When you’re ready to explore oral once more, you need to direct the action, and avoid specific styles of activity that were part of your abuse. Choreograph sexual positions, modes of caressing and even locations for sex-play that are entirely unique. Try juxtaposing tongue and vibrator, or tongue and manual touch, so that sensations and acts become a blur of surprises. Your goal is to reach a point where incorporating oral sex into your repertoire seems completely new, like you invented it all by yourself. Then you’ll be able to allow the pleasure in.

One final consideration: Children sometimes feel genital sensations when stimulated by someone they initially trust, but these responses often become their secret shame later, when they realize that the touches were “bad.” As adults, they may shut off sexual sensations that remind them of their past, lest their pleasure suggest they were responsible for their abuse all along. Never is a child responsible. Never! But if you’re lost in this mental labyrinth, a sex therapist can help you find your way out, free to reach for the grown-up ecstasy you so deserve.

A psychologist and certified sex therapist, Dr. Joy Davidson brings provocative insights to audiences via her work in television, radio, publishing and the internet. Her most recent book is Fearless Sex: A Babe's Guide to Overcoming Your Romantic Obsessions and Getting the Sex Life You Deserve. More about Dr. Joy can be found at www.joydavidson.com.
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