My lover and I had been together for 6 years when one day I experienced one of the most excruciating pains I had ever felt during sex.

He was a very patient lover, and for whatever reason on that particular day I impatiently decided to rush into it without giving my body time to become fully aroused and relaxed.

We used plenty of coconut oil for lubrication, but my body knew it wasn’t ready. The worst part is when I was feeling the pain, I told myself that it will shortly turn into pleasure.

As he increased his thrusting speed it became more and more painful to the point that my body completely shut down.

I had to tell him to stop, because the friction caused my entire body to cringe. I took a nap thinking by the time I woke up I would be fine.

I wasn’t fine, I was sore and I had a burning sensation at the entrance from all the friction – I had no idea how to make my vagina feel better. I tried putting ice and shea butter, but the pain was still there. 

It took three days for the burning sensation to calm and my body was completely closed off to sex and any kind of sensuality.

I punished my own body by not being patient – I also realized that it wasn’t the first time I rushed into sex without being relaxed and fully aroused.

I had no idea what I was feeling; expressing my feelings with words was very difficult.

At the time I was not yet in tune with my body, and didn’t pay much attention to obvious signs or signals. Five years later I’ve learned so much about my body and the female sexual anatomy.

When we feel pain in our bodies it’s the body’s way of signaling us that something is wrong. It’s a cue to take a step back and figure out what’s going on a deeper level.

Our body has its own intelligence mechanism and is always giving us signals, we just have to become more in tune and take the time to listen.

Aside from physical discomfort, pain during sex can also have negative psychological effects. The combination can hurt the relationship and decrease sexual desire.

According to some studies 30% of women experience pain during sex at some point during their lifetime.

There are many reasons why this can happen. Here are a few:

  1. Stress
  2. Speed
  3. Rushing
  4. Vaginal Dryness
  5. Guilt and Shame
  6. Past pain resurfacing
  7. Medical conditions like endometriosis
  8. Not knowing when you are fully aroused

After my own experiences and a few yoni massages later I came to the following conclusions. Some of our pain and memories can be unconscious which means we are rarely aware of them.

But when we slow down and bring our awareness to our genitals, old emotional pains buried deep in the past may surface. Pain or discomfort shouldn’t be avoided.

Pain gives us the opportunity to feel the tensions in our body that we need to address or heal. During the time of healing it’s important not to push your partner away, instead it’s best to take things slowly.

If you discover the pain you are experiencing is not medically related then relax, breath and allow his penis to enter and slowly transform the tension to relaxation and the pain to joy.

The release of buried emotional tension may surface into pleasure or tears.

If we keep ignoring the pain in hopes that one – day, it will go away we may end up creating hardness in the tissues of our vagina, and decreasing necessary blood flow and promoting a lack of receptivity.

During arousal our perception of both pain and pleasure is usually altered, because we become increasingly sensitive to pleasure.

At the same time our ability to perceive pain diminishes, causing varying levels of numbness.

During arousal, the fine line between pleasure and pain is constantly changing and this is both the best timing and reason for partners to communicate what they are experiencing in that moment in addition to what’s working and what’s not.

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