There is nothing to be baffled about.
He spent the majority of his adult life under the influence of a drug. Now combine
that with the FALSE REALITY that addiction creates. Now add that almost if not
ALL of his sexual encounters were had while under the influence of his current
DOC.
Now take the drugs and the false reality away. You have a VERY MESSED UP
individual.
I know, I was one of those, as I started using alcohol at age 12 and by 16 was
probably a full blown alcoholic. Even my daughter was conceived 'under the
influence.' I had no CLUE WHATSOEVER what REAL, TRUE LOVE, REAL EMOTIONAL
INVOLVEMENT with another, or all that 'sexual intimacy' versus just 'screwing my
brains out' was all about.
So the 'IT' you see that pushes your hand away is FEAR. Fear as he has no idea,
just like I had no idea, and this will come in time, when he gets the courage to
discuss this problem with his sponsor, maybe a good buddy in the program, who
will probably both tell him to get some private counseling.
This will come around in his time, not yours. Recovery can be totally an 'over
sensor mode' experience in the first few years.
Take away the drug(s). Body detoxes. Now brain has all these sights, smells,
feelings, ideas, etc that are IN TODAY and not a FALSE REALITY and it can
literally be 'mind boggling' for many of us, and not just for months, but some-
times years, especially when it comes to something so intimate as sexual
intimacy.
Might I suggest that you tell your boyfriend, that you do not totally understand
this, but do understand how important and how much work he is putting into his
recovery and you will stop discussing this particular subject. Then .................
BACK OFF. He cannot do this right now. You are stressing him out worse and
IN ESSENCE making the problem worse in his mind.
I was 18 months sober when I married my second husband who was 1 month
shy of 3 years sober. We had actually only had physical intimacy once before
our marriage (yes, we were still both coming to grips with 'things'. We con-
sumated our marriage 5 weeks after we were married.
And we were then pretty good together learning what made each other tick.
Just my experience, but .............................. I also know of problems in
this same area with many others in recovery, some my sponsees and some
not.
Please find some Alanon for you so you can work on yourself and keep your
side of the street clean and allow your RABF to work on his side of the street.
Love and hugs,