Greetings, thank you so much for taking the time to read my post.

I have been in self-imposed denial for 7 days, 14 hours, 5 minutes and 42 seconds at the moment of writing this.

With every day my body has grown more desperate, yearning for release. My mind however stands stalwart in the face of this strong, sexual frustration. Mentally, I’ve made peace with this loss. It’s a painful loss, but this pain I’ve learnt to cherish.

Whenever I find myself conducting myself much more obediently around others and having a much greater capacity for physical affection and care - something that is really rare for me to experience as a sex-repulsed aromantic asexual - I cherish it. I cherish what was taken from me and how it affected me, how it changed me.

It’s a whole new modality for closeness, that this journey has unlocked in me and for that I cherish it.

But that doesn’t make it any more hard. That doesn’t make me any more needy and desperate.

I’m still dealing with a system that was conditioned to receive hours of self-stimulation daily. A system that regrets this loss with every fibre of its being as it spends its mornings as it uncontrollably humps pillows and blankets before somehow the mind wins over it and puts it in its place, to get out of bed and start another day. Another denied day.

As this vivid description hopefully makes it clear - this is hard for me. I’m struggling.

I am really, REALLY proud of myself for getting this far. But it’s hard.

I understand that there’s many people on here like me, people who’ve experienced this hard ship and this deep need. And I am really, really impressed with you all!