I read a post somewhere where OP was saying how they had experienced severe bullying as a child and as they progressed with therapy as an adult, their sexual kinks (all revolving around humiliation, degradation and the like) were starting to disappear, and they no longer felt turned on by the subject as they worked through their traumas in therapy.
That got me thinking… I know it’s a defense mechanism to turn pain into an idea of pleasure, but on the surface it just seems so illogical that the mind gets programmed to seek out what has harmed it in the past. Can anyone explain to me how that works/what’s the point of it?
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A component of this phenomenon is that you are turning something which injured you into something you have active control over. You were bullied as a child, and now you are the one actively seeking out and making it happen in a controlled situation. You are now the one in charge, who can make it stop if you want it to. That can be a heady feeling and appeals to a lot of primate instincts centered on environmental safety.
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