Emotion and sex

It's well known that the emotional state of a person can determine how they feel about sex and relationships. It's something I've thought about quite regularly recently and how things in my life have affected my sexual identity

It is no secret that my childhood and teenage years were not plain sailing. my parents were passive and at times were cruel and emotionally unavailable. My sister was violent at times, though nothing i couldn't defend myself against. I was badly bullied throughout compulsory education and I self harmed to deal with the issues within my life, I've dealt with all this on a level in my everyday life however, and I feel positive for the future.

I've been wondering about how this is all relevant to my sexual identity.
I like the idea of BDSM, particularly submission and experiencing pain. It seems scary to me that something i relied on as an emotional crutch in a time i don't want to go back to would become something that turns me on so much. It's a worry that even though i like the pain element it could become just as destructive as the self injury ever was. I have not tried anything like BDSM and submission to date, so it seems as if it will be something that will probably be best explored in a stable relationship.

Trust and love are also things that can be tricky for me to get right. Because of my parents coldness to feelings and displays of affection i find it very hard to gauge how others display feelings and the levels of care that they have. If i am not careful sometimes i can trust someone that probably shouldn't have that much of an effect over me or mistake simple friendship for something more that it is. I am getting better at this with age, but there's still potential for destructive tendencies

I don't really know why I wanted to write about this, other than to try and find what is "normal" for other people, to gain another perspective, or to figure out if there's areas I may need to work on while single. I know i will never be able to forgive and forget what has happened in my past, but a major part of moving on is figuring out how it's shaped me as a person.

Hypersexuality and exams.

As any of you who read reguarly will know i have what I consider a healthy sex drive.
The only thing that I am not particuarly happy with is what happens to me when I go through times of stress or unhappyness.

When I feel stressed or unhappy I find that great relief comes from sexual release, be it sex or masturbation. It becomes a greater need than usual and I find myself preoccupied with masturbation, so much so that it becomes a distraction from everyday life and things that i should be doing to deal with the situation at hand.

It's easy to deal with though, through self imposed celibacy. I am approaching the final exams of my university career, and as expected it is a time of stress and i am constantly as horny as hell. This is the first time I've tried celibacy it has got me thinking about how my situation is quite fortunate at the moment. Celibacy isn't too hard to do while i am single, it's simply a case of self restraint, and it's only my needs that suffer. It would become so much trickier to deal with the hypersexual stage if I was in a relationship, as it would become an issue to me if my partner suffered because of my actions.

Being celibate for this time isn't proving too difficult. It's only a week or so untill my exams are over, and im finding that I am focusing much more than I usually do when undertaking university work and revision. it feels quite empowering to be free of the urges, but not something I want to do for a longer period than a week!

Posting may be a bit irregular over the next few weeks or so because of exams and moving and all the other things related to the end of a university year.