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Intrusive thoughts taking over during sex? It’s more common than you think…<\/p>\n
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Anonymous<\/p>\n
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Every now and again, during the throes of passion, something horrifying will happen to me. I\u2019ll be mid-shag and my dad\u2019s face will pop into my mind uninvited. Obviously, this is a terrifying mood kill and an affliction I\u2019ve long worried will have me carted off for psychiatric help if I ever admitted to it. Nobody wants to think about their parents in a sexual capacity. Ever. But this Freudian nightmare is actually more common than you might think. And no, it doesn\u2019t mean you fancy your family members. Thank God.<\/p>\n
Apparently, many of us are haunted by our family\u2019s faces when we get down to it. This week, while scrolling my life away on TikTok, I came across a clip of former Made in Chelsea star Jamie Laing admitting to this very thing on his podcast, NewlyWeds, with wife Sophie Habboo.<\/p>\n
While speaking about the mythical Greek king Oedipus, who slept with his mother without knowing it was her, Jamie said, \u2018I had it for a period, it’s an OCD thing where I would suddenly go to my mum’s image in my head while I was having sex with you.\u2019<\/p>\n
So, why do our parent\u2019s faces sometimes enter our minds at exactly the wrong time?
Jamie likened his mum appearing in his mind\u2019s eye at the wrong moment to other intrusive thoughts many of us get at entirely inopportune times: Thinking \u2018I could just jump\u2019 when standing on the tube platform or, for a fleeting second, visualising \u2018punching a baby\u2019 if one starts crying in public.<\/p>\n
Sex therapist Dr Holly Richmond explains that the basis for Jamie and I\u2019s particular intrusive thoughts is anxiety. So, essentially, if we\u2019re feeling anxious about being intimate with our partner for some reason, our brain will summon the most taboo image possible into our mind\u2019s eye in order to yank us out of the moment and keep us safe in a different way.<\/p>\n
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\u2018I would ask, what\u2019s going on with your partner?\u2019 she says. \u2018Is there resentment? Is there a lack of trust? Are you feeling too vulnerable? Any normal person would say they hate these intrusive thoughts. They want them to go away. Yet, we know clinically, they\u2019re serving some purpose\u2026They keep us not present because now we\u2019re in this intrusive thought and we\u2019re not in our body having sex.\u2019<\/p>\n
Of course, if your dad\u2019s face appears in your head when you’re mid-shag, your first terrified question is: was Freud right all along? Do we all secretly have some twisted feelings for the opposite-sex parent? \u2018There\u2019s literally almost never something sexual there,\u2019 reassures Dr Richmond. \u2018It\u2019s our body saying \u201chere\u2019s a distraction, because for some reason, it\u2019s really hard for me to be present right now\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n
Additionally, Richmond notes these thoughts don\u2019t always present as dads for daughters and mums for sons. \u2018Plenty of clients have had thoughts about their siblings,\u2019 she explains, adding your brain is reaching for whichever family member would be \u2018the worst\u2019 for you to see at that moment. Whoever would repulse you the most, works best for your brain to pull you out of your body and into your head.<\/p>\n
How can you stop intrusive thoughts like this from happening when you get intimate?
It almost goes without saying that me, Jamie Laing, and anyone else who has seen their parents, siblings, cousins or indeed grandparents faces during sex would really love for it to stop. Please, make the terror end. But, in order to be cured, Dr Richmond says we must first confront our anxiety head-on.<\/p>\n
\u2018I would just ask, what is there going on in your life that you have to be anxious about?\u2019 she says. \u2018Instead of being in the rest and digest state, you\u2019re in the fight of flight state \u2013 and fight or flight [when the body prepares for an incoming threat] is not conducive to having good sex.\u2019<\/p>\n
So, in order to move forward, Richmond recommends addressing the following questions: Is there a problem with your partner? Is there shame around sex? Is there a lack of deserving? Is there a lack of confidence that you don\u2019t know how to be present to receive pleasure?<\/p>\n
And onto the big question, should you tell your partner if you\u2019re having these intrusive thoughts while sleeping with them? When I ask this of Dr Richmond, her immediate response surprises me: \u2018No\u2019.<\/p>\n
Usually, sex therapists are very on board with sharing even the most embarrassing issues with your partner, so that you\u2019re on the same page and have a mutual understanding. However, in this case, your confession could just lead to further confusion for the person you\u2019re sleeping with.<\/p>\n
\u2018This could really impact the relationship,\u2019 says Dr Richmond. \u2018So, I think, if you have the means to see a therapist \u2013 specifically, a sex therapist who specialises in anxiety or obsessive-compulsive disorder \u2013 I would talk to a professional first. What would be great to share with your partner is \u201cI\u2019m having a hard time staying present during sex right now\u201d instead.\u2019<\/p>\n
She explains: \u2018I would just worry that \u2013 let\u2019s say it\u2019s your brother or your dad that pops into your head \u2013 that for a partner who doesn\u2019t understand psychology, they\u2019re going to think \u201cOh my God, do you really want to have sex with your brother or your dad?\u201d…They wouldn\u2019t understand the complex nuance of the human psyche and that none of [those feelings] are going on.\u2019<\/p>\n
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That certainly worked for me \u2013 but is there a point where you should be worried about these intrusive thoughts during sex? Dr Richmond notes that although having images of your family pop into your head when getting intimate isn\u2019t \u2018common\u2019 it\u2019s also certainly not \u2018abnormal\u2019.<\/p>\n
The time to worry about this problem is when these intrusive thoughts enter the realm of rumination. Aka, focusing passively and repetitively on them every time you have sex. \u2018Rumination is the top category for an obsessive-compulsive disorder diagnosis,\u2019 says Dr Richmond. \u2018Most people think OCD is behaviour based \u2013 washing your hands, checking the stove, checking you locked the door \u2013 but most of the time, it\u2019s ruminating thoughts.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018If you\u2019re thinking about this once every couple of months, just pay attention to it,\u2019 she advises. \u2018But, as soon as it starts negatively impacting your life, certainly that\u2019s when you\u2019re going to want to seek help.\u2019<\/p>\n
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IMAGES:<\/strong> IMAGO<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Having intrusive thoughts while doing the deed? You’re not the only one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":5822,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"kschwarz","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5935"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5938,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5935\/revisions\/5938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/grazia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}