My mini success story plus some questions

[LonelyTears]

Hello.

I posted a topic some months ago on my strange circumstances where essentially, I seem to have vaginismus but in a more backwards way to most people. I can be intimate with my husband on the most basic level i.e. I can tolerate slow penetration and that’s about it. There is no pleasure, and he has to go real slow or I wince (this is a reflex I usually can’t control). And even that has taken me a long time to achieve. But outside of that, I cannot tolerate ANYTHING touching me there, not even his or my own hands. It’s really strange, but I have a mini update to that now.

So we’ve been wanting kids for years but it’s always been a ‘sometime in the future’ type of thought mostly because of this problem. I’m scared to death of complications making invasive procedures necessary during pregnancy and/or childbirth. I was going to buy dilators when it occurred to me that maybe a vibrator would be better because at least that has the possibility of bringing pleasure one day, maybe. Dilators, as I understand them, are purely medical? Not to mention more expensive. My thinking is that if I can associate penetration with more than just tolerating discomfort, it might become easier. So with this thinking I bought a rabbit vibrator (plus water based lube) which I tried for the first time today, and I’m stoked to say I got all 4 inches inside me. It took a long time, and I had to be real slow because I kept hitting walls (muscle tightness?), but I got there, which is WAY more than I could have ever expected for my first use. The vibration sensation actually helped in that in sort of numbs the area somewhat.

While I’m beyond happy with this progress, it has ironically brought up new worries that I hadn’t considered before. I guess I’ll post them as bullet points. It’s important to bear in mind that my primary reason for doing all this is to have children some day, and be able to tolerate any unforeseeable procedures for the sake of the baby. Being able to feel pleasure is more of a bonus.

– Muscle tightness. Will the initial feeling of hitting a wall ever go away? Does it come and go depending on your frequency of inserting things, or will I always have to spend half of hour slowly waiting for those resistances to soften?

– Medical procedures. This relates to the above, in that I’m worried if I will always need so much time to be ready for penetration, my guess is that medical staff aren’t going to wait around for that. I do not understand for the life of me how women who undergo pap smears, for example, can just take an object suddenly going in with no time to ready themselves. If they did this to me it would cause tremendous pain/discomfort. I don’t care for procedures like this ordinarily, but if it were necessary during pregnancy/childbirth then I need to somehow resolve this in myself, but I’m not sure how.

– Pleasure. As I said, this is a side issue to me in the grand scheme of things. But I do wonder, will I ever feel this pleasure I hear others talk about so often? I’ve never even began to feel anything good outside of clitoral pleasure. It does bother me that intimacy with my husband is solely for his enjoyment. I don’t say this in a selfish way, I mean because he knows I feel nothing from it which plays on his mind. I want to provide him a proper experience by feeling something in return, instead of either nothing (best case scenario) or pain/discomfort (worst case scenario).

I apologize for writing an essay here, I just wanted to be thorough in explaining my concerns. Thank you for reading.

[mazemelissa]

Let’s celebrate your success…and it’s not so mini in my opinion. Inserting that vibrator for the first time practically the whole way is huge!

Vibrators can be very helpful with dilation for the reasons that you mentioned, the vibration sensation can help distract from discomfort, and might even feel pleasurable for some. However, most women will find pleasure from clitoral stimulation and not from the vibration inside the vagina, so keep that in mind.

As for the muscle tightness, it does continue to improve, the more you work through the dilators/vibrator. Since you just started, it is not surprising that you are feeling levels of tension as you insert it. Hopefully, the more you use it, the easier it will become, and you will continue to see the muscles tension give more easily.

You can bring dilators to appointments, and as to use them prior to a procedure. You can always ask to insert the speculum or the ultrasound wand yourself when you are in an exam room. It is important to find a provider who is sensitive to your issues, and if possible someone who has hx of working with vaginismus patients.

You might want to explore working with a pelvic floor physcial therapist. They would help treat your muscle tension, as well has help you learn to relax with exams and control your pelvic floor.

Hope this helps! Melissa

[Heather]

Hi LonelyTears!
Congratulations on getting that dilator inside!! That’s HUGE!! I suffered with vaginismus for 10 years before I got the BOTOX treatment and was cured!

The muscle tightness. Yes, it does go away! With more and more dilating, and as you get more comfortable, it does go away! That wall will eventually stop popping up on you. There are a few tips for that too. While you’re dilating, upon insertion, breathe in deep and fill your stomach with air instead of your lungs. This opens your diaphragm and makes more room for penetration. You can also Google yoga stretches that loosen up the pelvic floor. I would do some good, deep stretches before I would dilate and I really believe it helped! You can also use your finger or a tiny dilator to rotate clock wise, in the very opening of your vagina. This is an inner vaginal massage that my PT taught me and it’s supposed to relax those muscles.

Medical procedures. I am cured of my vaginismus, however I have a crippling fear of speculums. Hopefully one day I’ll get over it, but my gynecologist is very accommodating and every time I need a vaginal exam, she writes me a prescription for 1 Valium. My muscles aren’t even able to tighten if they wanted to and this makes my appointments a breeze! But just like what Melissa said too, bring your dilators, express your needs, if they are professionals, they’ll accommodate you. It’s good bedside manner! I know they even make Valium vaginal deposits. There is also lube infused with CBD and the companies promote it saying that it is really helpful for vaginismus. There are many different brands that infuse CBD into their lube.

Pleasure. Yes you will know all about the Pleasure you hear about! With every case it’s different. It took me quite a few months after I was cured, to start feeling good in my vagina and not just from clitoral stimulation. Probably because my brain was still anxious and scared around sex, therefore making it hard to enjoy. But yes it will come! And the day will come when there’s no need to prep as well! After maybe 7 months being cured I started to test my boundaries and stop dilating and I can’t remember the last time I even dilated. Eventually there is no need. Unless of course, you aren’t having regular sex, than it is important to dilate. To keep things open and stretched and healthy so there isn’t any set backs.

You already have come so far, you definitely can do this. And I highly recommend a physical therapist as well!

[LonelyTears]

Thank you for the praise and support, and I will also look into all the tips given. IRL I only have hubby to confide in about this. He’s amazing and understanding, but of course can’t relate to anything I tell him being a man. Sometimes it’s nice to just hear another woman say, I KNOW that feeling you describe. After 30 years of it alone and ashamed, it really means a lot.

I’ve always wondered how most women just do things without difficulty down there, whether it’s sex, medical exams, tampons, anything. Now I’m starting to realise that if you don’t get the discomfort/pain of muscles tightening, it must actually be quite easy? I used to think my tension was from being anxious/scared, in other words entirely within my control if I could just calm down, but when I used the vibrator I couldn’t be any more relaxed, yet I still hit those walls. So I guess I just have naturally tight muscles regardless of my emotional state? Do women without vaginismus just have naturally more relaxed muscles?

Sorry for all the questions, it’s just great to actually start understanding what’s going on and why. Anyway, I still feel saw from the vibrator 2 days later. Is that normal? I was intimate with hubby a few days prior to using it and even though he’s bigger than the vibrator, he doesn’t leave me saw for this long like the vibrator has. He was thinking it might be because it’s hard and curved at the tip while he is softer and straight. I don’t know, but to be honest I’m struggling a bit with the feeling lasting this long.

[recessivegenequeen]

Hi LonelyTears – thanks for updating us and sharing your questions! To your point about things like tampons and gyno appointments being less work, as someone who used to have severe vaginismus and has since been fully cured by the botox treatment, a lot of things DEFINITELY get easier (intercourse especially). For me there are still things that are a bit tough – for whatever reason, putting in tampons is still a struggle and I usually have to do it lying down if I want to wear one, but I’m still so many leaps and bounds ahead of where I was, and I’m pretty sure there’s women who never had vaginismus who still feel uncomfortable being touched certain ways or doing things like going to the gyno, so even if some things are still harder than others, that doesn’t mean you’re not cured. We’re all on a different journey but it’s possible to have way less discomfort than you have now!