Hi everybody, this is my first real post, so apologies if I’ve tagged or written anything wrong, but I’ve been feeling the need to reach out about this lately. Also super sorry this might be long.

I (nonbinary, assigned F at birth, 19) have struggled with BDD since I can remember perceiving the world around me. One of my biggest all-time triggers is the sexualization of women in media, anything from tv to movies to video games. Anime and mature rated series have always been the hardest for me, and not that long ago I decided that watching them just to fit in wasn’t worth the mental anguish is caused me. Seeing a woman with a nicer face and WAY nicer body than I could ever have just has like, day to week ruining effects on me. I should also add that in our society, an astonishingly minimal amount of media /doesn’t/ sexualize women, so I’m kind of left with kids shows and some art movies.

My bf (M, 19) is generally amazingly supportive of me and does his absolute best to make me comfortable with myself and him. He never criticizes my appearance, is always perfectly accepting of my very fluid physical boundaries, and generally agrees with me that the prevalence of sexualization in media is pretty gross. He says that, while he didn’t think about it before dating me, he’s now realized just how much media has really sexualized characters or gratuitous sex and nude scenes.

For the most part, he no longer enjoys media with a lot of sex, which I feel bad about (because I feel like I’ve ruined something otherwise very socially acceptable), but also so relieved about. If there’s one thing more triggering than seeing a hot woman myself, it’s knowing that he saw her too. That feels really sick and toxic, but I don’t know how to help it, I can’t even totally articulate why. Something about the feeling of known-inadequacy, and that he would subconsciously compare us, and that society/hollywood is trying to advertise a kind of woman/body to him that I could never provide.

However, there is still some media he watches that I’ve come to learn is fairly sexual. He loves One Piece, which is a very booby fan-servicey anime, and is a big fan of The Boys and Gen V. I just learned The Boys and Gen V are super upsettingly sexual after looking them up when I heard his friend talking about the next season coming out.

Problem is, I’m just distraught. I don’t want to make him stop watching anything I haven’t already ruined, because that feels borderline abusive, I feel bad even influencing him. But the idea of him seeing so many sexualized women and naked bodies is so genuinely sickening to me. Like if I knew he saw that and then got into bed with me and touched me at all, or saw me change, I’d feel sick. I’m tearing up and getting nauseous at typing it out. I feel inconsolable.

We generally have really open and productive discussions, and we’ve made plans to talk about it on Friday, but I’m just so scared. In all honesty, all possible outcomes suck. I wish I could just be normal and watch regular person stuff and let go.

TL;DR: my generally very supportive boyfriend watches some shows that I find very triggering. I want to talk to him about it but I don’t know what to say, and I just genuinely feel very bad.

Edit: spacing