi, which are FDA (U.S. Food and Drug Administration) approved injection treatments, are advised.
Anti-Anxiety Medications: To temporarily help people cope up with odd emotions and feelings that they encounter before sexual acts, medicines that reduce anxiety can be prescribed.
Therapy
Marriage and Couples Therapy: It helps the partners in understanding each other better by improving their communication and helping them accept each other, thereby creating a healthy bond.
Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT): It makes the individual untangle the negative attitudes towards sex and helps them develop adaptive coping skills to regulate their thoughts and emotional patterns.
Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Therapy (EMDR): It targets negative cognitions and related emotional disturbances so that over time, the trauma is desensitized and positive beliefs are strengthened.
Sex Therapy: It helps the individual explore past experiences with sex and intimacy while developing appropriate sex-related goals.
Support Groups
Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA): It is a 12-step group where the goal is to stop addictive sexual behaviours and to recover from sexual addiction. Meetings are peer-led and may be held in-person, over the phone, or online.
Sexual Anorexics may find there a space that acknowledges their fears and they learn with other’s experiences.
Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (SLAA): It is another 12-step group that aims at achieving a way out from a compulsive pattern of sex and love addiction. Meetings are peer-led and held in-person, over the phone, or online.
Sexual Anorexics gain a space that acknowledges their experiences, and they might find relief by voicing their deep-seated fears aloud.
Therapy Groups: Some community spaces led by mental health professionals–available online, offline or both–help people heal their fears and develop coping strategies to reshape their attitudes toward sex.
Sexual Addiction and Sexual Anorexia: a Close Bond
Compulsive behaviors, such as the use of strip clubs, sex workers or pornography, can hinder an individual’s ability to form intimate sexual relationships with a real-life partner. A person who fears physical intimacy can also engage in the acts of masturbation or compulsive porn watching to gain pleasure.
Addiction and withdrawal around sex appear to directly affect each other.
Sexual aversion can lead the person to avoid people completely, and the fear or disrupted beliefs towards relationships might cause the individual to refrain from developing sexual bonds or relationships of any type. These are two sides of the same coin and can impact each other equally.
Withdrawing from physical intimacy is normal. When it starts affecting daily functioning or self-esteem, seeking professional help is necessary. Though diagnosis of the problem is not easy, detection is not impossible. Sometimes, when one cannot help oneself, others can definitely prove to be a great helping hand in overcoming the odds.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_anorexia
https://www.healthline.com/health/what-sexual-anorexia
https://www.choosingtherapy.com/sexual-anorexia/
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/sexual-anorexia#outlook
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/sex-lies-trauma/201408/the-pain-of-sexual-anorexics/amp
https://slaadvi.org/characteristics-of-sexual-anorexia-slaa-greater-delaware-valley-sex-and-love-addiction-recovery/
https://www.betterhelp.com/advice/intimacy/sexual-anorexia-why-am-i-so-afraid-of-sex/
https://doi.org/10.1016/S0025-6196(19)30668-8
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