#NoSextember Year 2

Tags

detox, diet, food, giving up sex, Greggs vegan sausage rolls, losing weight, purification, Vegan

A woman at work was talking about going out to eat with her friend, to be sociable, rather than about the food, and about how it was hard to get a table, and then super cheap because of the Government’s Eat out to help out scheme (where they pay half the bill Mon-Wed, I believe, to help the hospitality industry recover from lockdown.) The woman, a beautiful slim woman in her early thirties said: “My friend, she is this big (miming very overweight person), “She LOVES food; it’s like she lives only for food. Me I can take it or leave it, one toast two days, no problem.”

I felt a little envious. I am not like that, unfortunately…. I am a Taurean, a lover of food, with a lack of discipline, and sometimes hedonistic. My husband talks about how important it is to have control and not be addicted to anything, to be able to pick things up and put them down again. This only works if you can put them down again, which is why we are doing this programme. It’s as much to prove to ourselves that we can do it as well as to get a bit healthier physically.

It’s about attachment, practising what we preach and ultimately, it’s all part of the lifelong preparation for death, can you pick it up and put it down? Worldly pleasures, and ultimately, when the time comes, life itself? I’m misquoting George Harrison, but he said something like, You don’t want to have to come back because you left the cat out, or whatever. Or haven’t finished your book. The moment it comes, all that ceases to matter, and the focus is on letting go. When he was attacked by an intruder in his home he realised ‘This is it’ and had started letting go when Olivia hit the guy over the head with a lamp stand and saved him.

The programme:

No cigarettes, no alcohol.

No pointless food- crisps, biscuits, cake, teacakes, etc

We did this last year, a made up month of purification/self improvement, prompted in large part to my terrible addiction to Greggs Vegan Sausage Rolls. Regular readers may be surprised to know that I have completely conquered said addiction. Just before everywhere locked down, I was in my home town of Diss, Norfolk, UK, buying GVSRs with my husband, having first been to Grapetree to stock up on nuts, seeds, dried fruit, maca powder, cacao powder, hemp protein powder (like all people I am a mix of apparent contradictions.) The young lad at the counter and us were bemusedly talking about Corona virus, and the lad mentioned Greggs might close down. I was disbelieving, “Close down Greggs?” I said, “Never!”

Of course I was wrong, and spent much of the first part of lockdown grieving for my occasional trips to Daventry (my current home town) and Greggs for an Americano and a VSR (or two), or same on the way to Norfolk for our regular three- four hour drives to see friends and family. But when we did try them again, they tasted horribly salty and we ended up throwing them away! We overheard meat eaters saying the same about the meat ones. Was it a change of recipe? Or had our palettes just changed over lockdown? Anyway, for my body it’s a blessing.

However, we’ve managed to put on weight via plenty of other means: crisps, teacakes, and for me, alcohol, starting with my lockdown birthday and sliding into regular G&T or beer on the deck after work.  And cigarettes. I love being outside, but what to do with myself? The last couple of days after work I sat on the deck and had a glass of lemon water and a bowl of trail mix or a banana, and it really was okay.

Walk/yoga daily

I really slacked re exercise during this big period of writing/editing.

Increase cooking from scratch and Avoid eating so much processed food

With the boom in ready made vegan food it’s tempting to go to Aldi or Tesco and pick up something ready made, new potatoes and a pack of salad for ease, rather than, what can I make out of what we have, and the more fiddly things/things that require going out of the way to shop for get sidelined or forgotten.

No caffeine- no coffee, no fizzy drinks, decaf tea, herbal/fruit tea, lemon water, water only. (from around 10 Aug I went to just caffeine tea first thing then no more tea or coffee or fizzy drinks, to help with the headache of abrupt coffee/caffeine stopping.

“Can I do it if I drink decaff coffee?” Someone at work asked me. “Yes of course, it’s just a made up thing,” I said. No real rules, other than what you make up yourself.  We’ve focused on our biggest weaknesses- last year, GVSRs, this year, crisps, smoking, and lack of exercise. Some things are fixed for us- no cigarettes, no alcohol- some are more general not 100% e.g. I’m sure we’ll have the odd processed meal, and processed is a definition that can be strict or loose- we’re reasonably loose- but we know where we need to make improvements.

So if you want to join me, I’m giving you some notice- particularly useful for caffeine as if you go from four cups of coffee to none in my experience you get a banging headache for a half a day- just make up your own programme but we could do it together, and share a blog about it? Do I need to tell you I am not a doctor? And that stopping excessive alcohol consumption abruptly can be dangerous and you need to seek proper advice re coming off that.

Talking about sharing the blog- if anyone would like to write a guest post for this blog do get in touch via the contact box. Promote your blog/ book/ music; tell us your story, about the detail of your daily life, comment on something on the blog that interests you…

No sex- this is the one I don’t tell people at work when I’m telling them about my September purification month, and the one people find most weird. But I refer you back to the intro re attachment.

Thank you very much for reading!

Rachel

Act Opposite!

Tags

DBT, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy, Housework, marriage, sex

Act Opposite is a DBT skill.  Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) was invented by Marsha Linehan, a US therapist, primarily to treat a particular client group for whom regular Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CBT) appeared ineffective.  Her clients were mainly women diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD) who frequently self harmed, often severely, made multiple suicide attempts, whose lives were chaotic and whose therapists were frequently burned out.

These were women who had grown up in invalidating environments.  Just being told they needed to change was often experienced as further invalidation.  Enter the paradox:  DBT says, yes, the current situation is untenable and you do need to make changes, but given your circumstances it is completely understandable that you feel and behave this way.  I am going to support you in making the changes you need to make but I am also going to accept you just as you are.  And however difficult I may sometimes find this to do, I am going to hold fast to the belief that you are doing your very best.

That’s quite a long explanation;  when I am in a hurry I just say DBT is like CBT with Buddhism.

There is also a very tight framework which supports the therapists in delivering high quality consistent therapy, this is important as many therapists working with this client group can’t cope and end up abandoning their clients, who have often already been abandoned by previous therapists, friends, etc.

In DBT, the client has an individual therapist who helps the client to talk through their week, focussing on the most dangerous incidents first, in a strict hierarchy, using chain analysis to see what triggered the event and where the client could have employed alternative skills and strategies.  Separately the client attends a skills training group, where they learn the skills of interpersonal effectiveness, emotion regulation and coping in crisis.  That way, even if individual sessions are dominated by chaining suicide attempts and self harm, the client is still getting protected time to learn the skills that will help them in the long term.  Oh and there’s lots of mindfulness.

I trained in DBT and learned all the skills myself.  So when on Sunday I found myself in a slump, groggy, no energy, slightly depressed, feeling kind of incapable, I knew what to do:  Act Opposite.

I wrapped the Christmas presents and actually didn’t hate it.   They look very pretty all together on a shelf in the dining room, surrounded by fairy lights, wrapped in brown paper and bright pink metallic ribbon.  I cleaned the bathroom, all of it, including the black and white lino floor.  (A word of advice, you might think a black and white checked floor will look nice, but it shows every mark, every piece of fluff, every strand of hair…)  I vacuumed everywhere.  All three of these tasks I dislike intensely, but I did them- with sensible breaks for food and smoothies and cat cuddling- and afterwards, my slump was over.  By the time evening came and I put my feet up on the sofa to read and write, I felt much, much better.

So what caused the slump?  Well, it was the weekend and at the moment that means sex:  Saturday night, early dinner, a roaring fire, the floor of the sitting room covered with rugs, blankets and cushions…

It was so good that the next morning we were hungover even though we’d only drunk tea!  In bed in the morning, we weren’t going to come, but then we did.  Afterwards we dragged ourselves out of bed and went for a hazardous walk in the ice, and about halfway back we both just felt the energy drain out of us.   Yes, it really is a thing, orgasms drain your energy.  Plus, we’ve both been slightly ill with colds.  Then at bedtime I realised my period had arrived.  I don’t follow a lot or read a lot, I manage my media and sensory input, and I don’t like much stuff.  But what I like, I really like, and I remember.  I remember this tweet from when I was on twitter about eight years ago:  ‘Do you ever get your period and think, wow, that explains a lot…’

See yourself as beautiful (Warning: sexually explicit)

Tags

healing, love, marriage, sex

I’ve got a perfect body, though sometimes I forget

I’ve got a perfect body cause my eyelashes catch my sweat

(Regina Spektor)

We went a week without having sex after getting back from Marrakech.  The sex we had in Marrakech seemed to be some kind of unlock, releasing things/me.  It felt like healing had occurred.  When we had sex again my husband took me to another dimension.  It was as if I had been waiting, searching, all through the intervening years since the first sexual encounter, until now.  I feel like I finally worked out how my body works.  Or rather, like I finally remembered how it works.

Because I used to know, and then I forgot.  It became layered under peer pressure (actually from my female peers this was often anti not pro sex), my mother saying about me:  where is she, whoring around again.  Relationships, unrequited love.  There was no place, no mirror I could find that supported or reflected my own particular brand of feminism.

Anyway, this is a personal not a political blog so back to the other night, in bed with my husband:  He took me to another dimension.  I feel like I’m in a special place, I whispered.  And there we were, both tripped into somewhere else.  I often go somewhere else during sex but I often go there by myself:  drifting in and out of tried and tested fantasies that help me relax enough to come.  Like I’m avoiding just being  present.  But that night, I thought to myself:  here you are, having sex WITH MY HUSBAND.

WITH MY HUSBAND.  I realised, of course, we are designed so perfectly.  He puts his penis into my vagina, it touches me just there and I…  Yes, I come, I come.  Oh my God, I came and came, without stopping, one orgasm rolled into another, began as the previous one was ending, as if the sensation of one ending was enough to trigger the next one.  And even just laying there afterwards, the slightest brush, the slightest movement, the slightest thought started it all off again.

FYI we weren’t doing anything unusual, we were in the missionary position which is good for sensation and touching the right spots inside.  But like everything, sex is really a mind game.

Looking in the bathroom mirror I saw myself as beautiful.  For a few precious moments I understood why he doesn’t like me wearing any make up on my face.   He wants to see me.

 

 

 

How to not have sex with your husband

Tags

awareness, erotica, love, marriage, relationships

 

Those of you that have read previous blogs will be aware that my husband and I have been experimenting with tearing ourselves away from wild and crazy sex and practising abstinence, karezza, or at least some measure of control.

Up until now this has largely taken the form of imposing rules on ourselves, not only about when and how much to have sex and orgasms, but also rules around behaviour, in order to ‘make it easier’.

Us being us, these rules fluctuate week to week and are frequently broken, but nonetheless, we have given it a go.  Things like no groping each other, no kissing, no spoon cuddling in bed, no getting naked, no looking at each other ‘like that’.

And then at the prescribed time, usually the weekend, we ‘switch it on’ or set ourselves free and turn, briefly, into sex maniacs again for 48 hours.  Well sometimes we do, sometimes we might be more restrained than that, but it is basically on or off.

And even though one of ‘our songs ‘ is called All Or Nothing, this approach didn’t actually work all that well for us.

Although we talked about it a lot, it wasn’t until we did things differently that we realised why, and more importantly, what might help it work in the future.

So the other night, we got into bed, it was the weekend but one of us had floated the idea of that not necessarily meaning we had to have sex, so neither of us were sure, although both were prepared to do it if the other one wanted to.  We ended up having a kiss and a cuddle and falling into a deep and refreshing sleep.

The next morning we woke up, kissed, cuddled and then talked:  my husband said, I feel like I am on the edge of a precipice.  I said, perhaps we should follow the American virgins* and only do it if we are really sure.  We also reflected on how nice it was, and how satisfying, to be intimate and affectionate, without having sex.  I realised then what I hadn’t liked about the ‘All Or Nothing’ approach:  the having to switch off and on my sexuality and my affection.  I want to be able to be warm and affectionate and to feel sexy and attractive, according to the mood and colour of the present moment, not the day on the calendar.  I think we can do this, and that a more natural approach will work better for us.

*This is in no way meant to offend any Americans, it was just me referring to True Love Waits and those kinds of movements, which we don’t really have, or don’t have to such an extent, in the UK.

 

Keep it in*

Tags

happiness, mental health, OCD, reality

I don’t feel amazing ALL THE TIME.  I am not in control of my thoughts all the time.  I just spent 48 hours plagued by a cocktail of shame, panic, anxiety and OCD type thoughts and all the time the phrase ‘your thoughts create your reality’ was playing in my mind like a threat, a warning, or at the very least, a taunt.

The trigger was an everyday event that could happen to anyone:  a decision you make, then afterwards wonder did I make a mistake?  Do I need to check on that?  Can I check on that?  If something goes wrong because of what I did…  Shame, and panic ensured.  So no, I’m not immune to difficulties.   Why did it happen?  Engaging in ‘low frequency activities’ probably didn’t help and was maybe even the entire cause.  However, coming up close against my own mind like that wasn’t an entirely wasted experience.  I saw my thoughts for what they were.  Unpleasant as it was, I knew what was going on.  And strangely enough, when after 48 hours I was able to check in and found, of course, that everything was absolutely fine, that my worst fears had not actually been realised, I didn’t actually feel that different.  Even through the 48 hours, I went to work, I stayed reasonably calm and positive and I kept in touch with my awareness, unpleasant though some aspects were.

More letting go of furniture and objects around the house.  Thinking of old people whose homes haven’t been decorated for years and who have had the same things around them for years.  As they do less outside the home, and spend more time in it, maybe the wallpaper, the furniture, the ornaments, maybe they all loom larger.  Because those things are given more attention and are all tied up with the memories they hold.  People say things are important because they hold our memories.  People say when they customise their homes they put something of themselves into it.  Yes, they do:  they put in energy from the present moment.  Just having things takes your energy, either if you believe in things being created by your own mind; or else via the emotional resonance of the object; or just simply by the energy involved in dusting, cleaning and noticing it.

So if you didn’t have those things, that same energy would remain in you (or go back into you if you get rid of the things and cut ties to them).  Let’s think about it for a moment:  where would you rather your life force, your energy, resided; inside you, to make you as strong, as powerful and as full of energy as possible, or in an old starburst clock?

Is this why people get old?  Not only do they stop moving, they also let their energy drain out into things, houses, wallpaper, curtains…

In the garden today, noticing the stone white goose the old person left behind, the earthenware pots… I fell in love so easily, I loved it just as it was, I didn’t want to change a thing.  Yet today, pulling up the vegetables, much of them planted and left untended and uneaten, I’m okay, I’m ready to leave.  As if, that was nice, or, that was strange, but it’s over now.  I thought about work:  I’m leaving before I go insane.  Or perhaps I am insane, that’s why I am leaving.  I’ve been doing this fairly conventional job for twenty years- I have no friends at work, no ‘people’; I get anxious every morning before work, even after all this time.  Why?  Why have I been doing this to myself?  Until recently, I thought I was happy there.  As Jung says:

 

*As in energy- don’t put it into Things.  As in sex- keep it in your pants.  As in don’t- sometimes it’s best to share what’s going on.