I’m a fairly impatient person, so when I finally took the plunge a few years back and purchased my dilators I was just keen to get it over with as soon as possible. Although my therapist had managed my expectations about it being a process, I just wanted to plough through. Who cared about connecting in the moment, about pleasure or taking it slow? Initially, I was very much going through the motions; tick, tick, tick! So, of course I was happy to have as many distractions as possible, whether that was scrolling through Instagram, mentally writing out my shopping list or texting a mate; anything to take my mind away from what was actually going on.
My therapist rightly put the brakes on this pretty quickly by reminding me that, because I had spent such a long time taking myself off mentally when having any kind of sex or being sexually intimate, I was lacking any sort of mind and body connection when it came to sex. This was particularly evident in my formative relationship which went on for several years with barely any communication about sex. This resulted in my mind shutting down or floating off and leaving the room when things got 'sexy'. Essentially, after years of repeating the same pattern over and over again, my mind and body were in very different places and I realised that what my therapist was saying was right: I had to establish this connection through dilating otherwise I'd never break the pattern and instead would continue floating away as I had always done. Having my therapist call this out made me see clearly that dilating is so much more than a ‘penetration tick box’ and I realised that I wanted – and deserved – to feel all of the things, mentally and physically.
It took a lot of perseverance to overcome this hurdle, and there were times when it was tempting to take the easier route that I had become so accustomed to and just disconnect from the moment. I’m a highly visual person with a very active mind (surely a winning combination for this?!), and this meant the phone had to be put away in the drawer – or at least far away enough so that I couldn’t reach it and mindlessly scroll through the news or people’s photos of their cute babies whilst trying to dilate. Secondly, I would always dim the lighting and, once comfortable, close my eyes (sometimes this involved wearing my sleep mask so that, even if I ‘cheated’, I literally had no visual distractions for my busy mind). Of course, by this stage the TV and radio were well and truly switched off. Next, I would really focus my thoughts on what I was doing. More helpfully, I often found, would be to actually say out loud what was happening and how it felt as this helped to focus my brain even more on the moment.
Learning to connect my mind and body was not easy, but it simply came down to the fact that I truly wanted to. Perhaps I’d have ‘conquered’ the largest dilator (aka ‘the beast’) regardless, however I do know that had I not invested time at the initial stages in establishing the mind-body connection and confronting those habits, then I probably wouldn’t ever truly experience that sexual connection going forward. And that was so important to me.
There are some things that I don't really count as a distraction, as long as they are about enhancing my pleasure (as opposed to mundane distractions!). So, sex toys and erotica are very welcome in my dilating practise!
As we always stress, we are all unique and this won’t resonate with everyone with vaginismus – not all of the tips in our series will, which just serves as a helpful reminder that it’s important to do what’s right for YOU. But, if you are reading this and you are in a similar place to where I was, then I hope that you will find this useful if you are considering using dilators to treat your vaginismus.
Over to Kate…
Re-emphasising the point that was made above, these pieces of advice are all intended to help you work out what works for you; and to show that there are so many ways in which dilating can be done. One of the barriers to starting a process like dilating is feeling that your options are limited, and that the only way to do it are ways that don't feel right for you. The thing that we are hoping to show with this is that this isn't the case, and that anecdotally finding the right way for you, is likely to be the way that brings you the most satisfaction and assistance in making the changes that you want to.
In terms of distractions generally in our sex lives, we know that one of the biggest interrupters of sexual desire and arousal is distraction. This can come in the form of a physical interrupter e.g. pain, noticing something, a noise; or a psychological distraction e.g. a thought. What distraction does is take our attention, prioritising that over what we were previously doing which, when it comes to our sex lives, can take us out of the moment and interrupt our experience. When it comes to dilating, yes, distraction may play a role in helping us to get started, by taking us away from what we are doing and refocusing our attention; and for some people this might be helpful - but if this is the case for you it may also be worth trying without distraction too. The advantage of having our focus and attention on dilating is to allow us to notice, to feel and to build awareness over what we are doing and what is working and not working for us. When it comes to dealing with vaginismus and the process of dilating, our natural instinct may be to create a separation with distraction, and that may have been what we have learnt to do. But really, my goal as a psychosexual therapist when working with people with this condition is to help them to integrate the relationship with their vagina and vulva, rather than maintaining that it should be something 'other' or something that doesn't deserve our care, attention or to be enjoyed.
What distraction might offer people is what I have often heard described as 'tricking my brain' - a way of feeling or thinking more elsewhere, essentially diverting away from dilating. But when it comes to sexual experiences, either with yourself or a partner, we want you to be able to feel. Feeling is about allowing the sensations, feeling comfortable and giving yourself permission to experience pleasure and to be in the moment. Often people describe the best sex as when they aren't thinking anything at all, and are fully 'in it' and let go; and although this may not feel possible at the start of using dilators, a part of the process is moving you towards experiences which are more like that.
So, although distraction may serve a purpose, often a helping hand for the boredom that so many people also describe with the process of dilating, what it can also do is keep your mind and your body experiencing separately. It can reinforce ideas that building a sensual and sexual relationship with yourself doesn't deserve your attention, and it can create a sense of dilating being very functional (which of course we all know at times that it can be). So, as with anything, use this blogpost to inform, to consider and to think about what works for you and what may be helpful. It may be that on some days you feel you can't be in the moment, can't focus and don't have the energy to use dilators and be distraction free, and that's also fine. For me, the things that we also want to encourage is flexibility, for you to be able to have a range of experiences, which allow you to try a range of situations and contexts and break up routines. The mind-body connection is an important part of vaginismus as a condition, and of its treatment, and distraction can be a barrier to that in some circumstances; and so if there is one thing I would want you to take away from this piece it's about noticing. Noticing your habits, noticing what works and what doesn't, noticing how you feel, noticing what you avoid and noticing your body.