[TW: Mention of SA, sex]
Hi Lems! I’m in a difficult situation and I was wondering if you had any thoughts or advice you might like to share.
I was recently in a short relationship where I had sexual boundaries crossed and its left me very shaken. A couple months later and I’m still dealing with the aftermath despite it not even happening with a malicious person. Ugh. Trauma is hard. I’m still figuring it out.
In parallel with that, I’ve been waiting to get on HRT for quite some time. I finally had my appointment on September 3rd and I’ve been on a starting dose of t-blockers and estrogen gel since.
A big concern of mine going into a physical transition was sexual function. I’m a very sex positive and sex loving person, and from where I stand now I really enjoy having a penis and want to keep using it. The problem is that I’m struggling deeply with traumatic flashes and triggers when not only having sex with a partner, but also even just while masturbating.
I want to maintain my sexual function very badly; its of high importance to me. So, I understand I need to use it or lose it, and I was reading online that I should masturbate at least every other day, or like 1-3 times every 3 days. But, I’m really struggling. Dealing with triggers while even just by myself, combined with the challenges of new hormones in my body, masturbating has just become so completely unappetizing. I often need a strong self care routine before and after just to feel okay about it. During, I have to work extra hard, check-in and calm myself down regularly, and my mind often feels apprehensive to doing it at all. These feelings are all brand new as of the traumatic event; I normally overreach on my masturbating quota.
So. I’m not sure what to do. I’m scared that if I push forward I’m going to cause more harm to my mental health by forcing myself to do something I don’t want to do. Feels almost like self-SA at that point, not to be too dramatic but i’m sure you understand my meaning. Its scary to think I might re-trigger myself. The other option i guess is pausing HRT but I don’t know. I could. I’d be fine maybe. But on the other hand I waited so long to start and I want this so badly that I hate the idea of halting or restarting even the small steps of progress made in the last 20 days. I could also just push forward while masturbating less and accept my fate. Those are the only courses I see now and I’d love to hear your thoughts if I’ve missed any other options or you have other opinions on the situation.
The worst part is that pornography has become a real draw despite having stopped using it for years at this point. Its so over-stimulating that I don’t have to worry about my mind wandering off elsewhere. But its terrible for my mental health. Reading smut is healthier and has been helpful but still the above problems persist.
I’m working with my therapist on all this right now. And, next month I have an appointment to ask my psych about trauma-specific or sexual trauma-specific counselling.
Any thoughts, or feelings that you might have towards my situation would be hugely appreciated. I just don’t feel like myself recently and wanted to try some external opinions.
Thank you all so much, sorry for such a heavy topic. I’m safe and figuring it out, I’m sure i’ll be okay.
in my experience even just using it once every few weeks it still works fine enough, only differences have been a lack of desire to do it and nothing coming out ATP. hope another perspective on that aspect helps :)
if you definitely want hrt for the other effects I wouldnt pause the process over this, especially considering it takes a few months to really ramp up usually. you waited this long its better to keep it going imo
i wish you luck ask away any questions you have I’m happy to answer 🩷
Thank you this is so so huge 🩷 I really think I just needed to hear a plain jane example of someone who relates. You’re right I really shouldnt pause, and it’s good to know I can slow down to that degree and still be okay. Even if I end up choosing to lean on pornography, once a week or even less wouldn’t be damaging to me.
Thanks friend, really appreciate it 🩷
I used it only once like many months, still works.
main difference is that it doesnt get hard when i dont want to, that’s very nice :3
tho i do plan for it to be fully gone eventually
Im happy for you! I never grasped though why some people didn’t like spontaneous erections. I find them so fun and I miss them a bit already.
But I’ll get on top of it and there’s been great advice in this thread. Thank you all so much
to add to what others have said, you really dont need to masturbate that much to maintain function, and you really only need to get an erection not do anything with it. im not sure why that frequency gets spread around so much. its like the world wants us to be hypersexual or something… once a week or so is enough in my experience. i havent had any shrinkage and there were a few times i went weeks without doing anything, during my libido dip.
it will get harder to get and maintain enough of an erection to top whether you get enough erections to prevent shrinkage or not. its pretty easy to be prescribed tadalafil or something though, which is a huge help. i take 5mg of tadalafil every day to make maintenance easier. ill even wake up with an erection sometimes still, so i really dont even need to worry about deliberate maintenance erections.
id say definitely continue with hrt. the changes are slow enough you will be kicking yourself later if you wait.
In my experience, once a week isn’t quite enough to stop atrophy (it hurt like hell the next time I do it), but every body is different.
thats certainly true. now that i think about it my body might be a little different because i have eds. im not super stretchy and flexible like the most obvious people but i am still stretchier than normal people, so that might make maintenance easier for me.
I don’t know if this makes any difference but just in case: the important part is that it gets hard, the rest is optional. For me that still just happens at random times so I don’t actually need to do anything
I have heard of some trans women using erectile dysfunction medicines to maintain function. They would take a pill before bed, get an erection overnight to maintain function without being aware enough to be repulsed by it.
I have no personal experience with this, I just know its something I have heard discussed in trans circles. It sounds like something that may be of help to you if accurate. I’d recommended looking into it if it sounds like it could help.
Trauma is hard. I hope you find the least bad way of getting through it.
I have no experience of it either but here is an article I’ve read about it: https://stainedglasswoman.substack.com/p/how-to-maintain-your-penis-function
Wow, that’s tough. I’m so sorry for you! 🫂💜
Maybe you want to check for non-trans-specific resources as well, as there’s probably… more. Also, check if there are support programs wherever you live! It’s great that you already got a therapist.
I feel stupid for suggesting this, but let’s take a shot: is the person who caused your trauma aware of their effect and might be willing to support you? I’m not saying you should blindly trust them and risk getting severely hurt again, but I can imagine having some closure to be helpful. Then again, I have no clue and maybe that approach is actually detrimental instead.
I would’ve suggested different kind of pornography. But rereading your post, I noticed you seem to know about that all to well.
Thank you so much for taking the time!!
It’s a long winding story but to put it concisely, me and that person are on civil terms but they’ve totally rejected how I feel about the situation. Despite making it clear to them that I don’t believe they were acting with malice, they essentially invalidated the idea that what happened could have been traumatic.
Sadly that person will have no role in my process because otherwise I totally agree, that was my first thought too. But we’ve talked several times in the past few months and I’m done barking up that tree looking for closure.
Thank you again for taking the time, I think the pornography one is a good one to explore, and I really appreciate you replying and sharing some ideas🩷
Well I initially wanted to write about how pornography that let’s you associating with another character take might help to avoid/reduce triggers, but I am honestly not knowledgeable about the subject of abuse. Maybe other enticing media helps. Besides well known porn videos, there’s also stories (ranging from romantic to explicit, from physical books to online fanfic to… interactive AI “assisted” writing), comics/manga, anime (pervert/suggestive is called “ecchi”, explicit is called “hentai”, if anyone reading this needed to know), heck maybe even drawn R34 pictures might help. Generally, I think society should grow a healthier relationship to pornography, but as I said, you made clear you’re not ignorant about that subject.
