Shame

I’ve dated several beautiful, intelligent women recently but can’t muster a physical response. With Tina, whose voice is catnip, the problem is she’s not submissive — when I asked her to wear something green and she deflected, every alarm bell went off, and now, shamefully, I want to run.

I’m reflecting on how shame has shaped my life and my blog since 2010 — from the radical openness I once had in writing about my most uncomfortable impulses, to the self-judgment and contempt that have crept back in now that I’m less anonymous and less self-accepting.

I had an epiphany about the shame I feel when relationships with women end — a deep sense that I am bad, unworthy, and that the loss is proof of it. It connected my pattern of abandonment to my mother, and felt like genuine news even though I’ve written about it many times before.

Remembering my suffering.

Just what is it I’m scared of? Same old same old…. Shame. Abandonment. Loss.

Why is it so shameful to be caught masturbating?

More than anything, sex parties make me THINK. The day after a sex party, I’m filled with thoughts, imaginings, and reflections.

I’m just always happier when I’m myself.

A fragment on secrecy and shame.

The beginning of a trip to Checkmate – a New York sex club – with Charlotte and Milica.