Leb89 wrote: ↑Fri Jul 17, 2020 10:34 am
arahant wrote: ↑Thu Jul 16, 2020 3:20 pm
defmyst wrote: ↑Thu Jul 16, 2020 11:46 am
My current sexual function is the same as it was when I was on Effexor. Now at the time, while I was still taking it and was in a relationship my ability to have sex was almost non-existent. I was not able to maintain an erection during intercourse literary every single time. My erection would just drop after a few minutes. This wasn't a confidence issue not one bit. I don't think things have improved even a little bit for me since I got off Effexor. I cannot enjoy the moment if I don't have any moment to enjoy. That is why I wanted to know how bad was your erection problem before taking buspirone. Were you able to have sex before you were on it? Were things as bad as they were (still are) for me?
Before buspirone, my sexual function (erection) was the same as it was when I was on Sertraline. The erection improved just a bit when I started to use reflex/touch training for erections, which I learned during CBT with a psychologist with sex-therapy experience. Then I was able to have sex, but the sensations and pleasure, and orgasm was shit.
That is why I nocited the difference of ED induced by anxiety (adrenaline overflow and vasoconstriction) and ED induced by SSRI (loss of erogenous sensations, then no drive to be erect).
I hope it answers your question
Hey Arahant,
I really appreciate that you are still active here, despite you feel cured. Would you mind writing down a comparison of your function between now and before the Sertraline. Like ED 8/10, libido 6/10 and on ... of course only if you find the time to do that ... best regards and thanks for giving us all the infos and updates. Somehow I think you could be right, that it should be better to give every experiment more time and not to quit so early.
Hey leb89,
To be honest with you, I think putting numbers in something fucking subjective as sexual experience can be a hell of misleading.
My background is Physics, and even in a much more "exact" science, we have to be careful when dealing with scales, and accept the notion of uncertainty.
We can end in a mental trap of "quantify" everything in a scale, something that can build a lot of frustration.
I have anxious/obsessive/OCPD traits, and I know how the feeling that "things are out of order, and must be this/that way" is unbearable.
Like having the mind imagining a "ideal" score that never happened even before.
And worse, trying o put it on a scale of 1-10, as like we had a precise measurement device to quantify it.
Our mind is not as precise in remembering and quantifying stuff as we think it is.
Then my "scale" for my function is like:
Before sertraline was never "magical and perfect", during and after sertraline was shit for many years.
With buspirone was awesome after I spend the time enough to kick in and found proper dosage.
The only thing I care is that today is better than before sertraline.
Take care,
Arahant.