Relationships are important to men. Relationships give connection and belonging, and allow us to express, and experience, love and care. For men who have been sexually abused in childhood, relationships are a place where trauma can be worked through and healed. This happens best when relationships are intimate.
What do we mean by ‘intimacy?’
Intimacy is a close personal connection between two people. It is a feeling of mutual trust, safety and acceptance.
We also use “intimacy” to mean sex. We will talk more about sexual intimacy below.
Intimacy and sexual abuse
It makes sense that intimacy can be a struggle for men who have been sexually abused. Creating a (false) sense of intimacy is a big part of how abusers groom their victims. Where boys were groomed, intimacy can become linked to sex and abuse, which makes survivors suspicious of it later in life.
Building intimacy usually means telling the other person about our lives, our thoughts, and our vulnerabilities. This can be a real challenge for survivors.
Intimacy and masculinity
Traditional gender roles haven’t done much to prepare men for intimacy. In the days when a man was expected to mostly be a breadwinner and a protector, putting effort into intimacy might not have been part of the job description.
These days, though, partners, children and friends expect more closeness and intimacy. This can be tough if a man’s upbringing has led him to believe that ‘intimacy’ is just sex. Although sex can increase feelings of intimacy, they are not the same thing. There can be intimacy without sex and sex without intimacy, and there can be relationships that are intimate without being sexual.
Mateship
While women can usually name a close group of friends, a lot of men don’t have close relationships outside of their partners. This can put pressure on the partnership and leave men isolated if the relationship ends. Research and experience tell us the more close friendships and connections we have, the better our wellbeing. Mateship and intimate friendships can sustain us and add to the richness of our lives.
Intimacy and sex
Even though we are supposed to live in a highly sexualised culture, sex is often hard to talk about. At SAMSN, when we listen to men talk about their struggles with sexual intimacy, we have found that old-school expectations about masculinity don’t help. Men can feel pressure to always be interested and ready for sex, and always be able to ‘perform’ sexually (defined – narrowly – as being able to get an erection and ejaculate. Because men’s conversations about sex are often performance- or ‘conquest’-based, men whose childhood trauma affected their sexual experience can feel damaged and become further isolated.
Trauma and sexual intimacy
Sometimes, the effects of abuse might not show up until later in life. Often this happens when the man is in a more committed relationship. It makes sense that if the original abuse occurred within an ‘intimate’ relationship (if the abuser was a family member or a trusted carer), then intimate situations might be triggering.
Triggers experienced during sexual intimacy can take many forms, including flashbacks, anxiety, pain, shame, confusion, loss of sexual desire (or compulsive desire), risky sexual behaviour, and an inability to maintain an erection. All these things are normal and explainable within the context of triggered trauma memories.
To try and figure out what caused the problem, you might try the following:
- Think back and figure out when you last felt okay before the problem happened. Then, figure out when you started to feel the trigger.
- Go back and forth in your memory between these two times. What was happening in those moments? What were you doing? What was your partner doing? What was around you? What feelings were you having?
- If you can identify the event or moment that triggered you, let your mind drift back over your life, and see if it reminds you of any similar event – or similar feeling – from your past.
If you can identify the trigger, it might be possible to avoid it in future. However, triggers related to sex and intimacy are usually complex and can take time to work through. If it keeps happening your best option is probably to get help from a trauma or sex therapist.
If you think your abuse is impacting on your ability to be intimate, and you haven’t told your partner about the abuse, now is probably the time. Navigating a way through sexual and relationship difficulties is easier if both partners understand what is happening. Sex is a joint, not a solo, endeavour.
Not everything is about trauma
Sexual problems can be related to physical health, so it’s also important to think about this and perhaps get medical help. It’s also definitely worth remembering that in any relationship, growing and keeping sexual intimacy is a challenge. It’s great when good sex just happens, but it doesn’t always work that way. In any sexual relationship, each partner will need to know and – most importantly – communicate what is sensual, playful, joyful and fulfilling for them. Intimacy needs real talk.
Trust and safety
Intimacy is built on trust, and trust is built on safety. The safer we feel in a relationship, the more we’re able to talk about difficult things. It’s in the interests of both people in a relationship to create a safe, supportive, and caring ‘feel’ to the way they are together.
Though it might sound strange, one of the best ways to keep a relationship feeling safe is to be vulnerable. Being vulnerable with the other person makes them feel trusted, and trust and safety are closely linked. We can’t really get to intimacy without letting ourselves be vulnerable with the other person.
The other big thing to remember is that safety is a partnership. It is not the same thing as being protective. Understandably, some male survivors can get very caught up in being protective, particularly of loved ones. A survivor may become hypervigilant, always scanning for danger and trying to keep his loved ones away from it. He might be tempted to try and limit their movement and keep them under his eye. This makes perfect sense, given that he knows first-hand what it’s like to be unsafe. But it can make the other people in the relationship feel controlled or smothered, which makes them feel unsafe.
The best way is to talk with the other person/s and understand what helps them to feel safe. Building a safe relationship is about taking on the responsibility to act in ways that help the other person feel safe and supported. It’s about checking in with them about what makes them feel safe.